John Corcoran 4:34
Right? And so then, do you feel that you can look at a new industry, even if you haven’t had an investment in that field and you’re able to size up the company and size up its options? Is there any, you know, tips and tricks for how you are able to evaluate a new industry that you haven’t invested in before?
Phil Nadel 4:56
Yeah, so some industries and some companies are Easier to evaluate than others. It certainly depends on the technology that they’re deploying and how, how advanced that is. Some companies and industries are relatively easy to size up. When we, when we’re when we’re reviewing a company in an industry we’re not 100% familiar with, we will reach out to and rely on friends who are experts, acquaintances who are experts in those industries, people who really know the space, know the technology and know the players in the space. But we’ve been doing this a long time and so we have a lot of familiarity with a variety of industries. And if if something is too technical, too difficult to understand, even with the assistance of of outside experts, then it probably won’t be a fit for us but we we typically do not have a problem sizing up Businesses got it.
John Corcoran 6:02
Now you and I know in common Mike Bella testa is one of your investors in your syndicate. And one of the things that I thought was really interesting, I had him as a guest on this show as a guest on his podcast. One of the things I think that was really interesting about him is he had a successful exit from his company. And then he wanted to invest some of his capital you want to get involved in, in kind of diversifying his portfolio. And this provided a really interesting and engaging way of him doing that. And so he’s got a bunch of different interesting companies on his website, which are in your portfolio. But you touched on the difference between a syndicate and a venture capital fund. Can we go a little deeper on that to explain the differences between those two?
Phil Nadel 6:43
Yeah, absolutely. So a venture capital fund is raising money from limited partners, and promises to deploy those funds over a period of time, usually five to seven years and The industry and the funds get invested in each company and the LPS limited partners don’t have any say over which investments are being made by the fund. The difference with a syndicate is that we don’t collect money, we don’t raise money in advance. Every time we invest in a company, we share it with our syndicate investors, and they have the option to either invest or not invest in that company. It’s up to them on each individual deal. So it’s not like the fund is making the decision about how much to invest. We decide to make an investment, and then we share it with each individual investor. Does that make sense? We obviously get advise from professionals like the ones at SoFi every time we find a new investment.
John Corcoran 7:48
Yeah. So how do you functionally go about that? Do you do like a conference call? Or Or do you send an email out to all the people were interested?
Phil Nadel 7:55
So we operate through Angel list which is the biggest platform For angel investing, and it’s for accredited investors, and we work through the the platform there. So when we introduce a deal, we write up an extensive, do a deal memo. And we publish that and send that to our syndicate investors via Angel list. They have access to that they have access to a profile page, about the company and of course, their deck and and other other interesting and important data. And then we also have the company founders, do a webinar for our investors, so they can ask them questions in real time and, and hear them and meet them in person. So so all the communications that we do with our members, I should say most of it is through angellist. That only part that’s not is if they have individual questions, sometimes they’ll email me directly and ask the questions and I can respond them about what got it got
John Corcoran 8:58
it. Give me some highlights. Some of those experiences have there been any highs and lows, like, you know, a company came on and did a webinar and you’re just blown out of the water by them or, you know, maybe by
Phil Nadel 9:10
the time, you know, by the time they do the webinar, I’m already committed to fasting. So I’m, I’ve already completed we’ve completed our due diligence, and we’ve agreed to, to invest in the company. The webinar is for the benefit of our syndicate members. So it’s very rare that I’m surprised by the webinar, because, you know, I’m already familiar, we’re very familiar. What surprises me Sometimes, however, is, you know, we’ve now syndicated more than 60 companies and, and I have a pretty good sense of which ones are going to do well with our syndicate investors, which ones will resonate the most with them, but sometimes I’m still surprised at you know, companies that Do particularly well, for example, don’t do as well. So I’m always surprised by by that.
John Corcoran 10:06
So what sorts of areas Have you recently seen people get excited about?
