Last month Octopus Ventures published a Q&A with Uzma Choudry, an investment analyst at the firm. In this interview, she describes her workday and process when analyzing 'deep-tech' startups. I found this interview particularly interesting (call it confirmation bias), because it shows where Avogadro One can make the job easier for an analyst or an investor.
Among the things mentioned are:
- I’m looking for details on the team, the technology, the market and the company’s financials.
- I also spend time meeting with industry experts. These may be other investment firms or academics. Talking to them helps identify any synergies that might be developed.
- ‘Pods’ are specialist groups within Octopus Ventures. Mine is the Future of Industry pod and we look closely at deep-tech businesses, which are companies that are looking to monetise technology based on tangible engineering innovation or groundbreaking scientific discoveries.
- Not only do I get to grapple with the science behind the new technologies shaping our future, but I’m learning about the way in which the world of investments, private equity, venture capital and start-ups combine to create incredible new companies.
- The meetings with my manager are an opportunity to discuss my objectives and targets. They’re also a chance to pass on any information or insights I will have gathered during the week.
- I’ll maybe scan technology articles in academic or tech journals to share with the extended team and read articles other team members have posted.
Most of these items are about understanding technologies and their context, including markets, research, companies, opinions, people etc. This is what Avogadro One is about. Our goal is to make it easier and more intuitive to get a complete understanding of a technology sector. And while many VC firms have the resources and the connections to pull in information and data to paint a more or less complete picture, smaller players, and especially individual investors, will certainly be limited in what they can do (at the very least it will be difficult to find the time to do proper research if they have a full-time job, unless this is their job). Even analysts whose day job is to do this kind of stuff will appreciate an opportunity to save time, which can be used to dig a bit deeper here and there to get an extra edge.
We'll talk in greater detail about some of the things mentioned above in future blog posts. For now, I just wanted to point out that our product addresses the core activity of investor analysts and investors who want to peer through hype and buzzwords. If you are regularly researching the innovation ecosystem or investing in startups, we encourage you to take the time to answer our anonymous questionnaire, which will help us get a better understanding of your needs.
And as always, sign up to our mailing list to find out when we launch!
And feel free to reach out directly to me at vitalie at avogadro.one.