Erik Bullen, founder, angel and listener, gives us an overview of his startups and how his life has changed since exiting his last company.
Highlights:
Sal Daher Introduces Erik Bullen, Angel, Founder & Listener
Erik Bullen Is Excited About Focal Point, a SaaS Solution in the Procurement Space
“It's one of those stories where he could not find a solution to actually solve this problem so... I'm going to create my own solution and build my own company.”
Anders Lillevik of Focal Point Was on the Fence About Joining Techstars Atlanta; It Turned Out Well
“What Focal Point does is it integrates a lot of the other silos that are out there.”
How Erik Bullen Reshaped His Work Life After Selling His Company
“...Guidely is targeting...alternate methods of mental health and personal development and using techniques, not clinical techniques...”
Cyberthentic: “...a very novel way to prevent email business compromise...”
“It's actually complementary to some of the other cybersecurity solutions out there.”
Meenta Grew Exponentially During COVID
Gabor Bethelendy’s First Startup Failed; a Few Months Later Gabor Was Starting Meenta
Gabor Bethlendy Met His Co-Founder Stephan Smith Because Their Sons Got into Fisticuffs at School
Realplay: Simplifying Sports Videos for Tournament Venues
Realplay Cameras Record Tournament Play, Its Algorithm Finds and Tags Crucial Parts
Erik Bullen and Justin Real of Real Play Developed a Close Advisory Relationship
Erik Bullen Was Born in Bremen to a German Mom and an American Dad
Biked 10 Miles in His Suit During a Virginia Summer to Get to a Job Interview!
“"Looks like you need a beer." He goes over a fridge gets me a beer. This is a very different interview than I was expecting.”
“It was formative for me in terms of really loving starting things and building things as well.”
"Hey, by the way, your van is smoking."
Erik Bullen Worked in Amsterdam in Digital Marketing; World Wildlife Fund & International Red Cross Were Clients
Erik Bullen Eventually Headed Global Services at Brightcove
Sal Daher Asks Erik Bullen About Obstacles to Investing in Biotech
Knowledge About the Science and the Industry Is the First Obstacle
Long Investment Hold and Capital Requirements Are the Second Obstacle
“Life Sciences would be great, but you know what, I can't spread myself too thin either.”
“I'm big on finding solutions and supporting cancer research...but I have not invested in a company that focuses on that area.”
Sal Daher’s Perspective on the Knowledge Problem in the Life Sciences
Why Sal Daher Is Bullish on Daphne Zohar and PureTech Health
Why Sal Daher Is Focusing on Angel-Scale Biotech
RockStep Solutions and VistaPath Bio Are Examples of Software Eating the Life Sciences
“Most of these companies are going to end up being bought by a strategic.”
The Angel Invest Boston Podcast Introduced Erik Bullen to Angel Investing
Compare & Contrast: Walnut Ventures, Launchpad and TBD Angels
Erik Bullen’s Parting Thoughts
ANGEL INVEST BOSTON IS SPONSORED BY:
Founder, Angel & Listener
Guest: Founder and Angel, Erik Bullen
Sal Daher: I'm really proud to say that the Angel Invest Boston Podcast is sponsored by Purdue University Entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson. Purdue is exceptional in its support of its faculty; faculty that's top five engineering school, in helping them get their technology from the lab out to the market, out to industry, out to the clinic.
Peter Fasse is also a great support to entrepreneurs. He is a patent attorney specializing in microfluidics and has been tremendously helpful to some of the startups which I'm involved including a startup, came out of Purdue, Savran Technologies. I'm proud to have these two sponsors for my podcast.
Sal Daher Introduces Erik Bullen, Angel, Founder & Listener
Welcome to Angel Invest Boston, conversations with Boston's most interesting angels and founders. Today, I'm delighted to have as my guest, founder and angel investor and advisor Erik Bullen. Welcome, Erik.
Erik Bullen: Hi, Sal. Great to be here. Nice to finally join your podcast, I think we met in July 2018 when we started talking about angel investing. I've talked for a while now, for the past few years, about being on a podcast. I'm glad to finally be here.
Sal Daher: Well, Erik is a listener to the podcast, and we connected because of that. Every time I talk to a listener, I'm like, "Oh, geez, oh, gosh, somebody like this listens to the podcast. I really have to up my game." It's just amazing.
Erik Bullen: I heard from you first back in 2018 and listened to it ever since. Honestly, I've been shut in for the past week just to prepare for the podcast [unintelligible 00:01:41]
Sal Daher: [laughs] No need to. No need to. Well, Erik, without too much ado, because there are listeners who want us to get to startups, let's talk about you're an angel investor. You're a very active angel. Let's talk about some startups that are exciting for you at the moment. It doesn't mean it's those startups you care about the most but it's like your daughter just got married so you talk about the daughter that just got married. Doesn't mean you don't like the other daughter.
Erik Bullen Is Excited About Focal Point, a SaaS Solution in the Procurement Space
Erik Bullen: Sure thing. There are a few startups that I'm excited about right now. There's one in particular that I've been working with for just about a year and a half and it's a startup called Focal Point. It's a B2B SaaS solution that is solving a big problem in the procurement space. Imagine there are large Fortune 500 and Fortune 1000 global companies that are managing procurement spend on spreadsheets and PowerPoints up to this day.
Yes, there are solutions out there such as Ariba and Coupa and so on, but they're not solving this particular problem, which is, I think, anytime you find a sector or a niche where people still use PowerPoints and spreadsheets that’s a break and that was the case here. Focal Point was founded by Anders Lillevik. He's based in Atlanta, but we also have myself here, in Boston. We have another team member in Boston as well. We're kind of global. We also have team members in Eastern Europe as well. Founded just a month before the pandemic. Imagine that. Anders, he was an executive, chief procurement officer at major Fortune 500s including Fannie Mae and Wells Fargo for many, many years.
“It's one of those stories where he could not find a solution to actually solve this problem so... I'm going to create my own solution and build my own company.”
It's one of those stories where he could not find a solution to actually solve this problem so he finally said, "Look, you know what? I'm quitting. I'm going to create my own solution and build my own company." I always thought founder stories, where they're scratching their own itch, which is the case here. It's not just product-market fit, but also founder-market fit, and he really deeply understands the market.
He started the company just about a month before the pandemic. Just about nine months later, he's got a product in market. He's got customers that are actually starting to pay, including global customers such as Indeed, Riot Games, MGM Grand. Subsequent to that, middle of this year, he was accepted into Techstars Atlanta. We actually had a pretty tough decision to make about that because of the, do you take three months, essentially, to go through Techstars? What's the value add there especially when your business is accelerating already?
Anders Lillevik of Focal Point Was on the Fence About Joining Techstars Atlanta; It Turned Out Well
It was one of those 50-50 decisions. In the end, he did join Atlanta but I think in the end, it was valuable building connections with some of the corporate venture firms as well, or corporate CVCs I'd say, including Comcast and then also Black and Decker, who are now interested in co-investing as well. It's a $56 billion market. In terms of the expected growth, looking to be, potentially, within the next five years at about $80 million with profitability as well. Highly profitable, potentially. It's a SaaS solution that has high margins, and a three-year contract as well for most companies.