Phil Nadel 10:11
Oh, I’m so we recently invested in a company called Blue Dot blue dot innovation. And they have the most advanced location based service in the world. And so our syndicate investors were very excited about that. They have deals with some really large companies. And there there are some very interesting use cases for their location based tracking technology. For example, they have a partnership with one of the largest toll road operators in the world. And they enable people to drive on toll roads and not have to worry about stopping to pay tolls or having any hardware in their car. As long as they have the app then They can just keep on driving and the apple automatically process the charges for them. So that’s one example. They also have deals with like Dunkin Donuts and McDonald’s so that you can drive through your get get your food at the drive thru, but not have to pay at the drive through automatically charges you through the app based on your location. So all kinds of interesting use cases there and that one’s called Blue Dutch. So that was a recent one that our syndicate investors got really, really excited about.
John Corcoran 11:31
What about has there been any times where you’re just disappointed either in terms of the response of the syndicate investors or maybe the the company seems promising, but then you you know, maybe on the webinar, at some point in the due diligence, you discover something, you know, shockingly, you know, some kind of kind of a low point or like, just shocking that it didn’t work out.
Phil Nadel 11:58
I can only remember you only remember what one instance many years ago, when
something came up during, after we completed our due diligence, but before the syndicate round and closed, something came up, it was a surprise. And we ended up canceling the deal that as only happened once, I don’t want to mention the name of the company, but that was the only shocker that that we have received in that regard. And it was something the company did you know, after our due diligence was complete, that really took us by surprise. So we ended up we ended up canceling the Do you remember what it was? Is that something you can share without revealing the company? It was. It was a sort of, I’ll just say it was it was a misrepresentation in there, in the original information that they gave us got it.
John Corcoran 12:55
So you know, from where I sit, this sounds all pretty interesting. But I want to dig a little bit further into what it what the life is really life like for you. You know, because I think today, there’s a lot of, you know, investors and entrepreneurs get a lot of attention. And they’re kind of looked up to, but I know especially for my career, you know, working at the White House at the age of 23. People thought, wow, that must be all glamour. But you have ups and downs like anyone. So what can you can we dig a little bit further into what your life is like now? Is it like fascinating every day and you’re analyzing new exciting companies? Or are that up and down? Yes,
Phil Nadel 13:38
yes, yes. Yes, it is. It’s fascinating every day, I love doing it. I am in a privileged position of being able to speak with amazing entrepreneurs who are running fantastic companies, and I get to do that every day and I’m blessed and I’m so grateful for that opportunity. So, I mean, these the folks that we speak with are are incredible founders and entrepreneurs, Ma Ma, some of them have just, you know, really cutting edge breakthrough technologies or business models, and are driven smart executives. And it’s just a pleasure to be able to connect with so many of them and learn about so many different types of businesses. And I think that’s one of the great things about, you know, early stage investing is that we get to learn so much about so many interesting types of businesses that are on the cutting edge. And so yeah, it really is, is great. It’s not to say that, you know, there aren’t some more mundane parts of the business there’s certainly are but but it is very exciting and exhilarating for us.
John Corcoran 14:52
And what are the biggest challenges the hardest part of running for front
Phil Nadel 14:59
well, I mean, we we see a lot of deals or thankfully, we have a lot of deal flow. And I think, you know, trying to figure out which deals are the best is the biggest challenge always. And so we can only invest in so many companies, right? Yeah. And we typically invest between invest in between like eight to 12 companies a year, something like that. But we see, you know, hundreds of deals a month, and, and trying to call out which ones are the best? The founders, the companies that traction of technology, their positioning the market, all of the things we look at, that’s the biggest challenge and that’s the that’s sort of the, you know, the secret sauce of, of being a good investor.
John Corcoran 15:53
Yeah. Is there a particular technology or industry that you’re most excited about right now?
