Past Events
Future Founders - GSSN Roundtable Call
Have you ever wanted to build a company but don’t have the right idea, team or resources to make it happen? This is your chance to learn about the incredible opportunity to co-found a company with a startup studio! During this one hour roundtable call you will learn:
-What a startup studio is
-Different opportunities studios have to co-found or to be on the founding team
-Characteristics that studios are looking for in a future founder
-The kind of support a studio provides while a founder is building
-Advantages of co-founding with a studio
-How to get on a studio’s radar for future opportunities
You will also get to hear personal stories from founders who will share their experiences after co-founding with a studio. Speakers:
Sarah Anderson, Managing Director at Cintrifuse
Douglas Beyer, Director of Investments at RadianX Capital
Alper Celen, Founding Partner at Enhance
Think efficiency. The startups coming out of studios have a unique composition. These companies solve the world’s biggest problems with the world’s best entrepreneurs. Because of this, the success of these startups is unprecedented. So, what does it take to build a successful studio that attracts the worlds leading investors and entrepreneurs? Join this roundtable with our four white paper contributors and your peers to hear:
- Why are studios an attractive investment?
- What are investors looking for in studios?
- What are the similarities and differences among studios across the globe?
- What does it take to build an investible studio that attracts the top entrepreneurial talent?
Speaker: Todd Ehrlich, CEO at Rule 1 Ventures
There are only 200 evergreen funds around the globe with 100 of those being in the United States. Venture funds, on the other hand — we can't keep count. So why is GSSN Studio, Rule 1 Ventures using the evergreen structure to support their studio? CEO and FounderTodd Ehrlich walked us all through this and answered a ton of great questions on why they're using the evergreen fund structure and where they see it taking them moving forward.
Speaker: Charles Perrard, Co-Founder at Sparkling Partners
As startup studios, we are extremely well-positioned to secure capital gains. Providing that the studio exists long enough to provide those returns. Charles Perrard out of Sparkling Partners will be leading studios through their plan to build a more sustainable studio model.
Speaker: Miles Dotson, Managing Partner at Devland
Studios will begin to outpace traditional venture returns as an asset class in the next 5 to 10 years. Through our research, we have grown a key understanding of how the early-stage funding gap undermines successful outcomes for women and minority-led companies. The U.S is currently losing out on over 1.1 million minority-owned businesses. As a result, the economy is foregoing over 9 million potential new jobs and $300 billion in collective national income. At Devland we leverage the studio model as a pathway to help enable the next wave of new disruptive companies with strategies around cash management, operational efficiency and shared resource support. We also work to understand and actively investigate the trends that enable new innovation. We will discuss Miles' perspective on how the studio model as an ecosystem can unlock long term success for these business creators and what you can do as a studio to tap into this talent pipeline.
Speaker: Andrew Hutton, Founder at Day One
Ten years from now we are projected to have 100 times fewer people working for the man. Part of this is due to the growth in entrepreneurial activity and side hustle work, which has grown 1,150% over the last five years. Founder of Day One Andrew Hutton led last week's roundtable call addressing exactly this conundrum and how entrepreneurs are able to get more support as this gap gets resolved through facilitating community, building new networks, and helping entrepreneurs learn about what they don't know.
Speaker: Kim Heras, Partner at 25Fifteen
The ASX has, for a while now, been setting itself up as a junior NASDAQ and apart from local tech companies listing, there are now a number of international tech cos listing here instead of the NY/London etc.
The drive for smaller tech companies to list in Australia is a function of the local capital markets but what it's done is create an environment where those smaller IPOs are better understood by founders and investors than in most other markets. The historical exposure to high risk mining stock listing probably has helped with investor understanding as well (perhaps a reason why TSX/Canada is another option in this space). Kim will share both the good and the bad behind two portfolio exits as IPOs.
Speaker: Mike Fridgen, Managing Director at Madrona Venture Labs
In this week’s roundtable call, Madrona Venture Labs will share the evolution of its operating and equity models, based on hundreds of interviews and interactions with its founder and investor customers.
Speaker: Jake Hurwitz, Partner at Jack Spades
COVID-19 had a drastic impact on startup studios around the world. Between the unplanned adoption of remote work, difficulties in fundraising, and an unclear future, studios are facing a lot of immediate challenges. Jake Hurwitz, Partner at Jack Spades and one of the Co-Founders of GSSN, has spent the last 3 years working with and researching hundreds of studios. In this roundtable, Jake will lead a discussion and share many of his recent learnings and findings on how studios can best approach the changes in the industry.
Speaker: Martin Bell, Founder & CEO at Bell Ventures
Martin is excited to be sharing his learnings from his time at Rocket Internet and share his guide for Venture Builders.
Date: March 19, 2020
Time: 11:00 AM ET
Speaker: John Carbrey, Managing Director at FutureSight
Join John Carbrey, Managing Director at FutureSight as he dives into his research on the different structures that studios are using across the globe. He'll be sharing pros/cons and what is working across the asset class.
Date: February 20, 2020
Time: 11:00 AM ET
Speakers: Alper Celen, Founding Partner at Enhance
The Startup Studio model is maturing all around the globe. Alper Celen walks us through the scales all studios need to be thinking about as they grow. What to do? How to do it? And, What to expect?
The Startup Studio model is maturing all around the globe. Alper Celen walks us through the scales all studios need to be thinking about as they grow. What to do? How to do it? And, What to expect?
Speakers: Steve Gotz, Partner at Silicon Foundry
Venture Studios are all the rage. Many corporations Steve speaks with have either set up or are exploring the creation of a Venture Studio…in short we’re in the honeymoon period of studios, but there may be rough waters ahead. During this interactive session, we’ll talk a bit about the latest happenings around studios, highlight a few recent successes and failures then discuss what needs to happen for the category to further mature.
Speakers: Zach Ferres, CEO at Coplex and
Mike McCann, SVP Corporate Partnerships at Rev 1 Ventures
Zach and Mike will discuss how they've built sustainable studios.. During the roundtable they will address their relationships with corporates and how this affects the way studios manage their cash and their processes to successfully spin-out startups.
Speaker: T.A. McCann, Managing Director at PSL
Speaker: Andy Kieffer, General Partner at Agave Lab
The Creative Capital Studio Model
Speaker: Jules Ehrhardt, Founder at FKTRY
Jules will run through his mission to help the Creative Class reshape the economy, the thinking behind and approach to the model, as well as the multiple funding models surfaced in this nascent category. (See his piece on The State of the Digital Nation)
Jules' Twitter Speaker: Wenyi Cai, Founder & CEO at Polymath Ventures
Polymath has proven its ability to manufacture value using an international, methodological approach to build innovative technology companies.
Wenyi's LinkedIn Speaker: Michael van Lier, Founder & CEO at We Are Builders
Key learnings to build the startup studio of your dreams. How to stop wasting human capital and how a studio is the framework for beating the odds
Michael's Twitter Speaker: Attila Szigeti, Author of "Startup Studio Playbook"
Where to look for hidden risks when creating your venture builder.
Attila's Twitter The Corporate Perspective
Speaker: Kelly LaPierre, Innovation Consultant at American Family Insurance
Using the Startup Studio model to structure Corporate Innovation Labs, co-create startups with Corporates, and the challenges of working with Corporates.
