Entrepreneurs who require funding for their startup have long counted on self-accredited high net worth individuals (“angels”) to fill their needs, after friends and family, and before they qualify for institutional investments (“VCs”). The many crowd funding platforms on the Internet, led still by Kickstarter and IndieGoGo, and the latest stages of the Jobs Act, were expected by many to put regular people in charge of funding new opportunities, and kill the need for angel groups.
I still don’t see it happening any time soon. Neither does David S. Rose, according to his latest book, “Angel Investing.” David is one of the most active angel investors in New York, and also the CEO of Gust, which is an online platform for startup financing used by 500,000 entrepreneurs over the years, and funding over 1800 startups in just the last 12 months.
In fact, angel investing seems to be leveling off at around $25 billion annually, while crowd funding is setting new records, expected to top $34 billion in 2017. Of course, both are impressive and both already exceed VC investments annually. Nevertheless, according to Rose, both are poised for further growth due to online technology, and there is indeed plenty of opportunity.
He does caution both entrepreneurs and investors to skip the hype and recognize the fundamental truths of the startup industry, before joining the crowd, or joining angels:
-
Most startups fail. Small business statistics have long shown that the failure rate for startups within the first 5 years is higher than 50 percent. Running out of money, or not getting funded is often given as the cause, but it’s often more an excuse than a reason. Thus investing in startups should always be approached as a low odds game.
-
No one knows which startups are not going to fail. Even David Rose, who has invested in over 90 startups, and proclaims real success, reminds everyone that there are too many exogenous factors affecting business outcomes for anyone to be able to pick only winners. Professional venture capitalists will tell you the same thing.
-
Investing in startups is a numbers game. Most startup investors today will tell you to put the same amount of money consistently in at least 20 to 25 companies, if you hope to approach a target 20 to 25 percent overall return. This is called the “portfolio approach,” which counts on hitting only a couple of big winners, while the others return very little.
-
What ends up, usually went down first. Because unsuccessful startups tend to fail early, and big successful exits tend to take a long time to develop, graphing growth follows the classic J-curve. This means that winning investors need to spread their investments across a long period of time, as well as across a large number of companies.
-
All startups always need more money. It doesn’t seem to matter what the founders’ projections are, or how fast they believe they will turn profitable. They will need more money. Thus every serious investor reserves a certain amount of his investment capital for follow-on rounds, which allows them to stay to course to success, even with dilution.
-
If you subscribe to truths one to five, startup investing can be lucrative. There is a rarified brand of successful investors who can show average IRRs of 25 percent or greater over the years. Investing can be satisfying, if not lucrative, for the rest of us, for keeping up with technology, as a give-back to entrepreneurs, and building a legacy.
Angel investors have long been required to "certify through signature" that their net worth or income qualifies them to become accredited, so their burden and risk haven't changed yet. Some investors fear that the recent general solicitation rule will lead to bank statement or tax return disclosures, increase their burden, and may cause qualified angels to back out of the process.
Angel groups fear the loss of members for the same reason. Here again, the entrepreneur will be the one hurt most, by having fewer funding sources to access. I predict that angel investors, who are generally early adopters, will actually be quick to adapt to the new requirements and online systems, and will operate side by side with the new influx of non-accredited investors.
