Jason Ash

Glen Mella has been an advocate of RevRoad from the beginning, for which we are grateful! You'll see why. Entrepreneurship runs deep in his veins and he is really good at it! In this episode he gives entrepreneurs tremendous advice about the importance of product market fit and finding the right co-founders. This is an episode you don't want to miss! Happy Holidays! 🎄 🎁 #founder #investor #CRO #tech

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Jessie Healy and I talked last week on #EcommerceImpact about some do's & don'ts for early stage brands who are seeking additional capital for their business. The age old question of - how to raise money :) We're both here in #NewZealand helping entrepreneurs and brands get the best help they need to grow their marketing & operations. Thank you so much for having me, Jessie! https://lnkd.in/gQsTnPsv

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"I have a very controversial view of consumer testing ..." 👀 Episode 16 of Now We Build by Forward Pursuit is now live! This week I was joined by Andy Shovel, founder at THIS™. In the episode we covered: 👉🏽 How Andy and his team started from zero when developing a totally new meat alternative. 👉🏽 Why brand is everything when it comes to winning consumer loyalty. 👉🏽 The mistakes that most consumer product founders make ... and how to avoid them. The episode is now live and you’ll find the links in the comments below 👇🏽 Proudly supported by Carta, Google Cloud, Fuelled Group | B Corp™ and Seven Legal. #founders #startup #business #growth

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It has been hard to keep quiet about this one... Today, though, I can announce that SuperSeed has led a £3.5m Seed round into Cerve. F&B is a tricky space. It is fragmented, its technology stack is outdated (and, impossibly, more fragmented even than the market), and margins are slim. It is a tough place to disrupt, ripe though it may be for disruption. Many aspects of this job are truly wonderful. Almost every moment of my typical day is spent exposed to unfathomably smart individuals, not least in my own team! Occasionally, someone stands out, even in such a crowd. Meeting Dan Mazig🎗️, it took approximately a nanosecond to establish that we were in the presence of true genius. Dan is not just an intelligent, multifaceted founder; he is an obsessive, diligent builder with maniacal attention to detail. All this is to say that having initially been very cynical about the space Cerve wanted to attack and disrupt, exposure to Dan quickly allayed concerns. As we dug deeper, we realised how elegant the solution he had built really was. Producers, distributors, wholesalers, and all the other participants that make up the F&B supply chain need not pick up the phone, submit an order form via Excel, lose 1,000 punnets of strawberries in an email, or integrate with 90s ERPs any more: Cerve serves as a seamless, real-time data exchange. Dan Mazig🎗️is a wonderful and thoughtful founder, and supporting him is a brilliant commercial leader, David Walker. Together, they have understood the complex web of the F&B supply chain well enough to tackle it, head-on, with the maturity of a startup much longer in the tooth than Cerve. It has been a pleasure assembling a consortium of well-informed, value-additive co-investors in this deal. Elin Torstensson from Zenith Ventures, Antony Yousefian from The First Thirty, and Evi Steyer from Ponderosa Ventures: thanks so much for your contributions to the journey already. I'm champing at the bit to keep working with and for Cerve to deliver on its enormous promise. Finally, I want to make sure Jamie Giles is celebrated for the immense shift he put in to get this deal in good shape! Thank you, J, for the hours and passion you invested: you drove this deal incredibly well, and I hope my dotting some Is and crossing some Ts in no way overshadows your impressive work here. Well done, and thank you. Here's to a bright new future for the F&B industry: bring on the paradigm shift! https://lnkd.in/egr4div2

