Eric Gordon’s Post

Make it happen. Doing large projects requires a conscious effort, and the only way that you can accomplish things is just to make it happen. I don’t know any other way. I often think that the scientific literature is just wrong because it is not talking about the average person. The average person doesn’t have the resources that is often talked about in the scientific literature. You don’t have access to venture capital, you don’t have access to large companies, you don’t have all of the things that people think are important. The only thing that you can do in your life is choose to make it happen. It’s a choice. You decide that you’re going to make this happen and carry it through to turn it into something.

In today's competitive research landscape, it's crucial for academics to move on from lamenting over unfunded projects to understanding the market-driven dynamics of funding. Securing investment, whether from industry partners or venture capitalists, hinges on presenting a compelling value proposition. Money flows towards addressing clear, tangible needs; if a research project doesn't fulfill a demand or solve a problem, it struggles to attract financial backing. Instead of focusing solely on the quest for funds, researchers should concentrate on identifying pressing needs and aligning their work with these demands. By doing so, they can develop projects with inherent value that naturally attract investment, ensuring their research has both impact and relevance.

I am thrilled to announce that I recently completed an externship program with Extern , in collaboration with Energy Innovation Capital . This incredible opportunity allowed me to delve into the world of venture capital, with a specific focus on the renewable energy sector and the carbon capture and storage industry. During this externship, I had the privilege of discovering the innovative ways in which startups are working to solve global energy challenges in a sustainable manner. I'm deeply grateful for the chance to collaborate with a company that is dedicated to providing abundant, clean, and accessible energy technology. Throughout this externship, I had the opportunity to: 1. Conduct essential market analysis. 2. Prepare a comprehensive market analysis presentation. 3. Design an investment summary. 4. Perform thorough due diligence on various documents. The experience was truly transformative, as I learned four key concepts that will be invaluable in my pursuit of a career in the venture capital field: 1. Truth speaking mindset : To excel in venture capital, one must be a relentless truth-seeker. It's not enough to simply accept information at face value; it must be thoroughly investigated to ascertain the facts. This is crucial in conducting due diligence, market research, and preparing investment memos. 2. Importance of Market Analysis: Conducting a comprehensive market analysis is vital for projecting the success potential of a startup. This involves assessing the company's target market and competitive landscape, as well as identifying key factors such as market growth rate, drivers, challenges, and key investors. 3. Pitch Deck Analysis: Analyzing and synthesizing data is a crucial skill in the venture capital industry. Pitch deck analysis goes beyond mere summarization; it requires examining information in detail to identify cause-and-effect relationships and key factors, while also combining insights from multiple sources to create a cohesive proposal. 4. Structured Idea Presentation: The Pyramid Principle, developed by Barbara Minto, is an excellent framework for structuring ideas in a logical and clear manner. This approach involves presenting the main point first, followed by supporting arguments and detailed information, essentially giving the conclusion upfront. I am deeply grateful to Extern and Energy Innovation Capital for providing me with this incredible opportunity. I would also like to extend my sincere thanks to Christie Andersen , our program manager Shawn Melville , and my fellow externs for their unwavering support and collaboration throughout this transformative experience. #extern

There are so many ways we spend our money to support what kind of futures we want to see. When we buy our food, shop for clothes, even a raffle ticket, we are making choices. Here are three ways I am putting this in place in my life. 1. Lending small amounts of money (around $500) via LendForGood. Here are some of the projects that Lend for Good have fostered recently: Sarvaguna Foods and Kitchen Feb 2024 Agri House - Cricket House project Jan 2024 Glean Asia Dec 2023 Emotions Org Community Dec 2023 Centre for Armed Violence Reduction Nov 2023 ATEC Nov 2023 Big shout out to Cameron Neil and Tom Dawkins for your incredible leadership and innovation. Collab4Good are thrilled to be on the journey for anyone in SA who might like to know more about this approach. 2. Annual subscription as a gift ($1100 p.a) I'm a long time activator with Coralus supporting female founders with the practice of #radicalgenerosity driving investment decisions with our collective imagination powering the future. Global impact without borders now at $16.5M capital with 7000+ involved and 170+ funded ventures it is a community that is very close to my heart and informed my practice. Minka Youngmi Park Sarah Gun to SA ventures are in that mix! 3. My local farmers market (weekly and priceless) And finally the other way I think about my #impactinvesting is by doing my weekly shop at the Willunga Farmers Market. Great produce, supporting local growers, slow food, community building as a practice all embedded into their #leadership. Incredibly grateful for people like Richard Bennett Vicki Osland and the founders of this market all those years ago when David Suzuki came down and opened it with Mike Rann. Hope this spikes your interest enough to pop in and find peers who want to build a network of people with mindsets around impact investing - in a wide range of ways! See you there.

