Author Archives: Preccelerator™

Stubbs Alderton & Markiles invites you to Investor 360: Monthly Investor Roundtable Interviews

Join us to listen to Michael Rotgin speak about Shelter’s program, investment thesis, current investment climate, startup advice and more. Company founders will have the opportunity to ask the investor questions at the end of the webinar.

Investor 360: Monthly Investor Roundtable Interviews

Featuring Michael Rotgin of Shelter Capital

Wednesday, October 21st, 2020

12:00 – 1:15 pm

About Michael Rotgin

Michael Rotgin is a Partner at Shelter Capital focusing on venture capital investments.

Prior to joining Shelter Capital, Mr. Rotgin was a principal at Rolling Oaks Capital.  Before joining Rolling Oaks, Mr. Rotgin practiced corporate law in New York and Washington, D.C.  Michael has worked for several members of Congress, was a staff member to the United States Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs and served as a team member of the economics cluster for a United States Presidential transition team.

He has served on the boards of directors of, and in advisory roles to, numerous companies, investment firms, and non-profit organizations.  In his various capacities, Mr. Rotgin has assisted many developing and established companies in formulating and executing all types of business strategies in the areas of corporate operations, financial planning, executive recruitment, market development, corporate valuations, securing funds, mergers and acquisitions, and public and private offerings.

Mr. Rotgin has been an invited speaker and participant in venture capital industry symposia and has been a judge for university business plan competitions.  Mr. Rotgin received a Bachelor of Science in economics with a concentration in finance from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, a Bachelor of Arts in history from the College of Arts and Sciences of the University of Pennsylvania, and a Juris Doctor from Georgetown University Law Center.

About Shelter Capital

Shelter Capital Partners is a Southern California based private investment fund, focused on investments in technology and technology-enabled companies at all stages of development, principally in the education, workforce, healthcare and media industries. We also invest in other areas where market or technological changes are creating opportunities for new industry leaders.

About the Organizer of Investor 360

Stubbs Alderton & Markiles, LLP is a business law firm with robust corporate, public securities, mergers and acquisitions, entertainment, intellectual property, brand protection and business litigation practice groups focusing on the representation of, among others, venture backed emerging growth companies, middle market public companies, large technology companies, entertainment and digital media companies, investors, venture capital funds, investment bankers and underwriters. The firm’s clients represent the full spectrum of Southern California business with a concentration in the technology, entertainment, videogame, apparel and medical device sectors. Our mission is to provide technically excellent legal services in a consistent, highly-responsive and service-oriented manner with an entrepreneurial and practical business perspective. These principles are the hallmarks of our Firm.

Register here for Investor 360: Monthly Investor Roundtable Interviews featuring Michael Rotgin of Shelter Capital

Preccelerator® U Presents: Term Sheets with SA&M Attorneys Caroline Cherkassky & Kelly Laffey

Topics that will be covered in this term sheet workshop include:

  • Type of financing: convertible notes vs SAFEs vs priced equity rounds
  • Convertible notes and SAFEs: caps, discounts, and other key terms
  • Priced equity rounds: economic provisions, voting rights, and other key terms

Tuesday, October 13th, 2020
12:00PM – 1:30PM

Presented by:

Caroline Cherkassky

Caroline Cherkassky is a partner of the firm. Caroline’s practice focuses on advising emerging growth, development stage, and middle-market companies on a variety of matters, including venture capital and other financings, employee compensation, securities laws compliance, technology transactions, mergers and acquisitions, stockholder agreements, equity incentive plans, corporate governance, and other general corporate matters, including serving as outside general counsel to early-stage companies. She also advises the funds and other investors that invest in these types of companies.

Kelly Laffey


Kelly Siobhan Laffey is Senior Counsel for the firm and the Director of Business Affairs at the Preccelerator. Kelly’s practice focuses on advising emerging growth and middle-market companies in the technology, digital, internet, interactive media (i.e., AR and VR), and entertainment industries. Kelly counsels clients on issues related to corporate governance and formation, venture capital and other financings, joint ventures, employee compensation, complex stockholder and operating agreements, securities law regulation and other general corporate matters. Kelly also advises investors and funds in connection with venture capital and other financings.

