Why Angels are perfect for Vertical Markets
Ran across Ron Conway’s post about why more startups need to embrace angel investors. He has one point that directly impacts startups in the vertical market:
2) Angels are often vertical specialists. Some VCs tend to be generalists when it comes to an industry (e.g., retail), or technology (e.g., mobile). Because angels often come from a successful industry background, you can do a better job of hand-picking a partner who will add expertise and value relevant to your precise market area — not just money. If your company operates in social networking, you might be enticed to go to a bulge-bracket, or marquee VC firm—and they would consider you because the space is so hot. But chances are that even some of the biggest VC firms won’t have someone with deep domain expertise in social networking, it’s just too new. But you could go see Owen Van Natta, who just left Facebook. You’re in cloud computing? Go get Diane Greene, the former CEO of VMWare. They’d both make great angels.
So if you’re not bootstrapping, try to find an angel investor first.
posted by Paul “The Pageman” Pajo
