Are you a startup gearing up for Series A funding? Or are you a startup that tried and failed? Either way, hear the experts share their views on what could go or could have gone wrong. For insights and perspectives from Vikram Upadhyaya and Deepak Srinath – Mentors who have helped startups reach and close Series A, and beyond

1. GHV Webinar

2. Deepak Introduction
• After 9 years in Marketing and Product Management roles in Technology firms and
Startups, I founded Viedea Capital in 2007
• Viedea was angel funded by IAN (including Vikram Upadhyay) and was a pioneering
tech i-bank; our clients were entrepreneurs looking to raise Series A or B VC funding
and founders of larger tech startups looking for M&A opportunities
• We successfully advised and executed over 20 VC funding and M&A transactions
between 2007-2013
• Some transactions of note:
– Series B funding of $7 million for Delhivery, India’s leading e-commerce logistics startup from Nexus
– Series A funding of $ 2 million for Chumbak,a kitsch consumer brand from Seedfund
– Series A funding of $5 million for istream, an online video streaming startup from SAIF
– Series A funding of $2 million of Peelworks from IDG and Inventus
– Series A funding of $2 million for eTechies from Inventus
– Series A funding of $3 million for Glocal, a tech enabled healthcare delivery startup from Sequoia
• In 2013, Viedea was acquired by Allegro Capital, a large cross sector investment bank
• In 2014 I started Phantom Hands (phantomhands.in), India’s first online platform for
Antiques and Vintage Collectibles

3. Challenges in raising VC funding
Typical reasons why VC fundraising
fails

4. How did you connect with the VC?
• VC’s receive over a 1000 business plans a year.
They are hard pressed for time and have very
short attention spans…
– Cold Call?
– Introduction through an entrepreneur?
– Introduction through a well known mentor or
angel investor?
• Have you researched your VC? Did you
approach the right partner within the fund?

5. FOUNDING TEAM
• Founding team does not have relevant skills
and experience
• Strong on tech but no business experience
• Single Founder without a strong team
• Shareholding structure amongst founders
does not reflect roles and responsibilities
• The team is the single most important factor
while investing in an early stage business

6. Have you built your product or
solution?
• Is it only a concept or a basic prototype at this
stage?
• Can we see something that will convince us
that this is a great product?

7. Market and Need
• Are you addressing a real pain point or need?
• Is your potential market large?
• Is the problem you are trying to solve worth
solving?
• Are there competitors who are ahead of you or
better established? (“We have no competition”
usually rings alarm bells for the VC)
• Very important that you know your market really
well

8. Adoption
• Do you have any proof that your product or
solution is being used?
• How many users or customers do your have?
• Do you users love your product?
• What is the rate of growth?

9. Go-to-Market plan
• Have you figured out a marketing plan?
• Do you have a revenue model in place?
• What are your customers willing to pay for
your product or service?
• What are the sales cycles in your business?
• VC’s like to see some revenue traction before
investing (growth trend)

10. Do you know how much money you
need and what you will do with it?
• Clarity on how much you want to raise?
• Use of proceeds
• Timeframe to next round

11. In summary
• Each startup is unique
• No one size fits all approach when it comes to
fundraising
• Figure out your strengths and play to them
• A good accelerator program with the right
mentors can help you do this