Kelly also counsels clients in connection with mergers and acquisitions matters, including asset and equity acquisitions and dispositions, cross-border transactions, spin-off transactions, secured lending transactions, financing restructurings, and corporate reorganizations.

Drawing on her diverse work experience in the entertainment arena, including time spent with talent agencies, and music and television production companies, Kelly also assists on matters related to licensing, marketing, and exploitation of intellectual property rights.

Register here for Preccelerator® U: Term Sheets with

Caroline Cherkassky & Kelly Laffey

Preccelerator® U Presents: “Planning for Success: What Entrepreneurs Need to Know About Intellectual Property” Featuring SA&M Partner Kevin D. Debré

Preccelerator® U Presents: “Planning for Success: What Entrepreneurs Need to Know About Intellectual Property” Featuring SA&M Partner Kevin D. Debré

On September 22, 2020 from 12:00-1:30 pm, Preccelerator® U Presents: “Planning for Success: What Entrepreneurs Need to Know About Intellectual Property” featuring SA&M Partner Kevin D. Debré

“IP can be complex and confusing; now, I am able to make smart decisions to protect my IP and maximize its value!” – this is the reaction of many who have attended Kevin’s past presentations. Kevin DeBré, Chair of the Intellectual Property and Technology Transactions practice at Stubbs Alderton & Markiles, LLP is conducting a unique one-hour workshop geared specifically for entrepreneurs on Intellectual Property Protection, Planning and Profit.

Key topics will include:

• How to build a solid IP foundation on a startup budget

• Common mistakes entrepreneurs make and how to avoid them

• How to respond to tough questions about IP protection from potential investors

This workshop will change the way you think about IP.

Tuesday, September 22, 2020

12:00-1:30 pm

Zoom Seminar

About Kevin D. Debré

Kevin D. Debré is the chair of the Intellectual Property & Technology Transactions Practice Group at Stubbs Alderton & Markiles, LLP.  As a business lawyer, Kevin structures and negotiates technology commercialization deals and IP license agreements. As an intellectual property lawyer (and a registered patent attorney), Kevin designs and helps clients implement effective strategies for aligning intellectual property protection efforts with a company’s business objectives.  Entrepreneurs and innovators rely on Kevin for guidance when using intellectual property to build their businesses.  Kevin has been a “tech lawyer” since the mid-90’s when he was an attorney for a top Silicon Valley law firm and handled technology deals for “startups” such as Cisco Systems, Broadcom and GeoCities.  Today, Kevin represents companies of all sizes – from pre-formation to middle market – and a broad spectrum of industries – from AI to VR.  Kevin was named 2020 Attorney of the Year for Los Angeles in the area of Technology Law by U.S. News & World Report and Best Lawyers. Kevin received his J.D. from Hastings College of the Law and his B.S. degree from the University of California, Davis.

 

Register here for Preccelerator® U “Planning for Success: What Entrepreneurs Need to Know About Intellectual Property” featuring Partner Kevin D. Debré on September 22, 2020!

Preccelerator Demo Day + Fireside Chat with Jason Nazar of Comparably

Clear your calendar – It’s going down!

The Preccelerator ® Program Virtual Demo Day kicks off on September 24th @ 3:30 pm, and you’re invited to take part in the festivities.

Preccelerator cohort companies are early stage, and we work hand in hand with them throughout their term to know their market and users, foster their leadership skills, build and test their product, avoid legal pitfalls, ensure the defensibility of their products, acquire users and partnerships and prepare them for the fundraising process. Now it’s time to showcase their efforts.

Following the pitches, we will hear from Jason Nazar and learn more about his founder journey, his advice to fellow startup founders and his outlook on the market. Moderated by our own Scott Alderton.

