What are the chances of a successful exit for angel investors in a startup? Angel investing is a high-risk, high-reward game. The chances of a successful exit for angel investors can vary widely depending on several factors, including the startup’s industry, market conditions, and the effectiveness of the startup’s management team. On average, angel investors … Read more
The old west is alive and well in Silicon Valley – and Silicon Valley North.The closure of Bench Accounting Inc – self-described as the “world’s largest bookkeeping and tax advisory platform” – last week in Vancouver, would have been devastating to the Canadian economy.Except that it wasn’t! First of all, it wasn’t the “world’s largest … Read more
Yesterday morning I attended a video conference with the CEO of a promising startup in the AI space. The other attendees were two lawyers from one of Canada’s most prestigious law firms in Toronto. According to Statistics Canada there are more than 49,500 law firms in Canada, but the profession is dominated by just 7 … Read more
BEWARE THE WALKING DEAD: Tax Incentives for Angel Investors Twenty-five years ago, the government of British Columbia introduced the SMALL BUSINESS VENTURE CAPITAL ACT. After a quarter of a century, it’s probably time that we reflected on how effective that program has been. The BC venture capital credit is the granddaddy of all the provincial … Read more
Canada’s Business Development Bank weighs in on the ‘decline in the number of Canadian entrepreneurs’ A few days ago, I came across several articles in the Globe and Mail on a new study by the BDC and the University of Montreal. The study addressed a supposed decline in the number of Canadian ‘entrepreneurs’. “The study … Read more
PILGRIMAGE TO THE HOLY LAND (HUNTING FOR UNICORNS – PART 3) Government bureaucrats and high-tech CEOs from around the world make their bi-annual pilgrimage to Silicon Valley – DALL-E Image Creator As we’ve seen earlier, many factors probably contribute to a ‘healthy’ startup ecosystem. This article delves deeper into the private equity firms that fund … Read more
The Unicorn Kingdom A SURVEY OF FIVE COUNTRIES (AND THEIR STARTUP ECOSYSTEMS)(HUNTING FOR UNICORNS – PART 2) Hunting for Unicorns – Youtube.com According to CB INSIGHTS there are over 1,200 unicorns around the world. A unicorn company, or unicorn startup, is a private company with a valuation over $1 billion. As of July 2023, there … Read more
BC’s Venture Capital Tax Credits – Do They Make Sense? (Hunting for Unicorns – Part 1) Government Incubators – Youtube.com About ten years ago, I invested in a VCC in the Province of British Columbia. ‘VCC’ is the acronym for a VENTURE CAPITAL CORPORATION as defined by my province’s SMALL BUSINESS VENTURE CAPITAL ACT. BC’s … Read more
Unicorns don’t exist. So why are there so many of them? Unicorns are supposed to be mythical beasts. Yet, according to a 2019 article published in the World Economic Forum, there were 326 of them in 2017. And if the new PM of the United Kingdom has his way, we can expect to see more … Read more