Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum

Thursday, August 25, 2011

6:30-7:30 PM: Networking Reception with complimentary refreshments
7:30-8:30 PM: Presentation

Andersen Auditorium, Haas School of Business

Click here for Steve Bengston's Money Tree Report

2011-12 Angel & Venture Capital Financing Overview

Sponsored by

Program Information and Speaker Biographies

Video (video on YouTube site):

Program Information and Speaker Biographies

The beginning of 2011 saw very strong growth in the level and strength of early stage financings, a trend which has continued throughout the year. 2011 is being viewed by some as the year of the founder/entrepreneur and by others as the year of the “tech bubble” and excess valuations. Regardless of your perspective, the investment environment remains incredibly strong – some would say the strongest since the internet bubble of 1999/2000. In addition, public and secondary trading markets are gaining meaningful traction and providing investors/employees with opportunities for liquidity that has not been seen in years. This robust financing environment is in sharp contrast to the state of the US and world economy generally, in which the national debt, record budget deficits and sovereign bailouts dominate the headlines.

Against this backdrop, the VC industry is undergoing profound changes and seed/angel funds have become more active than ever before. Please join our panel of expert angel and venture capital investors for a look at early stage investing during the past year and what the future investment environment holds. The presentation will also include a review of the key metrics for venture capital investments/exits and critical VC term sheet terms for Q2 2011. This will be a thought provoking and informative session you will not want to miss!

Our distinguished panel includes:

	Sam Angus (moderator) is resident in the San Francisco office of Fenwick & West LLP and his practice concentrates on seed/venture capital and debt financings, mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures and board and general corporate matters. Mr. Angus represents a broad range of companies from privately held start-up companies to publicly traded corporations. His practice also includes advising entrepreneurs and VC and angel investors. Mr. Angus’ clients include Airbnb, Marin Software, oDesk and Vibrant Media. He has also served as counsel for In-System Design, Inc. in connection with its acquisition by Cypress Semiconductor Corporation, Micro Focus Group on its $500 million merger with Intersolv, Inc., Junglee Corp. on its $300 million acquisition by Amazon.com, Inc., and Blue Lava Wireless on its $140 million acquisition by JAMDAT Mobile. More recently he counseled Qik, Inc. on its acquisition by Skype, and Kosmix on its acquisition by Walmart. Mr. Angus earned a J.D. from University of California, Hastings College of the Law.

	Steve Bengston heads the Emerging Company Services (ECS) group at PricewaterhouseCoopers. ECS acts as “mentor capitalists” for young, high potential companies. Before joining PwC, Steve had 20 years of experience in a variety of marketing, business development and general management roles at several high tech companies in the Bay Area. Most recently, he was Pres/CEO of ynot.com, a leading international emarketing and greeting card company. Previously, he was VP Marketing & Business Development at Worldview Systems, an Internet travel pioneer. At Worldview, Steve helped launch and market Travelocity with Sabre Interactive. Steve has a BA in Economics and MBA from Stanford University. He works closely or sits on the Advisory Board at Churchill Club, SVASE, Life Science Angels, Bay Bio, and the Stanford/MIT Venture Lab, has taught classes on start ups at UC Berkeley, San Jose State, Santa Clara Law School, Hastings Law School, and Stanford, and is active in a variety of other organizations in the Bay Area targeting entrepreneurs and investors. He is a frequent moderator/panelist at both university and industry sponsored events.

	Howard Hartenbaum joined August Capital in 2008. Prior to joining, he served as a General Partner at Draper Richards LP where he was the founding investor in Skype and a former member of the board of directors where his achievement resulted in his joining the Forbes Midas List of top venture capitalists. Before entering the venture capital field, Howard was at Hughes Electronics, where he was responsible for supporting business development, marketing and sales of satellite, information security and automotive technologies developed by HRL Laboratories. He also worked in engineering positions in ergonomics and user experience at Honda Motor Company and manufacturing at Teledyne Relays. Howard has worked overseas for a total of ten years in Luxembourg and Japan. He is a graduate of M.I.T.

	Joe Kraus is a Partner and has been with Google Ventures since 2009, and his primary areas of focus are mobile, gaming, and local services. Prior to Google Ventures, Joe was a two-time entrepreneur. In 1993, he co-founded Excite.com, an early Internet search engine, holding multiple positions in the company, including leadership roles in product, business development, and marketing. More recently, he co-founded JotSpot in 2004, a wiki company that was acquired by Google in 2006. While at Google, Joe had multiple product management roles including Blogger, Picasa, Sites, Friend Connect, and OpenSocial. In addition, Joe has been an active angel investor in multiple companies, including LinkedIn, Aardvark (sold to Google in 2010), Kongregate, and OpenCandy. Joe is also on the board of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF.org). Joe received a B.A. from Stanford University.

	Aydin Senkut is the Founder and President of Felicis Ventures. He has been named one of the top 25 tech angels by Businessweek and was featured as one of the top 8 up and coming VCs by Forbes’ Midas List. Felicis Ventures portfolio encompasses over 50 companies including Bump, Brightroll, Disqus, DNANexus, Dropcam, Inkling, Justin.tv, Meraki, Room 77, Rovio, Shopify, Weebly and Yume. In the last four years, 19 Felicis backed start-ups have been acquired by firms such as Google, Twitter, Groupon, Microsoft, AT&T, Disney, Ebay and Intuit. Prior to starting Felicis Ventures, Aydin was Google’s first product manager and launched its first 10 international sites in 2000. He then became the first International Sales Manager at Google, responsible for world-wide licensing deals. Before joining Google, Aydin was a product manager at SGI. He has a BS in Business Administration with Honors from Boston University, an MBA from the Wharton School and an MA in International Studies from the University of Pennsylvania.

Event and Registration Information

The program begins with a networking hour at 6:30 PM with complimentary drinks and hors d'oeuvres in the Bank of America Forum at the Haas School of Business. Don't forget the opportunity to "Be a Number" and pitch your idea or company to the crowd!

Registration is required. Links for online pre-registration are be available at the top of this page. Online pre-registration ends at 5 pm Tuesday, August 23 and all registrations after this time must be completed on site at the event. If you are unfamiliar with the UC Berkeley campus, check out the campus map to locate the Haas School on the east (uphill) side of campus.

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The Lester Center appreciates the generous support of the
Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum Sponsors:

Burr Pilger Mayer, Inc.
Claremont Creek Ventures

Deloitte

Fenwick & West
Intel Corporation
Morrison & Foerster LLP

Physic Ventures
Reed Smith LLP
San Francisco Business Times
Siemens Technology-to-Business Center
Silicon Valley Bank