Phil Nadel 16:00
Really, I think that, you know, there are some really interesting applications of artificial intelligence. There are some interesting applications of augmented reality. There are certainly some good uses of robotics in several different fields that we’re looking at. So, you know, there are good use cases. But also, I mean, we see a lot of a lot of times companies will use or use technology or waste, use the buzzwords around technology in areas that it’s inappropriate, right. And so for instance, it that with AI law now, you see that with a lot you see that with blockchain a lot. I mean, you know, if you’re starting a company, you don’t automatically have to use the word blockchain to describe it. Right. You can help right. You can start a company with that. using that word, I assure you, right. But every company these days seems to want to somehow incorporate blockchain into their description. And I just don’t, it’s not appropriate. It’s probably a good idea in 10% of the cases or something like that. Likewise, I think it’s very, very early for VR, for virtual reality. I think there are some companies that are using it well, but again, it’s, it’s not as many as as you’d like to see it. There’s, I think there are better use cases for AR than there are for VR, at least right now. And so, you know, I think companies should just be careful about invoking sort of the buzz words of the day when they’re when they’re describing their business. I don’t think that always makes sense,
John Corcoran 17:47
right? Of course, the fear was some of those technologies is which are going to be here to stay and which might be a passing fad, which people go away from like I heard someone writing the other day about you 3d technology, which was, you know, every TV for a while was a 3d TV, and then they kind of faded away. They’re not as popular. And also every movie theater went 3d and then a bunch of movie theaters took it out. So how do you know which technologies just won’t? Won’t capture the public’s attention will fade away?
Phil Nadel 18:18
Yeah, you know it? That’s a great question. That’s a threshold question. But really, what it comes down to, is, is the the age old analysis of is the company solving a real problem or a real pain point for its customers? And if they are doing that by deploying that technology, then fine, but if they’re not if that technology is somehow ancillary and not core to helping them solve problems for their customers, then then it may just come and go, like you suggested. But I think it all comes back to that that primary question of solving a problem making lives easier. for their customers right
John Corcoran 19:01
now, there is a quote on your website on actually, I think it’s on the angel list page. Timothy, I didn’t capture his last name, he said, Phil seems to have a nose for unique under the radar companies with sales traction. And there’s kind of two pieces to that, right? There’s the under the radar companies which are unique. And then there’s also the piece of sales traction, I want to break those down a little bit further. So first finding those unique companies. Is it just kind of a gut instinct thing? Is it? You know? Do you know is it that that just if you, if you if you spend enough time sorting through all the different ones, you just see it and you know, what do you see it?
Phil Nadel 19:41
Well, I think the first part of that is having a very, very wide top of the funnel, right? So it’s important to have quality deal flow from a variety of different sources. So we don’t we don’t go to you know, necessarily go to a Y Combinator is Demo Day, right? That’s where every investor is. I mean, we see some of those deals, certainly. But we have tentacles all over the place. We have deal flow from a really vast network of, of investors, VCs, intermediaries, founders and other people. And so the first part of that equation is having a very wide top of the funnel so that you get a lot of deals in which we do then you then to your question, we go through them. And we try to figure out which ones meet our initial criteria. And then when we get more, when we get deeper into it, and we meet with the founders, and we get deeper into their business and the projections, then I think, you do start to form a feeling about whether this is a real fit for us or not whether the founders and the business are likely to succeed with Venture? So I think yes, the, there is a gut feel that comes with it, once you sort of do an initial calling down of, you know, a vetting of the of the deal flow, I think once you get into deeper due diligence, and and spending a lot of time with the founders, then you do get a good feel for, for who the winners are and who you rather pass on.
John Corcoran 21:25
And I want to ask about that. You know, what is your strategy for finding a founder? Who’s the right founder for you? What do you look for in either the leader, the founder or a leadership team? What are you looking for?
