NACO Academy Podcast leverages the collective wisdom of 4,200 angel investors that have invested $1.12 billion into 1500 companies. Join us on a journey into the depths of the innovation economy and bring you the knowledge you need to build, grow and scale at the intersection of innovation, capital and entrepreneurship. Learn more about the National Angel Capital Organization (NACO) at www.nacocanada.com
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Why Canada needs a post-pandemic prosperity strategy
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Benjamin Bergen is Executive Director of the Council of Canadian Innovators, a national business council led by the CEOs of Canada’s fastest growing technology firms. It’s easy to be a pessimist these days. We have now been slogging through the turmoil, strain and heartache of a global pandemic for more than a year — long enough to grind anybody do…
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Season 2 is packed with actionable content and intimate conversations. For pure concentrated knowledge on mobilizing capital and scaling the next massive global success story, we will be interweaving content from a Practical Guide to Angel Investing and you will hear from over 100 prominent thought leaders at the intersection of entrepreneurship, c…
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Absolutely Critical to Preserve Diversity of Tech Sector: Laura McGee, CEO and Founder of Diversio
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“We crunched data a few weeks ago and the risk that the pandemic poses — in terms of erasing the gains that Canada has made on supporting diverse entrepreneurs — is significant and undeniable. The proportion of women-led business in a ‘do-nothing scenario’ will drop from 17% to 12%. Businesses everywhere are struggling and failing. According to our…
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Small Business is 98% of Our Economy: Frances McRae, Assistant Deputy Minister of Small Business and Marketplace Services Innovation, Science and Economic Development
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“You’ve heard the government say they are not afraid of adjusting the measures that have rolled out. Getting money out there as quickly as possible was important, but there would be adjustments. I think that’s what you’ve seen the government do the last number of weeks — they’re not afraid of saying they need to tweak, add more programs, expand eli…
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Government Should Leverage Angel Investors: Michael King, Finance Professor at the Gustavson School of Business, University of Victoria
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“To get to the punchline, the government should set up a co-investment fund that matches angel investments dollar for dollar. It should adopt a national tax incentive scheme that already exists in British Columbia, Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia. And it should consider replacing the loans that are being made available through its support packages wit…
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Government Funding to Survive the Crisis: Opening Remarks by Claudio Rojas, CEO at NACO
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The combined impact of the health pandemic and economic crisis hit hard and fast. This resulted in initial government relief taking what was described as a “people first” approach, with an emphasis on employees at risk of layoffs, and trying to minimize the impact on individuals. –– All of this was focused on helping to flatten the curve. And the c…
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Innovating at the Speed of the Crisis: Opening remarks by Claudio Rojas
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Innovating at the speed of the crisis is a concept that speaks to the importance of angel investing in early-stage start-ups and scale-ups, as well as the government’s decisive response to supporting the ecosystem. “We’ve already seen our government lead the way innovating at the speed of the crisis with unprecedented collaboration to catalyze and …
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Massive Tech Companies Grow From a Robust Pipeline of Start-ups: Janet Bannister, Managing Partner at Real Ventures
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“I use the analogy that you can’t grow a tree without planting a seed. And similarly, there’s no way you can build massive tech companies in Canada without supporting a robust pipeline of young, promising start-ups. Fostering of these early-stage tech companies must be done in Canada by Canadians.” “We need to keep investing in seed and pre-seed ec…
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Canada's Moment to Shine: Dr. Kamran Khan, CEO and Founder at BlueDot
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“History is unfolding right before our eyes. I don’t think it’s hyperbole to say that this pandemic is maybe one of the most important and significant events in human history. We’ve never had a moment where the entire planet has been crippled by a tiny little virus in the way that COVID-19 has impacted us,” said Dr. Kamran Khan, the founder and CEO…
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Canadian Entrepreneurs and Angel Investors Must Lead the Way: Ali Ehsassi, Parliamentary Secretary to The Honourable Navdeep Bains, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry
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“Over the past few months, we’ve been working hand in hand with companies as they retool and rapidly scale up to produce critical equipment such as masks, face shields, ventilators, medical gowns and test kits. This is an excellent opportunity for Canadian innovators. As many of you may have heard, Minister Bains likes to say this often and loudly—…
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Ecosystem in Crisis: InterGen CEO Sandi Gilbert, The OMX Founder Nicole Verkindt, and The DMZ Executive Director Abdullah Snobar
