Project Title: 40 Ventures- a “seed fund & venture development enterprise”

Organizers: Marti Nyman & John Montague

Strategy: 5 companies per year are taken in on full time basis to an environment known as “the facility”.  Mentorships ensue with multi-party hands on development aimed at prepping the startup for first round VC/Angel 12 months forward. “The facility” and related resources will be based out of Minneapolis and application process begins fall ‘09 and the program is set to kick off Jan 1 2010.  According to Mr. Nyman, the fund target is 20 million over 8 years, intending to to inject 40 different ventures with initial seed capital in the 100-200k range.  Percentage of equity will be negotiable and shares issed are in fact, founders shares.

Inv Paramaters: light orgs; not working with med device, not looking for long regulatory approval cycle, saas (consumer, enterprise, commercial), social media, digital media, online retail, mobility, computing simplification, etc.

Notes: Startups will spend a longer time “in facility” than comparable models, ie- techstars,y combinator.

Need: Right team,  clarity of idea, viability of idea, reality of demand, clear understanding of how to go to market, capital efficiency model.

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