Archive for October 2016

By David Verrill, Managing Director of Hub Investment Group 

Many angels have noticed the unique capabilities of entrepreneurs from outside the US to build great companies. Now, finally, so has the American federal government (noting that our colleague Canadians have been all over this for some time).  The Department of Homeland Security released rules that would allow more foreign born entrepreneurs to stay in the US longer to grow their companies.  One of the main requirements is for angels or VCs to invest in their companies.  The rules will become final after a review of comments to the first public draft. 

The following is part of our periodic ACA Blog series highlighting ACA member expertise and insights on resources for angels.  The topics will vary and include ways ACA angels are making best use of their time – and often ACA benefits – to make smart investment decisions.  This tip is how Women’s Capital Connection engages their members in educational discussions based on ACA webinars. Thank you Aviva Ajmera for sharing! 

We look forward to more member tips for angels.  When you have a resource to share with angels please contact Sarah Dickey, ACA Membership Director to learn more. 

By: Aviva Ajmera, Women’s Capital Connection

I used to take the ACA webinar emails for granted—just another email in my inbox— but what I found is they could help us learn. As Vice Chair of the Executive Committee one of my responsibilities is group education. Although every member in our group is a subject matter expert in something, we aren’t all experts in every aspect of angel investing. We have members that are veteran investors and we have investors new to angel investing,  ACA Webinars have been a great addition to our group development. 

By: Cheryl Isen, Media Relations for Angel Capital Association

Assurex Health is one of three companies that won the Luis Villalobos Award for innovation that also had an exit within one month in 2016.  Details on each of the exits are included in three blog posts on October 10.

  • Company: Assurex Health founded 2006; won Luis Villalobos Award in 2012

Assurex Health is a personalized medicine company dedicated to helping healthcare providers get the genetic information they need to determine the right medication for individual patients suffering from neuropsychiatric and other medical conditions. Assurex Health’s proprietary technology is based on pharmacogenomics— the study of the genetic factors that influence an individual’s response to drug treatments—as well as evidence-based medicine and clinical pharmacology. The “GeneSight” test was developed in the Assurex Health clinical laboratory and is based on patented technology licensed from two world renowned medical centers, Mayo Clinic and Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, which continue to be research collaborators.

By Cheryl Isen, Media Relations for Angel Capital Association

EyeVerify is one of three companies that won the Luis Villalobos Award for innovation that also had an exit within one month in 2016.  Details on each of the exits are included in three blog posts on October 10.

Eyeprint ID, created by EyeVerify, transforms an ordinary selfie into a key that protects your digital life. One look opens mobile devices, logs you into apps and secures your mobile payments. The patented, software-only biometric solution is 99.99% accurate and extremely scalable. In less than one second, with no add-on hardware, employees and customers can experience password-free mobility. Several large Android device manufacturers and a growing number of notable financial institutions have deployed “Eyeprint ID,” delivering convenient, secure, private authentication to millions of consumers today.

By: Cheryl Isen, Media Relations for Angel Capital Association

Retrosense Therapeutics is one of three companies that won the Luis Villalobos Award for innovation that also had an exit within one month in 2016.  Details on each of the exits are included in three blog posts on October 10.

RetroSense is developing life-enhancing gene therapies designed to restore vision in patients suffering from blindness due to retinitis pigmentosa and advanced dry age-related macular degeneration. There are currently no FDA-approved drugs to improve or restore vision in patients with these retinal degenerative conditions. The company's approach to using optogenetics in vision restoration is based on pioneering, proprietary research conducted at Wayne State University and Massachusetts General Hospital. RetroSense has worldwide exclusive rights to the relevant intellectual property from both institutions. 

By: Solomon Brenner, member of Keiretsu Forum Mid-Atlantic and Managing Director at Startup2angel

This post originally appeared on Startup2angel.

They all sounded good. All of them. I entered the world of angel investing 18 months ago and came to the immediate conclusion that every company seemed like a good idea. It’s like when I first started training in karate and thought every punch would result in a knockout. Surely, every opportunity wasn’t going to be the instant knockout investment success. Considering I couldn’t – and obviously shouldn’t – invest in all of them, I started looking for places with tips that I could use to help analyze each option.

Subscribe