We had a great time at the Clerkenwell Kitchen for our #MeetandEat with Simon Menashy, our after dinner speaker from MMC Ventures.

We were joined by some amazing startups, entrepreneurs and businesses including Lady Dinah’s Cat Emporium, Scarlett of Soho, DataSurgery, Heartcore Fitness, Fynder, Localoids, Double Double Studio, StepUp, SenseLab, Story Terrace, Hired By Me, Style Yard, ASF, StratexSystems, Adoreboard and more.

Simon Menashy is a member of the investment team at MMC Ventures, a London-based venture capital firm. They invest in early stage businesses in sectors where the UK is a world leader, including e-commerce, digital media, fintech and software/SaaS. He did over 24 deals in under 24 months in 2012-13!

Simon talked about the different stages of funding (from “Starbucks” to series A!). From the “friends, family and fools” round, through to seed, through to series A and onward to growth. Although in reality the rounds are not that clear cut. There was way too much content from Simon to share here, so just a few key pointers regarding seed and series A.

At the point a company is raising series A finance, they would be well on the way to proving their business model, they would be providing their customers with value, they would be successfully filling out the senior roles in the company and the economics would be working. It wouldn’t be unusual for them to be at £1-2m in annual revenues by this stage. This round would be raised from a VC and although hard to generalise, MMC would look for valuations of £1m+, for a stake of between 5% and 25%, with an exit of 5-10x investment.

Comparatively at seed round, there would be much left to prove but there would be a spark worth exploring. The company would need finance to provide runway to reach the point of being ready for a series A –  they would need to “professionalise’. A seed round would be funded by seed VCs or angels and (good news) the last 3 years has seen an increase in the availability of this level of funding. Although (bad news), angels still aren’t easy to find. There are some established networks you can approach (Cambridge Angels has a good rep) but it otherwise comes down to networking and selling yourself and your business (… I know a great site for doing this over dinner…)

Here are some pictures for you to enjoy:

Thanks to everyone that joined the dinner and shared food and thoughts. See what’s coming up soon here.

Thanks to our sponsor Rackspace for their ongoing support and thanks to Simon and MMC Ventures for the valuable insights.