London, May 22 2020
Support for startup founders to engage with investors – Platform Launch
Fantastic Beasts Ltd is pleased to announce the release of www.FantasticBeasts.TV, a SaaS platform to assist startup companies to engage with angel, VC and Family Office investors. Raising the first equity finance, whether angel or institutional, is traditionally a major challenge for startups, and since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the challenge has been exacerbated by the twin factors of diminished investor appetite and the impossibility of face-to-face investor meetings.
Events where startups pitch to investors (often known as “Demo Days”) have moved online but the challenge of finding relevant investor audiences remains key to the success of event organisers.
The Fantastic Beasts platform aggregates pitches from many Demo Day events in a single destination site so that they are more easily discoverable by investors. Some of the investors with early access to the platform are here, whilst an early Demo Day pilot adopter is WeWork Labs.
The platform allows founders to upload their pitch videos, and investors to search the database for opportunities which match their investment mandate or criteria, including location, business model, stage of development, sector, SEIS/EIS status, and others. For those seeking early-stage investment, the pitch video is instrumental in sparking interest and engagement with potential backers.
CEO & co-founder Jiahui Li explains:
“In the UK, around 36,000 new businesses seek equity funding each year, yet less than 1,000 are successful. There may be many reasons why a business fails to raise funding, but failure to connect with appropriate investors shouldn’t be one of them.”
Jiahui adds: “Our mission is to connect more founders with more potential investors and to empower investors to find the best opportunities. This is a really difficult time for startups – we know this first hand! We hope that our platform makes it just a bit easier for some of our fellow founders to stay in business and to prosper.”
Kay Kukoyi, tech startup mentor, author and Financial Times, Inclusive Boards & Tech Alliance Top 100 Most Influential BAME Leaders in UK Tech, comments:
“The Fantastic Beasts platform is a new gateway for investors and fundraisers to connect and initiate contact. The platform makes the discovery process more efficient and convenient, and in a global environment impacted by COVID-19, it is a tool that will raise startups’ visibility, and support investors in creating a pipeline of promising investments remotely.”
Jonathan Hollis, Managing Partner at Mountside Ventures, formerly head of PwC’s Raise programmes, comments:
“This platform removes friction from the process of early-stage discovery and investment. The platform allows investors to have a global view of the startup fundraising market, irrespective of where they are based, and allows founders to reach investors based around the world.”
Grant Calton, Angel Investor and Partner at Ironbridge Capital, said:
“Every investor wants to discover those fantastic beasts, whether centaurs or unicorns. The best returns generally come from the earliest investments yet those are often the hardest to find. This platform will make it easier for me to get sight of the best deals beyond London and beyond the UK”.
– ENDS
Notes to Editors
Fantastic Beasts Ltd The company was founded in London in December 2019 by King’s College London MSc Finance graduate Jiahui Li together with designer Benny Lee and developer Piyawan Tungkumvijit, ahead of entering the King’s College Ideas Factory competition where they reached the final in the House of Lords in February this year. In response to the pandemic, the company pivoted its business model and although dispersed by the lock-down to their respective homes in China, Thailand and Taiwan, have launched their revised product this week. The company has been named after the unicorns and centaurs that the founders hope the platform can help to bring to life.
For further information, please contact: Li@fantasticbeasts.tv
Kay Kukoyi CSM FITOL, CEO of Purposeful Group
Kay is a software delivery specialist, global tech startup mentor, author, speaker, and lecturer on the subjects of technology and entrepreneurship. Kay is the founder and CEO of Purposeful Group, a business, technology and training consultancy and Tech Startup Academy™, a global “Community and Centre for Learning”, which provides specialist books, mentoring, workshops, and programmes to support tech startup founders creating software from scratch to help them start, and grow their businesses. Kay has written five books for entrepreneurs and SMEs, including the Amazon international bestseller, Don’t Hire a Software Developer Until You Read this Book, and has been recognised on the #IB100, the Financial Times and Inclusive Boards list of the 100 Most Influential BAME Leaders in the UK Technology Sector.
For further information, please contact: hi@purposefulgroup.com.
Jonathan Hollis, Managing Partner at Mountside Ventures
For further information: https://www.mountsideventures.com
Grant Calton, Principal at Ironbridge Capital
Email: gc@ironbridgecp.com