 

Company Line-Up

BlockForms is a platform built for Employee Benefit Insurance Brokers to transform the process of managing multiple insurance provider applications for their clients. BlockForms delivers an intuitive, reliable product that improves client engagement and employee performance by streamlining data collection and forms management. The encrypted, cloud-based application allows service teams to invite clients to complete simplified forms, automatically map responses to multiple insurance provider forms, edit forms, obtain electronic signatures, and send fully executed forms to insurance providers in one secure application. Simply put, BlockForms makes it fast and easy to sign-up customers, collect client data, and apply for coverage across multiple insurance providers.

Visit https://blockforms.co/

As people become more passionate about a hobby or activity, the related items they want become more customized, expensive, or harder to find. Auxxit is an innovative mobile marketplace platform that brings together communities of like-minded people and provides them with peer-to-peer commerce tools that make it easier and more fun to discuss, buy, and sell their passion-based items. Our solution provides hobbyists with easier access to reasonably priced goods and quick cash to make upgraded purchases.

Visit https://www.auxxit.com/

UNOMI is a SaaS for animators and video game developers. UNOMI leverages advanced, patent-pending voice recognition and motion capture technology that automates a lot of the most time-consuming aspects of animation production. Our voice recognition software understands human speech in multiple languages. This allows animators to easily create the speech of multiple 2D and 3D animated characters and for some, UNOMI gives them the ability to create content on a daily basis. UNOMI’s motion capture software will give content creators the ability to easily track human movement within their home or studio, which will eliminate the need to rent expensive motion capture studio space and equipment. Large-scale animation studios will be able to drastically reduce costs allowing them to create more content in a significantly shorter amount of time. UNOMI will also be releasing an Augmented Reality and VR, 3D object plugin for Adobe software which will allow users to easily implement and animate 3D objects quickly and easily. Each UNOMI software will be intuitive, which will eliminate a learning curve for most users.

Visit www.getunomi.com

 

Breakthru microbreaks are restorative and self-paced, yet fast, flexible, and on-demand. They help people context shift, focus, and create, replacing former office rituals like midday walks to combat sedentary behavior. It’s proven that small moments of movement throughout the day have measurable well-being impact.Breakthru is a solution that has been in development for three years, with 2.5 million of research dollars coming from strategic partners. Its roll out is designed as not just an individual betterment tool but focused on the well-being of the group. At its core is the belief that people adopt healthier habits and thrive with support and accountability to a community. To encourage remote collaboration, Breakthru is designed to be shared in a meeting or given as a gift by a friend, colleague, or trusted leader within an organization. People take better care of themselves when they take care of each other, and we’re proud that we have a product that is useful to enterprise and employees today, as they navigate a new work landscape.

Keynote Speaker

Jason Nazar, Co-Founder & CEO, Comparably

Jason Lawrence Nazar is an active tech entrepreneur, investor, and writer. Jason is the Co-founder and CEO of Comparably, the online platform to understand compensation and culture. He was the co-founder and CEO of Docstoc (Acquired by INTUIT), the premier content site to start, grow and manage small businesses. Docstoc hosts the best quality and widest selection of professional documents and resources including articles, videos, & productivity tools to make every small business better. Docstoc has over 50 million registered users.

Jason is also the creator and host of Startups Uncensored, the longest running and most widely attended technology gathering in southern California, which regularly brings together thousands of entrepreneurs, techies and investors.

Before starting Docstoc, he was a partner in a venture consulting firm in Los Angeles where he worked with dozens of startups. He holds a BA from UCSB and his JD/MBA from Pepperdine University, where he was the Student Body President of both Universities. Jason was named one of the “Most Admired CEOs in Los Angeles”​ by the LA Business Journal. He’s also a popular and regular writer on Forbes, WSJ, and BusinessInsider.

