Chris Fralic

Where can a large PE fund write a $100-150M check into the creator economy, and get good ROI? That’s a question I’m hearing more and more often. I have some ideas, but honestly I think that’s a challenging proposition at this stage of the market. It’s prompted me to repost my analysis of creator x media fundraisings. 👉🏼 https://lnkd.in/gF3EJSEY What do you think? Where can a check of that size solve a market problem, and generate good return? — I’m the founder of RockWater Industries. We do m&a and strategy advisory for media, agencies, and crestor economy. My DMs are open.

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Excited to share that I've been admitted into the Operators Guild, an application-based, members-only community of founders, entrepreneurs, operations, and finance leaders in high-growth, VC-backed companies. 🛡 🚀 The Operators Guild – or the "OG" as they affectionately call themselves – spans almost 900 members across 25+ cities, including some of the best company builders in tech. I joined OG because how they defined "Operator" really, really resonated. "What we do goes far beyond our titles. We are multidisciplinary, cross-functional, untethered to any one department. Business first, function second. Specialists in being generalists. Together, we build the fastest-growing and most innovative companies in the world." I suppose it's because I've sometimes felt guilty that I couldn't easily hyper-specialize like others seemed to. Like there was something fundamentally wrong that I couldn't decide on one narrow lane and commit to loving it forever. Classic square peg, round hole. The OG framing empowered me to think of my breadth as an advantage, with depth in my "zones of genius" creating incredible leverage. I now believe this combination is crucial for successfully bringing transformative products to market and building winning companies. I am fully diving in, folks: I'll be attending the Operators Guild Summit on May 15-17 in Denver. It's the "only un-conference in the world for operators." To my fellow OGs, I look forward to meeting you there. Big thanks to Casey Woo and the OG team for onboarding me into this amazing community, and Russell S. for helping my candidacy. Y'all have been inspiring. If you are an "operator" or "company builder" who connected with any of this, check out the Operators Guild. You won't regret it.

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Great time on the Embracing Erosion podcast w/Devon O'Rourke! We talked about: 🚀 How to scale a company from concept to 9-figure exit 🔄 How to break away from the traditional consulting model and apply product approaches ⏩ Why it’s important to iterate quickly and often with messaging 💸📈What signals are important to pay attention to when investing in startups and much more!

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Big things on the horizon, we are motivated and blessed to be at the dawn of a new age for the internet. Read more about our journey below or listen to the podcast: https://lnkd.in/eJeNhvVa

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It turns out, the Long Island Sound IS water. For these and other insights, check out this post about our seed funding round. 😬 #startups #fundraising #newyork

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As we’ve begun building Oversubscribed Ventures, we’ve learned that the world of venture capital is way too mysterious and insular. We wanted to crack it wide open and make it accessible to everyone. So, we launched a new podcast, with Phil Schwarz. Some of you may already listen to our World’s First Podcast (and if you do, thank you!). The Oversubscribed Podcast takes a lot of what makes World’s First Podcast great and focuses on the business world. This is a business podcast for anyone and everyone who is curious about stories of success, failure, recovering from rejection, pivoting, and more. Why launch a new podcast? - The lessons that come out of talking to founders, executives, etc can apply to everyone, whether they’re starting a company or not; - We could add something to the (way too few but super impressive) female voices in the startup and venture world; and - We could inject our own personality and - admittedly - often inappropriate humor into the conversations (iykyk). We hope our Oversubscribed Podcast does all of this and more. Link below, and of course you can find it anywhere you can listen to podcasts. More to come! Link: https://lnkd.in/e2E6kynn

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🌱 For pre-seed/seed founders 🌱 The early stage vc markets have changed drastically -- but many founders don't truly understand how or how much things have shifted until its too late or they are deep into the fundraising process already. This recent Allocate pod lifts the veil on the pre-seed/seed 2024 markets. SO MANY GEMS are packed 💎 into the first 20 min, I had to listen twice. Key takeaways from pre-seed VCs I'm a big fan of Jenny Fielding of Everywhere Ventures, Kirby Winfield at Ascend (PNW represent!) & Nate Williams. 💎 The market in one word: 'turbulent' 💎 Fundraising bi-furcation; 2X founder building in AI (rounds take weeks) vs All Others (rounds take up to 6 months). 💎 "Leading VCs" (ie. first check in) are putting in a TON of work - building conviction & then helping founders fill the round. 💎 Up to 5 rounds pre-A; need lower early valuations to enable step ups 💎 Pre-seed entry valuations have corrected to $5-8M 💎 Round sizes have increased at pre-seed & seed for extended runway Many more insights in the full pod here: https://lnkd.in/gYf-DMr6 #venturecapital #preseed

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A great The Angel Nest Podcast episode recorded yesterday with Thomas Wisniewski of newark venture partners! Really insightful conversation around trends in Seed stage investing, how metrics matter in communicating traction, and important aspects of financial modeling for early stage startups. Many thanks for your time Tom and thanks David Hemenway as always for hosting. Look out for the release of the episode soon! #angelinvesting #seedstage #startups #financialmodeling #venturecapital #startups

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Entering the Post-ZIRP, venture-capital-winter years. Thanks TechCrunch for this great summary of the macro economic context of #VC emerging managers.

