I was thrilled to have a powerhouse early stage check investor from a powerhouse VC join me. In Summer 2021 Gemma joined Creandum as an investment principal. Creandum is a pan European early-stage VC fund, having invested in companies like Spotify, Trade Republic and Depop. Gemma covers the London market and is focused on both B2C and B2B technology businesses. Gemma was the Chief Operating Officer at Elder Technologies, a Series B health tech startup for the past 3 and a half years, where she h...
May 12, 2022•21 min•Season 5Ep. 7
Saasha is the daughter of Iowa hippy entrepreneurs who was raised with a deep appreciation for the planet and its scarce resources. After completing her MBA at Stanford School of Business, where she met her OLIO co-founder Tessa Cook. Saasha spent 13 years in various strategy and business development roles - at the likes McKinsey and Vice President of International Partnerships, American Express. When on maternity leave in 2012 she opened her first business in London, which she outfitted entirel...
May 05, 2022•20 min•Season 5Ep. 6
Maya is a multi-cultural & multi-lingual Google and American Express marketing, product & partnerships professional with 15+ years of experience in tech & D2C industries. Currently, as the Founder of a strategic growth consultancy - MarketingCube.co - her clients include portfolio companies of Balderton, Notion, Creandum, LocalGlobe amongst others. Maya has also joined advisory boards and is an active Angel investor. As a ‘full stack’ CMO Maya is able to support with: Identifying &am...
Apr 28, 2022•23 min•Season 5Ep. 5
This episode we chat with Pietro Invernizzi. Pietro is an investor at Stride, a London-based VC firm investing first checks at the pre-seed and seed stage alongside investing superstars such as Fred Destin, Cleo Sham and Gabbi Cahane. Before joining Stride, Pietro entered the investment world 5 years ago at The Family, a world-famous accelerator, where he spent most of his time helping founders raise money from top angel investors and VCs. He has also made over 20 personal angel investments too....
Apr 21, 2022•23 min•Season 5Ep. 4
This episode we speak to Matt Smith, a professional footballer for the last 11 years for clubs such as Leeds, Fulham, QPR and Millwall, scoring over 100 goals. Matt, who has a business degree is also very interested in the angel investing world, investing in over 10 startups to date, including the likes of Velocity Black and Honest Mobile. Episode Links: Supported by trumpet Matt's Twitter Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....
Apr 19, 2022•19 min•Season 5Ep. 3
In Episode 2 we are joined by Nikhil Shah. Nikhil is a creative, technology and social impact entrepreneur, passionate about supporting mission-driven founders on their entrepreneurial journeys. He is the founder of Mixcloud, the world's leading streaming platform for the DJ & radio community, with over 20 million listeners and 4 hours of content uploaded every minute. He now has a portfolio of startup advisory roles, social impact and creative projects. He is an angel investor with a portfo...
Apr 14, 2022•22 min•Season 5Ep. 2
In episode 1 we are joined by Deepali Nangia; Deepali is a seasoned, high profile, angel investor with over a decade of experience in private equity, investment banking and corporate operational roles. She is now a Partner at one of the world's most prestigious VCs, Speedinvest. Deepali also co-founded Alma Angels in 2019, an angel community on a mission to level the playing field for female entrepreneurs seeking early-stage startup funding. Episode Links: Sponsored by trumpet Deepali's Linkedin...
Apr 12, 2022•16 min•Season 5Ep. 1
Nick has taken a far too long hiatus but is back for Series 5! Here he reveals a new format for Series 5 which will give listeners a tonne of bite-sized, useful takeaways from leading angel investors and early-stage VCs. The plan for this series is to pump out a lot more content but in smaller chunks; 15-20 minutes per episode. Series 5 sponsored by trumpet - https://www.sendtrumpet.com/ Horseplay Ventures - https://horseplay.ventures/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....
Jan 25, 2022•1 min
I was joined by the inspirational Andrew Wilkinson, founder of Tiny ; he started product and branding agency Meta Lab in 2006 and was responsible for some of our most-loved and used companies such as Slack, UberEats, Coinbase, Pinterest and Headspace, to name a few. He then used MetaLab's profits to purchase other companies that have solid revenues, are designed well, have a great culture, and are profitable, which he knew he could rocket ship. Tiny now owns circa 30 companies, the likes of desi...
Jul 14, 2021•52 min•Season 3Ep. 8
I was joined by Gemma Bloemen; Gemma was the Chief Operating Officer at Elder Technologies, a Series B health tech startup for the past 3.5 years, where she helped the company scale from 20 to 120 people and raise a series B in 2019. She has been an angel investor for the past two years and is very interested in Healthtech, Marketplaces, Agetech, Silver economy and Sustainability. 80% of her investments have been in female founders. Previously, Gemma was a senior manager at Uber in the UK where ...
