Pitch deck

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Denis Kalyshkin

Principal at

I2BF Global Ventures

i2bf.com

О спикере

Инвестиционный директор I2BF Global Ventures 10+ лет опыта инвестиций в США и СНГ с фокусом на стартапах, которые трансформируют старые и скучные отрасли с помощью современных технологий

Основатель проекта «Спроси VC»�о стартапах и венчурных инвестициях

Основатель Space Ambition – �медиа-блога о космических стартапах

Развитие стартапа

2.

Акселераторы

 Недостатки акселераторов

2.

Ориентированность на шоу, а не на рост�Часто цель акселератора — провести яркий Demo Day, а не обеспечить долгосрочную жизнеспособность проекта

Стандартная программа для всех�Отсутствие индивидуального подхода для стартапов — снижает эффективность от участия в программе

Недостаточный доступ к качественным инвесторам�Даже после акселератора многие стартапы не получают выхода на действительно релевантных инвесторов

Размывание доли на ранней стадии�Некоторые акселераторы берут значительную долю за небольшую сумму инвестиций и базовую поддержку, что может отпугнуть будущих инвесторов

Слабый нетворк менторов�Много менторов не вникают глубоко в бизнес, давая общие советы, не адаптированные под конкретный рынок или стадию стартапа

 Боли фаундеров

3.

Почему отказ?

Неправильно оформлена презентация, фин. модель, data room…

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Неправильными словами рассказываю

Основатель стартапа

 Боли фаундеров

3.

Почему отказ?

Неправильно оформлена презентация, фин. модель, data room…

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Неправильными словами рассказываю

Основатель стартапа

Инвестор/фонд

Почему отказ?

Есть проблемы в бизнесе, рынке, команде, нужно менять именно их

 Топ-5 причин непривлечения инвестиций

3.

Russian VC ecosystem evolution

• VC ecosystem evolved for 20 years
• In 2000-2014 local champions and copy cuts
• 2014-2018 VCs going global, startups struggling locally
• 2018-present Russian startups going global (primarily to the US, some expand to the EU, LatAm, Singapore)

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What is pitch deck?

Pitch deck is a presentation for VCs. It typically has 13-18 slides. This documents shows the main aspects of your business to potential investors.

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The main goal of pitch desk is to shedule a meeting with a VC and support the conversation during the meeting.

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Важные моменты об инвестиционной презентации

1. 20 years ago startups were putting together business plans which were about 40 pages long. Now we live in a very dynamic era. Startup business changes really fast so we need a more flexible document to present it.
2. Pitch decks are really short and standard. But they serve their goal to show a snapshot of the company.
3. Pitch deck shouldn’t contain all the information and shouldn’t be long. It should cover however the main topics for VC’s.

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Мифы и предубеждения

За свою карьеру я видел очень много инвестиционных презентаций стартапов. Чаще всего стартапы делают презентации самостоятельно, некоторые привлекают сторонних консультантов. В целом в интернете много информации и лучших практик как сделать идеальную инвестиционную презентацию. На самом деле нет никакого шаманства. Здравый смысл и практика. Давайте развеем основные мифы.

Миф 1

Многие в целом не до конца понимают как работает венчурный фонд и поэтому предлагают инвестору вложиться в уникальную разработку без видимых перспектив монетизации.

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Главный вопрос, на который должна ответить презентация, почему вложив в вашу компанию, инвестор кратно вернет свои инвестиции.

Миф 2

Очень часто думают, что инвестиционная презентация - это что-то сверхсложное и что не получится самому сделать правильно.

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На самом деле на эту тему много материалов, примеров успешных компаний, шаблонов. Конечно, после того как вы составите презентацию, надо попробовать показать её другим людям, чтобы получить обратную связь, но в целом вы можете сделать её сами.

Миф 3

Многие думают, что хорошая инвестиционная презентация - залог успешного привлечения денег.