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A topic that comes up often with companies we work with is how they think about the (Return on Investment) ROI of group travel for offsites and retreats. I’m excited to share thoughts in partnership with the Chief of Staff network tomorrow at 12 pm EST. You san RSVP here: https://lu.ma/kstmwma6 Before considering the ROI, we should consider the investment itself. 1. Prior to COVID, companies paid for rent (duh). Many companies paid $1.5-2.5K+ per employee per month per rent - Companies didn’t have a choice on whether or not to pay for rent - A right of passage for startups used to be raising a seed round, and taking out an expensive lease - In cities like SF and NY, rent is expensive: $80-100 per sq ft. - Based on avg. sq ft per employee, and other expenses like snacks, security, etc. spend on rent adds up! 2. With distributed work, companies have to spend less on rent (sometimes a LOT less) - Some remote companies are spending nothing or very little on rent - Even for in-person companies, because employees aren’t coming in every day the sq footage needs are down - The price of commercial real estate has also fallen considerably - For example, all we spend on rent at Marco for a few WeWork subscriptions for certain team members 3. Companies are now spending more on T&E (offsites and onsites) - Spend on rent is lower, but spending on T&E has gone up - More employees are distributed, but the need for in-person connection hasn’t gone away - Many companies are now investing in gatherings 2-4x per year - On the whole, companies should be saving money between rent and T&E 4. With much lower spending on rent, and higher spending on group travel, on the whole companies should be saving a LOT I’ll break this math down, and show how we’ve seen companies measure the impact of gatherings like offsites tomorrow! #employeeexperience #offsites #futureofwork

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This weeks episode was excellent. NIA. https://lnkd.in/dCXpNZxe

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talking private companies all week in advance of the webinar on Thursday 4/25. here is a preview from one of the speakers. Vincent Alternative Investments #earnreturn

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My high/lowlights from M&A advisory, RE investing, and life this past week… 💸 potential buyer of one of our IM tech clients backed out of its LOI and exclusive deal talks due to last minute change in exec approvals, but…it’s ok, there are other interested buyers, time to reengage them! Every M&A process must be prepped for this 🦵our team kicked off a new strategy assignment for an ad agency, and for me personally a new 1on1 coaching relationship with an emerging influencer agency ❌ I told my Savannah real estate agent I’m going to pause on bidding for new listings. I was spending so much time doing deal analysis, not winning any deals, and getting very frustrated. The market clearing prices just don’t make any sense to me, and I’m not ok with no cash flow for two years, hoping it will CoC in 2026. And then yesterday I saw multiple listings slash prices, as sellers realized the fed’s updated guidance this week meant they weren’t going to cut interest rates. Home prices are still high, but a better buyer season may be approaching. And during lunch yesterday an owner of 7,500 units, who’s been through 40 years of market cycles, told me he hasn’t bought since Dec 2021, that gave me a lot more confidence in being patient… 🤝 exploring a unique target M&A deal structure for a new client relationship. It’s complex but the potential deal has very strong combination logic. Look forward to helping bring some smart growth equity and financiers into the mix 😅 I’m a bit stretched. A lot going on! But I’m working on cool assignments, with good people, and continuing to learn every day. So we need help since our advisory demand is growing (we’re #hiring). But means I really look forward to my Italy-Slovenia-Croatia vacay end of May ;) 🥶 a property I bought last September now needs a new hvac. It was 19 years old. I knew it was going to happen, but it���s still not fun to get a $6,500 bill…but hopefully it will last for two decades, and now my tenant will have great AC for the upcoming Savannah season! 🎸 I saw Taking Back Sunday on Wednesday and am shortly departing to go see Finch, Bayside, and Armor for Sleep in downtown SD. Finch’s “What It Is To Burn” was my gateway drug into the post hardcore / punk / emo scene. I love seeing these bands still touring for now more than 2 decades! 🌮 had a great friends dinner at Casa de Bandini in Carlsbad last night (photo below). Similar to the above, we shared our highs and woes from the week. Best part? My friend gave me a new surf board to demo in the restaurant parking lot when we were talking out! …alright, time to head out for the show 💪🏼 —- I do m&a and strategy advisory at RockWater Industries, and invest in real estate on the side. My DM’s are open.