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Sandi Gilbert, CEO at InterGen and Board Chair at NACO moderated a discussion with Abdullah Snobar, Executive Director at The DMZ and Nicole Verkindt, Founder at The OMX on their leadership journeys and insights on sustaining a business in crisis mode. Originally Recorded on April 30, 2020. Click here to join future roundtables.…
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Unleashing the Full Potential of Our Ecosystem with Cathy Bennett and Shelley Kuipers
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“About 51 percent of our population are women, and we get four percent of venture-capital funding. Quite frankly, that’s an awful lot of capital to leave, and a lot of people out of the competitive ecosystem underutilized.” “We really need also to remember that when you think about women as a whole, there’s significant underrepresentation of women …
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Activating Diversity: Nicole LeBlanc on Atlantic Women's Venture Fund
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“A lot of people understand diversity is important, but they actually don’t know how to translate that into action and really don’t understand how to bring more diverse perspectives, whether it’s female board members or female executives or female staff,” said Nicole Leblanc, the Toronto-based Director of Investments at Sidewalk Labs. Originally Re…
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Founding a Movement: Rhiannon Davies, Co-Founder of the Atlantic Women's Venture Fund
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Prior to the COVID-19 crisis, we had the opportunity to speak with three founders of the Atlantic Women's Venture Fund at the NACO Summit in Halifax. Their words still ring true in the current environment. More so, perhaps. Originally Recorded in September 2019. Sign-up to our newsletter for an invitation to future events.…
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Cathy Bennett on Unleashing a New Wave of Wealth
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This untapped segment of the population signifies incredible opportunity for investors and innovators. Increasing access to capital remains a persistent impediment to growing world-class companies. “This generation of women is going to inherit or have earned the most amount of wealth that women in Canada have ever had before,” says Cathy Bennett, e…
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Activating Capital for All Entrepreneurs: Claudio Rojas, CEO and Amanda Filipe Director at NACO
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NACO’s fifth weekly collaborative roundtable on Thursday April 30th focused on activating capital for the next wave of great founders. In partnership with The51 and Atlantic Women’s Venture Fund, NACO welcomed an impressive panel of industry insiders and experts well-versed in the intense need to support enterprises led by women and to remove barri…
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TV Host and Author Amber Mac on the State of the Ecosystem at NACO Roundtable
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I would argue that over the past couple of decades, there has been an overemphasis in the startup world on growth for the sake of growth. Employees hired, companies acquired. There have been startups that I’ve interviewed that can barely explain what they do, and leaders who have been praised for a lack of a moral compass. Today, I believe that we …
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In Conversation with Rachel Bendayan, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Small Business, Export Promotion and Internatio
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Rachel Bendayan, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Small Business, Export Promotion and International Trade, in a conversation with leading entrepreneurs, Bobbie Racette, Founder & CEO at Virtual Gurus; Dr Franziska Broell, CEO at Motryx; Stephany Lapierre, CEO at tealbook; and Jennifer Wagner, President at CarbonCure Technologies. "I thin…
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COVID-19 Has Changed Health Care and There Is No Going Back: Dr. Benjamin Fine, Physician and Co-Founder at HaloHealth
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“Everyone knows that post-COVID-19 — the next two years — are not going to look like a month ago. It’s not a switch you can just turn back on. We have glimmers of what that’s going to look like for anyone who’s been to Loblaws or any grocery store, and the question is healthcare providers need help from startups to think about what does the ‘X’ ser…
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Introductory Remarks at Roundtable on Innovations in Health Care
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We all know the idiom credited to philosopher Plato: “Necessity is the mother of invention.” It means, of course, that new ways of doing things are often created or discovered when there’s a real, intense need for them. And as we navigate this COVID-19 pandemic together, it’s fair to say this adage rings true louder today than in recent history — e…
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State of the Innovation Economy by Douglas Soltys, Editor-in-Chief at BetaKit
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“The main takeaways… are the difficulties people are having in projecting a way out of this and building a plan, and the difficulties in taking care of teams right now, as we are locked in self-isolation in trying circumstances.” — Douglas Soltys, Editor-in-Chief at BetaKit Originally Recorded on April 23, 2020. Click here to join future roundtable…
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Working Together Will Make Our Ecosystem Stronger: Victoria Lennox, Founder at Startup Canada
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“Cultivating that strong grassroots ecosystem from the ground up is so important right now… there are a lot of opportunities here to make a stronger ecosystem and it will take us all working together.” — Victoria Lennox, Founder of Startup Canada Originally Recorded on April 23, 2020. Click here to join future roundtables.…
