So there’s been a lot of questions around the application process, particularly around the Investor Presentation. We thought we’d clear some of the questions up.

Investor Presentation

Don’t worry, there’s no reinvention of the wheel here. We like to keep things simple as much as the next person and there are some awesome references made available by leading Angels and VCs. You might find the following links useful to get a better understanding of what we’re looking for:

Investor Presentation Template by Shai Goldman from SVB Capital

Startup Viagra: How to Pitch a VC by Dave McClure from 500 Startups

The investor presentations we’d like to see should be designed to be sent independently to potential investors to review rather than being a visual aid for a live presentation. The presentation should resemble a visual business plan, stuffed with all of the information that anyone would need to gain a complete understanding of your company, future plans, and business funding and investment needs.

A word of note – keep the live pitch deck for a live presentation rather than what you submit as your application. The live deck is designed to accompany a detailed oral presentation, focused on having the most important information elaborated on by the presenter.

Application Process

If you haven’t already seen the PDF regarding how the application process and timelines work, you might want to take a look at it here.

So some quick points:

• Even if you’re a startup that is affiliated with one of our Partners, you still need to officially apply to the Seed Program. To do this, startups (not Partners) should send the following details to apply@optusinnov8seed.com.au:

1. Startup name & referrer (referrer should be cc:’ed)
2. Co-founder name/s
3. Contact details incl. email & mobile number
4. Investor presentation
5. Any other relevant information

If we don’t receive your investor application through this channel, we won’t be able to assess your application.

• Please send investor presentations in PDF – it guarantees for you that what we see is what you think we see. For those who have already sent in PowerPoints, don’t worry, we can read them fine.
• Some of you have thought by adding your startup to our Australian startup directory SeedBase that your startup will be automatically considered for the Seed Program. This isn’t the case. If you want to be considered for the Seed Program, please follow the instructions detailed above.
• We have been meeting with startups all over the country over the past few weeks in various means including informal chats, some one-on-one pitches, at our information sessions and also at some of our partner’s demo events. If you have met with us or pitched to us, we will still need you to formally apply to be considered for the Program. Again, follow the details above.
• If you’ve pitched to us already, wherever that may be, that’s awesome. It gives us an added look into your business and a better understanding. However, for our Winter assessment process, we’ll only be able to invite 10 or so startups to the 31 July Pitch Event in Sydney. This is where our investment committee will be in attendance and make their investment decision.
• As much as we’d like to help out all the startups interested in being a part of our Program, our Program follows the Lean Startup methodology too and the lesson around Focus. Focus means that we think we will able to properly support up to 8 startups in our first year. If you’ve missed out on being invited to the 31 July Pitch Event, keep at it and do keep in touch with us as we’re open to investing outside the more formal Winter and Summer Pitch Events. You might be a bit early or haven’t got that level of traction yet but we know that things can change quickly in this space.

We hope that this gives people clarity to how the process works and what we’re hoping to see in your application.

Image courtesy of Opensourceway