eguide: sector review - ten capital networkcontents ben bennett of omnitude ..... 7 state of the...

SECTOR REVIEW

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Contents Ben Bennett of Omnitude ............................................................................. 7

State of the Crypto and Blockchain Market .................................................................................... 7

Challenges of Bringing Middleware to the Space ........................................................................ 7

Middleware Risks ...................................................................................................................................... 8

Final Thoughts ........................................................................................................................................... 8

Ben’s Background ...................................................................................................................................................................... 8

Contact Information ................................................................................................................................................................. 8

William Santana Li of Knightscope ........................................................... 9

The Autonomous Sector ........................................................................................................................ 9

Challenges in the Space ....................................................................................................................... 10

William’s Background ........................................................................................................................................................... 10

Contact Information .............................................................................................................................................................. 11

Felipe Luna of Omniscient .......................................................................... 12

Wealthtech Sector in the Fintech Market ...................................................................................... 12

Advice for Joining the Wealthtech Sector ..................................................................................... 12

Investment Opportunities ................................................................................................................... 13

Challenges in the Wealthtech Sector .............................................................................................. 13

Felipe’s Background .............................................................................................................................................................. 14


John Cooper of Minimelife ......................................................................... 15

Investing in the Healthcare Space .................................................................................................... 15

Minimelife in the Landscape of EMRs ............................................................................................. 15

Dealing with Data ................................................................................................................................... 16

Changing Business Models with Data Control ............................................................................. 16

John’s Background ................................................................................................................................................................. 17


John Pope and James Walker of WellDog ........................................... 18

Unconventional Oil and Gas Space .................................................................................................. 18

Impact of Technology on the Production Output ...................................................................... 18

Technologies and Returns ................................................................................................................... 19

WellDog in the Unconventional Oil and Gas Space ................................................................... 19

Investing in the Unconventional Oil and Gas Space .................................................................. 20

John’s Background ................................................................................................................................................................. 20

James’s Background .............................................................................................................................................................. 20


Jon Glesinger and Leslie Ackerman of Comprindeo......................... 21

Choosing AI and Deep Learning as a Technology Platform ................................................... 21

Advice for Investing in AI and Deep Learning ............................................................................. 21

Industry Evolution .................................................................................................................................. 22

Market Challenges ................................................................................................................................. 22

Jon’s Background ................................................................................................................................................................... 23

Leslie’s Background ............................................................................................................................................................... 23

Kalman Saffran of Summa Management ............................................. 24

Working in the Big Data and AI Space ........................................................................................... 24

Advice for Investing in Big Data and AI .......................................................................................... 24

Industry Evolution .................................................................................................................................. 24

Investment Thesis ................................................................................................................................... 25


Kalman’s Background ........................................................................................................................................................... 26


Michael Zavet of Hyperion Exchange ..................................................... 27

State of the Crypto Currency Market .............................................................................................. 27

Crypto Currency for Real Estate Applications .............................................................................. 27

Challenges and Risks in the Space ................................................................................................... 28

Michael’s Background .......................................................................................................................................................... 28


Mick Connors of Anytime Pediatrics ...................................................... 29

Advice for Investing in the Healthcare Space .............................................................................. 29

Evolution of the Industry ..................................................................................................................... 29

Sector Growth .......................................................................................................................................... 30

Challenges in the Telemedicine Space ........................................................................................... 30

Mick’s Background ................................................................................................................................................................. 31


Brooke Waupsh of Swoovy ........................................................................ 32

The Online Dating Sector .................................................................................................................... 32

Advice for Investing in the Online Dating Space ........................................................................ 32

Market Size and Players ....................................................................................................................... 33


Segments Swoovy is Pursuing ........................................................................................................... 33

Brooke’s Background ............................................................................................................................................................ 34


Chris Rawlings of JudoLaunch ................................................................ 35

Advice on Investing in Ecommerce .................................................................................................. 35

What Investors Look for in the SaaS Ecommerce Space .......................................................... 35


Chris’s Background ................................................................................................................................................................ 36


Damon Torgerson of Alludo ...................................................................... 37

Advice for Investing in the Education Sector ............................................................................... 37

Evolution of the Space .......................................................................................................................... 37

Challenges in Education ....................................................................................................................... 38

Damon’s Background ........................................................................................................................................................... 38


Eric Smith of AppBrilliance ....................................................................... 39

Advice for investing in the Fintech Space ...................................................................................... 39

How the Fintech Sector is Evolving .................................................................................................. 39

Technologies Driving the Growth Rate in the Sector ................................................................ 39

Eric’s Background ................................................................................................................................................................... 40


Mike Krilivsky of RageOn! .......................................................................... 41

Advice for Investing in the On Demand Space ............................................................................ 41

How the Sector is Changing ............................................................................................................... 41

Overcoming Technical Challenges in the On Demand Space ................................................ 42

Risks and Other Challenges in the On Demand Sector ............................................................ 42

Mike’s Background ................................................................................................................................................................ 43


Patrick Juthberg of Carable ..................................................................... 44

Advice for Investing in the Automotive Space ............................................................................ 44

How the Automotive Industry is Evolving ..................................................................................... 44

Future of the Industry ........................................................................................................................... 44

Patrick’s Background ............................................................................................................................................................. 45


Terry Koehler - Golf Industry Entrepreneur ....................................... 46

Starting in the Golf Sector ................................................................................................................... 46

Raising Funding for a Golf Company .............................................................................................. 46

Challenges in the Golf Space .............................................................................................................. 47

Terry’s Background ................................................................................................................................................................ 47


Paul Van Kleef of Nannocare................................................................... 48

Advice for Investing in the Healthcare Space .............................................................................. 48


Nannocare’s Position in the Space ................................................................................................... 48

Paul’s Background .................................................................................................................................................................. 49


Travis Farese of Real AI .............................................................................50

Innovating in the AI Sector for Commercial Real Estate .......................................................... 50

Real AI in the Real Estate Space ........................................................................................................ 50

Challenges and Barriers of applying AI Applications ................................................................ 51

Travis’s Background ............................................................................................................................................................... 51


7

Ben Bennett of Omnitude

State of the Crypto and Blockchain Market The cryptocurrency market is currently going through a large correction.