Sal Daher: Oh wow.
Erik Bullen: It's a really nice business model and an opportunity too to then branch out and do that line and expand that a lot of SaaS companies do. Expect to be profitable by 2024. I'm super excited about that.
Sal Daher: Explain to me, again, which particular sector they're addressing?
Erik Bullen: The pain point is really a functional pain point for procurement within large organizations, and midsize organizations as well, let's say organizations larger than 500 people. Imagine an organization like Indeed. I think they have about 160 procurements people across the globe, and they need to manage procurement spend, and spend meaning category spend, such as who's spending money on consultants or IT or other things. Their charge is, "Hey, you've got to control the spend. You've got to justify the spend as well.
You've got to report the spend. There's a lot of stuff there in terms of selecting vendors, bringing them on board, and then project managing that spend itself on a global basis. The pain point really is, it's a lot of manual work these days still. There is not a solution out there. It is literally spreadsheets and PowerPoints. From a justification perspective, sometimes CTOs, chief procurement officers, or procurement leaders, sometimes have trouble justifying even what value am I adding to the executives.
What Focal Point does is it integrates a lot of the other silos that are out there. It picks the data. It's a data layer as a business intelligence solution in many ways on one hand, and on the second hand, very simply, it's a project management tool for these procurement teams. It's solving a deep problem, and it really accelerates the ability to understand what's happening even for large organizations, where are we spending money? How are we spending money? What's the value add, et cetera. Then being able to coordinate with those teams.
“What Focal Point does is it integrates a lot of the other silos that are out there.”
Sal Daher: I like that play, where you're bringing in a SaaS platform that can bring information in an automated way and so forth, to replace spreadsheets. I am an investor. I don't know if you saw these guys at Walnut. They're called RockStep Solutions. They've been on the podcast. What they're doing is providing a SaaS platform for preclinical trials. Right now, all the data from preclinical trials are kept on spreadsheets. It's like they don't have any competition. It's really easy for them to go in someplace. It improves the productivity of the lab tremendously. It's all part of Marc Andreessen's thesis, as he stated in 2011, of software eating the world and still doing it. That is great. Now, what was your role in the company? You have an operating role the company as well?
Erik Bullen: Next to this one, I am an advisor as well as investor.
Sal Daher: Okay, great, how did you connect with them?
Erik Bullen: Connected through one of the networks that I had. I'm connected with several marketplaces for angels and investors. Somehow, Anders reached out to me, I think, via LinkedIn and wanted to chat. I'm sure you do the same thing. I get reached out to via LinkedIn quite a bit. [crosstalk] why not?
Sal Daher: There's a lot of stuff, oh, my gosh. Anybody who connects with me on LinkedIn should know if I don't respond it's not that I’m being standoffish. I'm overwhelmed. The other day, I discovered that I had a LinkedIn message from a year ago, from a guy who is Chief Counsel of a public company in which I was an early investor. It's like, "Oh, gosh, I can't believe it." My apologies. I'm going to chat with him in a couple days. He was a good sport about it. It just popped up. It was January 6th, 2020. He had sent me a message on LinkedIn and I missed it, because I got a gazillion things going on.
Erik Bullen: I feel the same way. I do my best to respond to people, especially founders, try to help them out, but sometimes it's just overwhelming and gets lost between email and LinkedIn, and Slack and everything else. You start feeling overwhelmed sometimes.
Sal Daher: Absolutely crazy.
Erik Bullen: I think the difference for us as well, there's some angel investors who are fulltime angel investors. I'm an angel investor and still an operator as well. You balance your one-day job with the other day job as well.
How Erik Bullen Reshaped His Work Life After Selling His Company
Sal Daher: What's your day job right now, Erik?
Erik Bullen: I really split my time since 2018 and really shortly after you and I met, I exited a company. I was CEO of a digital marketing company, exited that in August 2018. Then decided at that point, my daughter had turned five, she started kindergarten, I said, "Look, as opposed to having just a single job, I'll do a portfolio of things."
Sal Daher: Oh, good.
Erik Bullen: Splitting my time across three different things. One is giving back to the community. That includes mentoring at Techstars, MassChallenge, and some other accelerators. I'm also on the board of directors for an organization called Vencapital. We provide venture capital training to minorities and women entry level, and then help place them at at VC firms and PE firms. Also, on the board of advisors for The Capital Network, we provide fundraising training to all founders.
Sal Daher: Extremely valuable.
Erik Bullen: We're really focusing heavily right now on minorities and women as well and, running that program, on the board of advisors as well as mentoring there. That's one bucket of work that I do. The second bucket is I do advise and consult as well, with early-stage companies typically towards the formative stage sometimes as they're scaling up as well, and typically around product operations and scaling.
It could be more of a consulting advisor basis. I take a fractional COO job as well, which I'm doing right now. I could talk about one of the other companies I'm excited about where I'm fractional COO right now. Do you know Qiuyan? She's part of Walnut as well. She's part of TBD, Qiuyan Xu. We also do work together with Gravitate which is an AI data science consultancy.
Sal Daher: She's got to be on the podcast.
Erik Bullen: Awesome. She's amazing. We've been working together for about two years now and brilliant.
Sal Daher: Delightful person.
Erik Bullen: Then the third part, I think we'll talk about later is, or started talking about, is angel investing. My first angel investing group was Walnut. We can talk about how I get involved there and then Launchpad, TBD Angels, and on the investing side, also not just angel, but also an LP in two funds as well. I diversified. Anyway, that's the short story of what I'm doing right now.
Sal Daher: Let's do the angel stuff later, because we have a crowd that's very itching to hear about startups. Tell us about your second startup you're excited about.
“...Guidely is targeting...alternate methods of mental health and personal development and using techniques, not clinical techniques...”
Erik Bullen: The second startup is very different from Focal Point. Mental health and personal development, the need for that has really exploded in the past couple years. Partially because COVID, partially because mental health has become more acceptable as well. There are a lot of startups right now over the past years that have focused on more the clinical therapy of mental health. There's a sector there, or segment that a company called Guidely is targeting, which is the alternate methods of mental health and personal development and using techniques, not clinical techniques, but also meditation, NLP, shamanism, so art therapy and so on.
Really looking at what we call guides, and guides can be therapists, mentors, coaches, who help our clients to develop themselves and really focus on 16 different problem areas, including divorce, addiction, personal development, creativity, and so on, and really matching clients with those guides that we have on our platform. I say ours, because I'm actually a fractional COO for this company. I'm excited about it because it's also I think a really investible company. We just closed a $3 million seed round at this point, so really scaling at this point. Again, we have team members in Boston and Phoenix and actually one member in Israel as well. We’re distributed.
It's a sign of the times in some ways, but I'm excited about this company because the founders are Amir and Shannon. They've known each other for a long time. They really deeply understand the sector and this industry, have heavy connections in it, and they really want to make a difference. They're passionate about it. One thing I always look for founders is they really understand deeply their market, the problem that they're trying to solve and sometimes solving it for themselves as well. Super excited about it. We're scaling right now. I'm excited we just hired three new employees last week and we're getting to scale and, hopefully, have a rocket ship. We'll see.
