pictured above – Lana Larder, Kevin O’Leary
‘One thing’s for sure: We should be elevating women to the CEO position because we’re getting better returns,” Kevin O’Leary said. “You don’t need another reason in business. In my case, the numbers speak for themselves.”‘
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/kevin-olearys-female-ceos-make-all-the-money-2015-5#ixzz3apzqYJrw
If you own a company, and you are in the startup phase, the easiest way may be to learn from those that have reached $32 billion + status?
What are the patterns and traits found in $32 billion + companies like Twitter, Uber, Pinterest and Instagram?
http://shareonsite.blogspot.ca/2014/09/how-instagram-started-story-of-instagram.html
What did they look like as startups?
Even, more important, may be why did they get funded when they were startups?
http://www.adweek.com/socialtimes/how-popular-is-pinterest-around-the-world-infographic/93477
Thanks to Shasta Ventures for the study on $32 billion dollar plus companies to uncover patterns revealing common traits including:
Patterns of $32 billion+companies, Twitter, Uber, Pinterest & Instagram
‘1) Easy to dismiss ideas.
2) Competitive markets.
3) Reinventing existing customer experience.
4) Untested founders.
5) Zero monetization’
According to Shasta Ventures, the key takeaway is ‘that there are large companies to be built by offering new, innovative and superior customer experiences to large markets, regardless of how competitive the sector already is or how successful the founders have been before.’
Who is BFF with who in the VC world? CB insights tells us who. VC’s & investors overlap #investors #relationships
Continue reading “Who is BFF with who in the VC world? CB insights tells us who…”
Increasingly Upbeat Canada M&A Up 40.4 % Year-on-Year, 2014; C$245.7 billion
Reasons to be bullish Canada M&A 2015
Internationally, there seems to be a search to scale with other markets in North America seeing increased M&A. Key deals reveal size is becoming important. Once the norm was between $5 billion and $10 billion, with the norm moving closer to $10 billion driven by the desire to reach scale.
Exit Strategy #Exit #M&A #IPO 
Merger & Acquisition (M&A). This usually means merging with a similar company, or being bought by a larger company. This is a win-win situation when bordering companies have complementary skills, and can save resources by combining. For bigger companies, it’s a more efficient and a quicker way to grow their revenue than to create new products.
The Merger & Acquisition strategy is the most likely option for companies.
Name potential companies (any unique relationships with them?)
Name types / categories of companies that could acquire you?
Why would they acquire you, how do you fit into their strategy?
Why don’t they try and build it themselves?
Initial Public Offering (IPO). This used to be the preferred mode, and the quick way to riches. They are flashy, and they get all the press. Some say they make the lottery look good by comparison. Many public companies weren’t even founded by entrepreneurs, but rather were spun out from existing companies.
If you’re funded by professional investors with a track record of taking companies public, you might be able to do it.
What is involved in an IPO?
You start by spending millions just preparing for the road show (dog and pony show) where you convince investors your stock should be worth as much as possible. Unlike an acquisition, where you craft a good fit with a single suitor, and approach hundreds of analysts.
Pros
Your VCs will finally stop bugging you as they frantically try to insure their shares will retain value even when the lockout period expires.
Cons
Only a very few number of small businesses actually have this option available to them since there are very few IPOs completed annually.
You need financial and accounting rigor from day one far above what many entrepreneurs generally put in place. Some forms of corporations will require a reorganization before they can be taken public.
You’ll spend your time selling the company, not running it. Investment bankers take a percent off the top, and transaction costs for an IPO can run in the millions.When your lockout restrictions expire, your stock may be worth very little.
But, with money to grow the business from the infusion of cash derived from the sale of stock, the company may grow its business without having to borrow from traditional sources, and it will thus avoid paying the interest required to service debts. 
The cash spent on growth initiatives can result in a better bottom line. New capital may be spent on marketing and advertising, hiring more experienced personnel who require lucrative compensation packages, research and development of new products and/or services, renovation of physical plants, new construction and dozens of other programs to expand the business and improve profitability.
Sell to a friendly individual. This is not an M&A, since it is not combining two entities into one. Yet it’s a great way to “cash out” so you can pay investors, pay yourself, take some time off, and get ready to have some fun all over again. The ideal buyer is someone who has more skills and interest on the operational side of the business, and can scale it.
Will your company generate excess cash flow that could make it attractive to financial buyers to generate a return?
Is Nova Scotia pushing towards an innovation-driven system? Signs are emerging, encouragement to seek international markets, more sandboxes for entrepreneurs, and the new $50 million dollar fund for small to medium sized businesses in Nova Scotia and more diversity!
There are world famous eco systems for startups like China. The central government predicts the surge of money to support private entrepreneurs will generate new growth. The government’s investment in young companies is part of a larger push to reduce the country’s reliance on fixed-asset investment and develop an innovation-driven economy.
