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Newsletter ➢ ᴀFKAғ•2019#03

15/2/2019


	15 February 2019 #03

We had some pitches but then the champions decided that they're not are quite ready. Fair enough, that means no February pitch night. Let's just do BYO drinks, normal time (18:30) but different place (Rudi's).

So far we have 24 votes from our 34 Voting Angels in. 23 say YES to FormusLabs which leaps the minimum hurdle of 18. This means FKAngels have voted on the DD Report and will invest $85k as a group which then clears the way for discretionary co-investment from individual angels. Debra and Ju will now go on to nut out the legals. Debra will manage the commitments.

MIG Angels sent one hell of a sharp knife in Joe Harper and are first on the list to syndicate with FKAngels. BTW MIG is also the first NZ angel group after FKA to not charge a commission to startups. As usual, we will share the full DD Report via our Co-investment Call to all investing readers.

David has self-selected his angelic moniker with his very personal endorsement of FormusLabs. «Like it – am something of an expert in knees and hips as all 4 have been “done” to some degree! (the bionic man). So – although it is no doubt speculative – I have a vested interest for this to work!»

Angel investors are not just about making spectacular returns, often they just want to see great stuff happen.

Steffen Schaefer now lives closer to Munich's Hofbrauhaus than most. He got a taste of FKA a few months before he left NZ. But that didn't stop him to work in with several DD Teams. He would like to formally join as a Flying Kiwi and has talked to Phil, Rudi and Uli. All feel there is a mutually good fit.

Okay, yet another German but seriously, if you know of any reasons why Steffen should not join now is the time to speak up. Please raise your concerns in confidence with our FKA Directors.

Hi Rudi, We would love to invite you and the FKA crew to our 6th birthday party on the 22nd of February Friday at our office. Please RSVP by 20 February to alyssa@kamiapp.com Best, Alliv ☞ details

After Kami's successful raise at the end of last year, this should be one party not to miss!

Ever wondered what the inner workings of the AANZ look like? The above shot was taken this week when Rudi attended two days of AANZ council meetings in Auckland. He was promptly given the hot potato of commissions. Thankfully, a potato that has cooled a little as increased syndication with funds and VCs has been highlighting the mismatch of charging practices. Funds and VCs charge fees to their investors and don't like subsidising angel groups that charge their fees to startups post-investment.

Rudi's announcement of his new role has generated a lively debate on LinkedIn that is for the most part supportive of AANZ's recommended policy shift. See for yourself and feel free to join the debate.

☞ Fee Freedom Fighter

If you want to see rapid AR/VR game development on the Magic Leap platform come and see the graduation projects of a one week course that is finishing today. Weta Workshop is working closely with Magic Leap which is valued at over US$4.5 billion. Mel from Geo AR Games says she is both drained and excited after this week. Today, 16:00 at The University of Auckland, pls register here.

One of John Houston's 100 angelic aphorisms.

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Newsletter ➢ ᴀFKAғ•2019#02

8/2/2019

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	8 February 2019 #02

BoardPro is helping Kiwi company Boards go pro. Co-founders Brett and Kim are gaining traction and invite FKA portfolio companies to use BoardPro at a very special FKA rate. They also want to help FKAngels who work on other Boards.

☞ Just drop Brett an email at Brett@PoardProHub.com.

Garth is the fan among FKAngels with the wisest hair colour and he is using it at FileInvite and has introduced it to our FKA Board meetings.

Okay, we may sometimes talk a lot of sabrages or have wine related images but this is funny. «looking out for aspiring wine experts and wine lovers, we came across your page:www.fka.nz and it seems like you also cover wine-related topics. [...] if you're interested in collaborating with us and using our article on your site as an additional resource?»

Debra and team (Colin, Garth, James McGeorge [KPMG], Joe Harper [MIG], Owen Woodhouse [NZVIF], Todd Brackley, Pip Gilbert, Will Hewitt) have last night submitted their FormusLabs DD report to the investment vote of FKA's 34 Voting Angels. The team is very positive, more next week. ☞ See here the original pitch video.