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Super Angels Launch New Fund: Benton Leong, General Partner at ArchAngel Network of Funds
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“We have really bright minds working on how to solve various aspects of this pandemic… we want to make sure these folks are able to bring their solutions to market sooner rather than later. We’re changing the way we work. We’re deploying funds in a matter of weeks rather than months.” — Benton Leong, General Partner at ArchAngel Network of Funds Or…
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Claudia Krywiak, President & CEO at Ontario Centres of Excellence
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"This week’s respected roster of speakers spoke about how we can all do our part — the way we can lean in, support the emergence of new med-tech initiatives and help these small and medium-sized enterprises get their innovations and technologies to market sooner. “It is in precisely these times, as we navigate unchartered waters, that new solutions…
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Bold Government Procurement Policies Will Lead the Recovery: Angela Mondou, CEO of TechNation
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“We have billions of dollars across Canada right now earmarked for technology, so doesn’t it make sense that the government becomes the biggest customer as we face this economic slowdown for our tech scale-ups and SMEs? “I believe tech procurement is the biggest lever that the government has as an economic stimulus. They definitely need to take som…
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Necessity is the Mother of Invention: Dr. Sohail Ghandi, President at Ontario Medical Assocation
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“What’s changed significantly is how I practice medicine — the delivery of virtual care to patients has increased dramatically. It’s taught me it is possible to do phone and video visits with patients you know quite well. We now need to increase the level of virtual care we provide that we were forced into by this pandemic. I think there will be st…
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The Horse is Out of the Barn on Virtual Health Care: Dr. Darren Larsen, Chief Medical Officer at OntarioMD
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“The horse is out of the barn on virtual care. Once the horse is out of the barn it can never really be corralled, and I think this is going to become part of our permanent care-delivery landscape.” “The world changed almost overnight when we consider how COVID-19 took on our practices. We were looking at near zero virtual care use in primary care …
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The Honourable Minister Mélanie Joly in Conversation with Angel Investors, Entrepreneurs, and Innovation Leaders
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Earlier this week, an article that appeared in the Toronto Star stated that “The Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy program should be broadened to include high growth firms, software-as-a-service firms, firms whose revenues are seasonal or project-based and pre-revenue firms that are heavily invested in research and development.” With economic confidenc…
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Special Remarks at Roundtable on Sustaining the Innovation Ecosystem: Claudio Rojas - NACO, David Skok - The Logic, Anthony Lacavera - Globalive
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Welcome everyone to our Roundtable on Sustaining the Innovation Ecosystem. Today’s agenda includes Opening Comments by David Skok, CEO & Editor-in-Chief at The Logic, Special Remarks by Anthony Lacavera, Founder and Chairman of Globalive. And an important conversation with The Honourable Mélanie Joly, Minister of Economic Development and Official L…
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Insights on Entrepreneurial Activity by Communitech CEO Iain Klugman, OneEleven Executive Director Siri Agrell
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Replay of Part 2 of the NACO Roundtable on Incubators, Accelerators, and Entrepreneurial Activity "The biggest issue companies are facing is liquidity and cashflow. And that cashflow can come in the form of a bridge and then deal with our burn to get to that raise."Iain Klugman, President & CEO at Communitech "Everyone is saying we need to find a w…
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Insights by Ryerson University's John MacRitchie, Platform Calgary CEO Terry Rock, Spark Centre CEO Sherry Colbourne
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Replay of Part 3 of the NACO Roundtable on Incubators, Accelerators, and Entrepreneurial Activity "The bigger concern we're really seeing is founders that are pre-revenue or at that very early stage of development. They're the ones that are, are at this point, falling through the gap" John MacRitchie, Assistant Vice-President, Zone Learning and Str…
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Insights by Accelerate Okanagan CEO Brea Lake, Jordan Dutchak at co.labs, and Emilie Boutros at Tandem Launch
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Replay of Part 3 of the NACO Roundtable on Incubators, Accelerators, and Entrepreneurial Activity "The good part about the BDC program for matching funds is that it might help to speed up the process knowing that the BDC will be able to match some of those funds. But a challenge in the early stage in Canada is to find leads" Emilie Boutros, General…
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Roundtable on Entrepreneurial Activity: Special Remarks by John Ruffolo, Vice Chair at the Council of Canadian Innovators