In 2013, according to Fortune Magazine, venture capitalist invested $33bn in US – more than 4 times the amount invested in entire European Union. Then, there’s Silicon Valley, $8.67bn in 2013 compared with just $1.44bn in Europe. Creating, and nurturing entrepreneurs through eco systems for startups in Nova Scotia helps push to innovation driven systems.
Then, there is diversity. There are numerous reports, and research that identify enhanced innovation and creativity as benefits that flow from a more diverse workforce. Diverse employees, entrepreneurs, leaders bring fresh perspectives and different types of views. Many countries support diversity and innovation – resulting in well managed diverse teams – that are more productive, creative and more effective than teams that are alike.
In Canada, there are reports of a wealth of skilled and talented people not engaged in the workforce from the immigrant workforce, Canadian born visible minorities, youth, mature workers, persons with disabilities and Aboriginal Peoples. Engaging diversity in Canada’s labour force and recruiting immigration are solutions for recruitment challenges and skills shortages.
Where the Nova Scotia Economy Is Moving the Fastest:
Innovation, Diversity, & Domination
It seems like OneNS is right on the money giving entrepreneurs and others opportunities to innovate and diversity.
The 9 areas of support for startups, and diversity in Nova Scotia are the following:
Year 2015 marks many changes in Nova Scotia. Innovate, Dominate & be Diverse #NovaScotia
The oneNS Coalition builds on the earlier oneNS Commission.
Canadian RI (responsible investments) assets pass impressive $1 trillion. Internationally, 92 percent of high net worth individuals want to drive social impact investing, according to the World Wealth report, 2014.
Who is driving social impact investing internationally?
First generation wealth creators (high net worth individuals) look to give back when managing their wealth and want to achieve more than money in return.
Under 40 report driving social good
Internationally, 75 % of high net worth individuals, those under 40 report driving social impact is either extremely important or very important. The tendency declines about 10 percent with each age segment reaching lower percentages, arriving at 45.4% for those 60 and older.
How this impacts investing in 2015?
Impact investments and products are being demanded by investors and consumers internationally.
Top 5 countries driving social impact
India 90.5%
China 89.4
Indonesia 89.2%
Hong Kong 82.1%
Malaysia 81.1 %
Canadian reports support impact investment assets:
$4.13 billion
9.5 percent growth since 2012
87 % of impact investors who target competitive returns either met or outperformed expectations 2013.
Canadian investors and investment managers have numerous RI strategies. Four strategies stand above the rest:
Empathy trend emerging
Large brand strategists identify empathy as one of the four macro trends emerging. Reports state this is because of social networking, and the fact that people can connect with each other, across communities and across the world.
UK testing empathy
Empathy can be tested. Since The Wolf of Wall Street era, times have changed, along with marketing and these days, empathy, understanding, and sensitivity are almost demanded for your business success.
Top One of one hundred
In the UK, 100 of the best known companies were tested for empathy based on three components: customer, employees, and social media. The UK based Linkedin topped number one for empathy.
Empathy embedded in organization
There’s really nothing soft about empathy, and some say it should be embedded into the entire organization.
Empathy trend in Canada
Empathy is catching on in 2015. It’s a good thing – investing and creating more businesses, and companies with empathy.
Video games report a $60 billion industry worldwide.
Markets predict video game companies, and investors will make money on empathy-building games. There are two reasons for this. Parents want them, and they align with the identified market trend towards greater empathy.
$1.7 billion Canadian Video Games industry
With over 90% of kids and teenagers gamers in Canada, there is a trend to help children embrace differences, challenges, and work through things, and be kind. Parents and video game makers continue to request video games with empathy.
Can video games make you a better person?
Minority Media thinks so. Located in Montreal, in Canada is Vader Cabellero, Minority’s creative director who left the big corporate world to make games that are non violent and have “meaningful impacts on people’s lives” – to make players feel something other than aggression. These are called empathy games.
Example of empathy – recognizing and acting on consumer’s emotions
An example of empathy is Dove soap’s self acceptance campaign. Dove tapped into customer’s desires to express positive emotions to others and themselves.
Is empathy key to social media success?
Some say it is, as social media puts the power in the hands of the audience, not the speaker.
Nurturing empathy
First, it seems hard-wired lab rats will sometimes free a trapped companion before munching on a food treat. So, sometimes, there’s no rhyme or reason to nurturing empathy.
The University of California at Berkeley, Dacher Keltner, says having people think about suffering activates the vagus nerve that is linked to compassion. He also says that uplifting stories about sacrifice boost empathy. Prayer, meditation, and yoga are known to boost empathy. He also says going out into nature appears to encourage compassion.
Professor Pinker, in his book, “Better Angels of Our Nature,” explores if affordable fiction and journalism that began in the 18th century helped to expand empathy way back then?
Did affordable fiction and journalism make it easier for people to imagine themselves in the shoes of others? And therefore expand empathy?
