Eligibility
Your time is valuable, as is ours. Please DO NOT APPLY unless you fit the following criteria. Applications not meeting these requirements will be rejected without additional review:
- US-based C-Corporation (or the Canadian equivalent). LLCs with proof of having elected to be taxed as a C-Corporation or in the process of converting to a C-Corporation may apply, but will be given a lower priority.
- Deal terms must be clearly specified. Missing or inconsistent deal terms will cause your application to be rejected. If you do not have a lead investor and the terms are not set, state your proposed terms. Deal terms must include the investment vehicle: preferred equity (no common stock deals), convertible note or post-money SAFE note. If preferred equity, a pre-money valuation must be specified. For convertible notes, a pre or post-money valuation cap must be specified, along with the discount, interest rate and maturity period. For SAFEs, only POST-money SAFEs will be considered, and the cap and any discount must be specified. SAFEs that include an alternative conversion trigger in the event a Series A raise is not forthcoming within a specified time period will be considered more favorably than those without such a clause.
- Minimum Viable Product (MVP) or working prototype must exist. We do not invest at the idea, vision or concept stage, or where the primary use of funds is R&D/product development. Most of our investments are at the Seed or Bridge to Series A stage. We occasionally invest in a late Pre-Seed deal or an early/small Series A (where the raise is less than $10M and the valuation cap is less than $25M). We invest primarily in early go-to-market and commercialization, typically leading to a next-stage growth round.
- In revenue (MedTech/Life Sciences deals excepted). The amount of revenue does not need to be high and can come from non-recurring engineering and/or pilots (although initial commercial revenue is preferred). Revenue helps validate the market and product-market fit. We will use revenue as one key input to assessing your valuation cap (along with other factors such as investment to-date, patents/IP and other assets). The revenue requirement will be waived for MedTech/Life Sciences deals that have not yet received FDA approval.
- Team of at least two. We don’t invest in solo entrepreneurs – one is not a team! Non-critical roles can be contracted and/or part-time. Advisors with domain expertise and experience are also important.
- Funding timeline of at least 60 days (with exceptions for syndicated deals). Our target for due diligence is 30 days, but the front-end of our deal flow process is gated by the number of deals in our deal flow queues. It is rare that we can review, approve and fund a deal in less than 60 days. Syndicated deals where due diligence has been completed by another angel group and where an investment summary memo/deal memo is available may be “fast-tracked” (target 14-30 days).
- Round size and valuation ranges as follows: Round sizes we typically invest in are $250K to low single digit millions. Our typical investment is $150K to $750K (may be higher if other TCA VG networks join in the investment). We typically invest in deals where the valuation caps are in the range of $1M to $15M, with our sweet spot in the single digit millions up to $10M. We have invested in deals with valuation caps up to ~$25M, but it is rare.
- Markets: We are generally market agnostic, but we only rarely invest in consumer products deals. We do not directly invest in real estate deals (although we do invest in PropTech/RealtyTech).
- You have 3-5 year pro forma financial projections, which we will ask you to upload (and please include a summary table in your pitch deck).
- You should want more than our money. We invest in deals where the company can benefit from the experience, expertise and network of our members. Companies that want just funding and no further engagement with us are not our primary demographic. Where we invest a significant amount, we expect a BoD seat, preferably voting but at least as a BoD observer. In other cases, our members are often willing to serve on advisory boards or in other formal or informal advisory capacities.