Sal Daher: That's Guidely.
Erik Bullen: It's Guidely.
Sal Daher: Excellent.
Cyberthentic: “...a very novel way to prevent email business compromise...”
Erik Bullen: I can talk about one other startup. I talked about two that you know, which I'm so excited about, and then I think both of us are involved in. One other that is, again, very different. I'm talking about these because they're very different industries and sectors. There's another startup that involved in right now called Cyberthentic. Very super early stage. Charles, the founder is a technologist, more of a CTO type, but he's found a very novel way to prevent email business compromise, essentially, phishing.
Sal Daher: Would you say the name again?
Erik Bullen: Cyberthentic.
Sal Daher: Cyberthentic, like cyber authentic? Cyberthentic.
Erik Bullen: Except the A and U. Charles found a novel way of-- Basically, we believe right now preventing email business compromise, which includes phishing and other ways to compromise email 100%, there are other cybersecurity firms out there right now that can claim let's say 92%, 93% effectiveness, depending on who you talk to. We believe that at least the way that this system has been designed, it can be done 100%. We're still in the formative stages right now piloting things and testing things out, but we believe the way it's been designed... We are actually planning to have a hackathon potentially in the next six months to have people actually try to break the system. We believe that we can do this 100%.
“It's actually complementary to some of the other cybersecurity solutions out there.”
It's actually complementary to some of the other cybersecurity solutions out there. Similar to Focal Point, it's not intended to be a replacement, but a compliment to what some of these larger companies have. There are a lot of opportunities there. Imagine two actors in an ecosystem or sector, government, for instance. If you're the DOD or other parts of the Federal government, or you're in the healthcare systems, which are highly regulated, if you have two organizations within that who want to email themselves between each other highly securely without being able to be compromised, or having the solution that's out there actually capturing any of the personal identifiable information, Cyberthentic can do that.
You have to as Organization A and Organization B agree that you're going to use the solution. Once you do that, it's 100% guaranteed at that point. It's pretty exciting to be able to do that. Like I said, we believe it works. We have to prove it. Once it is, I think it's a huge opportunity for that company.
Sal Daher: It sounds tremendous. What are the other startups that you're excited about that we have in common?
Erik Bullen: Let me mention, two. I think you've mentioned Meenta a few times, right?
Sal Daher: Oh, yes.
Erik Bullen and Sal Daher on Meenta, One of Their Favorite Startups
Erik Bullen: Definitely excited about Meenta, what Gabor and Stephan has been able to do with the past couple of years and during the pandemic. There was a lot of hand wringing and debate about should you go into COVID-19 testing and so on. Are you splitting the business model into two? I think it's the ways it I guess, coalesced or come together as being this overall marketplace for all testing, right?
Sal Daher: Yes. It's amazing what they have done.
Erik Bullen: Definitely excited about what's happening on that side.
Sal Daher: Let's recapitulate a little bit what Meenta was supposed to do, what they're doing right now and where are they going to go. Do you care to do that? I think it's a good idea. Your take on Meenta instead of mine which they've heard three times over.
Erik Bullen: My take is I actually met Gabor and Stephan during the early days. The original idea was to have a marketplace for genome sequencers. Scientists need to use genome sequencers, which are large. Machines at either labs or even higher educational services, they could cost anywhere from $50,000 to $100,000 to $150,000. The way that scientists used to find availability for these GM sequencers was they called around. They basically had--
Sal Daher: They sent emails.
Erik Bullen: Right. Sent emails.
Sal Daher: How many was it? Was it 60 emails that they had to set around before they could book a slot on one of these next-generation sequencers?
Erik Bullen: Exactly. A highly manual process. Again, I think anytime you find a sector where things are very manual, there might be an ability there to make a difference.
Sal Daher: Software eating the world again.
Erik Bullen: Exactly. I think early-stage Gabor said we're the Airbnb of GM sequencing. I've heard that a few times, but that was the original idea. I think they had a pretty good start and then COVID-19 hit. Obviously, at that point, things started shutting down. Question is what do you do now at this point? There was some debate about going into other markets and so on but, obviously, one area where there was a lot of need was for COVID-19 tests.
Sal Daher: They're in the testing business.
Erik Bullen: Yes. We're in the testing business. Hey, why not?
Sal Daher: Yes. Clinical tests, scientific tests.
Meenta Grew Exponentially During COVID
Erik Bullen: That was the decision to go, "Hey, let's offer COVID-19 tests and once the pandemic is over, we can go back to offering genome sequencers and all the other stuff." I think the COVID-19 testing business has done well. I'm actually a client as well because I couldn't find any tests and I could find tests on Meenta which is something I'm happy about. At the same time, now it's a much broader scope for the company. It's really an any test any time marketplace for anyone. Really offering access across the world for all clinical tests and scientific equipment.
Sal Daher: And reagents.
Erik Bullen: Yes.
Sal Daher: Basically, what they're going to end up doing is solving the pain point for scientists that they need to do a clinical test, a clinical assay, and they need reagents. They need to book time on a machine. A lot of times you have four slots on a sequencer. There’s a scheduling thing because it's $15,000 per slot. Even if you're the Broad Institute and you've got this high-end sequencer, it costs you $60,000 every time you run it. It makes sense if you can have two slots that you're occupying and have two other people occupying the other two slots on the machine, it becomes a lot cheaper. It becomes a lot more doable. It's amazing.
Gabor Bethelendy’s First Startup Failed; a Few Months Later Gabor Was Starting Meenta
I met Gabor in a startup prior to Meenta. As a matter of fact, it was a failed startup. Let me tell you, Gabor, the CEO, those guys, they gave their best, but it just wasn't to be. It was neonatal testing. Actually, the technology was bought by Quest. It's been used, but it just wasn't viable at that scale. I tell you, it was like, I don’t know, I want to say three or four months after they closed the company, Gabor calls me says, "Sal, let's get together at Darwin's in Cambridge and have some coffee. I got an idea." He had Meenta.
He had just been through this failed startup and it was four months later he was ready to get back on the saddle. I was like, "This guy's amazing." He's a tenacious marathoner. He's the most tenacious character you've ever seen. He had the good sense to hook up with Stephan, who's knowledgeable on the software side and so forth, and Gabor's a life science person, so it was great. The whole thing came about because their kids had fisticuffs at school. Kids go to the same school, and they became great friends. I think the kids are friends now but at that point, they had to go to the house--
One father had to go to the house of the other father to apologize about that or something. Then they became friends from that experience. They've hit it off and they are a great team. They complement each other tremendously. They've built a really great team because they're nice people, a good group of people to work with. They are looking for people right now. They probably won't be when the podcast launches but they are always looking for really talented people, product people, software people, and so forth. That is an amazing company. A testament to the tenacity and just vision of Gabor and Stephan. Tremendous.