The phrase, “the better angels of our nature” stem from US President Lincoln, 1st inaugural address. Pinker in his book uses the phrase as a metaphor for four human motivations that, he writes, can “orient us away from violence and towards cooperation and altruism.”
The four motivations (four better angels) namely:
1. Empathy – gets us to feel pain of others, and align their interests with our own.
2. Self control – anticipate consequences of acting on impulses, and inhibit them as needed.
3. The “moral sense,” and,
4. reason allows us to remove ourselves from our limited, narrow minded vantage points.
Since the 1900s, did affordable books and news help to expand empathy?
Did this give people a chance to see what it felt like to be in somebody elses’s shoes?
Maybe affordable books and news helped to expand empathy in the 18th century. In 2015, it seems empathy is catching on with social media and marketing trends demanding empathy.
So, good bye to The Wolf of Wall Street that had little time to worry about other’s needs, and little empathy. The business world is changing because of the nature of empathy marketing, and investors and customers demanding impact and social investing in their investment portfolios internationally.
87 % of impact investors who target competitive returns, either met or outperformed expectations; 2013.
There are many reasons why people are investing in socially conscious businesses. It may be they want to give back somehow. It may be because we are in a low interest rate era.
It may be because Toms, the footwear company that gives a pair of shoes to a child in need for every pair they sell is valued at $625 million and is a socially conscious business as reported;
Social stock exchanges are being founded.
But, always, the question begs who is driving this?
The new generation is almost insisting on some social investments in their portfolios, and if advisors have nothing to offer, a big client or a young heir may leave the firm, according to David Brooks in how to leave a mark. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/27/opinion/david-brooks-how-to-leave-a-mark.html?_r=0
Even Merrill Lynch is into impact investing stating that young associates are eager to work to create an impact fund!
Investing in socially conscious businesses!
Results report shifting an office environment from all male or all female office to an office of equal amount of females and males may help your bottom line and increase productivity up to 41 percent!
Basically, what does this really mean?
This has been compared to a baseball team made up of only catchers….well they could share experiences, equipment, tips and so on, but would they perform well on the field?
So, having more workplace diversity might help with your bottom line. ^ 41 %
Original article:
http://newsoffice.mit.edu/2014/workplace-diversity-can-help-bottom-line-1007
Investing no longer depends on white-male stereotype reports 30 under 30 VC’s
Investing is not longer depending upon a white-male stereotype even though several Silicon Valley icons still make the list. This year’s 30 under 30 list of VC’s reveal 8 female investors out of 30, along with investors from India and Taiwan, Venezuela and Ukraine.
8 Female Investors out of 30 VC’s
Alex Banayan (Alsop Louie Partners) and Stephanie Weiner (Bain Capital Ventures) both started investing in their teens. Stephanie is a founding member of Dorm Room Fund. Alex is writing a book about his career advising Lady Gaga to the Department of Education.
Female investor First Round Capital’s Cee Cee Cheng, (27 years old) Director of Dorm Room Fund started as a peer-to-peer investing platform that’s backed 60 student startups.
Then there is the most powerful investor in Silicon Valley – he’s 29 years old and the president of Y Combinator that gets 10,000 submission each year. He’s Sam Altman, and his startup, Loopt, sold for $43.4 million!
Ilya Golubivich, is 29 and a managing partner of I2BF Global Ventures that backs companies launching satellites and mining for precious minerals on asteroids.
Blaze Byers is 29 and a general partner at Google Ventures. Chetan Puttagunta is 28, and rose from associate to partner at NEA in just three years.
There is also Nitesh Banta, 28, and Peter Boyce II,at 24 years old that both joined the list for founding Rough Draft Ventures, providing funding up to $25,000 to dozens of student entrepreneurs.
Young investors, more female investors, and immigrant investors represent the changing face of technology and investing!
Read more at:
http://www.forbes.com/30under30/#/venture-capital
I am proud to know and have met Linda Smilestone a couple years ago when she first designed her Keffit. She loved large, Middle Eastern-styled, square-shaped scarves worn everywhere in the world. She also loved a special friend and made them in pink to help raise funds for breast cancer research.
Linda Smilestone is an entrepreneur that gives back and she’s from Halifax, Nova Scotia! Linda worked many years to get her product to market. I knew she had a great product and tried to help guide her to many agencies and institutes for business assistance and funding. I was amazed my her talent and personality and relentless passion!
She is a designer and entrepreneur that just would not give up! She worked at a hospital in the evening, and tirelessly worked on her true love – her product development during the day. I am proud of her and recognize all the hurtles she had to overcome to get her product to market!
Her first product – beribboned, pink scarves scarf – designed with love giving back to breast research To Give Pink A Chance! A true giving entrepreneur!
Her scarves are sold in six stores in Halifax, Bedford and Parrsboro, and Sundays at the Alderney Landing Farmers’ Market in Dartmouth.
Linda’s scarves are also available online https://www.etsy.com/shop/keffit
Halifax finance news 