Businesses that have raised money through cryptocurrency are either delivering on their

promises and prevailing or failing due to lack of having a product in place and lack of

skills to take the product to market.

Since some of these companies have been more of a cash grab rather than a legit

business model, there have been a lot of victims in the correction of the market.

The days of making quick money off the back of ICO investments and then cashing out

quickly are gone. So, the real use case and the real value of what the technology can

deliver are now going to come to fruition.

With the correction of the market, middleware, which Omnitude focuses on, is a big

opportunity in this particular market since there hasn’t been a lot of recent innovation in

the middleware space.

Challenges of Bringing Middleware to the Space From a technical perspective it’s about understanding what’s out there for you build

upon and having a proposal that is scalable.

Blockchain is still very much a confusing space and looked down upon because it lacks a

broad enough education on the benefits for enterprise.

There’s a long way to go before people are confident in their understanding of what the

technology can do and how it can benefit their business and their customers.

8

Middleware Risks The technical aspect is one of the biggest risks because you need to:

1. Make sure your product works, it delivers, and is received positively.

2. Stay at the forefront of innovation and the cutting edge since the

landscape is moving so fast.

Final Thoughts It’s important that anyone who has negative views on the subject matter of blockchain

to do some research and even reach out to Omnitude. They want to play a key part in

education and demonstrate that this technology is not going away and that it can be

used as a force of good in every scenario.

Ben’s Background • Ben started in the commercial side of businesses working telesales, field sales,

product sales, to more strategic and development roles before launching his own

consultancy.

• His business focused on startups and enabled businesses to understand their

value proposition so they could take it to market.

• While running his own business he met Chris Painter, the CEO of Omnitude, while

Chris was working at a previous company prior to starting Omnitude.

Contact Information

Web: Omnitude

Email: [email protected]

Listen to the full interview here

https://omnitude.tech/


https://investorconnect.org/ben-bennett-of-omnitude/

9

William Santana Li of Knightscope

The Autonomous Sector William believes that self-driving, autonomous technology is going to turn the $2 trillion

automotive industry upside down.

Currently, over $80 billion dollars has been invested in autonomous technology and

there’s over 50 companies working in the space without a single drop of revenue.

We still have a lot of ground to cover before we get to self-driving cars because of how

technically difficult this is to achieve. Factors to consider are:

1. Technical difficulty

It’s solvable but needs more time, processing power, more machine

learning, and a lot of real-world testing.

2. Lack of regulatory framework

You cannot recognize meaningful revenue or sell the technology until the

federal government has given you the rules and regulations on how to

operate.

3. Insurance

There is no legal framework established.

4. Generational factor

Most legacy automakers didn’t grow up with a supercomputer in their

pocket. It’s unlikely that a board of directors is going to bet their $100

billion brand based on a chip and software.

10

Challenges in the Space Testing and simulation is one of the largest challenges - it takes about 400 prototypes

to get a new vehicle out the door and this applies to previously used models, not

something new and built from scratch.

In this space it’s impossible to develop the technology in a laboratory and having a large

amount of run time on the road is going to be critical for the entire industry.

Simulation is not a path forward for the industry. While it is a very important input, it is

not a panacea to the challenge. You need to be out in the field, making mistakes;

otherwise you are never going to make progress. You really need to get out there in

order to make something commercially viable.

William’s Background • William is a former auto executive. He spent 10 years at Ford Motor Company

where he worked with the Escort Tracer team at Ford with Mazda. He was also a

Lincoln vehicle engineer and worked with Ford of Europe and Ford of India.

• William was also a Director of Mergers and Acquisitions and then became Vice

President and Chief Operating Officer for a subsidiary he built for Ford where he

convinced the board of directors to release a quarter billion dollars to him to do a

roll up in the used parts industry.

• He built the world’s second largest automotive recycler and bought 22

companies in 11 months with 600 employees working for him while doing about

$150 million in sales.

• At the age of 28, he was the youngest Senior Executive at Ford worldwide.

• He’s held 12 different jobs and focused on four different continents in every

functional area which was the training ground for what he is currently doing at

Knightscope.

11

Contact Information

LinkedIn: William Santana Li



https://www.linkedin.com/in/williamsantanali


https://investorconnect.org/william-santana-li-of-knightscope-2/

12

Felipe Luna of Omniscient

Wealthtech Sector in the Fintech Market Fintech is a broad category that encompasses technology that manages, measures, or

processes financial data.

It covers areas such as:

• credit cards

• payments

• money movement

Wealthtech is a subset of fintech and is a smaller populace of technology solutions that

is more narrowly focused on financial advisers and how they work with their end clients

as opposed to directly focusing their solutions on the end consumer. It falls into

categories like:

• business automation

• portfolio accounting

• data analytics

• financial planning

Lastly, wealthtech makes up about 30 to 35% of the fintech market right now.