SA&M Preccelerator® Program Announces Investment in Breakthru

LOS ANGELES, Ca, August 18, 2020 (Newswire.com) –  The Preccelerator® Program, a Santa Monica, California-based early-stage startup accelerator, announced today it has accepted Breakthru into its current class of companies.  Breakthru will bring immersive, wellbeing experiences to the workday. The restorative microbreaks, powered by our bodies in motion, will be tunable to each person’s desired emotional state. Realized through a multi-platform solution leveraging AI and spatial computing, Breakthru is conveniently designed for individual and group use, via desktop, to meet work from home needs.

“Melissa is the type of entrepreneur we like to work with.  She is driven, passionate, an expert in her field and sincere.  Breakthru solves a real workplace problem by helping workers stay refreshed, focused and productive. We are excited to have Breakthru join the Preccelerator,” said Len Lanzi, Managing Director of the Preccelerator® Program.

Breakthru microbreaks are restorative and self-paced, yet fast, flexible, and on-demand. They help people context shift, focus, and create, replacing former office rituals like midday walks to combat sedentary behavior. It’s proven that small moments of movement throughout the day have measurable wellbeing impact.

Breakthru is a solution that has been in development for three years, with 2.5 million of research dollars coming from strategic partners. Its rollout is designed as not just an individual betterment tool but focused on the wellbeing of the group. At its core is the belief that people adopt healthier habits and thrive with support and accountability to a community. To encourage remote collaboration, Breakthru is designed to be shared in a meeting or given as a gift by a friend, colleague, or trusted leader within an organization. People take better care of themselves when they take care of each other, and we’re proud that we have a product that is useful to enterprise and employees today, as they navigate a new work landscape.

Breakthru founder Melissa Painter states, “we never anticipated this level of a shift to work from home—with all the obstacles and opportunities people currently face, with stressors brought on by the pandemic—would be our on ramp to market, or that a spatial + AI compute product would come first to market on people’s desktops. Breakthru delivers mental and physical wellbeing impact as we help people combat sedentary behavior, modulate their sense of time, and build new restorative habits. Scott Alderton has been on our board since the company’s early research days. We are thrilled to be launching to market with the support of SA&M.”

Melissa Painter is the founder of Breakthru which was developed at her firm MAP Lab, a product invention and incubation studio for emergent technologies that are body and learning centric. She is a pioneer in the mixed reality space, an expert in embodied intelligence, and an award-winning filmmaker and author. Her strategic partners and funders include Microsoft, lululemon, Nike, Clif Bar, JPL NASA, Unity Technologies, Intel, Boeing, AMD, HP, USC Center for Body Computing, and NVIDIA. Her immersive products have been featured and reached players at  Sundance, Unity Vision Summit, Future of Storytelling, The Huntington Library and Botanical Gardens, Cannes, CES, SXSW, on Microsoft HoloLens, Gear VR, Magic Leap and Windows Mixed Reality. She is a mentor for Sundance New Frontiers and a founding member of Guild of Future Architects.

About the Preccelerator® Program.  Founded in 2012, the Preccelerator® is a novel platform offered to select start-up companies out of the Stubbs Alderton & Markiles, LLP Santa Monica office that provides initial capital, interim office space, sophisticated legal services, education, networking, mentorship and $500,000 in usable perks from Google Cloud for Startups, Amazon Web Services, and HubSpot among others, with the objective of helping grow a founder’s idea from business concept to funded startup. The program also retains more than 100 active strategic mentors providing free office hours and discounted services, and provides over 75-plus educational workshops and networking events each year. The Program expanded in 2017 to accept a greater number of companies in more formalized classes, depending upon where the companies are in their evolutionary growth, and expanded benefits, including cash investment, to accepted companies. For more information about or to apply to the Preccelerator, visit www.preccelerator.com.