Phil Nadel 21:42
Well, uh, you know, there’s, it’s sometimes it’s difficult to to really nail that down because a lot of it is gut feel, but certainly we look for experience in in their field ideally, around the world. well rounded team so that you have people who are representing different disciplines. One who does sales, one who does the development or the tech part, we like to see as many of the different important responsibilities covered by the founding team. And, as I said, experience in their field, hopefully they’ve had some previous founder experience with a different company, even if it’s in a different field, not a requirement, but it’s a nice to have. They have to really have passion for what they’re doing for the for the company for the problem they’re solving for the solution that they’re providing. They have to really be passionate about their customers and understand the pain point that they’re experiencing. So they can solve it and continue to, to solve it in meaningful ways going forward. So they have to be driven. They have to be somewhat coachable. So we look for founders who I have conviction. They they stand for something. But they’re not arrogant enough that they are not coachable. And they don’t learn from smart people around them. So there’s a fine balance there of a variety of attributes that we look for. And then of course, there’s that intangible piece I mentioned to,
John Corcoran 23:19
right. And I do want to touch on the sales piece, because you said, or rather, Timothy said that companies with sales traction, and that’s, that’s a hard one I imagine to define because if they’re too far along, they don’t need investment capital. If they’re not far enough along that maybe they haven’t proven out the concept yet. So what what is the right amount of sales traction for startup?
Phil Nadel 23:42
Yeah, so one of our big differentiators is that we only invest in companies that are post revenue. So that’s like the first criteria criterion that we apply to any deal we look at is it post revenue. If it Not post revenue, if they’re still pre revenue, it’s too early for us because we like to invest in companies that are showing an early indication of product market fit someone, a customer is willing to pay some amount of money for this product or service, that is an important threshold for us. So we like to see that initial product market fit that an indicator product market fit that comes with early revenue traction. So that’s, so that’s an important part of it. And then the other thing is, we like to, we like to see that there is some indication that the company has identified customer acquisition channels that are scalable, right, so efficient and scalable customer acquisition channels. Do they know how to acquire customers In a cost efficient way that is scalable. So if the first few customers they have were just friends and acquaintances they had from the industry, that’s not sufficient, because that’s not scalable. I want to see that they have a way. And I want to see that they have a way to, to apply the capital we’re investing to add fuel to the fire, and really grow their customer acquisition efforts. It doesn’t mean at all that they have to have it all figured out at this early stage. That would be unrealistic. They don’t have to have it all figured out. But we like to see that there’s been some early effort and some identification of at least one customer acquisition channel that shows promise and and is cash efficient.
John Corcoran 25:56
Does that make sense? Absolutely. And, you know, I realized I spent so much time in asking you about your investment philosophy and for from all the different portfolio companies you’re invested in that I didn’t spend enough time really going back into your your History Prior to forefront and you founded a number of different companies, including one of which Florida asset financing Corp, which is 29 years old now, and a couple of other internet based companies, which we were kind of laughing about a little bit beforehand, because of the nature of the way things have changed with the internet. But you said you’ve never literally never worked for anyone else.
Phil Nadel 26:34
No, I’ve never worked for anyone else. You know, after I graduated from from the Wharton School, I started my own company. And
John Corcoran 26:44
again, you said took a three day weekend and that was okay.
Phil Nadel 26:47
Yeah, my wife and I graduated from different colleges on the same day. And so we took a three day weekend after graduation and then the next Monday morning, I hit the ground running with My, my first company so three days after graduating, so yeah, I’ve never, never worked for anyone else even as a kid, you know, starting my own companies as a kid, but yeah, it’s just you know, growing up, we’re in an entrepreneurial household. It was never really a thought for me to work for anyone else. The the entrepreneurial journey was always the way I saw myself going
John Corcoran 27:26
and what sorts of things as a kid did you do you mowing lawns and restarting t shirt companies in your your, you know, garage?
Phil Nadel 27:34
Yeah, you know, typical like, you know,
typical kid businesses. So, we had we had one company up so we have one company that was cleaning, we insert here in Florida, we have these pool enclosures made of screen their screen screens and enclosures, and they get filthy, they get pine needles in them and leaves on them and they’re very difficult Queen the pine needles especially. So we would my partner and friend of mine and I would risk life and limb climb up on on roofs and and screening closures cleaning these things. And we got big money for it because no one else could do it. I was also a queen on my high school tennis team. And so I would string tennis rackets for the guys on the team and in other players in the local area because we were all broke strings frequently, especially in the humidity in South Florida. We would break strings all the time. So I bought a string machine became an expert at stringing a tennis rackets and and did that for a while. So there were a bunch of, you know, kid friendly businesses that I started early on, but you’re
John Corcoran 28:46
looking for opportunities and when you see an opportunity you went for it, it seems like and so you’ve got a couple of different businesses. You got a couple of interesting internet businesses. Selling ring tones or mp3 is I believe, go mp3 giveaway. Tell us about some of those.