Jul 07, 2021•48 min•Season 3Ep. 7
Please Note: The brand name has changed since recording from Captain Compare to GoCaptain I'm joined by Chris Smith, Managing Partner at Playfair Capital. He focuses his investing activities on seed (and pre-seed) deals in the UK and Israel. Chris is particularly interested in autonomous transportation, business and industrial automation, HealthTech and B2B SaaS. He loves finding companies operating in unloved/overlooked sectors that are ripe for disruption. Prior to joining Playfair, Chris held...
Jun 30, 2021•43 min•Season 3Ep. 6
I'm joined by Timothy Armoo, who is the CEO/Founder of Fanbytes and recently named in the Forbes 30 Under 30 list for his achievements in Media and Marketing; making the front cover no less! Timo has also been voted the Huffington Post Entrepreneur of the Year and most “Influential person in advertising” from the Evening Standard. Fanbytes is recognised as the leading GenZ marketing agency with over 60 employees and working with the likes of the Government, on some corona campaigns, Deliveroo, M...
Jun 23, 2021•50 min•Season 3Ep. 5
I was thrilled to be joined by guest investor, Alex Dunsdon. Alex was previously head of central strategy and business development director for M&C Saatchi. He was also co-founder of thebakery.com from Dec 2012 to Jan 2020, which enables corporates to drive meaningful innovation, as well as creating partnerships with startups. Alex moved on to be chief of staff at Redbrain, one of Europe's fastest-growing companies, helping them transform from startup to scaleup. Currently, Alex set up, and ...
Jun 16, 2021•46 min•Season 3Ep. 4
I'm joined by legendary west coast angel investor, Zach Coelius. Zach is a 4-time entrepreneur and his last company, Triggit was acquired by Gravity4 in 2015. From then on, Zach has become one of the most revered angel investors in the US with circa 50 investments to his name and 80 invested in total. He currently invests $200K-$1m cheques into early-stage companies and $2-$5m cheques into later-stage ones. Zach uses 3 vehicles for investing; a $45m fund with Industry Ventures as the sole LP; a ...
Jun 09, 2021•54 min•Season 3Ep. 3
I'm joined by Pietro Invernizzi, first cheque investor at Stride.VC, who recently closed their second $138m seed fund and have recently officially launched the First Check Programme, where they are looking to back up to 20 teams straight out the gate as their first supporter, regardless of how early they are. Pietro started his career as an investment banking analyst in London before moving into the startup world where he joined The Family, the "coolest" place if you want to build a startup in F...
Jun 02, 2021•46 min•Season 3Ep. 2
I'm joined by legendary investor and Forbes acclaimed, "Queen of UK VC", Eileen Burbidge. Eileen is a Partner at Passion Capital, the legendary early-stage tech venture fund with the likes of Monzo, Tide, Nested, Butternut Box & Marshmallow under their belts and is actually a Board Director with Monzo as well as being super involved with a lot of the other portfolio companies too. Eileen started her career in Silicon Valley, working for the likes of Apple, Yahoo!, and Sun Microsystems. In 20...
May 26, 2021•49 min•Season 3Ep. 1
Super excited to announce that Series 3 will be launching soon. Series 3 is going to be the biggest yet, with some of the world's biggest and most renowned Angel Investors, VCs and Mentors, listening to pitches from some incredibly exciting startups. Listen to the trailer for Series 3 to see who we have lined up...it's going to be a banger of a Series! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Apr 29, 2021•2 min
I'm joined by Chris Smith, Managing Partner at Playfair Capital who focus on pre-seed and seed investments in UK and Israel. Chris is specifically interested in autonomous transportation, business automation, health tech and B2B SaaS. Chris is also an angel investor with 14 deals and 4 exits to date, previously an operator at plan.com and a corporate lawyer. We listened to the pitch from Elliott Herrod - Taylor, founder of The Bunch - looking to reimagine how tenants manage the process of shared...
Jan 12, 2021•44 min•Season 2Ep. 7
I am joined by Veronika Kapustina, an early-stage investor and advisor, who started her journey working on capital raising for late-stage technology corporates such as Uber, Airbnb and Netflix in London and later in California. After moving to the West Coast she started mentoring seed-stage founders and quickly realised that her passion lay in angel investing. After building a high-performing portfolio, Veronika has now become a founder herself, currently setting up a Venture Fund focused on inv...
Jan 05, 2021•43 min•Season 2Ep. 6
Guest Angel is Saloni Bhojwani who has moved from operator to investor. Saloni was a management consultant at Deloitte for 3 years followed by doing an MBA at London Business School to then being a strategy lead at startup Zebra Fuel. She has since moved into the world of angel investing independently as well as at Founders Factory. Saloni is also recently the founder of Sie; a capital platform that supports the most promising female founders on their fundraising journey. Their ultimate goal is ...