Erik Bullen: Agree. Great people, good people. I think you mentioned tenacity. I think the one thing I look for in founders is conviction as well and passion for it. Really being able to continue sticking with it, despite the adversity as well. Actually, I want to talk about one of the other startups which actually is on the topic. I'm just curious from your perspective, given this is for angel investors, given that you knew Gabor and Gabor's previous endeavor did not end successfully, how did you decide to invest in him again? I'm curious about that.
Sal Daher: To watch Gabor. Gabor is not a pretty talker, okay? He's not a smooth talker but the guy is tenacious. He's focused. He gives it his best and he has, what you mentioned, conviction. Get a beer into Gabor and get him talking about the problems in science. The waste and all the inefficiencies. We spend more than ever. The inputs into science are growing all the time, the outputs are flat. We can do so much better at generating scientific discoveries, and Gabor is intensely aware of that. Meenta is an attempt to solve one little corner of that massive inefficiency that exists in the research world. Patrick Collison of Stripe fame-addresses this problem as well. It's well recognized.
This is his conviction. I think this is a highly consequential area, improving the scientific process. The process for discovery is everything, okay? The character that I saw in Gabor. He's an honest guy, really hard working, straightforward, not a BS artist. Then what really impressed me is that he had the foresight to recognize that he needed somebody who understood software and somebody who could talk, which is Stephan. Gabor can explain it to you, but Stephen is very well-spoken. There's this division of labor there, and Gabor knows intimately the whole life science space.
Gabor Bethlendy Met His Co-Founder Stephan Smith Because Their Sons Got into Fisticuffs at School
Stephen really understands software and can explain it and it's a great, great partnership. They're friends. That's the amazing thing. [chuckles] They get along very well and it's an amazing, remarkable company. I wish them every success, not just because I've got to make tons of money on that company [laughter] and you too, but because it could not be a more likable group. They're going to do a lot of good for the world. Making scientific discovery more efficient is going to save a lot of lives.
Erik Bullen: Yes, I agree. Then just one last thing about Stephan is I think he's a great technologist. He can very quickly understand the needs and very quickly build new functions, new functionality, and build what customers need. I really appreciate that about him.
Sal Daher: He can explain it.
Erik Bullen: Yes.
Sal Daher: Which is amazing. Imagine a software guy that can talk.
Realplay: Simplifying Sports Videos for Tournament Venues
Erik Bullen: [chuckles] Exactly. One last startup I'm excited about it. I think we have some commonality here. You know this company called Realplay?
Sal Daher: Oh, yes. [laughs] Poor Justin Real. Oh my gosh. I called the dogs on him the other day.
Erik Bullen: Really? [laughs]
Sal Daher: Oh, yes. I'll tell you later. It's a stupid story.
Erik Bullen: I'm talking about different startups in different sectors because I think it's interesting. We get to cover life sciences, mental health, cybersecurity, et cetera. This is sports tech for youth. I met Justin about just a few months after I met you. It was about September, October, 2018. I was speaking on a panel at Startup Boston. Justin saw that I was speaking there and he reached out to me via LinkedIn and said, "Hey, I got this startup. Do you mind spending 10 minutes with me?" Going back to what do we talked about LinkedIn. I was like, "Sure, why not? Happy to chat about it."
We spent some time during Startup Boston and said, "Look, great. This looks really interesting. Maybe I can help you and maybe we can work together. Let's have a follow-up conversation." The relationship evolved from there. We started working together. For me when I work together with a founder it's got to be, one, can I help them? Two is, is there chemistry? Then at the same time, look, I'm still learning as well. I'm interested in things and I've got my philosophy tis beginner's mind. I don't know everything. I'm continuously learning. I can learn from these brilliant founders as well.
Sal Daher: Oh geez. They're like scientists discovering stuff. They're on the edge of knowledge. You better learn from them. [laughs] Erik, what we can teach them is tie your shoelaces, or [unintelligible 00:27:05]. That kind of stuff. They're on the edge of human knowledge and they're discovering stuff that nobody knows. You can't teach them about that. They have to discover. We help them with the lease. We help them with the procurement, that kind of stuff, but they have to drive the thing.
Erik Bullen: The more you know, the more you know you don't know, right?
Sal Daher: It all goes back to Socrates. The one thing I know is that I don’t know.
Erik Bullen: Exactly. We started working together and the relationship evolved from there. We started working together on fundraising and then eventually on sales and marketing, customer success. Eventually, we raised a round from Launchpad as well. We ended up at about, I think $750,000 maybe $800,000 total for the seed round. At that point, I also jumped in to help Justin for about a three-month period during the summer to prove product market fit, working with him on customer success, sales, and marketing during the summer. I get to have my hair on fire as well operating as opposed to just being an investor and advisor as well. I'm excited about the company. Just to take a step back in terms of what Realplay does is, they solve a problem.
Imagine you’re a parent, coach or even player scout typically when you go to a baseball or softball game for your sports, anywhere from early-stage up to high school level, you want to have video clips of either your daughter or your kids, essentially. Scouts want video clips of the players as well to be able to select them. Typically, what has happened in the past is, especially in the past 10 years, people hold up their cell phones.
Realplay Cameras Record Tournament Play, Its Algorithm Finds and Tags Crucial Parts
Justin is a former college baseball player. He said, "Look," again, going back to founder-market fit, "this is a problem that I've had myself. Why not create a solution where we can actually record video of the games. We can clip those games for each particular player using machine learning and natural language processing, and computer vision. Then provide those clips to players, coaches, and parents via SaaS solution subscription basis."
Sal Daher: Once again, software eating the world.
Erik Bullen: Yes, what's interesting here is...it's definitely software play, but also hardware component too, the camera itself, which we had to provide. Which sometimes from some of the investors' perspective is, well, there's this asset-heavy, capital-heavy equipment.
Sal Daher: "That's not going to scale, blah, blah, blah." A lot of friction.
Erik Bullen: It's a small component. The initial business model had Realplay going out to-- Initially, the idea was going out to high schools, or other players. That's heavily intensive, wouldn't work, not scalable. Then, eventually, the idea which work now is going to tournament providers. There are hundreds of tournament providers out there that we could actually then sell through as part of the package.
Sal Daher: For those people were not familiar, these are, basically, venues that are destination and they have, I don't know, like 16 baseball diamonds. Kids go there, they have tournaments, they stay at hotels nearby. There's a whole little microeconomy that's around this little nucleus of baseball diamonds. Those kids are the kids that are likely scouts are going to be interested in and so forth. It's not like my dad taking a video of me playing something in sports.
It's just for the picture books. It's never going to be qualifying for, but these kids that are going to these camps, they are. They have a high propensity to buy, for them it's very high value, and he's using machines and software to solve headaches that humans have. The thing is, piecing these things back together and finding the play where the kid hits the ball just right and so forth, I understand they have a little bit of machine vision applied to that to figure out where the interesting spots are.
Erik Bullen: They do. I think what's interesting here just in terms of the journey, what I want, want to mention too, is the original plan for the first three to four years was to be very labor intensive initially. That first summer we hired about 50 college students who were there for the summer, set up the cameras, managed the cameras, downloaded the videos, recorded and then essentially processed the video as well. The idea was eventually everything will be automated over a three to four-year period. What happened was that with COVID that accelerated, so essentially forced the hand of Realplay. I remember this was probably about a year and a half ago maybe, Justin and I, we talked almost every week.