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Презентация - это раздатка, маркетинговый материал, буклет для продажи долей бизнеса вашей компании. Если бизнес плохой, то хорошая презентация не спасет ситуацию. А вот если бизнес хороший, но вы плохо про него рассказали, то можете не произвести должного впечатления. Но все-таки первичен бизнес.

Миф 4

Часто вижу презентации на 20-30-40 слайдов. Основатели хотят вместить максимально информации, чтобы читатель ответил на все вопросы сразу.

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В среднем инвестор читает презентацию меньше 4 минут. За это время вдумчиво 40 слайдов не прочитаешь. Основная задача инвестиционной презентации - продать личную встречу, а также поддержать беседу во время встречи.

Миф 5

Периодически люди пытаются совместить в одном документе презентацию для инвестора и презентацию для покупателя с большим количеством продуктовых слайдов.

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Делайте 2 отдельных документа, так как клиенты ищут ответы на одни вопросы, а инвесторы на другие.

Миф 6

Очень часто в слайдах основатели делают большой упор на продуктовые или технологические фишки решения.

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Инвестора в первую очередь интересует бизнес компании и как он на этом бизнесе сможет заработать. Не забывайте, что VC – инвестиционная компания. Её задача купить подешевле и продать подороже.

Миф 7

Некоторые изобретают велосипед и пытаются добавлять экстраординарные слайды.

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На самом деле есть типовые слайды, которые инвестор ищет в вашей презентации, чтобы увидеть важные для себя моменты. Отрасль выработала типовой шаблон, например, Sequoia Capital pitch deck template. Обычно хорошая презентация 10-15-20 слайдов. Старайтесь его придерживаться.

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https://www.slideshare.net/PitchDeckCoach/sequoia-capital-pitchdecktemplate

Миф 8

Одна презентация подойдет на все случаи жизни.

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Есть 2 типа инвестиционных презентаций для выступления на публичных мероприятиях и для чтения за компьютером/отправки по email. В первом случае очень мало слов, могут быть одни картинки, потому что вы рассказываете текст лично. Если вы отправляете презентацию по почте, то на слайдах должно быть больше текста, чтобы читатель понял, что вы имеете ввиду.

Миф 9

Некоторые считают, что презентацию сделал раз и навсегда.

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На самом деле после каждого общения с инвестором вы получаете обратную связь и неплохо бы немного редактировать слайды. Также в зависимости от предпочтений и фокуса инвестора периодически немного редактируют презентацию, чтобы подсветить нужные для конкретного инвестора моменты. Но это уже высший пилотаж.

Миф 10

Некоторые считают, что инвестор должен знать все технические термины и спецификации, иначе он вам не подходит / тупой.

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Старайтесь употреблять более простые слова и избегать каких-то специфических терминов, аббревиатур и технического жаргона. Вы с ним знакомы, потому что 24/7 работаете в этом поле, а вот инвестор может слышать их впервые.

Миф 11

Один из важных моментов, который часто плохо раскрыт в презентациях - это “почему сейчас правильное время для вашего бизнеса?” Что изменилось на рынке или в технологиях, что 2 года назад такие же стартапы не взлетали, а сейчас взлетят.

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На самом деле это один из ключевых вопросов который вы прежде всего должны задать себе. Если ничего не изменилось на рынке, то ваши конкуренты должны были уже привлечь денег.

Миф 12

Какой размер рынка (TAM), на котором оперирует стартап.

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Очень плохая практика показывать размер вашего рынка десятки миллиардов или триллионы долларов. Это значит, что вы его не считали. Лучше считать рынок снизу вверх. Да, он получится меньше, зато это выглядит профессионально. Ну и в первую очередь вам надо понять, действительно ли есть емкость рынка $1B, или может пора искать другую идею.

Миф 13

Часто в презентации написано, что ваш продукт единственный в мире и не имеющий аналогов.