Dec 22, 2020•43 min•Season 2Ep. 5
Guest Angel is Anthony Rose, currently the founder of Seed Legals. Anthony is a serial tech entrepreneur whose career has spanned across many sectors including the advent of 3D graphics, P2P music, video streaming, social TV, social platforms, and most recently, legal technology. Anthony is best known for his work managing the launch of BBC iPlayer for which Wired named him "the man who saved the BBC. Anthony lead the team as CTO from 2007 until 2010. Since leaving the BBC Anthony has founded 5 ...
Dec 15, 2020•55 min•Season 2Ep. 4
Guest Angel, Alex Macdonald is founder of Velocity Black, the leading global digital concierge service. Velocity Black is now on Series C, operates in 70+ countries and has been one of the fastest-growing companies in the UK over the last few years. Alex made his first angel investment 5 years ago that exited last year for a 26x return and now reinvests the gains in early-stage, seed and pre-seed tech investments, with a particular interest in marketplaces. Alex joins me to listen to, and questi...
Dec 08, 2020•51 min•Season 2Ep. 3
Angel guest is Pietro Invernizzi, 1st cheque investor at Stride VC and actively looking for seed deals. Stride has become one of the most respected VCs in a very short time due to the line up of Pietro, Harry Stebbings and Fred Destin. They have a £100m fund to deploy across a small number of exciting companies and founders. Pietro joins me to listen to and question Kemal's pitch, Send Music. Kemal has been top of his game as a music producer for decades, currently producing for Radio 1 and Radi...
Dec 02, 2020•39 min•Season 2Ep. 1
Guest Angel Simon Squibb has started 17 companies, invested in over 60+ startups and has mentored hundreds of founders. Having sold his award-winning branding and digital agency, Fluid, to PwC, Simon now focuses on inspiring, motivating and guiding both budding and experienced entrepreneurs by sharing his personal experiences, insights, ideas and tips. His aim is to get 1 million people to start a company. Simon joins me to listen to and question Mariams pitch, Oja. Mariam knows the pain point o...
Dec 02, 2020•47 min•Season 2Ep. 2
Delighted to announce that Series 2 is about to launch. A quick intro about what to expect from Series 2 of Pitch Deck and the release date. Brought to you by my startup playground Horseplay Ventures. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Nov 30, 2020•57 sec
In this short episode we look back at 4 of the startups that featured in Series 1, to see: - Did they raise their round? - Did Horseplay Ventures invest in their round? - How has the company been progressing? - Is there anything the Pitch Deck community can do to help them? The startups featured in this episode are: 👶 Mamamade - D2C baby food brand 🧠 Heights - D2C brain supplement brand 🛴 Zwings - B2B/B2G turnkey e-mobility solution 💳 Mintago - B2B financial well-being platform Hosted on Aca...
Oct 13, 2020•8 min•Season 1Ep. 12
Guest Angel Chet Parker, started out in Architecture, then went into the world of tech, finding his feet at cyber security company, RSA, out of Boston. Whilst there he started flipping houses, builidng up a contact book in California and then went into Angel Investing. 23 investments later, Chet invests in positive impact companies and is now also co-founding his own company, currently in Stealth Mode. Chet joins me to listen to and question Andy's pitch, Honest Mobile. Bulb changed the landscap...
Sep 21, 2020•41 min•Season 1Ep. 11
Guest Angel Samira Ann Qassim founded Pink Salt Ventures to back purpose-led female founders. She invests early stage and is sector agnostic. Prior to investing, Samira gained experience as a successful tech founder and global brand strategist. Samira joins me to listen to and question Alex and Yang's pitch, Just Wears. Fresh from their appearance on TV's Dragon's Den, husband and wife team, Alex & Yang looked at disruptive brands such as Away and Harry's, who disrupted old school industries...
Sep 14, 2020•41 min•Season 1Ep. 10
Guest Angel Henry Allan, UK GM of mega D2C brand, Hims, joins me to listen to and question Meenesh Mistry's pitch, Wholey Moly. Surprised at the lack of choice of a naughty but healthy snack, Meenesh and his wife hit the kitchen and set about creating the first-ever healthy cookie. Over 50 iterations later they launched Wholey Moly with interest already from Whole Foods and Selfridges, Meenesh is looking to raise cash to take the brand onto the next level in retail and launch their D2C letterbox...
Aug 31, 2020•35 min•Season 1Ep. 9
Guest Angel, Dan Rosenberg, founding partner of acquired apparel brand Represent, and now an angel investor in UK and West Coast US, joins me to listen to, and question, Alma Ramirez Acosta's pitch, Vibio. Vibio is looking to bring 21st century connectivity and sensuality into the world of sex toys. They launched their first female vibrator on Kickstarter with an accompanying app, allowing women and couples to control the wearable via the app as well as having educational content to improve peop...
Aug 25, 2020•40 min•Season 1Ep. 8