Phil Nadel 29:01
Yeah, we had a company that was an online rewards platform. And we had a variety of different websites with different rewards. Now this goes back many years. So what our most popular website was called MP free calm and we gave away a free mp3 downloads. So this is in the days, of course before streaming music and all that, and people would, you know, would be buying their music through through iTunes and buying mp3. And so we were, we were giving away mp3 is of all the all the best music and in exchange for comfort for consumers, taking advantage of offers or shopping through our website. So that was one of the one of the rewards on that.
John Corcoran 29:49
I guess one of the lessons perhaps in that is that some companies just have a limited lifespan. Technology is going to change and evolve and if you don’t exit your It may be too late. Yeah. What are some of the lessons that you apply in the work that you do today from all those different ventures that you founded?
Phil Nadel 30:08
Well, I think you hit upon something interesting. And that is the constant need to innovate. So for us, every time, you know, we were constantly on the lookout for for new rewards that we could offer in that company. And so I remember when the iPod when Apple introduced the iPod, to the first time, we said, this would be a great, you know, reward for us to offer. So we started offering that and as new as new products and services came out, we tried to constantly innovate and find a new way new products to offer new rewards, but also new ways for our members to to earn those rewards. So that’s, that’s one example. I’m constantly constantly innovating. But But always again, focusing on solving a problem.
John Corcoran 31:00
Now one thing I did want to ask about is how do you end up partnering up with Barbara Corcoran? A lot of my listeners wonder about that sort of thing, like, you know, when you you partner with someone who’s got statues got a claim to fame, that sort of thing. How did that come about?
Phil Nadel 31:13
Um, so Barbara and I were introduced by a mutual friend years ago, and I was helping her with a little bit with some of her Shark Tank investments, and with some of the companies in her Shark Tank portfolio, and at that time angellist introduced this syndicate feature, which we talked about earlier. And I said to Barbara, you know, this is a great opportunity for us, because people know you for angel investing. And an angel investing is becoming very popular and through Angel list. This is a way for people to invest alongside of us, and, and, and take advantage of all the due diligence that we do and she said, it sounds Great fill, but I don’t have time to run it. So I’ll be your partner but you’re running. And so that’s how we started it together about five or six years ago.
John Corcoran 32:10
And and of course it became forefront into no longer she’s she’s not involved in the way that she was initially it’s now forefront Investment Partners and you’ve had 1400 unique limited partners invested in forefront. How do you manage that number of investors? How do you keep the communication flowing? keep everyone happy? I mean, I’m imagining your inbox it must be overflowing.
Phil Nadel 32:37
Yeah, it is, of course, and this is this goes back to the point I made earlier, which is a distinction between forefront Venture Partners and a VC fund. So again, we are 100% dedicated to being a syndicate. So our primary constituency is RR syndicate. Members, and that’s who you know, we are focused on. And so the communications with them providing information to them. And enabling communications between the companies we invest in, and our investors is absolutely paramount and kid. And so that that is our focus. We we provide a lot of information and a lot of communication. We are very, very responsive to two questions that come in from our syndicate investors. And, and that’s, that’s what we do, and that’s what we’re focused on. So, yeah, I we do get a lot of inbound inquiries and questions from our syndicate investors. But you know, what, they also do so much for our portfolio companies, they add a tremendous amount of value from their experiences, their connections and whatnot. They will add a lot of value to our portfolio companies
John Corcoran 33:57
that’s really interesting. It’s almost like having a really active Standard advisory board,
Phil Nadel 34:01
it really is. And so it’s only one entity on their cap table for the companies, which is great. But they’ll get the benefit of hundreds of investors who have incredible connections and experience and can share those with the companies. They these are investors have a vested interest in each company they invest in, even if they only invest $5,000 or something. They’re willing to introduce the company to potential customers, refer potential hires for them, share experiences and knowledge of the space, whatever it may be. All of that has been so very valuable. And I’m so grateful for the value that our syndicate members bring to our portfolio companies because it’s really, really helped.