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#Manchester based past SkilledUp Life tech startup customer Cytix raises £1.6 million Seed investment from Manchester based Praetura Ventures founded by David Foreman. Michael Rees well done. Limited Partner (LP) in this case is Northern Powerhouse Fund II operated by British Business Bank British Business Bank North of England Delyth Lloyd Edwards. Simon Cunnington SkilledUp Life helped Thomas Ballin and the team during the earliest stages of the tech startup when they were self-funded and bootstrapping. I also had the pleasure to mingle with Ben Armstrong at Techcelerate when they were just starting up and trying to build the first version of the product. Both Ben and Thomas stood up as a strong pair of co-founders. They came from the same industry, worked for the same boss and knew the market inside out. They knew how to innovate the market and slice a portion of the market for themselves. They also had a superb unfair advantage in addition to above. The pair was perfect to start a tech product company. Let me explain why. When you talk about building tech startups, especially at the very earliest stages, you need to two people: - Some one who can code and build - Thomas Ballin - Some one who can sell - Ben Armstrong Having been in the tech startup world for 20 years, I rarely see this ideal combination. I knew they would go places. And they had. A massive congratulations from me to Thomas, Ben and the team. My only regret was I could not convince them to join Techcelerate. 😁 Here's the story https://lnkd.in/ec7VzXp2 covered by Deal Lite. Here's the story about Pre-Seed round https://lnkd.in/eR4UQ9fi I look forward to reading the story about Series A investment not too long in the near future. Congrats all. A good day for #Manchester! 🥂 Oh, by the way, we have a ton of #cybersecurity volunteers on https://skilledup.life Here is a bunch of Manchester tech startups who are leveraging SkilledUp Life as they self-fund and bootstrap their businesses in the early stage. These companies are cash-efficient and understand how hard the journey is: - Dustid run by Michael Livingstone - Orakly run by Craig A. Taylor - also a Techcelerate member - mutuals run by eddy D. SkilledUp Life de-risked Cytix over 20 months period. SkilledUp Life is here to give a leg up to tech startups in early years. #Cytix #Cybersecurity #Manchester #TechManchester #SkilledUpLife

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Taavet Hinrikus and I made the Financial Times Due Diligence email. https://lnkd.in/ez2AuGQx One 'unintended consequence' is that if there is a 45% tax on carry and CGT (raising £40m per year, remember) it for all intents and purposes closes the door on new VCs in the UK. Especially started by teams from non-traditional backgrounds. To meet the GP commit, you need to be already part of the 'wealthy' as you cannot rely on the value you create - nearly half of it will disappear - to fund it. We have both had extremely successful startups which are few and far between. The smaller number of new VCs will therefore more likely increasingly be for people who have inherited the capital or can draw it from their already rich family. Probably not want they have in mind with this policy.

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TLDR: EIS should be scrapped as a fund structure but retained for Angel investments by individuals. Alex Chalmers has done all the work which in 10 years I've never got around to doing: why 95% of EIS/VCT funds are bad for our tech ecosystem, rip #startups off, and why as a Founder you should push back against their stupid fees or not take their money. https://lnkd.in/dnq9ZScS

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Healthy founders = healthy startups, and there is a lot investors can do to support, eg: - providing access to third-party resources and peer support - raising conversations about financial pressure - offering structured support for leadership development Read more from our latest survey and set of initiatives 👇

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Sales processes Of products and services Of businesses Planning ahead Here’s a thought👇🏼 The wheels of profitable commerce depend on sales, so it’s always a bit strange that in the UK that sales people are still somehow under rated. We talk of technical founders and non technical founders, we talk about operations teams, we talk about fund raising, we rightly focus on client segmentation, and we should be talking about client needs. And so the list goes on. But rarely about the art and skills of selling. We talk about it obliquely when we talk of product market fit and go to market strategies. Because guess who makes those cogs go round? Sales teams do. Who provides the feedback mechanism? Sales people do. Marketeers design the messages and claim the strategy, they build the plans and write the content, they pick the channels, they quantify and qualify the feedback. All good and vital. Investopedia tells us that “Marketing refers to the activities a company undertakes to promote the buying or selling of its products or services. Marketing includes advertising and allows businesses to sell products and services to consumers, other businesses, and organizations.” However sales is the main event that makes this business happen. So many cost lines and sales teams are the revenue line. The content conversations on here talk about fund raising and then celebrate exits. I’ve rarely seen content about sales processes and an even rarer sight is talking about selling businesses. The latter is going to be part of the cycle unless you are focussed on building an evergreen family business. It’s definitely going to be part of the cycle if you have taken in external capital because that’s how they will crystallise their profit . It makes me think we all better have a plan for that leg of the journey so that it’s not full of surprises. Let’s hope more people start writing about it and then it’ll start being discussed openly. #ThinkLikeAClient #GrumpyOptimism #TechStartUps #VentureStudios #Innovations Footnote: all my content is written daily by me with no additives or tricks. If it interests you please tag the 🔔 in my profile to get it delivered straight to you. Otherwise if you search #GrumpyOptimism and #GrumpyOptimist you’ll find my library of past posts. Never recycled, always fresh.