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Replay of Part 1 of the NACO Roundtable on Incubators, Accelerators, and Entrepreneurial Activity "The Council of Canadian Innovators has determined that the wage subsidy is probably going to help maybe about 25% of their businesses... but the businesses that are being left out right now are all pre-revenue companies" John Ruffolo, Vice Chair at Co…
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Atlantic Canada, Northern Ontario, and Beyond: Roundtable on Angel Activity
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Replay of Part 4 the NACO Roundtable on Canadian Angel Activity In relation to how do we keep investment moving and in Atlantic Canada… the most crucial things we need to be looking at are… matching funds from government… and investor tax credit –Stefanie Corbett, Director of Operations at Island Capital Partners We have had successful applications…
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International Insights: Roundtable on Canadian Angel Activity
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Replay of the NACO Roundtable on Canadian Angel Activity We have the privilege of bringing international insights from Jacopo Losso, Director Secretariat at the European Business Angels Network (EBAN), and Pat Gouhin, CEO at the U.S. Angel Capital Association. Both Jacopo and Pat lead the equivalent organizations of NACO in their respective jurisdi…
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Angel Activity from a Regional Perspective: Roundtable on Angel Activity
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Replay of the NACO Roundtable on Canadian Angel Activity We have Ginette Mailhot, Chair at Anges Québec, a prominent angel group and member of NACO that does extraordinary work in unlocking capital in the Province of Québec. Also, joining is Derrick Hunter, President and CEO at Bluesky Equities based in Calgary, Alberta. Derrick was recognized this…
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Roundtable on Angel Activity: Senator Colin Deacon and Professor Thomas Hellmann, Oxford University
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Replay of the NACO Roundtable on Canadian Angel Activity Good morning everyone. Welcome to today's Roundtable on Canadian Angel Activity. I'm Claudio Rojas, CEO of NACO and I will be your host for today's discussion. Thank you all for making the time to join us. Entrepreneurs are under severe pressure. COVID-19 has unleashed a combined health pande…
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What is the role of angel investing in the economy? If there is no capital, there is no company. It's as simple as that. Without investment capital, there would be no new companies and no new jobs. Our economy would be in zero growth mode. This is based on a quote from Carl Furtado from the Golden Triangle Angel Network. Small to medium size enterp…
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Billionaire Mindset – Sale of iStockphoto to Getty Images: Patrick Lor, Managing Partner at Panache Ventures
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Lessons learned from Patrick Lor, Co-Founder of iStockphoto and Managing Partner at Panache Ventures based in Calgary, Alberta. "I don't know if there's anything secret about this. But, we grew iStockphoto off the side of our desks and eventually iStock became such a success that we sold it for $50 million U.S. A few years later, they were doing ab…
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How do you value a company? How many companies do you need in your portfolio? The general suggestion among Canadian angels is 20 companies. Dr. Wade Brooks estimates that you need 40 companies to have a 95% chance of getting the average internal rate of return of 27%. A portfolio of 20 companies would give you a 60 to 70% chance of hitting the aver…
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Portfolio Diversification and Calculating Return
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Angel investors bring more than capital. The knowledge that you have, your experience, what you've done in your professional life is exceptionally important for helping the next generation of entrepreneurs achieve success. High potential entrepreneurs in Canada do not need to exit. They do not need to sell their companies in order for the investors…
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Angel Capital in Alberta: Senator Doug Black
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We are here with Senator Doug Black, Chair of the Senate Banking, Finance, and Trade Committee. The innovation ecosystem in Alberta has a tremendous potential. We see an opportunity to transition the risk capital, that has historically been in more traditional industries, to the high growth industries that can contribute so much to the economy. Fro…
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What will you do with the next 20+ years of your life? For most angels, the answer is: "I want to contribute to the good of my community" "I want to continue to do what I love." "I want to be involved in strategy, important deals and major decisions." "I want to lend my expertise." The value of angel groups is that they essentially help mitigate yo…
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This podcast is for informational purposes only and is based on the book "A Practical Guide to Angel Investing, 2nd Edition" authored by Steven Gedeon PhD and published by the National Angel Capital Organization. Content discussed is for general guidance on matters of interest and should not be taken as professional, legal, business or investment a…
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Welcome to the World of Angel Investing - Trailer
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Built by Angels is a new podcast series that will guide you on the road to venture capital scale and growth. Interested in funding the next big thing? Are you an entrepreneur searching for capital, to fund and scale your company? Are you on the sidelines, wondering how to jump in, while everyone else is building, backing, and supporting the next ge…
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