Advice for Joining the Wealthtech Sector It’s currently a fragmented space with many small players and few of those players focus

on integrating information from one application to another.

Therefore, it is important to find points of differentiation in a crowded market.

13

Investment Opportunities Right now, a large amount of investment dollars is going into:

• automated advice

• larger firms

• Robo-advisers

The space is also starting to see a lot of volume coming into business-process

automation and analytics. Additionally, data aggregation and big data firms are going to

be great areas for growth in the next three to five years.

Challenges in the Wealthtech Sector Currently, the two biggest challenges in the sector are legacy and security.

Legacy

Legacy software and legacy databases comprise about 35 to 40% of the market. It

can be a combination of early adopters, or people who have engineered their

own technology solutions, and getting those users to migrate to a newer, more

efficient and effective technology environment needs structural discomfort. This

is a challenge because these firms are running suboptimal businesses and don’t

have a clear view of what’s going on in their industry, so they struggle with scale

and with controlling costs.

Security

Security is an issue that any internet-facing business is going to struggle with in

terms of cybersecurity and the state of hacking. These issues pose a challenge in

keeping customer data secure both from hackers and from a user’s poor security

habits.

14

Felipe’s Background • Felipe’s career began in the US Navy during the late 80’s and he is a Naval

Academy graduate.

• He started in the retail financial-services industry with Merrill Lynch in Silicon

Valley, and then moved into higher roles of responsibility with Smith Barney,

Citigroup, and UVS while building out businesses involving technology and

integration in corporate services.

• During the mid-2000’s he and his wife decided to start their own financial firm.

They began the process of assessing technology needs for their new firm and

realized that there were no good technology options available that streamlined

information and integrated data, so they built their own platform and their firm

on the back of that platform.

Contact Information

Web: Omniscient

LinkedIn: Felipe Luna


https://omniscientcrm.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/felipeluna

https://investorconnect.org/felipe-luna-of-omniscient/

15

John Cooper of Minimelife

Investing in the Healthcare Space John notes that anything that helps a patient’s involvement, management and

communication is a promising area to pursue in the healthcare market.

Investors should also be focused on innovations that help the aging population as the

baby boomers are now turning 65 and hitting Medicare age.

Lastly, when considering an investment in the healthcare space, innovations that focus

on consolidating current information, population health and patient-centered care

appear to be common denominators for the next few decades to come.

Minimelife in the Landscape of EMRs Minimelife is a broad-based platform. The platform centralizes healthcare records that

the patient controls and connects with physicians and hospital’s electronic health

records.

It integrates with wellness apps, telemedicine, wearable devices and remote monitoring

systems then collects and analyzes data.

Overall, Minimelife provides an easy navigated social and supportive environment for

patients to connect to:

• physicians

• nurses

• physical therapists

• nutritionists

• case workers

• users with similar medical problems

The platform alleviates the burden on physicians, and it redistributes the responsibility

to healthcare providers.

16

Dealing with Data There’s an enormous amount of information being dealt with in the healthcare space.

Medications, for example, may rest with pharmacies, some are in the hands of the

physicians and some are in the hands of the patients. Yet, there are still numerous cases

where patients are saying that the medications are not current or correct.

Another example of large amounts of data is wearables, such as a Fitbit, that isolates

information to the patient.

Yet another illustration of data and information not being centralized is a primary care

practice having one set of patient information and a hospital having another.

Eventually, it becomes more and more complicated to have all this information in one

place. There’s a lot of data that is fragmented for a patient and this is what makes it

confusing and hard to navigate the healthcare system.

Changing Business Models with Data Control The whole business model for a health system is changing. In the future we’re not going

to be able to build different levels of care based on the EHR and the data that we are

entering.

We are going to be able to build a base payment for Medicare, and then we’re going to

have to meet different metrics and put in care plans just to be able to get some of that

other money that we typically already get from the healthcare industry.

Again, we are seeing a big shift of this responsibility for patients to start taking control

which is completely different than how it’s been done in the past.

17

John’s Background • John has been in the healthcare field for most of his life. Over the last 14 years he

has been practicing as an attending vascular surgeon at Virtual Health System in

New Jersey.

• During his years of practicing, John noticed better health outcomes when his

patients were involved with their healthcare.

• In educating his patients, he believes the better he can illustrate the medical

information to them, the better they understand their health.

• This led him to create the application that not only can teach patients, but also

put the control into the patient’s hands when it comes to health records.

Contact Information




https://investorconnect.org/john-cooper-of-minimelife/

18

John Pope and James Walker of

WellDog

Unconventional Oil and Gas Space John and James note that this space is the place to do work that’s going to have the

highest impact on oil and gas production and sustainability.

The world uses 100 million barrels of oil a day, and that grows with population change,

so the industry is growing, regardless of new technologies coming into the marketplace.

The US presently produces 12 million barrels of oil a day and is projected to grow to 20

million in 2025. Most of this growth is going to come from west Texas where there are

significant investment dollars.

Impact of Technology on the Production Output Currently the industry has plateaued and needs innovations to use technology and

improve recovery to ensure:

• wells are in the right place

• they’re fracking in the right place

• wells are spaced correctly

WellDog’s technologies deliver on those values.

19

Technologies and Returns Companies have invested heavily to gain the acreage of the west and either drilling or

producing that acreage. The price of oil has been elevated in the last year, so the returns

are just past break-even at the moment.