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80Noir Ultra Makes Headlines: Transforming Banking Wellness with Dark Chocolate Beyond thrilled to see 80Noir Ultra featured in the London News! Our mission to combat burnout and transform banking wellness with the power of luxurious dark chocolate is clearly resonating. Our upcoming research partnership with top universities is making waves, and we can't wait to share more. If you're interested in learning how we're using immersive experiences and scientifically-backed solutions to boost focus, productivity, and well-being among banking professionals, comment "YES!" below. I'll send you all the details. Like and share with your network, especially those in the banking world who could use a break from the stress. Let's spread the word and create a healthier, happier future for this industry together! https://lnkd.in/dPtdNxkj #80NoirUltra #BankingWellness #DarkChocolate #Wellness #BurnoutPrevention #ResearchPartnership #LuxuryChocolate #ImmersiveExperiences #Focus #Productivity #MentalHealthMatters #WorkplaceWellness #FinancialWellness #TransformingBanking

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This month marks my 10 year anniversary in Venture, and what a ten years it has been 🎉 🤩 First stop: JamJar Investments Rewind 10 years and you’ll find me sitting at my desk at JamJar, operating under the alias of “Bread”, working my way through an inbox full of 1000 cold inbound pitch decks, reviewing and replying to every single one. Highlights included a hand drawn picture of a new ketchup sachet design with “target market: Nandos” written below it, and a concept for a drink that tasted like the leftover milk at the bottom of a cereal bowl. But there were also some diamonds in the rough, and it was here that I got my first experience of that lightbulb moment when you meet an exceptional founder that you want to back, making my first investment a few months in. JamJar was the best training ground I could have hoped for, and I'm so grateful to Katie Marrache and Adam Balon, Richard Reed & Jonathan Wright for welcoming me into the team. Second stop: Venrex In 2015, I joined Mark & Tom at Venrex alongside Pooja Patel. We clicked as a team immediately, and over the ensuing years launched 7 new funds, grew the portfolio to 180+ companies, built a brilliant team, moved from a small attic in West London to panoramic views in Fitzrovia, and had a lot of fun along the way. As well as the buzz of discovering new founders to back, I also discovered my love for supporting founders post-investment. With 11 board roles and a further 16 portfolio companies to support, the ex-strategy consultant in me had just enough to get my teeth into. Venrex’s people-centric and pragmatic approach to investing chimed with my own instincts about the type of investor I wanted to be. They gave me the most incredible platform to grow as an investor and roll up my sleeves with all of the operational sides of running a venture fund. To the entire Venrex team, new and old, thank you for an amazing chapter. Third stop: Circle & Co In June, I left Venrex to launch my own Venture fund, Circle & Co, which is on track for its first close next month. It's by total chance that this milestone falls on my 10th anniversary in venture, but what an incredible way to kick off the next decade. More details on the fund to follow, but for the moment I want to thank the amazing network of friends, fellow VCs, founders, LPs and family who have got me this far. You are the original Circle, and have been the inspiration & driving force behind this next step. Let's make it a good one.

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Two of my favourite things. VC performance and the Ryder Cup 🇪🇺 IRR as a standalone metric should be taken with a pinch of salt. Here its definitely more relevant on the left hand side than the right. 🤯 BUT. Europe has better ‘performance’ in the last two decades, yet the US seed price premium of 90% is at its highest in ten years. The faces of IPO and M&A activity are strongest in the US, but European Seed seems a great entry point right now. #VC #venturecapital

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