053 – Thomas Sparico of Brand New Matter and Gillian Morris of HitList – Venture Capital in Travel

Travel Is Your Business

The state of travel, the explosion of travel technology, venture capital, and the future of the industry from the perspective of investors in the travel space…

Thomas Sparico, Founder/Managing Partner of Brand New Matter and Gillian Morris, Founder of HitList [Episode 33] join John Matson, Bess Chapman, and guest host Brandon McKenzie for a MouthMedia Network Live event recorded in front of a live audience at Experience by Knotel, an interactive space located in the heart of Noho in New York City (666 Broadway) designed to showcase the experience of working in a flexible, adaptable, always energized environment. Sponsored by Knotel – Your agile business deserves an agile space. Knotel will find, customize, and operate your ideal office while you focus on your business. Discover more at www.knotel.com

In this episode:

• The fundraising landscape in travel, how it feels like someone else is getting all the money
• A lot of investors have been burned in the travel industry
• Location matters such as NY vs. SF
• Knowing where to look, right people to talk to
• B-to-B, B-to-C , and is B-to-C is the graveyard?
• Liking people, liking business, taking data drven justifiable approach
• Developing strategic and meaningful relationships
• What Brand New Matter looks for in a company and founders
• Strategic vs. nonstrategic money
• Taking dumb money and how it affects a cap table
• Q and A

Thomas Sparico is the Founder & Managing Partner of Brand New Matter (BNM) Ventures. BNM Ventures invests in pre-seed and seed stage companies. His current investments include Leaflink, Bizly, VenueBook, Seatboost, AirportSherpa, LYNQ, Beachy and Buster. He is an advisor to several travel industry companies including Rocketrip and Curacity. Tom is a career entrepreneur, inventor, operator and investor with 22 years of experience. He was part of the founding team at priceline.com and a named inventor on over 100 patents at Walker Digital Corp. He was the founder and CEO of Internet Travel Enterprises, led the acquisition and turnaround of Hickory Travel and the turnaround and subsequent sale of ECS to Onyx Centersource.

Gillian Morris is the founder and CEO of Hitlist, named one of the 50 Best Apps of 2016 by TIME. Before entering the start-up world, Gillian worked as a consultant, journalist, and educator in Turkey, China, the Gulf states, and Syria. Her work has appeared in/on the New York Times, Harvard Business Review, Buzzfeed, CNN, CNBC, TechCrunch, The Next Web, and LifeHacker. She is a proud mentor with the School of Leadership Afghanistan and Gaza Sky Geeks and serves on the board of Data4America, a nonprofit, nonpartisan think tank dedicated to bringing data and conversations to advance the understanding of policy.

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