Erik Bullen and Justin Real of Real Play Developed a Close Advisory Relationship
We got to the point of the relationship with Justin calling me up on the weekend, and I'm doing laundry, he's doing dishes and we just chat about the business and what his issues are, things he can't talk with his board about or his team. Literally he had to make a decision. He was in Boston, and he had to make a decision. I'm going to be at this tournament in Wisconsin, I've got two weeks of cash left in the bank, do I stay for another three days over the weekend because there's an opportunity to actually meet someone who could be a great partner, another tournament provider and potentially technology partner? Debating back and forth about that.
If you stay you, and it doesn't work out, you are out. We're not going to have any cash anymore. We eventually decided, look, go for it and take another swing at the bat. You’ve got to do it. We have to try it. You're an entrepreneur. He went out there. He stayed out an additional three days. Again, it's sometimes serendipity as well and making things happen, and he built a relationship and got a deal. It helped to bring the company along. Through COVID-19 despite tournaments shutting down, he's really, I hate to use the term pivot, but he's accelerated some of the technology development, built relationship with really important other tournament providers as well as technology partners, and the company's still in existence and now raising the next round. I think it's a wonderful story.
Sal Daher: No, no, he's a very impressive founder. I really like Justin. He's going to be back on the podcast soon. He's been on before, and he's going to be telling the story in more detail. Great, Erik, appreciate hearing from your interesting startups.
Give us a little bit of your biography and how you got interested in starting a company first, and then eventually how you became an angel. You were not born in the US. You were born in the Netherlands. Is that right?
Erik Bullen: Next door, in Germany.
Sal Daher: In Germany, okay.
Erik Bullen Was Born in Bremen to a German Mom and an American Dad
Erik Bullen: I was born in Germany to a German mom and American dad, and lived in Northern Germany a city state called Bremen, and grew up there for nine years. Pretty modest family upbringing. My mom's side, she was a homemaker, and her extended family, police, military, just very modest, farmers as well and teachers. My dad was 24 years in the air force, veteran of World War II and Korea, and then eventually ended up in the aerospace industry and traveled quite a bit for aerospace and working customer service and support as well. I always remember he traveled quite a bit, but he was always-- There's a term aerospace called Aircraft On Ground, AOG.
He literally had the pager when an aircraft was on ground, he was in charge. I grew up in Northern Germany then moved down south for three years in a small village in Bavaria, which was pretty much a culture shock for me in some ways. It's very different down there. Then, eventually, my dad got a job to open an office in the US for another aerospace company and we ended up in Minneapolis. Spent three years there and then he ended up opening another office for another company in the Northern Virginia DC area. Ended up in Northern Virginia for quite some time.
I went to high school there and then eventually decided to go to college in Virginia to William & Mary, which is in Waynesburg and studied both business, primarily around operations and then computer science as well. Back then, this was in the early '90s, it was either I'll be a doctor or a lawyer or you go into business. I decided business would give me more flexibility in terms of where and how. At the same time you had this trend of technology really being integral to business as well, so I decided study computer science as well during that time.
My first experience with entrepreneurship was, while I was in William & Mary, I needed a job. I saw a flyer in the dorm about a company called College and University Computers. If you remember during those days Dell compact, et cetera. You could essentially at that point, you could take computer components, build PCs, and then sell them. That's how Dell and Compact and others got to start. This company CUC, did the same thing and Lee, the founder was a William and Mary grad, and he decided, "Look, this is market niche here. We can target every college student who needs a computer, let's go for it." He founded a company about a year before I joined.
Biked 10 Miles in His Suit During a Virginia Summer to Get to a Job Interview!
I saw the flyer; I needed a job. I said, look, I'll apply. I got the interview with Lee. Now, when I got the interview, it was a late summer day in Virginia, about 95 degrees, very hot. The only thing I had was my bike and I had about 10 miles to go. I didn't have a car back then. I put on the only suit I had, got on my beat-up bike and cycled 10 miles to the office.
Sal Daher: Listeners should know that Erik Bullen is a very fit biker.
Erik Bullen: I am now.
Sal Daher: It's not me on a bike, it's Erik Bullen on the bike. He's going to slow a little less, but still, and bikes really do cool you, but still.
“"Looks like you need a beer." He goes over a fridge gets me a beer. This is a very different interview than I was expecting.”
Erik Bullen: Yes. By the way, back then I was not as fit of a biker as I am today. I arrived very exhausted. I got off my bike walk in, I see Lee the founder, and he brings me into this office, which is a typical startup office. Boxes everywhere, messy, and, very scrappy, and brings me in. First thing he says is, "Looks like you need a beer." He goes over a fridge gets me a beer. This is a very different interview than I was expecting.
Anyway yes, I got the job. I did a lot of things around operations, putting together computers, testing them, delivering customer service. I learned a lot about business, different functions, including sales and marketing. We had a retail arm, we had mail arm as well, and then delivered computers. Lee, he was my boss. He became a mentor and also best friend till this day as well.
Sal Daher: Tremendous.
“It was formative for me in terms of really loving starting things and building things as well.”
Erik Bullen: It was formative for me in terms of really loving starting things and building things as well. I remember a couple scenarios, a few years ago walking and talking one-on-ones became popular I think pre-COVID, especially in Silicon Valley. Lee and I did that all the time. Even one day I had a bad experience, or I didn't do the best job with a customer and by the time I got back to the office, Lee was like, "Well, I got a call from a customer. Let's talk about it," so we did a walk and talk.
Sal Daher: Let's walk and talk.
Erik Bullen: We did a walk and talk, yes. He had some really sage advice about how to deal with customers, even if they're not the best customers. I really learned a lot from him. I'll mention one other story about that and then I'll move on. The one time we had one delivery van, a very beat up delivery van with what a hundred thousand miles on it. Which we used to drive all over Virginia to deliver the PCs to students. One day we had the van loaded up, we were back in the office and next thing you know, the company owner comes over, he says, "Hey, by the way, your van is smoking." The engine was smoking, like, "Oh, no. What I'm going to do?" By the time I had enough cash to actually buy a used-
"Hey, by the way, your van is smoking."
Sal Daher: Take the computers out.
Erik Bullen: Yes, take the computers out first. Save the computers. Needless to say, we couldn't use it anymore. I finally had enough money to actually buy a used Hyundai Elantra. In fact, Hyundai was low, not as high as it is today, right?
Sal Daher: Yes.
Erik Bullen: We packed all the computer boxes in the Hyundai Elantra and Lee the founder he got in. It's a calm car, so he drove five and a half hours, 250 miles to Virginia Tech. It's resilience, you figure it out and go for it.
Sal Daher: Absolutely.
Erik Bullen: That was my first experience with a startup and really formed a lot of what I believe in, and also my passion for it. Since that time, I joined what's today, Verizon, back then it was Bell Atlantic. I did software engineering for a few years when we moved everything from mainframes over to the internet. I did work on mainframes and started developing Internet technologies as well. I really didn't like the corporate environment. I was there for about two and a half years.