John Corcoran 34:46
It’s such an interesting distinction compared to VCs. I imagine. You see some founders that do a really good job of leveraging that community.
Phil Nadel 34:54
Yeah, yeah, they do and some, some are certainly better at it than others. But You know that the comp, the syndicate members are very forthcoming. So they will be, they’ll reach out and they’ll say, Look, I know this connection. Can I make an introduction? But yes, you’re right. The companies that sort of include an ask in their monthly investor updates, right. They include a request for assistance. Those do those companies do the best. Typically, they’ll they’ll include a paragraph that says here are areas where we need help, can you help us? And inevitably they’ll get, you know, six or eight replies from our syndicate members.
John Corcoran 35:31
Right. All right. Well, we’re running short on time here. Just a couple more questions. So first, I have to ask you about the role that podcasting is played because I’ve been podcasting since 2012. I love it. You’ve been on the pitch podcast for a while. And there’s so many investors these days that are involved in podcasting, from Jason Calacanis, two different big, you know, well known investors and VC funds and that sort of thing. What role has being one of the investors on that podcast played for you.
Phil Nadel 36:01
Oh, it’s been a while. It’s been a great experience. And I’m grateful for Josh Muccio for inviting me initially on when he started the pitch podcast years ago. It’s been a great experience. It’s helpful for me in terms of exposure and brand recognition for forefront. More people are aware of us, which is a great thing. It’s, it’s been also very fruitful in terms of meeting companies that are pitching on on the show. We’ve invested in a few of those, several of those. So that’s been wonderful. And just it’s a great opportunity to, to meet companies and to and to sort of, you know, just get more exposure in the market.
John Corcoran 36:46
Great. Alright, so wrapping things up the question I always ask, let’s pretend Phil we’re at an awards banquet, much like the Oscars of the Emmys you were receiving yet another lifetime. award? Yeah, no, come on. You got to Make some space on the shelf. And so what we all want to know is who do you think who are the you know, friends, family partners, who are the people that you acknowledge in your remarks?
Phil Nadel 37:10
Alright, so the requisite family thing, you know, aside, so obviously, my wife, my kids, and my parents got to thank them personally. And I could go speak about that for hours, but I won’t bore you. But I would say there are sort of three, three groups one, or maybe two groups of friends, there are two friends in particular and several teachers. So I have to have two of my closest friends are very helpful and influential in my career, Jamie Hutchinson and Bill diamond, both of them I’ve been friends with for decades, and it may help me in innumerable ways and then I had a friend great teacher who to really changed my life. Helen Weinberg shout out to Helen. She really, really changed my life and, and gave me a lot of confidence that I was able to achieve and and help me see that. So that was a real positive. And then a few of my Wharton professors, specifically miles bass, who unfortunately passed away several years ago. But some of my Wharton professors really helped fuel the flame, the entrepreneurial flame that I had. These were these were professors who had experience in, in founding businesses, they were not purely academics, they were practitioners and, and their experiences, the way they spoke about them would I just found fascinating and, and really, as I said, it fueled the fire that I had. So those I guess those are some of the people that that I thing,
John Corcoran 39:00
excellent forefront vp.com is the website or you can go to Angel CO and search for forefront venture partners on there. Just google it angellist forefront Venture Partners. Where else can people learn more about you, Phil?
Phil Nadel 39:14
A LinkedIn, they can always connect with me on LinkedIn or by email. I’m on Twitter too. So yeah, just I’m not hard to find LinkedIn is probably the best place if they you know, or the website, and so
forth on vp.com. Yep.
John Corcoran 39:32
Great. Alright. Thanks so much,
Phil Nadel 39:34
john. Thank you. It’s been a pleasure. I really appreciate it.