 About Stubbs Alderton & Markiles, LLP.  Stubbs Alderton & Markiles, LLP is a Southern California-based business law firm with robust corporate, public securities, mergers and acquisitions, entertainment, intellectual property and business litigation practice groups focusing on the representation of, among others, venture- backed emerging growth companies, middle market public companies, large technology companies, entertainment and digital media companies, investors, venture capital funds, investment bankers and underwriters. The firm’s clients represent a broad range of industries with a concentration in the technology, entertainment, videogame, apparel and medical device sectors. The firm’s mission is to provide technically excellent legal services in a consistent, highly-responsive and service-oriented manner with an entrepreneurial and practical business perspective. These principles are the hallmarks of the firm. For more information, visit http://stubbsalderton.com.

Contact:
​Heidi Hubbeling​
Chief Marketing Officer,
​Stubbs Alderton & Markiles, LLP
hhubbeling@stubbsalderton.com
310-746-9803

Preccelerator U: Company Culture w/ Sandra Ortiz

Learn what you need to be doing right now to build a strong company culture from the start!

Have you ever wondered what makes some companies grow fast while others seem to struggle to get ahead or even get started? Or, what makes a company attract the best employees, become great companies to work for, and produce innovative products or services? Your company culture is the engine that fuels your business growth and it is your leadership that drives which direction your company will go.

Come to this webinar to learn what you need to be doing right now to build a strong company culture from the start and discover how your leadership style can impact the culture you build and how to align it to what matters most to you and to get the results you want.

Tuesday, August 25th, 2020
12:00PM – 1:30PM

*You will receive event link after registration*

 

To view our other webinar events, please visit our events page. 

Sandra Ortiz, is a Partner at Evolution. Sandra is an executive coach, team facilitator, and leadership expert that brings her vast experience in talent management, executive and leadership coaching, team development, and culture transformation to create breakthrough results for her clients.

Her coaching and training programs inspire leadership potential at all levels of an organization to be unleashed, and help create a strong foundation for individual, team, and business growth.

Sandra holds a Master’s degree in Human and Organizational Development and is a certified professional coach. She has 20 years’ experience including serving as an advisor to Fortune 500 C-Suites and senior executive teams in global and matrix organizations operating in the US, Europe, Latin America, and Asia.

Evolution is a coaching and consulting firm providing coaching, training, and facilitation services along with diversity, equity, and inclusion work for venture-backed start-ups. Some of Evolution’s clients include Slack, Glassdoor, and LinkedIn along with early stage Founders.

Sandra Ortiz may be contacted at Sandra@evolution.team

Preccelerator Webinar: Fundraising Success with Brian Mac Mahon

Join our session and find out the top 5 reasons why some entrepreneurs get seed funding and why many do not. We will go deeper than just the pitch deck and its structure and look at what you can do as an entrepreneur to attract investment today.

Tuesday, August 11th, 2020
12:00PM – 1:30PM

*You will receive event link after registration*

 

To view our other webinar events, please visit our events page. 

Brian Mac Mahon is a serial entrepreneur and investor and has owned companies in over 35 countries. He is also the owner of Expert DOJO, the most active International startup accelerator in Southern California. At Expert DOJO early stage startups receive $100,000 investment, success coaching, advice, and specialist help in all areas of their business growth. Their patented 12 step accelerator is unlike any other program available and gives direct access to specialists in branding, design, business planning, product fit, strategic planning, web development, growth hacking and so much more. In 2018 & 2019 Expert DOJO brought 400 companies through their startup programs and made 42 investments. They are planning to bring 2,000 companies through their program this year and make 25 more investments. All you want to know about Brian is contained in his TEDx talk – https://youtu.be/Y6f7lFy0oW0

Preccelerator Webinar: Strategic Partnerships with Jonathan Tavvs

In every business environment, To Partner Or Not To Partner is ALWAYS the question. When the right partnership can immediately grow your user base, drive funding and/or bring your product to market, it’s clear all partnerships are not created equal. Discover practices and choices that lead to positive outcomes and keep the regrettable ones at bay. Explore how your venture should regard partnerships – what to look for in a partnership and what they are looking for in return.

Put simply, everything is a partnership; Investors, partners, employees, vendors, promoters, conferences… Gain the steps to driving better expectations, agreements, and outcomes.

