Chris Smith is the managing partner at Playfair Capital where he focuses on seed (and pre-seed) deals in the UK, Europe and Israel. Chris is particularly interested in autonomous transportation, business and industrial automation (especially through AI, ML and computer vision), HealthTech (except diagnostics and therapeutics) and B2B SaaS. But what gets Chris truly excited is when he can find companies operating in unloved/overlooked sectors that are ripe for disruption.

In this episode you’ll learn:
•The impact of being a 1-LP fund & how Playfair brings their heart with them into VC.
•Strategies for VCs and founders to win in the current bull market
•Why globally distributed teams are more resilient than traditional businesses
•The post-COVID effects on deal sourcing strategy and VC operations
•How PlayFair thinks about value add as a hands-on pre-seed & seed investor

Nico Goulet is founding and managing partner of Adara Ventures where they focus exclusively on B2B startups solving complex problems with breakthrough solutions. Adara are behind 36 investments and are responsible for the exit of AlienVault - the largest Spanish deep tech exit ever. Nico is a world-class thinker whose teaching at INSEAD and IE Business School has inspired VCs across all of Europe.
In this episode you’ll learn:
• Why dragons are often a better bet than unicorns.
• The difference between pickers and allocators and what each strategy’s strengths and weaknesses are
• How to craft a strategy and story that will convince investors to invest and stick with you through three busts and booms.
• How Nico thinks about portfolio strategy, modelling and the importance of staying coherent

Yuri Navarro is the founder and managing partner at Kanata Ventures. At Kanata they invest in promising B2B Enterprise technology startups and help them enter the North American market through Canada. Kanata Ventures operates out of Toronto and is attracting the best global founder teams to help them settle and grow out of Canada.

In this episode you’ll learn:
•How to hustle your way to raising a fund
•How to hack public programs for increased deal flow
•Why European startups should attack North America through Canada
•Why Yuri believes in the power of community and cooperation in the VC Industry.

Pedro Vieira is a founding and managing partner at newly launched Shilling Founders fund. We dive deep with Pedro on everything from raising the fund, how they’ve strategically designed their LP-base for a superior value add to their investment & portfolio management strategy. We also featured Pedro in our 8th episode where we dived deep with him on his time as Europe & Africa Lead at 500 Startups and creator of West to West.

In this episode you’ll learn:

•Why Pedro and Shilling share their profit with founders
•Shilling’s SLA to founders: in thirty days you’ll have money in the bank or a no-go.
•How to handle the pre-seed space as an institutional investor
•How to think about partnering with founders and other VCs for a competitive edge

Itxaso Del Palacio is a Partner at Notion Capital, one of Europe’s strongest early-stage SaaS and enterprise tech investors. Notion Capital was founded in 2009 and has invested in more than 60 startups and has more than €500 M assets under management. Itxaso joined the team of entrepreneurs and operators turned investors with a laser focus on product led growth and a truly founder-centric perspective that has quickly made her a central figure in the SaaS space.

** In this episode you will learn **

•What is product-led growth and why it’s one of the best growth routes for B2B SaaS in Europe.
•Why product-led growth companies are extra resilient during hard times.
•How Itxaso views startups advisors and best practice for working with them.
•Key lessons from Itxaso’s work with some of Europe’s best SaaS success stories.

Kate Talbot is Senior Forbes contributor and Marketing strategist for great VC firms such as Plexo Capital, Community Fund and Flybridge. Kate has a background from working directly with none other than the famed Richard Branson, in startups backed by revered firms such as Andreesen-Horowitz and has now started her own consultancy where she works with VCs on developing and executing their marketing strategy.

** In this episode you will learn **

• The importance of saying "Yes!".
• The strength of a well-crafted content marketing strategy & how to build it.
• Why marketing needs to be top of mind of any VC firm.
• How to humanize VC & make it leverage the power of community.

Pedro Vieira is Europe & Africa Lead at 500 Startups where he is working with governments in building up their ecosystems and training & aligning all relevant stakeholders. Pedro is a scientist, turned founder, turned investor, with deep experience in the tech world. He is also the creator of West to West, a not-for-profit that helps create and support a thriving environment for Portuguese entrepreneurship in the San Francisco Bay Area.

** In this episode you will learn **

• The contrasting characteristics of the European and US ecosystems from the perspective of someone connecting the West Coasts of these two geographies.
• The differing profiles of European and American founders.
• How 500 startups creates synergies to help countries across Europe build stronger and more robust innovation ecosystems.
• The value perceived by LPs in aligning and training all stakeholders of the ecosystem.one thing

Andrés Dancausa is EMEA Partner at The Venture City. The Venture City helps diverse founders achieve global impact through a unique model bringing together a product-led acceleration program and an early stage venture capital fund Head Quartered in Madrid, Spain but operating all around the globe. Andrés is a true operator turned investor, a friend of founders for his constant readiness and good advice. Something you’ll surely experience throughout the episode.

** In this episode you will learn **

• Why Andrés thinks diversity is imperative for generating VC & LP returns.
• How Andrés and TVC build with a true operator mindset.
• What TVC, as a truly globally diverse VC firm, brings to its founders.
• What product-led growth is and why it’s part of their secret sauce.

William McQuillan is a founding partner of Frontline Ventures. This is the second part of a two-part episode with William. If you haven't done it yet, we strongly recommend you go back and listen to our previous episode with William on Frontline's investment theses and how they support founders. In this episode we focus on firm building. Specifically how William built Frontline and took it from an Irish focused firm to a firm for globally ambitious B2B companies on both sides of the Atlantic.

** In this episode you will learn **

• How William perceives the funding environment in Europe, compared to the US.
• How Frontline collaborates with its LPs in adding value to their portfolio companies.
• The importance of VC firm building from William's perspective and how he believes it contributed to Frontline's success.
• Why William believes VCs should be more rigorous in their use of data to find deals

William McQuillan is a founding partner of Frontline Ventures. Prior to starting Frontline, William was a founding employee at Ondra, an award-winning startup investment boutique that went from a 4 person team to 70+ employees across London, New York and Paris in only 18 months. When Frontline was founded, William was 27 years old, making him the youngest VC ever to have raised a fund at that time (2012). Shortly after recording this episode William announced Frontline Fund III.

** In this episode you will learn **

•How William has built a truly differentiated investment thesis for Frontline’s two funds.
•What William looks for in seed stage startups and why he believes integrity is all important and money cannot be the founder’s main driver.
•How William perceives the effects of Brexit and its implications for their investment strategy and work with startups.
•Why William and Frontline are strong supporters of founders taking a small bit of secondaries in each round.

LINK https://www.frontline.vc/library/the-usa-playbook/
LINK https://www.frontline.vc/expanding-to-europe/