Come along the the Impact Investment Network of SA (formerly Social Impact Investment Network SA) to hear more about their plans and future direction for impact investment in South Australia - more details and link to book your place below!

I had the fantastic opportunity to join Warren Bebb and Pau Medrano on stage at the Agritech Investment Forum to talk about science commercialisation in NZ. A few key takeaways about commercialisation and the role investors can play to support success. - Early stage investors are pulling together complementary tech, keeping that view across the ecosystem, including Australia. - Collaboration and connections important, the Bridgewest ecosystem is an excellent example of this, leveraging your partners connections and experience saves time going out to market. The best investor relationships go beyond capital. Domain experts are required within the investors or their network, this enables them to bring more than the money, to help build effective and global businesses. - Deep tech investment challenges include conflicting motivations for researchers, challenges to find IP worth protecting before a market is apparent or proven. - Technology DD and IP DD is key. The $35k pre incubation grants allows an obligation- free "quote" to deep dive into the opportunity head of investment (message me if you want more info on this one). Key quote goes out to Pau Medrano “ Don't be afraid, be smart. “ What’s on our Christmas wish list for 2024? Scientists and non-scientist founders who are entrepreneurial, willing to engage with potential customers and looking to build a long term partnerships.

Today as my guest I am hosting Joseph Heade,Venture Principal. He has extensive experience in venture funding and research. He shared with us his journey from education to the professional world and what he has learned along the way that has helped him on his career path. In addition, he was kind of to speak about his experience, how we got involved in new technologies, and specifically venture funding.  Note: The views expressed in this episode are personal in nature and in no way reflect the views of any organization, company, or institution.  https://lnkd.in/daz7Tu9s https://lnkd.in/d2PEENFc https://lnkd.in/eZxH6qVZ #venturecapital #careerfocus #technology #innovation #careerdevelopment

New Research! "How to Apply Machine Learning in Venture Capital Investment?" This paper explores the significant potential of ML/DL in enhancing private equity and venture capital investments, presenting a method for identifying investment targets with Multivariate Time Series Transformers. Here, I summarize the paper in a nutshell: 👇 ➡ The paper introduces the integration of ML/DL methodologies in the Private Equity (PE) sector, focusing on sourcing potential investments for Venture Capital (VC) and Growth Capital (GC). ➡ It presents a novel strategy that employs a Transformer-based Multivariate Time Series Classifier (TMTSC) for predicting the future success of prospective companies. ➡ This research aims to enhance sourcing efficiency for VC and GC investments by redefining the sourcing challenge as a multivariate time series classification task. ➡ The authors detail the key aspects of their approach, including the selection of input features, the design of the model architecture, and the optimization targets. ➡ They also introduce investor-centric techniques for data augmentation and dataset splitting, crucial for the model's application in VC/GC investment sourcing. ➡ Extensive experiments conducted on four distinct datasets, benchmarked against three popular models, validate the effectiveness of the TMTSC approach in improving decision-making in the VC and GC domains. ➡ The success of this approach highlights the potential of advanced machine learning techniques to revolutionize investment targeting in the PE industry, marking a significant leap forward in strategic VC and GC investments. ----------------------- → Join 1000+ Quants who receive new trading ideas weekly in their email: https://lnkd.in/dkxSDJpq ----------------------- Read the full paper: https://lnkd.in/dj97X9K7

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The article from The Quantum Insider (and MIT Sloan Management Review) discusses the need for venture capital to return to its roots by funding deep-tech ventures essential for significant technological advancements and societal benefits. The current VC trend focuses on safer, short-term gains, neglecting the funding of breakthrough technologies such as quantum computing that could address critical global challenges. The piece highlights the "innovation valley of death," where promising technologies struggle due to a lack of investment. It calls for VC firms to take more significant risks and include experts capable of evaluating deep-tech's potential, stressing that government funding alone is insufficient for deep-tech's success. https://lnkd.in/g2Ti368S