Ralf and team (Alan, Steffen Schaefer, Steve C, and Steven M,) found much to like about Kademi but decided that the new business model needs more time to be proven and have stopped DD.

Uli and team (Allen Fan [Zino], Cornelius, Jesper, Molly [NZVIF], Steffen Schaefer, Victor Tsai [Zino]) had a good look at Geo AR Games. They could not verify the pipeline in China that would underpin the proposed business model. Geo AR Games has consequently recalibrated its China focus and DD was stopped.

A big thank you to all the above for getting stuck in with the DD work!

Ralf, a German was leading a colourful and geographically dispersed team: Pom Alan and Kiwi Stephen ex London, Kiwi Steve ex Auckland, German Steffen ex Munich.
Uli, yet another German was leading a team consisting of Chinese, German, Danish and Kiwi nationals from FKA ranks and our partners.
Steffen was common to both teams but is not the reason why both came to a halt.
Steffen is close on the heels of our multi-DD-doer Phil but should be ready to finally brave the Veto Gate into FKAngeldom.
Geo AR Team had an FKAngel in the founder team but that is no guarantee for a positive DD outcome.

We kicked off with ADI this week, on Monday in Wellington, on Tuesday in Whangarei and on Thursday in Auckland where we had a strong contingent of angelic mentors as the above picture attests.

Among other things, we had one startup in the Esports arena looking for advice on how to spend the remainder of their $900k ICO. Another one had an uncanny resemblance by name and looks to this internet troll of 2013.

Maybe ICOs and blockchain are a way to print money? See for yourselves and come along to the demo day of the Centrality Accelerator, Wed, 27 Feb, 17:30. Register via this FKA invite.

Preview the brief intros of the startups and be intrigued by the Japanese hit music video that is part of this playlist. Erick is a mentor and can tell you more about it.

Our sponsors can and will help us help Kiwi startups in many ways. For example, last week when Rudi was desperately looking for a venue for the AGM of Asleworx and Paul McPadden not only helped with a perfect room but also made time to welcome shareholders.

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Newsletter ➢ ᴀFKAғ•2019#01

25/1/2019

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	25 January 2019 #01

Next to progressing FormusLabs DD, Debra still finds time to crunch the stats of the NZ eco-system and talk about it to NBR's Calida Stuart-Menteath. GO DEBRA! What a start to 2019.

The full article and video are behind NBR's paywall. However, you can register for a free digital subscription that gives access to two articles per week. Debra should be one of them!!! ☞ video + article

Unlike Debra, not everyone loves what they do. This video raises questions about Theresa May's job satisfaction. Our CCH has turned it promptly into an FKA promo piece.

We have first bookings for Wellington, Whangarei, Takapuna and Hamilton. The first Thursday in Auckland has been fully booked for weeks. ☞ ADI.Clinc

Our CCH has upgraded the reporting from the FKA Nominees register. More robust, easier round management for investor reps, visibility of Voting Funds, full transaction list, not just end of period balance, some graphics for visualisation, personal vs total portfolio benchmark, also as PDF not just as Google sheet. ☞ here a sample

NZVIF Update: 2018 was another big year for New Zealand in terms of investment with total annual investment likely to get close to or potentially exceed $100m, which is a staggering rate of growth in just over 10 years, which saw $30m invested in 2007.

NZVIF through the SCIF Programme invested a total of $7.1m across 37 companies in 2018, with an average investment size of $200k. Investments included PriceTech, Nyriad, FaceMe, AskNicely, Montoux, Wing Acoustics and Upside Biotechnologies, with successful exits in 2018 including Engender Technologies and Swiped On. Also, SCIF invested in its 200th company. The investments were alongside angel partner investments of $17.45 million.

Of NZVIF’s 282 portfolio companies (SCIF and VIF ), over 40% have emerged from Crown Research Institutes and universities, or incubators and accelerators.

Note: Of course we all hope not to raise too many zombies with our seed investments.

Somewhat in contrast to Debra's findings above...

