AV Entrepreneur Hours

We are excited to announce our first trip to Dallas for AV Entrepreneur Hours.  Our plan is to get started Wednesday morning bright and early, ready to meet Dallas’ finest early stage entrepreneurs/companies.  Depending on the response (and our travel plans), we will have 10-12 slots on February 24th.  For those of you that don’t know about the format, feel free to scroll down for the details and/or check out our Houston and Austin “conversation” pages.  The premise is simple:  we will have quick 20-30 minute chats, preferably with internet and software entrepreneurs.  The goal is to offer early stage entrepreneurs the opportunity to dictate the conversation with VCs in a casual setting (think coffee shop, not boardroom/bright lights).  Ask us about your marketing strategy, business plan, hiring needs, fundraising advice, etc.  The one thing that we guarantee is honest feedback.  If you are heading in the wrong direction (in our opinion of course!) expect us to tell you.  You guys get access and we get to meet the next generation. 

To sign up, please send us a sentence or two about your company and what you would like to discuss.  The email address is entrepreneurhours@austinventures.com.  Please start sending requests in as soon as possible.  We will announce the lineup about a week before the event date.

Also, I am offering a prize of public admiration to the person that suggests the best venue to host our event.  We have had great luck at coffee shops that have semi-private conference rooms or nooks, so we don’t bother the other customers and we keep your conversations somewhat private.  It also has to be a place that can stomach us for 7 or 8 consecutive hours.  We are good for the bill though.  Any suggestions? 

Looking forward to Dallas, see you then.

Tuesday’s Entrepreneur Hours in Austin reminded our venture team why this town is a great place to start a business.  We met with 12 early stage companies driven by creative local entrepreneurs.  Some of these entrepreneurs have peeled off from other ventures, recently quit a more stable job, or are still “moonlighting” while collecting a consistent paycheck.  Regardless of the situation, all the folks we met with were determined to get to the next level and were looking for some practical advice.  The fun part for us was that each group had their own unique questions and challenges, which kept the daylong event fresh and exciting.  Here is a snapshot of a few of our conversations:

• Talked with an expert in the web analytics space about measuring social media ROI
• Discussed go-to-market approach for a digital media distribution platform
• Offered fund raising advice for a consumer web play that recently went live
• Relayed the challenges that we are witnessing in the complicated Healthcare IT space
• Debated the sales distribution options for a fledgling SaaS B2B software application

The one thing that AVEH wasn’t short on was candid feedback.  We definitely are not experts in every space, but if there was an opportunity to relay an experience or message from what we are seeing in the start-up world, we made sure we passed on to the entrepreneur.  If we thought someone was headed down a difficult path we didn’t try to sugar coat it.  Our goal is to reach out to the local entrepreneurial community, offer applicable advice and identify companies to keep on our long-term radar screen.  Tuesday accomplished all of those and more.  We can’t wait for the next event and we look forward to hearing updates from all the past participants.

As you may have noticed, we have started “conversation” tabs for each of our AVEH cities.  All participants (and any entrepreneurs for that matter) are encouraged to join the discussion.  We would love for these conversations to serve as a forum for participants to offer feedback on AVEH and for the general entrepreneurial community to ask questions/give comments.  Go ahead, take advantage of it.  Click here for the Austin Conversation.

Thank you Austin

Thanks to our friends re-tweeting and blogging about AVEH, we have fielded a flood of requests for time slots at next Tuesday’s event.  Judging by the number of responses, AVEH is picking up steam in Austin!   We couldn’t be more impressed with the Austin entrepreneurial community.  Obviously we wish we could accomodate more folks, but keep in mind we are doing this quarterly in Austin, so there are more opportunities on the horizon.

Also, we are going to experiment with a new location this time.  Trianon coffee shop in Westlake has an ideal setup with a glassed in conference room.  It’s perfect for our laid back setting, with just enough privacy.  The address is 3201 Bee Cave (Bee Cave & Walsh Tarlton), just across the lot from the Post Office, next door to Thundercloud.

Finally, here is the lineup:

A couple quick notes on our event in Austin next Tuesday, January 19th.  We will be sending out the lineup later this week – probably Thursday or early Friday.  My goal is to make sure everyone has about 4-5 days notice.  I have been hesitant to start responding to all of the requests because more keep pouring in.  We will probably stop taking requests late Tuesday or early Wednesday.  Lastly, we will announce the location when we release the lineup.  Because of the success in Houston at a local coffee shop, we are looking at similar potential locations in downtown Austin.

Looking forward to the 19th!