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UNLOCKING THE SECREATS OF THE GLOBAL VC ECOSYSTEM : A SUMMIT FOR LIMITED PARTNERS AND VENTURE CAPITALISTS TO THE GLOBAL VC's ECOSYSTEM SUMMIT -------------- 💰💵 Check 1st post in features section in my profile 💵💰 -------------- #VCEcosystemSummit #VentureCapital #LimitedPartners #Investment #PortfolioManagement #GrowthStrategy #IndustryLeaders #Networking #Collaboration #Innovation #Startup #Entrepreneurship #Funding #Investor #LP #GP #VC #PrivateEquity #HedgeFund #AssetManagement #WealthManagement #FinancialServices #InvestmentBanking #CapitalMarkets #BusinessGrowth #Scaling #Expansion #Disruption #Volatility #RiskManagement #Resilience #Sustainability #ESG #ImpactInvesting #Diversity #Inclusion #Equity #Equality #WomenInVC #WomenInFinance #MenInVC #MenInFinance #VentureCapitalist #InvestmentBanker #FinancialAnalyst #PortfolioManager #InvestmentManager #AssetManager #WealthManager #FinancialPlanner #InvestmentAdvisor #VCFirm #StartupAccelerator #Incubator #CoworkingSpace #EntrepreneurialEcosystem #InnovationHub #BusinessNetworking #ProfessionalDevelopment #Leadership #Mentorship #CareerGrowth #IndustryTrends #MarketInsights #FinancialRegulations #InvestmentStrategy #RiskAssessment #DueDiligence #DealMaking #MandA #IPO #PrivatePlacement #HedgeFundManager #AssetAllocator #FamilyOffice #SovereignWealthFund #PensionFund #EndowmentFund #VentureCapitalInvesting #StartupFunding #GrowthCapital #ExpansionCapital #Buyout #Recapitalization #Restructuring #Turnaround #DistressedInvesting #SpecialSituations #EventDriven #CreditInvesting #DebtFinancing #EquityInvesting #MezzanineFinancing #GrowthEquity #VentureDebt #SeedFunding #SeriesA #SeriesB #SeriesC #IPOPrep #PreIPO #PostIPO #PrivateCompany #PublicCompany #MicroVC #NanoVC #SeedStage #EarlyStage #GrowthStage #LateStage #PrivateEquityFund #HedgeFundManager #InvestmentPortfolio #RiskManagementStrategy #InvestmentResearch #FinancialPlanning #WealthCreation #CapitalGrowth #InvestmentOpportunities #BusinessExpansion #MarketTrends #IndustryInsights #FinancialInnovation #InvestmentInnovation #VCDeals #StartupSuccess #InvestmentStrategy #PortfolioDiversification #InvestmentRisk #InvestmentReturn #InvestmentGrowth #InvestmentIncome #InvestmentManagement #InvestmentConsulting #PrivateEquityInvesting #HedgeFundInvesting #VentureCapitalInvesting #AngelInvesting #ImpactInvesting #SustainableInvesting #ESGInvesting #ResponsibleInvesting #InvestmentFirms #InvestmentCompanies #InvestmentPartners #InvestmentNetwork #InvestmentCommunity #InvestmentEvents #InvestmentConferences #InvestmentSummit #InvestmentForum #InvestmentRoundtable #StartupInvesting #EarlyStageInvesting #GrowthStageInvesting #LateStageInvesting #PrivateEquityFirms #HedgeFundManagers #VentureCapitalFirms #AngelGroups #ImpactInvestors

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“The funding landscape has changed during the time we have been involved in it, and continues to evolve,” “And we’re evolving with it, to ensure that there is even more flexibility for companies to access the specific capital they need for a given scenario. We’ve funded well over 180 technology companies across multiple industries and verticals, and we’re not slowing down any time soon.” Regarding the total addressable market for Tractor to operate in, Imam explains that the one-funding-product-fits-all approach has required tweaking, simply due to the totally different needs expressed by the financial decision-makers, related to time, total access to the capital itself, and looming milestones that require a more strategic approach to accessing capital. “If you’re a SaaS company, or an ecommerce company, or a hardware company, or operating in a particular niche or vertical like marketing tech for example, you will have a different set of needs for funding based on your revenue,” explains Imam. “We’ve moved to a scenario-based funding model, based on the most common queries we receive at this point in time. B2B Enterprise SaaS we will always be able to fund in an instant. Other scenarios arise when the financials require a bit more flexible and bespoke assessment.” “In particular, our Inventory product points to our capability to fund in some very very specific and founder-focussed ways, and that flexibility really excites us, now and for the future.” Thank you for this write up SmartCompany!

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Wonderful article about Emily Knight and the whole The Engine Accelerator team on the amazing work their doing changing the world with #ToughTech!