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Вы плохо искали. Конкуренты есть всегда. В среднем по больнице у стартапа 10 конкурентов. Это может быть не полная копия вашего сервиса, а альтернативный способ выполнить ту же самую задачу. Стилистически можно оформить этот слайд по-разному, но я больше люблю сравнительную таблицу по ключевым бизнес и техническим аспектам для 3-5 основных конкурентов.

Миф 14

В презентации обязательно должен быть слайд с суммой привлекаемых инвестиций и на что будут потрачены эти деньги!

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Неочевидный момент: не нужно указывать какую долю за эту сумму вы готовы отдать, так как это вопрос переговорный. Вообще во время встречи оценку компании спрашивают последним вопросом и как бы невзначай.

Миф 15

Ну и последнее. Вообще красота слайдов, гармоничное сочетание цветов и шрифтов конечно радует глаз, но не является важным атрибутом.

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В общем не обязательно заказывать оформление у графического дизайнера. Но конечно типовой шаблон PowerPoint и кричащие шрифты красным цветом на желтом фоне лучше не использовать.

Sequoia Capital Pitch Deck Template

https://www.slideshare.net/PitchDeckCoach/sequoia-capital-pitchdecktemplate

Template structure

1. Company Purpose
2. Problem
3. Solution
4. Why Now
5. Market Size
6. Competition
7. Product
8. Business Model
9. Team
10. Financials

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Slide: Company Purpose

Define the company/business in a single declarative sentence

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Try to put in simple words what exactly you’re building so that a VC easily understood what is your startup about and what sector targets

AirBnB: Company Purpose

https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/airbnb-seed-pitch-deck/

Uber: Company Purpose

https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/uber-pitch-deck-raise-seed-capital-investment/

Slide: Problem

1. Describe the pain of the customer (or the customer’s customer)
2. Outline how the customer addresses the issue today
3. Make sure that you solve a real problem and that clients are paying money for it (pain killer, not vitamin)

AirBnB: Problem

• Price is important concern for customers booking online
• Hotels leave you disconnected from the city and its culture
• No easy way exists to book a room with a local or become a host.

Uber: Problem

Slide: Solution

1. Demonstrate your company’s value proposition to make the customer’s life better
2. Show where your product physically sits
3. Provide use cases

AirBnB: Solution

Slide: Why Now

1. Set-up the historical evolution of your category
2. Define recent trends that make your solution possible
3. This slide is mission critical not only for investors but for you as well. If nothing specific happened on the market, then your solution had to be a unicorn already or dead bodies of competitors around.

DropBox: Why Now

1. Lot’s of devices, bigger files, more content
2. Increasingly distributed / remote teams
3. Falling bandwidth, storage prices
4. Online storage is unclaimed, unmonetized territory, much like search pre-Google

https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/dropbox-pitch-deck-to-raise-seed-capital-investment/

Slide: Market size

1. Identify/profile the customer you cater to
2. Calculate the TAM (top down), SAM (bottoms up) and SOM
3. VC double check if they believe in your assumptions and is the market big enough ($1B+) to build a big story. If you start from a niche market show how you are going to expand it in the long run.

AirBnB: Market size

Docsend: Market size

Uber: Market size

Slide: Competitors

1. List competitors
2. List competitive advantages
3. Show how you differentiate from others. VC’s are betting on #1 in the niche

AirBnB: Competitors

AirBnB: Competitor advantages

Petal Diagram: Competitors

DropBox: Competitors

A good example of competitor analysis

One liner

Founding year

Funding, $

Price, $/mo

Cloud based

Processing time

Flexibility

Implementation cost

Many stress on technological advantages, but you should show business and positioning advantages first and show that you can win clients over the competitors. You should show not only direct competitors, but also client alternatives (like do something in-house or use Excel).

Revenue, $

Our startup

Competitor 1

Competitor 2

Competitor 3

Competitor 4

Competitor 5

Slide: Product

1. Product line-up (form factor, functionality, features, architecture, intellectual property)
2. Development roadmap
3. VC’s would like to understand how you expand your solution according to your business development roadmap.