When prices of oil and natural gas were challenged in the past, the customers

responded by focusing on adopting new tools that could get them into a place where

they were more efficient and sustainable in their production.

They also focused on a manufacturing approach to their operations, driving down

incremental costs because they knew that what they saved on a particular well was

going to be amplified since they were going to drill 100,000 more wells.

It all comes down to both supply chain and business operation efficiencies together with

exploration and production efficiencies that are sourced from technology.

If you have one of those without the other, you cannot fully serve these customers,

which is why WellDog operates in both spaces.

WellDog in the Unconventional Oil and Gas Space During 2013 WellDog was #88 on the Inc. 500 list and that was driven largely by James

and his team driving the company in Australia.

WellDog is now focused primarily on the U.S. shale and China tight gas markets, which

are much larger than Australia in terms of market size. The company is going through a

similar growth curve now and doing everything it can to manage the growth as

successfully as in the past.

20

Investing in the Unconventional Oil and Gas Space If you invest in a business model that is delivering something that the customers are

already purchasing you can avoid the market adoption issue but your multiple on exit is

going to be lower. Multiples on exits of pure commodity service businesses in this space

are about 3 to 5 times the earnings.

However, if you invest in technology driven businesses and get multiples on exit, it can

be an extremely interesting outcome. The problem is that the market adoption process

in this industry is notorious for either never happening or taking decades.

These are the two things to be aware of when you look at the space. As an investor you

need to be aware of those risks for each path.

John’s Background • John has been an entrepreneur for 20-25 years.

• He started in with a PhD in chemistry, mainly focused on chemical sensing and

got into WellDog by starting it in order to apply cutting-edge chemical sensing

techniques to unconventional oil and gas.

James’s Background • James has 38 years industry experience and over the last 20 years has been at the

management/executive level.

• He has degrees in geology, engineering, and an MBA.

Contact Information

Web: WellDog



https://www.welldog.com/


https://investorconnect.org/john-pope-and-james-walker-of-welldog/

21

Jon Glesinger and Leslie

Ackerman of Comprindeo

Choosing AI and Deep Learning as a Technology

Platform Comprindeo notes that the largest amount of data that’s on the internet is found in

videos. This is almost as big a challenge as what’s on the dark web. For most people, on

the surface of the video, you have no idea what’s in there.

The concept of being able to unbundle hidden data is an exciting one. The emergence

of AI and deep learning in language allows Comprindeo to come up with fast methods

of being able to understand concepts within the videos.

Advice for Investing in AI and Deep Learning Make sure to check the AI-ness of what you are investing in.

Is it really solving a problem?

There are going to be several companies trying to put together software that is going to

be replacing human like intelligence. So, just make sure that it solves a problem and that

it is unique.

It’s also important to verify that the technology is using the algorithms that we typically

see in AI.

22

Industry Evolution The level of activity and what’s possible within the space is growing.

One of the most exciting developments is the way that we can interface with different

classes of processors.

The evolution of voice is also making large leaps into the future since people now want

to control everything by voice. However, there's a big gap between what we would like

and what is reliable right now.

Yet, with all the forward progress, we need to be cautious because there are still

limitations within the space in terms of what can actually be accomplished.

Market Challenges A lot of the challenges in the market are traditional:

• Do you have a great team?

• Do you have a good business model?

• Do you understand your market?

Another challenge is companies and startups that are pitching their products and their

solutions have technology heavy presentations.

This is a big challenge because being able to convey very simply to an audience what it

is that you’re doing with AI or deep learning is important.

23

Jon’s Background • Jon started in the tech sector in the early 80’s with the first IBM computers.

• He then started his first tech startup designing CAD/CAM.

• He has since built platforms in the HR space and is now with Comprindeo as a

result of working extensively with unstructured data around people.

Leslie’s Background • Right out of college, Leslie met musicians in London who were having trouble

finding affordable studio space.

• In order to meet the needs of struggling musicians, they decided to purchase and

rent out studio space to musicians in need.

• At the same time, Leslie was involved with a rock band that was one of the first to

sell albums online.

• This led to the development of a merchandise platform to sell albums and

marketing materials.


https://investorconnect.org/jon-glesinger-and-leslie-ackerman-of-comprindeo/

24

Kalman Saffran of Summa

Management

Working in the Big Data and AI Space Kalman and his partners decided to speculate in securities and when they researched

the state of the field, they determined that a new theory had to be developed. This

theory would be dependent upon large amounts of data and large amounts of

processing. So, they took a big data approach to the data and artificial intelligence

approach to the process.

Advice for Investing in Big Data and AI Look for new and out of the box approaches.

Although quantitative trading is quite popular, about 1/3 of all trading is done

quantitative. However, not many quantitative firms produce high returns. Part of the

reason is that they are following the same outdated models.

Therefore, investors should look for new, out of the box, approaches to quantitative

trading because these should produce the highest returns.

Industry Evolution The world is moving toward quantitative trading as opposed to discretionary trading.

Some might call discretionary trading stock picking in the stocks and securities industry.

Thus, the industry is moving toward innovative approaches and processing more and

more data in non-human ways.

25

Investment Thesis One requirement is that the investment should be something new and revolutionary.

This is because old systems simply haven’t performed well.

For example, when looking at the quantitative trading industry 2018, the industry’s

returns were around 0. The reason for this is that they are all doing the same thing to

one degree or another and this does not produce high returns.

