AngelEd conference gives wings to angel investment for tech start-ups

THE AngelEd Conference, an initiative from startup community veterans Innovation Bay and PushStart, was staged in Sydney on November 7 to better support Australia's high tech entrepreneurial community.

AngelEd is designed to help build a greater pool of knowledgeable angel investors who will help create more international success stories, organisers said.

The inaugural AngelEd Sydney 2013 -- sponsored by Macquarie Private Wealth, Deloitte and Deutsch Miller -- will be held tomorrow (November 7) in Sydney to help investors learn the risk, benefits and hype around angel investment specifically in the fast-growing technology category.

Even though there are estimated to be about 1500 tech start-ups in Australia right now, this is an asset class which has historically been very difficult to gain access to.

Aimed at those interested in the technology sector who are ready to diversify their investment strategy and keen to find out about angel investing from experts, AngelEd features a speaker line-up including Bill Bartee, Melissa Widner and Andrey Shirben.

“It's really important for our economy, skills and productivity to expand the angel investor asset class and help future generations of tech startups to flourish like we've seen internationally. AngelEd will contribute greatly towards this,” said Southern Cross Venture Partners managing director, Bill Bartee.

With an estimated 1500 technology startups in Australia, the tech innovation community is currently seeing a frenzy of activity but its growth is being limited by the relative lack of funding options around the $100,000 to $500,000 level.

Businesses at this stage need money and support to develop sales and marketing activities, scale their product or expand internationally, Mr Bartee said.

A recent survey of 72 investors showed that one quarter committed between $100,000 and $500,000 in Australia during 2012, with the majority below $100,000.

Australia’s startup scene could add $109 billion to the economy and 540,000 new jobs over the next 20 years, if fostered properly, according to a report on The Startup Economy from Google Australia.

“For the very early stage Aussie startups, there are dozens of incubators, events and mentoring schemes, but for what we term the 'establishing and emerging' category which needs investment ranging between $100,000 and $500,000, there's a dearth of tangible financial support,” said Ian Gardiner, co-founder of Innovation Bay & AngelEd.

“In our experience, however, these companies are ready to fly as they have established their business model and processes through rigorous evaluation from the various early stage pitch processes, and they have established their monetisation strategy, they simply need angel investment to scale their operations.

"AngelEd aims to build up that pool of high calibre investors so that the whole ecosystem benefits.” Mr Gardner said.

Innovation Bay currently offers Angel Investors one of Australia’s most notable startup pitching events, as a not-for-profit networking group "bringing together extraordinary people passionate about innovation, entrepreneurship and technology".

Over the last 10 years, Innovation Bay has seen more than 300 pitches at its Angel Dinners and helped Australian tech startups raise more than $10 million in seed capital, ranging from $100,000 to $500,000 in investment size.

PushStart runs activities for early stage Australian tech startups. Combining education, mentoring from experienced tech startup people both in Australia and around the world, and seed funding, the organisation gives local tech entrepreneurs help to start, grow and succeed.

To register for AngelEd Sydney 2013: http://angeled2013.tumblr.com/Register

AngelEd can be followed on Tumblr http://angeled2013.tumblr.com

Twitter: #AngelEd

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