Resources

By: Ethel Rubin, PhD, Entrepreneur-in-Residence, NIH Office of the Director Office of Extramural Research

Looking for a deal in your backyard? The NIH is the world's largest investor in early stage life sciences companies. Over 1000 companies annually tap into NIH’s SBIR and STTR program for nondilutive funding to the tune of $980M in FY17. Did you know the NIH maintains RePORTER, an online database, of all funded companies and projects? This link will take you to what's been funded this fiscal year, but you can query the database yourself to look for companies specific to your interests. There are over 25 different ways to search and visualize the data with built in analytics (click on the Data & Visualize to create graphs and more you can export directly to PowerPoint and Excel).

By: Marianne Hudson, ACA Executive Director

This post originally appeared on Forbes.com

On my mission to get smarter and smarter about angel investing, I think it’s important to read as much as I can from leading investors and experts in entrepreneurship.  There were some really great articles last year that made a difference to my own investing and thinking about trends and policies.  Here are 25 top articles that caught my attention in 2016.  I think they’re worth another read, or a first read in case you missed them.

By: Ham Lord, Managing Director of Launchpad Venture Group and Co-Founder of Seraf-investor.com

This post originally appeared on Seraf-investor.com

The handyman’s toolbox… whether you use it for small home improvement projects or just minor repairs, no home is complete without a few essential tools. At Seraf, we feel the same way when it comes to investing in early stage companies. You need a good set of tools to do the job right.

Sometimes the task at hand is overseeing due diligence on a potential investment. Other times, you need to advise a CEO on how to run a great board meeting. Or maybe you need some guidance on where to look for key data in the investment documents you receive from company counsel. Whatever the task is, we want you to have the right tools to get the job done, so we’ve collected a great set of early stage company checklists and templates for everyone to use as a reference. Bookmark it, link to it, share it and keep your eye on it - we’ll add additional handy tools every so often.

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: Marianne Hudson, ACA Executive Director

Yesterday I took a call from an accelerator managing partner who wanted to educate some of his investors on how to get started in angel investing.  As I put together a list of resources for him, it occurred to me that lots of angel investors and others are interested in this information, so let me share my list here!

This is also a chance to mention that the Angel Capital Association is now starting our new monthly “Best Practice” Webinar series aimed at providing education on the key things new investors need to know:  having a portfolio strategy to begin with, valuation, due diligence, term sheets, sourcing deals, etc.  If you like these, you can also download the decks from the main webinar page.  This program is in partnership with The Rising Tide Fund, Kauffman Foundation, Go Beyond Investing, Portfolia and Next Wave Ventures.  We’ll have more information about this exciting program soon.

Subscribe

ACA On the Road by Angel Capital Association  on  March 11
ACA Announces Keynote Speaker for Summit: Kwame Anku by Angel Capital Association  on  March 08