AirBnB: Product

Slide: Business model

1. Revenue model
2. Pricing
3. Average account size and/or lifetime value
4. Sales & distribution model
5. Customer/pipeline list
6. VC’s want to understand how you get money, is the model different from other players in the niche and why it is better for the target clients

AirBnB: Business model

Slide: Team

1. Founders & Management
2. Board of Directors/Board of Advisors
3. Team slide answers on the question “Why are you the best team to become #1 player?” They would like to decrease execution risk. Founders are the key personas. If you are young try to build a strong management & advisory team and prove that it solves the issue. If the co-founders previously worked together, built businesses, or knew each other for years.

AirBnB: Team

Docsend: Team

https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/docsend-pitch-deck-raise-angel-round-capital-investment/

Пример: Команда

Slide: Financials

1. P&L /Balance sheet /Cash flow (show your traction and ambitions)
2. Cap table (Actually it’s not mandatory for pitch deck)
3. The current round of investments and use of proceeds (show that you are reasonable about the funding round given your traction)
4. Actually it takes 2-3 slides (actual traction, forecasts, current round, client pipeline/testimonials)

Canvas: Financials (1/2)

https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/canvas-pitch-deck-seed-stage-startup/

Canvas: Financials (2/2)

Recommendations and statistics

from Docsend.com:

https://www.docsend.com/blog/seed-pitch-deck-best-practices/

https://techcrunch.com/2019/04/12/why-pitching-your-product-will-kill-your-fundraising/?_guc_consent_skip=1600538468

https://techcrunch.com/2015/06/08/lessons-from-a-study-of-perfect-pitch-decks-vcs-spend-an-average-of-3-minutes-44-seconds-on-them/

Fundraising takes time

Have a run way of 6+ months minimum to successfully raise money. Average time to raise funds is 11-15 weeks.

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The more runway you have the bigger negotiating power you possess and the better deal you eventually have at the table.

Fundraising is a very intense time

You will need to do 40-100 meetings with investors. You will need to reserve 2-5 weeks in your schedule for investors meetings. This will give the sense of urgency among VC’s and you can close a better deal.

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But keep in mind that you should be sure that you are at the right stage and the round parameters are in line with your traction. Otherwise it will be a waste of time.

The secret of fundraising is in the adoption

The number of meetings doesn’t directly correlate with the success of fundraising. According to Docsend founders typically took 40 meeting to successfully close the round.

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The secret is on reflecting on the VC’s feedback. Every meeting with VC is a sort of customer development on the topic why your shares are the best. Get feedback, think of the issues arose, adjust your deck, and sometimes your vision and business.

VC’s like stories

Don’t just put together slides. Make a narrative telling why now is the best time for your startup and why you are the best team to deliver the solution.

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Keep in mind that an average VC reads your pitch deck less that 4 min. And if your deck is done properly than this time is even shorter since everything is clear. If a VC spends a lot of time on some slide it means that it’s not clear enough. Think of improvements.

Don’t be obsessed with templates and best practices

I previously told you about Sequoia Pitch Deck Template and it’s really great. But take is as a guide, not dogma. You can reorder slides if you believe that it helps to tell a better story or do something else.

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There is also a tip that you should start your presentation from your strengths. If the team is the strongest competitive advantage than highlight it early in your narrative. It also helps to tell the story how you came up with idea and how the team came together.

Statistics on successful seed fundraising

You’d better focus on the VC’s that fit you better

Pitch deck slide order

Docsend statistics successful vs failed decks

Docsend statistics successful vs failed decks

Explain better what exactly you’re building

Docsend statistics successful vs failed decks

Boldly stress why your team is the best

Docsend statistics successful vs failed decks

Explain in simple words how exactly your product works

Docsend statistics successful vs failed decks

You should reasonably prove that you have a big opportunity

Docsend statistics successful vs failed decks

Investors always double check on competition. Help them!