The proper approach for investors in the sector is to look for firms or investments that

are outside of the mainstream of classic quantitative trading.

Challenges in the Space There are two key challenges in the space:

1. Ever changing nature of markets

What a market is today is not what it will be tomorrow. Therefore, one

must keep evolving the technology, algorithms, and data necessary in

order to keep up with the market.

2. Data is expensive

Costs are more likely to rise rather than lower since there is a monopoly on

data.

26

Kalman’s Background • Kalman started out as a physicist at MIT and then went on to become an

entrepreneur.

• He founded three companies, the latest of which Summa Management.

Contact Information

Web: Summa Management


http://summamanagementllc.com/

https://investorconnect.org/kalman-saffran-of-summa-management/

27

Michael Zavet of Hyperion

Exchange

State of the Crypto Currency Market The climate has been very tough for a lot of platforms with the amount of capital that

poured into the space and the lack of results for investors.

A lot of people were expecting a great degree of institutional adoption, but institutions

have been slow to adopt some of these laws and procedures.

These things are starting to happen, though not at a pace that a lot of investors who

invested early hoped for.

Crypto Currency for Real Estate Applications The security token is a great use case for real estate.

With regards to real estate as security token, it makes a lot of sense because it can offer

investment deals that are not available to everyday investors such as:

• second mortgages

• estate development financing

Currently, these vehicles are only available to high net worth individuals or companies

that work in the states. So, there’s a huge play for some of these asset-backed

investments through cryptocurrency.

There are a lot of companies looking at engaging in the space on different levels,

however the barriers to entry are a lot higher than some people may anticipate, know,

or understand.

Ultimately, there are not a lot of companies in the sector who are not doing big things

yet.

28

Challenges and Risks in the Space The biggest challenge is regulations.

No one has a clear picture of what the regulators are thinking and that goes for every

jurisdiction.

Generally, the bigger economies are much slower to adopt and they’re scrutinizing

these things on a board level.

The same risks that go along with any general investing apply to this space as well and

depends a lot on the following questions:

• What stage is the company at?

• Do they have revenue?

• What are the fundamentals of the company?

Michael’s Background • Michael came from the real estate development world and private equity

investing.

• After venturing into investing, the crypto world caught his eye.

• The first foray he had into crypto was though a well-known token platform called

Polymath which is a securitization platform that issues security tokens on behalf

of companies.

• This got Michael interested in the security company market which led him to

starting Hyperion.

Contact Information

LinkedIn: Michael Zavet


https://ca.linkedin.com/in/michael-zavet-08aa0167

https://investorconnect.org/michael-zavet-of-hyperion-exchange/

29

Mick Connors of Anytime

Pediatrics

Advice for Investing in the Healthcare Space The future of the healthcare space, especially around telemedicine, is about ways to save

costs. The more we can invest in things that are going to save costs is an important area

to consider.

Mick encourages investors to look at the long track record of the medical home and

primary care practices because they provide the most data.

The ability to connect patients with their primary care provider and not fragment the

care is the only thing shown to lower healthcare costs.

Evolution of the Industry There is a large amount of investments currently going into:

• direct to consumer telemedicine

• employer based health clinics and urgent cares

These things are feeding the consumerism of medicine, which is incredibly important

because they foster innovations that match what the patients want.

However, there also needs to be innovations that match what the patient needs which is

the biggest challenge currently faced in the healthcare system.

The healthcare market needs to focus more on what’s needed as much as what’s wanted

because this is where quality will bubble up.

30

Sector Growth Telemedicine technology is growing exponentially and is in the 25 to $30 billion range

in the next few years. The question to ask is:

Where will those dollars be invested, and will they have the long-term

impact that we need out of the technology?

Additionally, artificial intelligence, remote patient monitoring, and telemedicine are all

technologies that are going to impact healthcare going forward.

Challenges in the Telemedicine Space The primary challenge is adoption.

Companies have a serious challenge with how they grow the adoption of telemedicine.

It’s a matter of figuring out what solution is going to enable patients to utilize it, benefit

from it, and show the long-term outcomes that they need.

Ultimately, trust needs to be established because adoption will grow from relationships

and connections. That is, the primary care providers suggesting patients go on

telemedicine and the patient trusting the care that’s delivered via telemedicine.

31

Mick’s Background • Mick’s background is in pediatric emergency medicine.

• He was inspired to enter the field by brother who passed from pediatric cancer

before Mick was born.

• What he’s seen in his career in pediatric emergency medicine is more and more

fragmentation of care.

• When he looked at Anytime Pediatrics and developed the concept, it was about

being the connector and how to get kids, patients, and families connected to the

right care at the right time.

Contact Information




https://investorconnect.org/mick-connors-of-anytime-pediatrics/

32

Brooke Waupsh of Swoovy

The Online Dating Sector The dating industry has grown tremendously over the past few years. It is a space that

people saw a lot of value in because of the convenience and technology in today’s world

of being able to more efficiently meet people and create relationships.

With growth, there are a lot of pain points and there’s a lot of vulnerability in the

industry. It is ripe for innovation- one of those innovations being the unmet needs that

people have which is mostly focused around not meeting genuine people and making

those meaningful connections that they originally sought out to do.

Advice for Investing in the Online Dating Space Within the space there are a lot of players and with that there is a ton of demand.

People are using, on average, 2 to 3 dating apps at a time. They are hedging their bets

on building these relationships that are huge priority segments and people, like

millennials, who are spending over 500 hours a year on dating apps.

