The process of reauthorizing the SBIR/STTR Program has been, like many other government programs, a long journey. It appears that the House has agreed to the Senate’s modifications for SBIR/STTR reauthorization as part of the National Defense Authorization Act for 2012 NDAA. As reported by Rick Shindell of the SBIR Gateway almost 1000 small businesses contacted their Representatives and urged them to agree to the Senate modifications for SBIR/STTR. As the final bill has not yet been authorized we do not have all the details. Here is what is known:
Reauthorization through 2017.
Increased Set Aside: SBIR from 2.5% to 3.2%, STTR from 0.3% to 0.45%.
VC Majority Ownership: Allowable for 25% of awards from NIH, DoE and NSF, 15% of awards from all other agencies.
Limit on Number of Awards Per Company: Rejected, but language included to monitor a company’s success.
Agency Administrative Fund: 3% of SBIR funds can be used by the agencies for outreach and administration.
Phase I Skip: Allowable for NIH, DoD and DoEd, at the agencies discretion.
Mitchell Kopelman has a little advice for most young entrepreneurs and startups. Take advantage of the state’s Angel Investor Tax Credit, and do it as quickly as possible.
“The biggest issue we’ve seen at ATDC is someone might wait to apply until after they have an interested investor,” said Kopelman, a partner with Habif, Arogeti & Wynne, LLP, the largest independent CPA firm in Georgia. “We say, send in the application now. This way, when an investor is interested, your company will already be approved by the state. It’s free and it’s good for one year.”
Signed into law by former Gov. Sonny Perdue in June of 2010, the legislation took effect at the beginning of 2011 and helps to promote the development of startup companies in the state by encouraging direct investment from individuals in high?tech businesses.
The credit provides up to $50,000 annually – or 35 percent of the amount invested in the startup – for individual investors of early-stage, startup companies in Georgia. It’s available for investments made in 2011, 2012 and 2013, however, the credit cannot be used until two years after the investment is made. Other qualifications require that the investments come in the form of cash in exchange for stock by accredited investors that manage $5 million or less in capital. In addition, applicants must be Georgia-based companies, in business for less than three years with fewer than twenty employees. They can have no more than $500,000 in revenue and less than $1 million raised by debt or equity.
Access to early-stage growth in young companies is often difficult to obtain, so the Angel Investor Tax Credit could potentially help boost the Georgia economy by strengthening its entrepreneur-driven community and creating new, high-paying jobs. While there are some industry limitations, most technology companies are eligible so Kopelman encourages ATDC members to read up and apply for the program.
For a business to qualify as an eligible company under the angel tax credit, the startup must register first with the tax commissioner using Form IT-QBR. Although some startups experienced form approval delays in the initial months of the program, Kopelman said the process is moving more quickly now.
“The form itself is very easy,” said Kopelman, who chairs his firm’s Tax Group and Technology Practice. “The issue is that because it was new to the state, approvals were moving very slowly. In at least half a dozen cases, we’ve been able to help accelerate the approval process for these startups by contacting the state directly. The key is to send the form in now, and two months before it expires each year, assuming the company still qualifies.”
For more information on the Angel Investor Tax Credit program or links to the program requirements and Form IT-QBR, read this article co-authored by Kopelman.
Cardlytics, an ATDC company offering targeted, trackable deals through financial institutions, recently closed an $18 million Series B round led by ITC holdings and Kinetic Ventures. Previous investors Canaan Partners, Polaris Venture Partners, and Total Technology Partners also participated. Cam Lanier of ITC will join the Cardlytics board and Nelson Chu of Kinetic will become a board observer.
The success of Cardlytics is exciting but not surprising. In the fall of 2008, Scott Grimes and Lynne Laube proposed an idea that would enable banks and merchants to provide rich rewards to customers based on their individual purchase behavior. Like a personalized GroupOn-type deal delivered via online bank statements, Cardlytics enables retailers to run offers in consumers’ transactions statements targeted against actual debit or credit card purchases. Cardlytics then tracks all redemptions, whether online or in store. Merchants do not pay for distribution, clicks, or customer intelligence, only sales.
The Cardlytics concept and exceptional founders have lived up to their potential, generating customer response rates up to 20 times more effective than traditional advertising. Stay tuned. This remarkable success story is warming up and could be very big by the time Scott and Lynne are finished.
Venture Atlanta, where Georgia’s top technology companies meet top-tier investors, is seeking companies to present at its 2010 conference taking place on October 12 – 13 at the Georgia Aquarium. More than 20 Georgia companies will be selected to speak. There will also be a trade show-style showcase to highlight 25 additional earlier stage companies. Entrepreneurs will have the opportunity to pitch their companies to more than 100 investors.
Notable companies that used Venture Atlanta as part of their fundraising process in past years include CloudSherpas, ControlScan, PlayOn Sports, Purewire, RentWiki, SoloHealth, Vertical Acuity, and WorthPoint. The video has testimonials from the leaders of a few of these companies.
There is no charge to apply to present or to present your company. Entrepreneurs interested in presenting at Venture Atlanta need to submit a two page executive summary by August 20th.
Despite the challenging times for bioscience funding, two ATDC companies successfully raised funds to complete clinical trials and expand footprint respectively.