NZTE in partnership with First New Zealand Capital (FNZC) and Spark, is excited to announce the InvestHER Showcase. Please save Wednesday 6th of March in your calendars as this will be an event featuring the best and brightest start-ups led by inspiring female founders.

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Newsletter ➢ ᴀFKAғ•2018#45

21/12/2018

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	21 December 2018 #45

FKA's back-office is still operating in the last week before Xmas. Thank you to all FKAngels and co-investors for delivering funds and docs in good time so that FKA Nominees Limited can close those two rounds.

We always call for more engagement from our startups. Kami founders Hengjie and Alliv took this literally and got engaged.

Best wishes from all of us at FKA

However, that engagement did not get in the way of continued customer engagement with now well over five million users, nor did it get in the way of closing a US$1M round just before Xmas. One for your stockings.

Kami press in NZBusiness «A revolution in the classroom». Thanks to David Russell in San Francisco, our Investor Rep for Kami.

At the close of the year, it feels great to close the Moxion round at just over NZ$1.9M. With that, have a great Xmas and summer break, all our founders, angels and partners.

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FKAngel Chris can really fly, has more wing power than most. His business Auckland Seaplanes transports tourists and flightless birds. He has just expanded his business and is now also flying from Waiheke. Also, he is our Investor Rep for StretchSense.

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Newsletter ➢ ᴀFKAғ•2018#44

14/12/2018

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	14 December 2018 #44

Tuesday 18 December 2018, 18:30 at The Flagship

All partners, founders and Angels, get your $66 ticket ☞ here . Numbers are limited for this boutique venue. Be there, it will be a great night!

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At the end of 2018, this is FKA's 16x85 portfolio matrix. Ian has backed all 16 startups, closely followed by Chris, Heath, Josh and Rudi who are backing 15. FileInvite has the most nominee investors with 44, then Wherewolf 40, Moxion 39, the average is 27 investors per startup.

At the end of 2018, we have clocked up 1175 ADI sessions since we started this initiative in 2013. A proud result! Not all founders like what we tell them but most of them appreciate our frank advice and helpful connections. Sadly, we are seeing only modest participation from other angel groups.

This is about helping #KIWIstartups, not hogging deal flow!

Welcome aboard, Graeme! He has cleared the FKA Veto Gate without incident and that makes the last mug shot to be added to our list of Active Angels fka.nz/angels for this year, a nice round number of 50!

Tinsel the tree, the bra or moxion to Tinseltown? Just in time for the silly season that is so much about gifting, we bring you Debra's musings of last year, still just as relevant in 2018.

«My husband has never bought me a bra… »

Reading about Peter's deed has inspired our CCH. Rudi will put an investment voucher into the stockings of his kids for them to invest alongside any FKA investment in 2019. This should add extra fire to the already lively dinner table conversations about startups.

Technically all will be done under Rudi's normal investment vehicle.

Agtech is one form of hitech in NZ. Peter Wren-Hilton, Dean Tilyard and Vic Crone dig this sector and report from their trip to the Agtech Nexus Europe conference in Dublin.

Hot and sticky! Our Hot Lime Labs co-investor Brent Ogilvie aka Pacific Channel is, like all angel investors, looking for stickiness in every business. With Engender he has taken that into a different direction with great success. Read all about it!

Steph lives in Dunedin but prefers to hang with the Wellington Angels. Some say she is a Taniwha, others say she is an Angel. Like a Taniwha, she hijacked a recent FKA LinkedIn post to unashamedly promote a startup all about safety, particularly around forklift trucks.

Funny how investor and founder can look alike... ☞ LinkedIn

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Newsletter ➢ ᴀFKAғ•2019#03

15 February 2019 #03

Newsletter ➢ ᴀFKAғ•2019#02

8 February 2019 #02

Newsletter ➢ ᴀFKAғ•2019#01

25 January 2019 #01

Somewhat in contrast to Debra's findings above...

Newsletter ➢ ᴀFKAғ•2018#45

21 December 2018 #45

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Newsletter ➢ ᴀFKAғ•2018#44

14 December 2018 #44

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