Customers are prioritizing and you have large players in the industry (ex. Match.com)

who are starting to look at startup companies and these high growth examples of new

brands being introduced as an incubator which has led to a lot of acquisitions.

You need to make sure there is a unique offer and then unique value within a new

dating app for a need that’s not being met today with a solid segment of people who

will be attracted to that offer.

33

Market Size and Players If you look at the total population of adult Americans who are single, it’s just over 40% -

which is over a hundred million people today.

In this space, there’s a handful of really large players and a lot of smaller groups that are

niche focused. There are brands that are focused on farmers only and brands that are

focused on more of the faith-based groups. It varies across the spectrum.

Challenges in the Space To have a successful business that connects people, you must have a community. You

cannot launch one of these apps and have only one person show up – it’s not a great

experience for anybody.

A big challenge is that there needs to be a strategy around early traction, early growth,

and being able to leverage influencers. The network effect needs to drive the

community quickly so people have decent options of others they can connect with for

meaningful relationships.

The other challenge, from a revenue standpoint, is holding off on charging subscriptions

for 12 to 18 months.

Segments Swoovy is Pursuing One pain point is not meeting genuine people. The other piece is that because this is a

technology, a technology driven offer, people are relying heavily on their phones to

meet people.

Swoopy is giving people an opportunity to get to an in-person meetup faster and

encouraging them to go volunteer together for a nonprofit. So, they’re working on not

only getting them to meet in person, but in a space that has more sense of security.

34

Brooke’s Background • Brooke spent 15 years in the consumer space, starting out in advertising.

• She was highly focused on consumer packaged goods working with large brands

like Clorox and Coors.

• Her focus over the years has been on research and consumer insight and

translating that into action.

• She left the advertising world in 2008 and joined a SaaS Company Startup in

financial services.

• There, she had the opportunity to introduce a consumer brand, within their

financial space, that grew to a national brand over her 6-year tenure.

Contact Information

LinkedIn: Brooke Waupsh


https://www.linkedin.com/in/bwaupsh

https://investorconnect.org/brooke-waupsh-of-swoovy/

35

Chris Rawlings of JudoLaunch

Advice on Investing in Ecommerce Chris notes that commerce is somewhat of an unsexy realm in the tech sphere.

Ecommerce, right now, is only 10% of total retail and it is only going to continue

expanding and growing.

Ecommerce is just coming out of its toddler phase and into its teenage years, and this is

the time to invest.

What Investors Look for in the SaaS Ecommerce

Space Generally, you’re looking at your normal CAC, LTV, and SaaS metrics to see if this is

something that is proven, repeatable and scalable.

The most important thing is the actual value being delivered.

Challenges in the Space One of the biggest challenges is that this is an ecosystem that’s built within the umbrella

of another ecosystem.

You will need to constantly keep up with the changes of company terms of service, their

API, their algorithm changes, etc.

Speed becomes the most important function along with the ability to adapt and be

flexible.

36

Chris’s Background • Chris spent the first two decades of his life in the technical field and obtained a

degree in Physics.

• After graduating, he started working in the solar industry and then realized that if

he was going to control his own destiny, he had to learn the art of the business.

• He left the solar industry and started his own business that was a direct to

consumer brand in the health and personal care space before starting

JudoLaunch.

Contact Information

Web: JudoLaunch

LinkedIn: Chris Rawlings


https://www.judolaunch.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrishanemannrawlings

https://investorconnect.org/chris-rawlings-of-judolaunch/

37

Damon Torgerson of Alludo

Advice for Investing in the Education Sector There is a tremendous amount of opportunity within the educational tech space, but be

aware that the sales cycles are a little bit longer and a little bit slower – so you won’t see

that fast takeoff.

However, on the flip side, you will see an opportunity for longer lifetime value.

Evolution of the Space Damon believes that the space is evolving in a similar fashion to what IT evolved into

10/15 years ago.

• You’re starting to see the consumerization of education take place.

• You have teachers and staff members that are getting the technology that they

want in their hands.

These people are going directly to the providers rather than an intermediary

department. This is creating real challenges in the same way it created challenges for IT.

However, you are also seeing a lot of direct to teacher and direct to staff member sales

model.

Another area that is exciting from an investor standpoint is that there’s a lot of general

disruption and a lot of players, so you’re starting to see a lot of consolidation occur.

There are also a lot of changes happening within education itself that is creating

opportunities:

• an increase in homeschooling

• an increase in teacher churn

This creates a lot of pressure on the education system to try new things, and creates an

opportunity for companies to go in and meet those specific needs.

38

Challenges in Education A company dealing with public education needs to be authentic and you can’t be

particular about who you work with.

It is a not-for-profit type mindset – so you must be aligned to the overall goal of

education, which is to educate children and, ultimately, build better citizens.

If you don’t have that alignment, you’re going to be in trouble.

Damon’s Background • Damon was mostly involved in enterprise IT consulting type work.

• His background is technical, working with companies like Microsoft and doing

consulting with them both within the educational space but also within the

fortune 500 space.

• With Microsoft, Damon had several clients – both inside and outside of

education. His partner and him decided that they would start exclusively focusing

on K12.

• They had customers that thought the market was underserved, so they started

Alludo to change that.