CardioMEMS Inc., which is developing an implantable device to measure and transmit pulmonary artery pressure, has raised $37.9 million in additional capital. The funds give the Atlanta-based vendor capital to complete a clinical trial of its heart failure pressure management system, called CHAMPION, with 550 patients through 65 heart centers in the U.S. The trial started in 2007 with results expected this summer. The device is a wireless high-frequency sensor implanted in the artery using a catheter-based procedure based on proprietary technology from Georgia Tech. The pressure is measured and displayed on a monitoring system. Following the procedure, patients perform wireless measurements of the pulmonary artery pressure from home. The data is transmitted to a secure database for physician review on a proprietary Web site.
SoloHealth, Inc has raised $660,000 in additional capital. Founded in 2007, the company offers self-directed health-care services. Its first product, EyeSite, is an interactive, self-service, vision-testing kiosk that provides consumers with a free assessment of their vision, information about common eye health conditions and referrals to local eye care practitioners. As of March this year, SoloHealth had nearly 100 EyeSite kiosks in seven U.S. markets — including Atlanta ; Houston ; Richmond , Va. ; and Charlotte , N.C. — and will add three cities this year while enhancing the kiosks’ technology.
With ATDC’s expanded bioscience catalyst team we are available to work with all bioscience companies, from concept to market.
At its most basic, these are the three things that any investor wants to get answered before they will consider investing in your enterprise. Unfortunately, most entrepreneurs only address one of them.
Why this?
This is what most entrepreneurs focus on. Their idea. The product. The business plan. The marketing strategy. The sales channel. Manufacturing. Pricing. The website. The blog. Social media. Intellectual property protection. All critical things. And must be done right. But most people understand that, so let’s move on.
Why now?
Timing is everything. Are you the first player in an unproven market? Are you the last entrant in a crowded market with an undifferentiated solution? Being too early is just as bad as being too late. Is the market truly ready for your solution? How can you prove it? As they say, “you can’t time timing.”
Why you?
This my be the single most important piece of the puzzle. Why are you and your team the right group to pull off this business? Just because you thought of the idea, or are passionate about it is not enough. Do you have the ability to design the product, build the product, sell the product? Do you have domain experience in the market you’re going after? Can you be trusted with someone else’s money? Do you know what it really takes to run a startup company?
Think through these questions from an investor’s point of view. Make sure you are just as compelling on the timing and the team as you are on the product, and maybe you will be attractive to outside capital.
Cardlytics Inc., an ATDC member company, just closed on a $5 million round lead by Canaan and Polaris Ventures. Cardlytics software allows retailers to target advertising to specific consumers, via banking websites. Retailer ads are based on transaction information collected through the consumer’s bank card usage behavior. The transaction information is cleaned of personal data, so retailers can’t identify individual consumers.
“It’s a new way for customers to save money through the online banking relationship,” Cardlytics co-founder and Chief Operating Officer Lynne Laube said.
The company has raised about $8.4 million so far, and plans to add about 50 jobs early next year — more than doubling its current workforce.
That’s one of the essential questions we help you answer in our upcoming educational program CapVenture. CapVenture is a six week long, boot camp that will educate and equip early stage CEOs and executives to better manage and fund their business.
If you’re actively seeking funding or ever expect to, this is an essential program for you. You’ll get a inside look at the minds of venture capitalists and angel investors with an experienced team of investors, CEOs and industry executives. You will create a fundraising strategy, practice and sharpen your investor pitch, and at the end of the program, give your pitch in front of a room full of investors.
But CapVenture is not solely focused on fundraising. For entrepreneurs not looking to raise capital, CapVenture offers a unique opportunity to develop their business model, sharpen their go-to-market strategy, and enhance their network by sharing with and learning from a room full of CEOs, executives and investors.
Entrepreneurs, if you sell your company tomorrow, do you know how much you would make? Do you know how much your investors make? How about your employees? Better yet, you're raising a round of funding and you just received a new term sheet. How does this change everything?
The Liquidity Event Proceeds Calculator ("LEPC") was developed as a
joint project between the Atlanta Technology Development Center (ATDC)
and Siavage Law Group, LLC with assistance from Atlanta investment
bankers Croft and Bender, LLC. The LEPC provides users with a
comprehensive understanding of the effect of their particular venture
capital deal terms. It allows the user to input valuation, option pool
size, amount of investment, and amount and timing of the liquidity
event in order to customize various scenarios to the company's unique
financing circumstances. The LEPC projects the proceeds to be derived
by common holders, preferred holders and option holders in liquidity
events at varying valuations and varying time periods. The assumptions
are listed on the first page and the tool proceeds through three
pro-forma rounds of funding, A, B and C. In order to gain a working
understanding of the tool, we recommend that users review the
spreadsheets as written first before they modify the assumptions to
suit their needs. Each of the rounds has a pro-forma liquidity event at
increasing dollar values that can be modified by the user.
ATDC spends innumerable hours every week coaching entrepreneurs on their investment pitches. We see many entrepreneurs with good intentions make common mistakes and help them avoid common pitfalls as they prepare to present their companies in the best possible light. A great opportunity to observe fellow entrepreneurs in action is next Tuesday May 19th at MIT Forum of Atlanta’s Run it By the Pros workshop.
At Run it By the Pros four new companies will present their business plans to a panel of experts. The Venue : Law Offices of Carlton Fields, One Atlantic Center, 1201 West Peachtree Street, 49th Floor, Atlanta, GA, 30309; Time: 3:30 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. You can register here (members only but TAG members are eligible and can attend at the MIT Forum Member $25 rate). Clarification: You must be a member of the MIT Enterprise Forum to attend.
In addition to attending Run it By the Pros many an entrepreneur will find our articles on Telling a Compelling Story and Top VC Questions valuable resources when prepping to pitch their own deal.
