Vanguard Ventures - The Process

If you think that your company matches our Investment Focus, we would like to hear from you. Please send us a 2 to 5 page Executive Summary via email (preferred) or regular mail. Your Executive Summary should address the following issues:

Business. Provide a business description and clearly define the problem you are solving.
Management team. List the founders and executive team, and provide their backgrounds, relevant experience. Also provide your immediate and long-term staffing needs.
Product. Explain your product, including customer needs and applications, and a synopsis of any underlying technology.
Barriers to Entry. explain your plans to protect your intellectual property and other barriers to enter your space.
Value Proposition. Explain how the problem is being solved today and how your technology is differentiated from the currently-available solutions.
Market Opportunity. Describe the market opportunity, including the size, history, characteristics, and dynamics of the market, showing how you fit in the market.
Competition. Describe your competitors, their relative strengths and weaknesses, and your position in the space.
Strategy/Business Model. Describe your marketing strategy and the proposed business model, including a discussion on sales and distribution channels. Provide details on what market validation you have conducted, and your current status with any customers.
Financing. State the amount of the investment you are looking to raise and your funding history. List your future milestones and the amount of capital required to reach these milestones.

Please note that we would not fund a potential competitor to a current portfolio company. Also, while we review every plan submitted to us, a personal referral from someone who already knows Vanguard is very helpful.

We will respond to your Executive Summary within 2 to 4 weeks. Should we wish to pursue your opportunity, we will contact you to ask further questions, request your full business plan, or arrange a meeting.

In order to have a successful and productive meeting, we recommend that you provide us with any presentation materials at least one business day in advance. Initial meetings are scheduled for one hour, and we recommend the following time budget:

• 5 minutes Introduction of the team

• 40 minutes Presentation covering all aspects of the Executive Summary

• 15 minutes Questions and answers

As the process proceeds, we'll be able to spend much more time on each of these areas.

Thank you for considering Vanguard Ventures as you look to grow your company. We look forward to hearing from you.