Docsend statistics successful vs failed decks

Be very explicit about your traction. Stress boldly what metrics you use MRR, annual revenue, GMV, or other

Don’t start with your product. Technical founders are in love with the product, but investor would like to understand the business behind, what problem you solve, what market segment you address.

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Typically you have an extra call for the product demo after the 1^st meeting if a VC would like to move forward.

Mistake

Startup pitch decks:

https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/airbnb-seed-pitch-deck/

https://starthouse.xyz/

https://www.businessinsider.com/pitch-decks-that-helped-hot-startups-raise-millions-2019-4

A seed investing framework:

https://medium.com/@checkwarner/a-seed-investing-framework-5c7844157baa

Questions to answer: problem

1. How big is the problem the company is solving? Is the TAM ~$1B+

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• Is the problem real and validated by customers? Do you really have customers paying cash for it or dramatically save costs?)

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• Is it a vitamin (nice to have) or a painkiller (must have)? Sometimes you can have millions of customers using a solution for free but they never convert to paying ones.

Questions to answer: solution

1. Are the founder[s] well-placed or uniquely qualified to come up with the solution? Ideally the founders have experience in the field and it arose from personal need.
2. Is there evidence that customers like it? Does anyone pay for it? What is the churn, etc.?
3. Is it [50]% better, faster or cheaper than what else is available? There is a mantra that the soution should be 10x better than competitors
4. Can it scale globally? This is specifically important if the local market of one country is not that big.

Questions to answer: Market

1. Is the target market big enough to enable this company to grow to a multi-billion $?
2. What are the dynamics of this market? Is it crowded? Sluggish? Fast growing?
3. Why now? Is this the right time for this market to change or new entrants to emerge? Eg. is there a major shift happening on consumer behaviour/ enterprise buying behaviour/ regulation that can be taken advantage of?
4. What’s the ‘go to market’ plan to take advantage of that? Is it credible?

Questions to answer: Business model

1. Are the projections & assumptions in the business model realistic? Can we test these assumptions? The founders are often very optimistic, for example they claim they will absorb 50%+ of the market
2. Are there network effects baked in to the business model (i.e does the product get better with more users)? Network effects don’t apply to all business models (for example for SaaS). But having them is a strong competitive advantage since you can build a monopoly and improve profit margins.

Questions to answer: current round

1. Does the investment fit the fund strategy in terms of ownership, stage, cheque size?
2. What’s the valuation? Can we earn enough given an expected exit? Sometimes the market size is not that big for a unicorn or there are very few potential acquirers (for example in marketing tech)
3. What are the subsequent funding requirements? Do we know which funds are likely to do those rounds and can we gauge their interest now? Is there financing risk? Some verticals are not sexy for investors and it would be hard to secure the next round (Drones, 3D printing)

Questions to answer: value creation

1. Has the company got patents or defensible technology, a unique data set, or a stellar team?
2. Have the company built a community of early customers or advocates who are driving above average engagement (Facebook at Colleges in the US)?
3. How much value can be captured from the solution? Eg. how much will customers pay for it ? For example if it is radically cheaper than existing solutions, the company will need to sell much more to generate the same value as existing businesses in the space.

Questions to answer: competition

1. Are there moats the company can build or high barriers to entry? Intense competition means low margins and soring marketing budgets
2. Is there a significant ‘incumbent advantage’ or an existing giant (eg. Amazon, Facebook) moving into the space? It’s extremely hard and pricey to overcompete giants

Questions to answer: exit

1. Why & when would a company buy it and does the company have a relationship with potential acquirers? Are the players in the field/geography open to M&A? Are there enough acquirers?
2. On what metric would it be valued? Revenue/ EBITDA multiples? Size of patent portfolio? Team? Clinical / technical milestone?
3. If the company was acquired, what kind of price would be paid for it? How do we know? Are there proxies? Some companies are acquired for the product, others for business, IP or team