Contact Information

Web: Alludo

LinkedIn: Damon Torgerson


https://www.alludolearning.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/damontorgerson

https://investorconnect.org/damon-torgerson-of-alludo/

39

Eric Smith of AppBrilliance

Advice for investing in the Fintech Space Historically, fintech is a challenging space to invest in because of the disconnect

between the traction that you need to have and the ability to scale is pretty broad.

The story goes that getting the first customer, if you’re a fintech company that

traditionally sells to banks, is technically impossible because banks are barred from

doing business with pure play startups that don’t have an established track record. This

is always a huge challenge to a fintech company that sells to entities like banks.

How the Fintech Sector is Evolving There are trends right now in fintech specifically that are mirroring trends that we’re

starting to see in the broader consumer marketplace, which is a substantial focus on

consumer privacy and security. That’s something that has defined much of the last

decade and has led to the growth of the technology platform.

The industry has been forced to come to grips with how to balance consumer privacy

and high-data security in a modern world and that will be a challenge a lot of fintech

providers and data providers in the fintech space.

Technologies Driving the Growth Rate in the Sector It’s all about reducing friction.

It’s about technologies that can make it easier for people to adopt new platforms and to

migrate their relationships with their legacy banking providers, or their legacy

investment providers and move to some of these next-generation platforms.

A lot of momentum in the space that’s leading to accelerating growth is the technology

platforms that make things easier.

40

Eric’s Background • Before AppBrilliance, Eric ran Unwired Banking which was a venture backed

mobile backing startup in Austin, TX.

Contact Information

Web: AppBrilliance



https://www.appbrilliance.com/


https://investorconnect.org/eric-smith-of-appbrilliance/

41

Mike Krilivsky of RageOn!

Advice for Investing in the On-Demand Space Things are changing rapidly in the space and people should be looking for founders and

companies that are innovating.

It may sound trite, but it works.

Look for the innovation.

How the Sector is Changing The space is evolving to a very niche and high-quality area with a wide range of

products that can be made on demand.

There are thousands of different product types that people can create on demand, so

the sector is starting to come across different challenges.

For example, while people want to sell licensed products, they cannot do that on

demand.

The true evolution is in niche premium products; you’ll be seeing turnaround times

getting faster and you’ll be seeing a lot of interesting things happening with licenses

and major brands.

42

Overcoming Technical Challenges in the On-

Demand Space When RageOn!! started, they didn’t have any engineers on their team. So, finding an

engineer that shared the vision was the first challenge.

The continuous difficult challenge is finding a great engineering talent team. You want

to have a high bar for technical people to bring on board.

The next challenge is to ensure a good design and product team to iron it out for the

engineers, so they know exactly what they’re doing.

Risks and Other Challenges in the On-Demand

Sector In this space, you’re not spending a ton of money on products upfront because you

won’t make something until someone buys it.

The risk comes from a user generated marketplace where people upload things that

they shouldn’t.

They use images without the owner’s permission.

The challenges are working within DMC law and the Digital Millennium Copyright

Act.

You will need to hire a DMC agent and make friends with a lot of IP attorneys.

Ultimately, the biggest risk is how you will deal with intellectual property.

43

Mike’s Background • Mike’s series of startups included Record Labels – the largest dance party

company in New England.

• The company hosted some of the biggest parties in the world and then they built

a lifestyle brand, scaling that around the country.

• From there, they saw the pain points of merchandise and that led them into the

demand print space.

Contact Information

Web: RageOn!



https://www.rageon.com/


https://investorconnect.org/mike-krilivsky-of-rageon/

44

Patrick Juthberg of Carable

Advice for Investing in the Automotive Space

1. Look for something new.

2. Look for something that is asset-light and highly scalable.

Find something that is really disruptive and find an asset-light business model that is

highly scalable you’ll have something great to work with.

Patrick suggests keeping away from the asset-heavy business models that literally are

traditional dealerships.

How the Automotive Industry is Evolving There’s a lot of new business models coming out from a SaaS perspective.

So, software as a service in this industry is transportation as a service. With self-driving

cars, electric cars, etc., the whole industry is undergoing enormous change.

Patrick predicts a service similar to Uber that incorporates a subscription-based

transportation service.

Future of the Industry From the current perspective, independent used car dealers will not have a market

because all the cars will be sold from the manufacturer direct.

However, used cars will always be an asset that has to be transacted over time, so

therefore there is focus on the used car marketplace and the ability to sell the car direct

to another private person to take back the margin.

Carable believes in focusing on an asset-light used car marketplace instead of going the

dealer route because car dealers will not be the way of the future.

45

Patrick’s Background • Before joining Carable Patrick was a serial entrepreneur, so he sees a flow or

problem and follows the urge to make something happen from a problem

perspective.

• This led him to start companies, evolved companies and sell companies.

• He comes from a technical background and has experience with multiple

startups, Carable now being his focus.

• His last business in Sweden was a SaaS company within the insurance claims

sector.

Contact Information




https://investorconnect.org/patrick-juthberg-of-carable/

46

Terry Koehler - Golf Industry

Entrepreneur

Starting in the Golf Sector Terry grew up with the game and knew the game very well. He spent a decent amount

of time studying the industry and the consumers.

As an entrepreneur, Terry believes you must dive into things that you are passionate

about since passion drives success.

His advice is to find something that will lure you into working 10- to 15-hour days and

70-hour work weeks and to give it everything you’ve got.

Raising Funding for a Golf Company Terry notes that golf is an extremely stable marketplace and a very niche boutique sport

with about 12 to 15 million core avid participants. This is a number that has been stable

for years.

