Representatives of five high-tech startup companies, three with roots in Marin, were given 15 minutes each Tuesday night to make their pitch for investment capital to members of Bay Angels, a Sausalito-based group of angel investors.
This high-tech version of "American Idol" returned to the Spinnaker Restaurant in Sausalito, where Bay Angels held its meetings during its previous incarnation, from 1998 to 2001. Bay Angels re-launched this week, thanks to the efforts of Roger King of Mill Valley, the organization's original founder. King is founder and chief executive of Chief People, a Sausalito-based high-tech recruiting company.
King said the primary reason he chose to revive Bay Angels now is "the market is right."
"Valuations are reasonable," King said.
Gone but not forgotten are the hyperbolic days of the dot-com bubble, when companies such as Pets.com could demand multi-million-dollar valuations based largely on their URLs, King said, referring to the Uniform Resource Locators that serve as the addresses of web pages on the Internet.
"Now companies are coming to us, and they're beyond the launch stage. They actually have revenues," King said.
Angel investors are typically affluent individuals who supply startups with capital until the companies are successful enough to attract the attention of venture capitalists, who typically manage the pooled money of others. King said the investors
who attend Bay Angels meetings, usually by invitation, share research on companies but don't pool their money.AdvertisementKing said the companies that Bay Angels invites to make presentations will not be charged for the privilege. He said some angel groups charge fledgling companies as much as $6,000 to make a single pitch.
"We would rather make money alongside the early stage companies rather than take money from them," King said.
King said Bay Angels complements the executive search work he does with Chief People.
"These companies need two things: funding and people," King said. "We've always provided them with people. I thought if we could also supply them with funding, it's good for everybody."
Jamie Pardi of Novato, the founder of Gaga Sports & Entertainment, one of the five companies that delivered pitches Tuesday night, said he is looking for angel funding to tide his company over until it gets its first round of venture financing.
Gaga Sports helps professional sports teams use the Internet to collect demographic data on their fans and employ the information to boost ticket sales and product sponsorships. Gaga Sports' clients include the San Francisco 49ers, Los Angeles Lakers, Utah Jazz and Houston Dynamo.
Pardi built his company with $500,000 in previous funding from angel investors. Pardi said, unlike the founders of many other companies, he never sought investments from friends or family.
"I went into this thinking I never wanted to change Thanksgiving," Pardi said. "Because if things went really well all they'd want to talk about at Thanksgiving is how well they're doing, and if things went bad — it doesn't make good conversation when you're watching the Cowboys game."
Pardi said telling his company's story to investors in 10 minutes, followed by five minutes of questions, was no problem for him.
"I've done it before in one or two minutes," Pardi said. "It really helps me to get my story concise and to the point."
Pardi faced some stiff competition Tuesday night. One of the other five presenters was Nolan Bushnell, the founder of both Atari Inc., maker of the seminal video game Pong, and the Chuck E. Cheese's Pizza-Time Theaters chain. Bushnell is seeking funding for Waba, a social network and mobile game platform company.
Two other companies whose founders live in Marin — Hopscout and PhoneTell — also made presentations Tuesday night. Hopscout is an online store for children's products that features daily sales. PhoneTell provides a search engine that can be embedded in cellphones and other mobile devices. The search engine uses Global Positioning System technology to find companies near the user that can immediately supply the product or service they need.
The fifth company that presented Tuesday night was Global Mojo, a San Francisco-based company that makes a free web browser available to the public. Companies pay Global Mojo to have their products and services listed at the top of searches. Global Majo shares half of its profits with nonprofits, charities and schools selected by the browser users.
King said Bay Angels will be "geographically agnostic" looking at promising companies no matter where they're located. But he said it should, nevertheless, benefit the local economy.
The Marin Economic Forum, a public-private partnership created to foster local economic growth, has identified companies engaged in multimedia/digital arts, engineering and business software, environmental technology and biotechnology as the core technologies vital to Marin County's economic future.
Robert Eyler, the forum's interim chief executive, said, "We wholeheartedly welcome the return of the Bay Angels and applaud its focus on enhancing Marin's economic vitality."
Contact Richard Halstead via email at rhalstead@marinij.com
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