During that time, I decided I wanted to branch out and do something else, in addition to working for the corporate environment. I founded a nonprofit that helped K-12 schools to connect with technologists and for the technologists, and tech companies to help K-12 schools with technology, including mentoring, providing equipment, and so on. I founded the nonprofit and through the nonprofit got connected with a venture capital firm that had invested in a company called New Media Publishing.
Erik Bullen Worked in Amsterdam in Digital Marketing; World Wildlife Fund & International Red Cross Were Clients
New Media Publishing, during the heyday of the internet, worked on developing websites and products and so on for media companies, nonprofits, as well as telecom companies. Through that connection, I joined NMP, and then ended up opening up a Dutch office after three months. I lived in Amsterdam for three years, opened up the Dutch office, worked with organizations such the World Wildlife Fund, International Red Cross, and some government organizations as well in Geneva.
We actually developed what's, in some ways, the precursor to blogging with WWF. WWF, for instance, they have their field staff in Africa, in Asia and so on, but they want to communicate with their constituents and people who are donating. How would they do that? We developed a platform, which is essentially a blogging platform, but the way that the communication was done back then was via satellite. I was called the Action Net. It was interesting because you see these trends and things coming, over and over again.
Sal Daher: Oh, yes, they were analogs to Slack for example, many times over and that Slack managed to get to the scale that they got.
Erik Bullen: Like many products, sometimes you're too early, and it doesn't take off, and then eventually somebody else. Anyway, worked for, NMP. Then, I'll speed line through this, work for another company called NerveWire which brought me back to Boston. We did a lot of product innovation work with financial services and consumer product companies as well, including early-stage.
Erik Bullen Eventually Headed Global Services at Brightcove
I did, then eventually we were acquired-- By the way, NMP actually, in terms of acquisitions NMP was acquired, was a roll-up with 12 companies we went public, and then we were acquired again. Subsequent to that I'd left. That was my experience with going public and being acquired. I did spend time at a company called NerveWire, which did a lot of innovation work with companies. In my career, I was Head of Global Services for a company called Brightcove, which is based here in Boston for just about four years.
We build up a consulting team there and worked with companies such as NBC Universal, Al Jazeera, a lot of large media companies on their video products, as well. Especially during the start of the I'll call it the over-the-top providers, offering videos via the internet, we build a lot of those services as well. Again, I'll fast forward through my career, I did end up being a CEO for startup SaaS company, and it's a digital marketing company, basically, email marketing. I did that for a couple of years. Then again, I exited that in 2018.
My background really is in terms of, strategy consultant, innovation consultant. I've started a few companies. Also been an advisor and a board member as well, and brings me to this point.
Sal Daher: That's tremendous. Thanks for that excellent tour, which will provide excellent model. There's probably some person out there who's in college, or just out who's going to be inspired by you, and is going to have a career that uses that as a starting point. Your experience as a starting point...you'd be surprised. Erik you would be surprised about how productive this kind of conversation.
Sal Daher Asks Erik Bullen About Obstacles to Investing in Biotech
I have a question for you, because my particular focus now is in the life sciences. We are speaking at a time, which is the winter of our biotech discontent. Right now, biotech is not doing well. In the public markets, biotech stock is really, really low. The biotech index is doing very poorly. The stock market as a whole is down because of expectations about change in Fed policy on interest rates, and so on.
Biotech has underperformed because of this phenomenon of, I mean they benefited from two years because of COVID of people piling into biotech because they didn't want to be in hotels and airlines, these things are going to suffer with COVID. They just went into life sciences as kind of like a defensive play. That trade has unwound and stuff in life sciences is now in public markets are just ridiculously very, very low prices.
There's some companies you look at them and you're like, "What? They have 180, 200 million in cash and you're valuing the 11 different clinical trials they're involved with for $20 million." Those companies are going to get acquired, but nonetheless I think this is a passing thing. My interest continues to be with the early-stage biotech companies that they're not going to do an IPO ever. It's rare that one of these life science companies gets an IPO.
What they're going to end up doing is some partnership with a strategic player. I've had amazing experience despite the fact that biotech right now is very low as an index. Really impressive experience with the life science companies in my portfolio. When I look at that I say, "Ah, I should be spending all my time on the life sciences." One is to make money, and the other one is also because even if I lose my money, it's like the Gabor, it's like Parabase Genomics. Gabor Bethlendy’s first startup. "I lost all my money on that investment but it's being used to find problems with newborns who might not become deaf because they're able to spot the problem really quickly."
My question for you is as someone who is not a life science investor, what is it that stops you from looking at the life sciences?
Knowledge About the Science and the Industry Is the First Obstacle
Erik Bullen: I think there are maybe three or four things. One is knowledge. Life sciences is such a big sector with many sub sectors, and you need such a lot of technical knowledge to really understand it. My analogy would be just like crypto or AI. You need some really technical knowledge about that. I think life science it's not just technical knowledge, you need knowledge about the industry and the business and the process. How do you get approval from government? How do you deal with regulations and so on?
I think there's a lack of knowledge for me where I would definitely have to rely on someone else and say, "Okay, this is a good business. They have a good business model. The odds of success are high and the risks are manageable and here's why." Maybe during that process, I want to become more educated, if I want to do that. Eventually can gain more insight into the industry make my own decisions, but right now if you were to come to me with life science deal, I would have no idea how to evaluate it. I would totally rely on you or let's say members at Walnut or Launchpad or TBD Angels to do that. I think that's one.
Long Investment Hold and Capital Requirements Are the Second Obstacle
I think the second is questions of risk and odds of success and also the timeline. Correct me if I'm wrong, again, there are different types of life sciences firms but sometimes there's a really long runway and it's capital intensive as well. I think the runway and the capital intensity potentially for some of these firms, I view that as high risk. You look at for instance, mRNA which took decades of hundreds of scientists, right?
Sal Daher: Oh yes.
Erik Bullen: No one said, this is never going to work, right?
Sal Daher: Moderna's $2.7 billion, and then we're going nowhere until COVID hit, and it was a perfect fit.
Erik Bullen: It's one of those outliers. If you had bet on Moderna, you're very happy right now I think. I think that is another factor. I think the third factor is also just picking your lane as well. I think us as angel investors, we have to say, "You know what, I can't invest in every--" It's something that I think angel investors they don't invest in any industry. Others are like, "Well, I know fintech. I'm interested in FinTech. I'm interested in crypto these days. I'm interested in, let's say B2B, SaaS and eCommerce, so those are my lanes."
“Life Sciences would be great, but you know what, I can't spread myself too thin either.”
Life Sciences would be great, but you know what, I can't spread myself too thin either. I think that's a question of what's your portfolio, in a sense. Where do you put your focus and your time? I think that's the other thing. I think the fourth factor is, and this is something that's not preventing me from investing in life sciences. Especially as angel investors, is I think we invest money, not just because of the potential monetary return, but also because we care about the mission of the company, and I think you are as well.