Golf drives a multibillion-dollar industry and its practitioners have time and money.

However, it’s common to run into investors that are not knowledgeable and passionate

about the sport.

Terry suggests that these types of investors should probably stay out of the business

because it is a quirky industry that’s quite small compared to tech or medical.

However, since the industry is fairly predictable and friendly, it can be easy to raise

funding.

47

Challenges in the Golf Space None of the challenges are particularly unique to golf itself. For example, as with any

consumer product; distribution, tooling and management challenges will come into

play.

The biggest challenge you’ll face is understanding every customer you’re servicing.

It is important to learn about the people that are buying your product and learn how

you can leverage them through the funnel of awareness to transaction to advocacy.

Terry’s Background • Terry got involved in the golf industry nearly 40 years ago while he was working

in the advertising world.

• He started working with golf accounts which led him into developing his own

golf club designs and marketing philosophies.

• Until he started his own golf company in the mid-90’s, he had been with the Ben

Hogan Company as they moved from Texas to Virginia.

Contact Information

LinkedIn: Terry Koehler


https://www.linkedin.com/in/terry-koehler-a464987

https://investorconnect.org/terry-koehler-a-golf-industry-entrepreneur/

48

Paul Van Kleef of Nannocare

Advice for Investing in the Healthcare Space Paul states that a hot term right now is Femtech.

There are a huge amount of startups and energy going into feminine technologies, so

you’ll want to look for these innovative products.

Also look for people that are aiming to find an area that is ready to be disrupted.

Feminine care, for example, is a 20 to $25 billion dollar industry that is starting to

change due to startups entering the space.

Challenges in the Space There is regulatory scrutiny for the product and system since feminine care is a very

intimate product in an intimate area.

Many of these products involved are being used and touched by women, so the FDA is

critical and strict with their guidelines.

Depending on the class of the product it takes a lot more regulatory push to get the

product approved and into the hands of women.

Nannocare’s Position in the Space Nannocare considers itself a disruptive company.

They started off with a goal of solving an issue with women- that is cramping/bloating-

and women having to use 5 to 10 Advil or Tylenol a day in order to gain relief.

The company came up with a product that’s specifically in the femcare space and they

have an innovative patented technology that they built into their pads that works

naturally with a woman’s body and creates microcirculation in the blood.

49

Paul’s Background • Paul went to Business College in Los Angeles.

• He ended up going into a few different consulting business companies, but then

realized his real passion was startups and starting his own business.

• His family has a resort in Canada, options in real estate, and has had a lot of

different startups over the years, so the business mentality ran in his blood.

• His first company was called Coffee Miles –chocolates that were distributed to

Whole Foods that helped flavor coffee.

• Paul’s background before Nannocare was in product distribution on a massive

scale.

• He knew he wanted to get into the healthcare space, and he knew he wanted to

help women, so he began to dabble and research in the area.

Contact Information

Web: Nannocare



https://nannocare.com/


https://investorconnect.org/paul-van-kleef-of-nannocare/

50

Travis Farese of Real AI

Innovating in the AI Sector for Commercial Real

Estate Real AI began when Travis witnessed a problem while investing in commercial real

estate. He saw how fragmented the acquisitions process was and how “left on the loan”

the investor was.

The entire industry of commercial real estate is built around servicing the sell side of the

transaction. This means that investors and the acquirers of real estate are left on their

own to figure out a process and a strategy to acquire assets.

Travis thought that if he could apply machine learning algorithms on top of data to look

for hidden value and to look for assets that were significantly below market brands that

it would be a platform he would, ideally, like to use. So, he set out to build that very

platform.

Real AI believes that it is about man and machine. It’s real estate, real people and

artificial intelligence in today’s world. They are integrating data inventory and have

boots on the ground.

It’s about putting the brokerage community into an integrated and intelligent platform

that is human and can guide decision making.

Real AI in the Real Estate Space Today Real AI is leveraging their data set in the multifamily space. This is where they are

getting their start to help investors identify where they should invest and where the

opportunity is across the country.

They’ve identified 6,000 assets across the country that they call their valued assets.

These are assets that are charging significantly below market rents. If investors were to

make an improvement on the property, they could expect significantly increased rents.

Ultimately, this means a return for the investor.

51

Challenges and Barriers of applying AI Applications The real challenge is access to data.

Real AI interested in understanding how they can build a predictive model around the

estimated cap required in an investment opportunity in an automated way.

Another challenge is in the algorithms and turning it into predictive information.

The questions asked are:

• How do we deploy the interface?

• How do we deploy that insight?

• How do we act on that?

Real AI also looks at what they call data to deals.

This means taking data and translating it into a deal and integrating the human

component.

It’s about being thoughtful around the user experience and how investors leverage it

and how brokers leverage it.

Travis’s Background • Before he started in Real AI, Travis had previous careers in the oil and gas

services, engineering, and business.

• He and some partners founded a services company which they successfully sold

right before the downturn in 2015.

• After the company was sold Travis began working in commercial real estate.

Contact Information

Web: Real AI



https://www.real-ai.co/


https://investorconnect.org/travis-farese-0f-real-ai/

52

Band of Angels

About TEN Capital Network

TEN Capital Network provides funding as a

service to companies anywhere raising venture

capital. Its network of over 5000 accredited

investors represents venture capital, angels,

family offices, and high networth individuals.

©2019 TEN Capital Group

www.tencapital.group

[email protected]

https://www.bandangels.com/

http://www.tencapital.group/


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