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𝗪𝗵𝘆 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗿𝘁𝘂𝗽'𝘀 𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗺𝘂𝗻𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗶𝘀 𝗪𝗼𝗿𝘁𝗵 𝗠𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗧𝗵𝗮𝗻 𝗠𝗼𝗻𝗲𝘆 I recently had an insightful conversation with Derek Andersen, the visionary founder of Bevy and Startup Grind, on my podcast. Derek's journey is a testament to the power of community building and the transformative impact it can have on businesses and individuals alike. I wanted to share some key takeaways from our chat in this blog post. 𝗙𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗿𝘁𝘂𝗽 𝗚𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝗕𝗲𝘃𝘆: 𝗔 𝗙𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿'𝘀 𝗝𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗻𝗲𝘆 Derek's passion for community building led him to create Startup Grind in 2010, a global platform that connects and supports entrepreneurs. Startup Grind's success is a testament to its core values: giving more than you take, helping others first, and making friends. As Startup Grind grew, Derek and his team realized the need for better tools to manage and scale their community efforts. This led to the creation of Bevy, an AI-powered platform designed to streamline community management and growth. It's a great example of how identifying and addressing real-world problems can lead to innovative solutions. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗣𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿 𝗼𝗳 𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗺𝘂𝗻𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗶𝗻 𝗧𝗼𝗱𝗮𝘆'𝘀 𝗪𝗼𝗿𝗹𝗱 In our conversation, Derek emphasized the increasing importance of community building in today's world. In the digital age, where connections can often feel fleeting, communities provide a sense of belonging, support, and shared purpose. For businesses, fostering a strong community can lead to increased customer loyalty, engagement, and even product innovation. Derek's insights on leveraging AI in community management were particularly interesting. AI can help automate repetitive tasks, personalize experiences, and provide valuable insights into community behavior. However, Derek also stressed the importance of maintaining a human touch in community building. AI is a tool to enhance, not replace, human connection. 𝗞𝗲𝘆 𝗧𝗮𝗸𝗲𝗮𝘄𝗮𝘆𝘀 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗕𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗧𝗵𝗿𝗶𝘃𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗺𝘂𝗻𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗲𝘀 Here are some key lessons I took away from my conversation with Derek: 1.Start with a clear purpose: What do you want your community to achieve? 2.Focus on giving value: Offer your members something they can't find elsewhere. 3.Embrace technology: Use tools like Bevy to streamline your efforts. 4.Never forget the human touch: Foster genuine connections within your community. If you're interested in learning more about community building, I highly recommend checking out the full episode of my podcast with Derek Andersen. It's packed with valuable insights and practical advice for anyone looking to build a thriving community. Let me know your thoughts in the comments below!

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In this episode of "The Future of the Bioeconomy," AV Associate Drew Wandzilak and CEO and co-founder of Hyfe Michelle Ruiz discuss the economy's shift from traditional systems to more sustainable and environmentally friendly practices. Watch now! https://buff.ly/3JZ5gQI

Check this out! Yesterday, we filmed our Financial Literacy roundtable on the Lower East Side of New York City. We had an incredible conversation with five outstanding athletes and Michael Bapis from Vios Advisors at Rockefeller Capital Management, who oversees $1.4 billion in assets under management and is a frequent guest on CNBC. While financial literacy was the main focus, the discussion delved into much more, offering eye-opening insights. Here are a few highlights: 🔹 Your greatest #NIL currency isn’t always about money; it’s about the network you build as an athlete. All five athletes now have Michael’s cell number and each other’s. What’s that worth? 🔹 A powerful alumni group is far more valuable than short-term cash.  Your network is your net worth. 🔹 Find 3-4 mentors and build your personal board with people you trust who have your best interests in mind. 🔹 Don’t get jealous, even if the person you’re playing with is making more money—attitude is everything. 🔹 Mentorship can come from someone just two years older than you and on your team. 🔹 Play the long game—would you rather have $30k today from NIL or set yourself up for a job making $300k/year eventually? 🔹 Be a good person and never forget where you came from. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. 🔹 Compounding interest applies to relationships too. I am incredibly thankful to have these special athletes as part of our ZIYNX community. Though they are all still playing, I would hire any one of them on the spot. Impressive is an understatement. Amber Hofenk Jerembo - Field Hockey - Temple University Kenyon Miles - Football - Villanova University Maria Themelis - Lacrosse - The Wharton School Nicholas Matos - Football - Ithaca College Sky Owen - Basketball - St. John's University Next up: How to build your Professional Brand. The NIL deals we’re making with our community, in partnership with Opendorse, are about so much more than money. Cash comes and goes, but experiences last a lifetime. Randy Paul, M.S. Luidji Dormeus Amelia Magel Bryce Reiner Kelsey Cuje Klarke Sconiers Margaux Gill #financialliteracy #studentathletes #ncaa #impact #genZ

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