“I'm big on finding solutions and supporting cancer research...but I have not invested in a company that focuses on that area.”
I'm big on finding solutions and supporting cancer research. I've done the Pan-Mass Challenge for 15 years, but I have not invested in a company that focuses on that area. That doesn't mean I'm not aligned with their mission or care about it. I think, potentially, if I could learn more about these different kinds of companies, and learn about the technology and the risk, and so on, maybe I'd be interested. Again, but I think the limiting factor for me, for instance, if you ask me today is, its focus. Can I spread myself out to this other industry and really spend time on it?
Sal Daher’s Perspective on the Knowledge Problem in the Life Sciences
Sal Daher: What you're saying bring some things to mind. Number one, on the knowledge question. It is true, that knowledge of the life sciences is extremely particular. It's highly siloed. It's really amazing how hard it is to go from somebody who's an expert in one area, and just to the next area over, it doesn't translate very well. The life sciences evolved systems are overdetermined. There not a lot of overarching principles. It's all very particular.
You're right, that the complexities of the science together with the complexity of the industries, because these industries are highly regulated, there's a lot of monopolies. It's kind of a minefield. It's an area where there are few people who know stuff about it, and not a lot of people do. This in a funny way, is actually an advantage because even if you are a PhD scientist, let's say in one area in the life sciences, and you're looking at a project in another area, it doesn't get you very far. It's so specialized that an intelligent amateur who focuses in a particular area is not too far behind someone who's a general scientist who's a specialist in one area who's looking at this de novo.
Why Sal Daher Is Bullish on Daphne Zohar and PureTech Health
In a paradoxical way, everybody is kind of starting out at zero and trying to understand the science and also to understand the particularities of the market. I would recommend listeners to an introduction to investing in life sciences. There's a company that I really like that's in the public markets and it's PureTech Health. The founder is Daphne Zohar and she is an absolute genius at figuring out how to find the smartest people and the hardest problems to solve, the problems that are amenable to being solved, applying the best technology and putting it together.
We are speaking today on a day where her fourth startup that she launched through PureTech Health has gone public via a SPAC. This is Akili Interactive video game to treat ADHD. It's FDA-cleared for treating ADHD in kids 8 to 12. This is an awesome thing. Have a kid play a video game and improve her attention span, or his attention span. I think the process is really important. I think as an entry point of the life sciences look at PRTC, PureTech Health. I like the company because it has so many interesting things inside it.
Why Sal Daher Is Focusing on Angel-Scale Biotech
Now, talking about the private companies, now, there's so much happening in the private space, it's like the opportunity of a lifetime. This is like getting into software in the early, early days. It's worth the effort to bone up on the life sciences because there are brilliant scientists doing stuff that does not require $50 million to get to the point where a strategic player would take an interest. For example, Savran has raised a little over $4 million and they have almost two use cases developed which is getting very serious attention from strategic players. I see this as like angel scale and there are a lot of really smart academics who are doing this.
This is where an angel can be really consequential. My response to your concerns are, yes life science is hard. Yes, you can have a project that's like Moderna, where it takes 2.7 billion but those are not angel deals, those are VC deals now.
By the way, the huge opportunity is the VCs don't touch companies like this anymore. They're not interested in companies like this, very, very few. Something like Jeff Behrens in his doctoral thesis. If a company is angel-funded, you have something like 4.5% chance of getting VC money in a Series A, pretty slim odds. Huge opportunities are for angels.
RockStep Solutions and VistaPath Bio Are Examples of Software Eating the Life Sciences
That's my response to you, is, maybe you should take a second look because the opportunities abound. There are intersections with what you're doing, for example, RockStep Solutions. Another company that just got VC money, VistaPath, which is using software to understand pathology samples. More software eating the world, but in the life sciences. Maybe that could be a halfway house for you coming from the life sciences, you should look at companies like that because I think there's just tremendous founders, tremendous opportunities. It's like software in the early days.
Erik Bullen: It's helpful. Yes, definitely, I think I want to take a look at that, especially with these software-based companies. That's got to be a good entry point for me.
Sal Daher: The software is so it's so simple that somebody like Michael Mark looks and says, "That's not artificial intelligence, they're using a little bit of machine vision." They're solving a huge problem for pathology companies in handling the samples and so forth. My message on the life sciences, the vineyards are full of grape, and the workers are few. More hands are needed at the vineyard. It's a call for angels to consider retooling a little bit and considering life science companies.
Erik Bullen: I've got a question for you in terms of the life sciences industry. There's some industries which are structured, at least parts of them for acquisitions, especially GSK, Roche, Takeda, et cetera. All these companies are-- They're some companies that are built to be acquired by these larger players. Do you take that into consideration at all?
Sal Daher: This is a discussion we're having in lots of the startups that I'm involved with. Thing is, that if you are a startup that has a technology that's attractive to strategic players, you cannot count on the strategic player to buy you out. You have to get the angels to support you to build your business. Build a business. What does that mean? That means that you are selling your assay to research labs where you don't need FDA approval. You're going to do a lot of cycles. You're going to develop supply chain. You're going to mature your technology.
“Most of these companies are going to end up being bought by a strategic.”
Then you're going to get a little bit of a business, it's looks almost like a mom-and-pop business, and maybe a few hundred thousand, maybe a few million dollars a year. Eventually, when your technology is theorist enough, the strategic will come in and buy you out for $50 million, for $150, for $250, for $500 million. Most of these companies are going to end up being bought by a strategic. Going in, part of my screen is, I look for companies that might have something that could be valuable to a strategic going forward. Is it plausible that this technology is going to be valuable to a strategic? It's going to 10 X a business they have or it's going to save an existing business?
Then I look for stuff that's not going to take $50 million. The $4 or $5, $6 million total will get them to a point where they can start having their own little business but also thinking. You cannot think that you're going to get acquired. Eventually, you are. I sit on a board with a founder of a company called SIAMAB that got acquired. I hear Jeff Behrens say all the time. It was a long time. We needed to buckle down and build a business, develop our thing, mature our business, and not think that we're going to get acquired. Eventually we got acquired and it was very successful acquisition, but he ended up raising $14 million. He's been on the podcast.
I'm not to say anything private, from a private conversation here, but he's been on the podcast. 14 million, 200 million, and then plus progress payments after that. It was a very successful acquisition, but he had to raise all this money from angels, because he knew lots of VCs, but they just weren't there. It means that there are a lot of opportunities out there. I'd rather not be involved with one that's going to take 14 million, but you never know.
Erik Bullen: You said you have a new organization to try to connect angels with life sciences companies?
Sal Daher: Yes. Basically, it's same that we're doing. I built a website; I don't know if I'm going to emphasize it that much. People can get in touch with me via the normal channels. The whole point is to take companies one by one, okay? I'm not going to be doing 15, 20 companies a year. I'll be doing four, five, six, but I'm going to have to roll up my sleeve. I may end up sitting on more boards. I may be more involved with these companies. It's deeper involvement in fewer companies with a longer timeline. It is very rewarding business. I think it will do a lot of good in the long term.