Questions to answer: risk profile

1. What are the key risks we’d need to get comfortable with if we were to make this investment. Keep in mind that you should take some business risks given the stage
2. On the flip side — are we taking enough risk? If portfolio companies don’t die then we’re not doing VC and won’t get necessary returns
3. Is this company a ‘moonshot’ — i.e if it succeeded could it generate ‘outsized returns’ (Horsley Bridge data shows just 6% of venture portfolio companies generate 60% of returns)

Questions to answer: Team (1/3)

1. Does the team have a unique advantage or edge? For example they are the biggest experts in the sector or they have technology experts or network
2. Do they have some unique market insights or secret souse?
3. Do you trust them? What does your gut feeling say to you? Do you have good references on them?
4. Are they mission driven and do they have a noble purpose? Startup is an extremely difficult journey. Are they passionate enough to grant 10 years to it and build a big company?

Questions to answer: Team (2/3)

1. Can they lead and hire fantastic people? Startup is about extreme growth for years. They will need scale the team 100 times and often at lower salary.
2. Are they commercial and can they sell? Typically CEO is the first sales rep in the company. Do you believe he can sell to the clients, partners, other VC’s?
3. Do they understand the market and the product they’re selling? Good founders deeply understand the market and competition (sometimes have their decks)
4. Do they have grit, ambition and hustle? Often times revenue projections imply the ambitions.

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Questions to answer: Team (3/3)

1. Do their skills gel well as a group? Often times people built business, worked or studied together. So they operated as a team.
2. Are they diverse? Can they think differently?
3. What are the gaps? You need to identify the next hires and if it would doable to find those people?
4. Finally, are they humble and will they listen (to us, to their customers, to their employees)? They shouldn’t blindly do whatever you say, but they should hear the feedback, reflect and act on it.

VC’s get lower returns investing on like-similarity biases

If you are a founder you can persuade a VC more easily if you have the same ethnicity, previous experience, graduated from the same university, etc. You can also get higher valuation. VC’s in general are less profitable.

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1. Ethnic Matching in the U.S. Venture Capital Market https://repository.upenn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1151&context=mgmt_papers
2. What you are is what you like-similarity biases in venture capitalists’ evaluations of start-up teams https://epub.wu.ac.at/3113/

Second time founder research

There is a belief that second time entrepreneurs perform better. 30% of VC backed founders with successful exit succeed in the next startup. First time entrepreneurs succeed in 21% cases, while 2^nd time entrepreneurs that failed succeed only in 22% cases.

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The 2 crucial skills to succeed are timing and execution.

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Article: Performance persistence in entrepreneurship http://www.people.hbs.edu/dscharfstein/performance_persistence_in_entrepreneurship.pdf

VC’s with strong brand pay less

Entrepreneurs always want to get money from top brands. The reality is that those VC’s typically give a valuation 10-15% lower. On the bright side an investment from a top brand is a quality mark on the markets with a tremendous information asymmetry.

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Article: What Do Entrepreneurs Pay for Venture Capital Affiliation

http://www-management.wharton.upenn.edu/hsu/inc/doc/2015/3.pdf

Advantages of successful entrepreneurs

Experienced entrepreneurs can raise money at higher valuation and can take money not only from strong brands since they already have network, a quality mark, can hire better talents. They also typically invest as business angels and mentor others. This also gives extra skills.

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Article: Experienced entrepreneurial founders, organizational capital, and venture capital funding

http://www.management.wharton.upenn.edu/hsu/inc/doc/2015/7.pdf

How to invest in other geographies

There is a tremendous information asymmetry between a startup and VC. VC’s try to comfort themselves investing in the teams “next door”. If a startup is in another geography VC’s tend to do investment in tranches, co-invest in syndicates, put smaller checks.

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Article: The causes and consequences of venture capital stage financing

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=965803

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