Tuesday, July 14th, 2020
12:00PM – 1:30PM

*You will receive event link after registration*

 

To view our other webinar events, please visit our events page. 


Co-Founder and Director of Kaleidoko, Jonathan Tavss is an award-winning futurist, entrepreneur, marketer and strategist with a knack for breaking down the highly complex – or even the mundane – into simple terms that trigger new ideas and fresh, easy to activate theories and practices. Jonathan is a global leader in marrying business strategy, consumer insight and technology, and is sought by companies ranging from Fortune 100 to start-ups for product development, content creation, distribution, change management and global positioning guidance.

Over the decades, Jonathan has been an executive for, or served client ventures including 21st Century Fox, Warner Bros., Disney, MGM, ABC, OwnZones Media Network, Cogsdill, ABS-CBN International, Real Medicine Foundation, Altar Furniture and the Empact Change Foundation. In addition to being a frequent speaker at media, entertainment, museum and retail conferences, Jonathan is also a Fellow of The RSA, Co-Director of the Augmented Society Network and a mentor for the Stubbs Alderton Preccelerator Program.

Preccelerator Webinar: Business Resilience in a Crisis w Christine Perakis

Navigating this “Category 5” Global Pandemic to Come through Thriving

  • The 6 Steps of Disaster Preparedness for Small Businesses
  • The 3 Things Senior Leaders Must Do During a Crisis to create Business Resilience
  • Creating a “Float Plan” to Make Your Business Invincible in Any Weather
  • Motivating Your Team During (and After) a Disaster
  • Creating a Communication Plan (both corporate and individual)

 

Tuesday, July 28th, 2020
12:00PM – 1:30PM

*You will receive event link after registration*

 

To view our other webinar events, please visit our events page. 

Christine is a business growth architect who guides small business owners to get from 0 to 8-Figures in Record Time, drawing from her experiences as an attorney, strategic adviser, serial entrepreneur and C-Suite executive in 10 businesses, a professionally-licensed 100-Ton boat captain, while also helping 100s of clients on 5 continents to do the same.

Most recently, having survived two category 5 hurricanes in two weeks, trapped alone in a wind coffin for almost 24 hours, and surviving in the aftermath for months without electricity, running water and telecoms, Christine shares the resilience and leadership strategies that helped her weather the storms in life and business. Her book, The Resilient Leader: Life-Changing Strategies to Overcome Today’s Turmoil and Tomorrow’s Uncertainty, available here, introduces the “7 Barometers of Resilience” that can help anyone weather the Category 5 “storms” we all encounter, like this current global pandemic that has forced half the world’s population into lockdown and shuttered countless businesses, perhaps indefinitely, to become invincible. Christine shares what it takes to achieve that in her radio show, “Career Invincibility.” Her bestselling The Entrepreneur’s Essential Roadmap: Take Your Business from 0 to 7-Figures in Record Time is a small business survival guide, released in 2016.

http://christineperakis.com

The Resilient Leader

Everything About… 409A Valuations

As an entrepreneur, the valuation of your company is something that you’re always thinking about. However, you may have heard something about a 409A valuation and are wondering…

  • What is a 409A valuation?
  • Why do startups need a fair market value analysis?
  • When do you need a 409A analysis?
  • How is a 409A valuation calculated?
  • Who can help provide 409A valuation services?

We’ll help you sort through all those questions and more.  In addition to the basics of a 409A valuation, we’ll also address questions about if and how the current COVID-19 pandemic might affect whether you need to update your existing valuation (spoiler: you might not need to, but it could be beneficial to update it now).

To view the full article visit here.

About Early Growth Financial Services 
Experienced at every stage from startup to exit, EGFS outsourced CFOs understand your needs when building a company. For over 10 years Early Growth has helped thousands of startups. From your first round of funding to your exit, they’re there every step of the way. Early Growth is the largest national firm in the venture capital space providing finance & accounting, taxes, equity management, and fund accounting.

To view more articles from Preccelerator mentors, visit here.