20 VC 052: How To Make The Leap From Seed To Series A with Ari Helgason @ Dawn Capital
The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
The Twenty Minute VC
4.4 • 637 Ratings
🗓️ 8 July 2015
⏱️ 21 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Ari Helgason is a VC at Dawn Capital in London and a former entrepreneur with operational experience in both London and New York. Prior to Dawn, Ari founded SaaS sales and workflow management system World on a Hanger and ecommerce clothing marketplace Fabricly.com. More recently, he launched ecommerce sites for fashion and luxury brands in London and New York. Ari is an alumnus of the Y Combinator startup accelerator and he regularly visits Silicon Valley where he has extensive relationships.
In Today's Episode You Will Learn:
- How Ari made his move into the VC scene?
- Why Ari decided to bootstrap his first business?
- Does Ari believe that Founders should always be fundraising?
- Should Founders take more money than they need, 'a war chest'?
- What type of goals do VCs want to see from founders?
- What do investors expect from startups at Series A?
- How can founders learn what KPI's make sense for their business?
- How can founders know when is the right time to fundraise?
- How can startup founders get their foot in the VC door?
Items Mentioned in Today's Episode:
- Predictable Revenue: Aaron Ross (Mandatory Reading for All SaaS CEO's)
- Elon Musk: How The Billionaire of SpaceX and Tesla is Shaping Our Future
- Saastr by Jason Lemkin
- AVC.com
As always you can follow Harry, Ari and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You're listening to episode 52 of the 20 minute VC with your host Harry Stebbings. And on today's |
| 0:06.5 | episode of the 20 minute VC, I'm thrilled to welcome Ari Helgeson at Dawn Capital. Ari is a former |
| 0:13.5 | entrepreneur with operational experience in London and New York. Prior to working at Dawn, |
| 0:19.2 | Ari founded SaaS, sales and workflow management system World on |
| 0:23.2 | a Hanger and e-commerce clothing marketplace Fabricly.com. |
| 0:28.6 | More recently, he launched e-commerce sites for fashion and luxury brands in London and New |
| 0:33.6 | York, and Ari is an alumnus of the Y Combinator startup accelerator. |
| 0:38.3 | But before we jump into today's interview with Ari, I would like to say a huge |
| 0:42.3 | congratulations to HiringSreen for joining one of Asia's leading tech accelerator's |
| 0:47.3 | blueprint run by Swire Properties, and we will be checking in with CEO of HiringSkreen Richard Hansen to see what life is like inside a tech accelerator. |
| 0:57.6 | But ladies and gentlemen, without further ado, here is Ari Helgeson. |
| 1:01.7 | Three, two, one, zero. |
| 1:07.2 | You have now arrived at your destination. |
| 1:10.3 | Ari, welcome to the 20 minute VC. |
| 1:12.3 | I'm so pleased to have you on the show. |
| 1:14.3 | Thanks for having me. |
| 1:15.6 | Now, can you start off with a little background on yourself |
| 1:18.3 | and how you made your move into the venture capital scene? |
| 1:22.5 | So I was born in Iceland. |
| 1:24.2 | I grew up in Denmark and the UK. |
| 1:26.3 | My brother taught me programming when I was 11, |
| 1:29.0 | and I was always quite excited about technology and playing around with computers. I started my |
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