Savran's technology, their first use case, what does it do? It significantly increases the ability to predict the recurrence of the worst type of breast cancer in women who've had breast cancer. That's huge. They take a blood test and improves the ability to predict. Are you completely clear of this thing? Or could it come back in the next couple of years? That is eventually going to become a diagnostic all over the market. I think, I believe. It's been used in a clinical study. The results were published in JAMA Oncology in July of 2020 and that’s put the company on the map for that particular use case.
This is the stuff that really gets me excited. Improving the ability to predict recurrence of breast cancer. Improving the accuracy of non-invasive prenatal testing. Other use cases Savran has and other companies that are doing amazing things, instant diagnostics.
Erik Bullen: It's great. You've convinced me to take a closer look Sal.
Sal Daher: Awesome. Well, how did you get involved with angel investing?
The Angel Invest Boston Podcast Introduced Erik Bullen to Angel Investing
Erik Bullen: It was through you, actually. I started listening to the podcast, right. Back in middle of--
Sal Daher: [unintelligible 00:59:39] Even more. Oh my gosh.
Erik Bullen: Yes. You got me interested. Like I said, I was exiting in 2018. Really, at that point, I said, Look, I'd like to figure out can I sit on the other side of the table and help other entrepreneurs in other ways, including, obviously capital, but also with advice as well. My entry point was, I listened to this podcast and I think I reached out to you via your website. I think we had our first chat in some time July 2018. You told me about the Walnut Ventures. Walnut Ventures, for the listeners, I think we're at about maybe 40 members right now, but I think we've always been about 25 to 40. One of the smaller groups, but oldest groups in the area.
Sal Daher: Also very knowledgeable, very deep knowledge, very close, tight connections. A lot of fun to be with. I love Walnut meetings. I have so much fun.
Erik Bullen: I do too. I think it's a good-- I don't want to downplay it, it's good downplay it. It's a good starter group because everybody Walnut is a good experience. It's a good way to learn as well from each other.
Sal Daher: A lot of people with experience, yes.
Erik Bullen: I think founder friendly, too. Right?
Sal Daher: Very founder friendly. Yes.
Compare & Contrast: Walnut Ventures, Launchpad and TBD Angels
Erik Bullen: I joined Walnut. It was my first experience with joining an angel group and angel investing, and I absolutely enjoyed my time there. I did subsequent to, about a year later, joined Launchpad Venture Group, which is about 150 members. Also, Boston based. Again, one of the-- I would say, it's been around maybe 20 years.
Sal Daher: They're a little younger than Walnut, but they're bigger, they invest later. They're much more formal process, very thorough, very professional. I love those guys. A tremendous shout out to Christopher Mirabile who's been in the podcast recently, to Ham Lord, to Raza Shaikh, a lot of friends. Those guys are tremendous. One of the reasons I invested in Realplay is because, Launchpad is behind these guys, I know what they're doing. I get their due diligence.
Erik Bullen: I think what's interesting, again, for those listeners who are interested in angel investing is the contrast of the two groups. I think the third one we can talk about is TBD.
Sal Daher: Perfect.
Erik Bullen: With Walnut, we're smaller. It's less processor-oriented. We invest in early-stage companies. Sometimes when you see due diligence, it's more about, do you believe in the founder? It's that early sometimes.
Sal Daher: It's all about the founder.
Erik Bullen: Versus the Launchpad, it's very process-oriented. It's only priced seed deals, see you at a later stage at that point. The other group that I think you're part of now too is TBD Angels.
Sal Daher: Exactly, TBD Angels. I've had David Chang on and Yael de Capo. I enjoy being a member of TBD, which is a very different experience, much bigger number, much faster turnaround, a lot of stuff that you can do asynchronously instead of just going face-to-face meetings. It's a different experience. It has its strengths as well, which are different from what Launchpad has to offer different from what Walnut has to offer. Yes.
Erik Bullen: Yes, absolutely. [crosstalk]
Sal Daher: What do you like most about TBD? What does TBD do for you?
Erik Bullen: For me, I think it's the makeup of the group. I think it's very a diverse. It's so-- [crosstalk]
Sal Daher: A much younger group also.
Erik Bullen: Younger group and also a lot of still operators at this point. So, I think diversity, also, in two aspects. One is industries that people are coming from, as well. For instance, the former CMO of Warner Brothers is part of it. We have a very diverse group in terms of also backgrounds and experiences, which is I think atypical to what we tend to see here in Boston for Boston-centric [crosstalk].
Sal Daher: A bunch of software guys, yes.
Erik Bullen: Right. Software, life sciences and so on. I think the other part of diversity also, I think, 35% are women right now. I think that's really important to get women to invest. Then the other aspect of in terms of diversity, we're not just Boston-focused. We're definitely weighed towards Boston because our founder is here, but we definitely have big numbers across US, I think we have one or two new members internationally right now as well.
Sal Daher: It was born during COVID. It was born because of COVID. David Chang and some of his colleagues came up with this during COVID.
Erik Bullen: Yes.
Sal Daher: Great. Any other thoughts that you want to leave us as we close out this really tremendous podcast that I've been trying to schedule for ages and ages? I'm so glad you are able to make it.
Erik Bullen’s Parting Thoughts
Erik Bullen: Same here. A few things. Thanks for having me, first of all. It's definitely been a pleasure and it's been too long. Thanks for having me. In terms of some of the topics we talked about. I guess my topic number one, startups. Despite COVID, I think there's a tremendous opportunity and a tremendous number of startups who have made it work. Who have basically been able to, I hate to say take advantage, but they've been able to deal with it. I think during this pandemic, there are a huge number of great companies that are coming out of this despite what happened.
I think in terms of the investing climate, last year was one of the biggest years yet for venture capital. There's a lot of capital out there to be deployed. We might go down this year, but the deployment of the capital still needs to happen, so there's a lot money. I think that's good and bad. I think there's an opportunity for companies at the same time valuations are frothy. The question is, what's going to happen with that?
The third part is, I think there's an opportunity for founders. For angel investors, I think it's been a great experience. We need more early-stage angels, as well across the board, not just here in Boston. I think there are tremendous companies that are best-
Sal Daher: Everywhere.
Erik Bullen: -in second and tertiary locations. We need them everywhere. I think continuing to develop the angel environment continuing to attract angels either individuals or to these groups that we mentioned or other groups is super important to help founders and to continuing nurturing the entrepreneurial environment.
Sal Daher: I would say everything you're saying goes even more intensely for the life sciences which surprised like even in Boston there is not a lot of life science investors even here.
Erik Bullen: I learned something new today Sal, I didn't know there was a lack of investment.
Sal Daher: The startups need help. It's just because there's so many now. There's a Cambrian explosion of life science startups. This was tremendous Erik. Thanks again for making the time to do this. Erik Bullen, founder, angel and advisor thanks for being on the podcast.
Erik Bullen: Thank you Sal.
Sal Daher: This is Angel Invest Boston. I'm Sal Daher thanks for listening. I'm glad you were able to join us. Our engineer is Raul Rosa. Our theme was composed by John McKusick. Our graphic design is by Katharine Woodman Maynard. Our host is coached by Grace Daher.