The Founders and Funders dinners are a series of invitation-only dinners that are held across Canada several times a year. They are a sort of summit on the state of each community and we do our best to make sure that the best startups possible have a chance to meet the most respected and active investors who are doing deals in those cities. There is always a mix of locals and people who come in for the event as a way to get connected.

We believe that if you cannot sit down and have dinner with someone, then you probably shouldn’t invest in or take investment from them. This is a great chance to apply a social filter to the dealflow in any one place.

What is it?: An invitation-only 3 course dinner. Cocktails before, cocktails after….

Who is coming?: The top investment-ready startups and active investors in Canada.

Where is it?: Downtown Toronto

When?: February 16th, 2012 at 6:30pm

How much is it?: Tickets range from $125 (startups) to $500 (service providers)

We are now accepting requests for invitations and the first round of invitations will go out this week.

Apply to attend F&F »

We have also decided to include a brief fireside chat with Daniel Debow at this dinner. We rarely do this sort of thing at a Founders and Funders but 2011 was such a great year we thought it would be fun to look back on the ups and downs of Rypple through the years and how they got to their eventual exit, some of which was written about in Forbes this week.

Daniel and Rypple have also been a big part of the Canadian startup community and he has also been an active angel investor recently.

We are excited to hear what he has to say about how we can help build more great Canadian companies and how to build awareness in Silicon Valley when your HQ is back here in Canada.

We hope you will join us as we kick off another great year for the Toronto and Canadian startup community.

We will be announcing Founders and Funders dinners in other cities soon as well.

We are finalizing a new date with the venue. I’m leaning towards Monday, March 1, 2010. I’d like to connect with everyone before SxSWi & Mix.

Once the new date at the venue is finalized, I will begin sending out personal invitations. How do you get an invitation? Step 1 is to let us know that you are interested. We have begun reviewing applications (and in case you’re curious, we make everyone tell us why they should participate: Founders, Funders, a limited number of Service Providers – Jevon made Jonas and me justify our participation I am hoping to finalize the venue and date this week, with the first round of invitations sent out by Friday.

Cheers,
David, Jevon & Jonas

Founders & Funders Toronto is booked for Februrary 15, 2010.

How do I attend?

Founders & Funders is by invitation only. We are actively seeking new talent. That means new companies, new startups, new founders, new entrepreneurs. We are looking for new funders. How do I get an invite if I’m new? Well, you should apply to attend.

How much does it cost?

The price is $100/founder, $200/funder and $500/service provider. We’re also looking for separate wine sponsors.

Who is attending?

Details of the funders, founders and everyone else attending will be added shortly. One of the reasons for the changes to the application process is to help gather information to share with attendees. This should be a great social event.

The inaugural Toronto event sold out. And we’re expecting this event to reach capacity very quickly.

We are limited to 100 seats. The fee for the dinner is $100 which will include drinks and dinner.  This is a private networking event and we are selecting the audience to ensure a quality group of attendees. And to provide the best chance to network together.

How do I get an Invite?

If you would like to attend the dinner, please fill out the following form and let us know who you are.

We will be contacting those invited with details on the registration and attendance details for the dinner in the coming weeks.

Special Guest – Dan’l Lewin

We’re incredibly lucky to have Dan’l Lewin scheduled to be in attendance (Dan’l is the Corporate Vice-President, Strategic and Emerging Business Development for Microsoft). Check out GigaOM’s interview with Dan’l where he talks candidly about his role in Microsoft and how Microsoft works with other emerging technology companies.

Dan’l Lewin is corporate vice president of Strategic and Emerging Business Development, responsible for managing worldwide strategic business relationships with venture capitalists and emerging venture-capital-backed businesses, as well as managing the business relationship with leading global industry partners such as SUN, Adobe, Intuit and BEA to ensure their applications interoperate with and run well on the Microsoft platform – for the benefit of the companies’ common customers. Lewin is based at Microsoft’s Mountain View, Calif. campus.

A 25-year Silicon Valley veteran, Lewin was most recently CEO of Aurigin Systems Inc., an enterprise software company focused on intellectual property asset management. He also spent 18 years as an executive, leading sales and marketing divisions for companies including Apple Computer Corp., NeXT Inc. and GO Corporation. In addition, Lewin has served as a consultant for emerging companies, venture capital firms and corporate joint ventures.

Lewin holds an A.B. in politics from Princeton University.

Sponsors

We’re working with a number of great organizations to sponsor the event.

• Microsoft Canada
• Atlas Venture
• General Catalyst Partners

If you would like to sponsor this event or other Founders & Funders events across Canada please feel free to contact David Crow or Jevon MacDonald.

The inaugural Founders & Funders went off without a hitch. It was a fantastic evening. It wouldn’t have been possible without our sponsors, thank you very much Microsoft and JLA Ventures, the event wouldn’t have happened without their support.

Jess and Chris from Istoica snapped a fantastic pictures of the event and the attendees. The gallery from Founders & Funders event is available. Maybe we should do a set of hockey cards of Founders & Funders. On the back of each card it could have stats like amount raised, fund size, number of deals, etc. Until then, check out the pictures from Istoica.

The goal of Founders & Funders is to create a social environment where the people who fund companies and the people who start companies can begin conversations outside of the pitch. As an attendee, I’ll extend an invitation to connect you with any other attendee you might have missed.

Thank you for making the inaugural Toronto Founders & Funders a success. We look forward to hosting another event later in 2008.

Cheers,
David & Jevon

Monsoon
100 Simcoe Street
Toronto, Ontario

(Yahoo! Maps, Google Maps)

I really don’t want to miss out on hearing from all of you, even if you can’t make it to Toronto for the dinner tonight, so I thought I would post the questions we will post tonight at the dinner. Please comment below with your thoughts on the state of funding in Canada. Answering these questions isn’t a requirement at the dinner, but we wanted to set the tone of the discussion to focus as much as possible about what we can do to change things in Canada.

• Do Angel Investors and Venture Capitalists get enough recognition for the deals they do in Canada?
• Do Canadian universities inspire and support entrepreneurship? Could a “Startup Co-Op” program help?
• What is the minimum amount of funding a startup should be able to deliver a product with?
  
• Is the Dragon’s Den the most visible face of Canadian Entrepreneurship right now? What is wrong with that?

Some of these questions may change by tonight depending on the answers we get.

Head over to StartupNorth to respond or to suggest another question.

Rick has led the charge calling for disruption in the venture capital community. Rick has provided detailed documentation on the venture funding process and continues to have “No Harm, No Foul” meetings with entrepreneurs to provide feedback on the idea, the revenue model and the customers. The “30 minute no harm, no foul” meetings are a great way to learn about how a VC thinks about your company, the problem space you’ve chosen and your solution.

JLA Ventures invests in Internet, digital media, e-commerce, communications security, mobile computing, and enterprise software companies. Portfolio candidates typically possess superior technology, a sustainable competitive advantage, and exceptional growth prospects.

Our investments range in size from $500,000 to $10 million, with an initial investment normally being between $2 million and $5 million. As active, multi-stage investors, we provide long-term capital for growth purposes.

JLA Ventures portfolio includes

• Iloverewards
• b5media
• PlanetEye
• QuickPlayMedia
• ZipLocal
• SIRIT
• Truition Marketplace Solutions
• Tungle
• Fun Technologies
• and others

Appetizer, choice of:

• seasonal daily soup
• baby greens in pappadum cup with yuzu vinaigrette and seedlings

Main course, choice of:

• organic “firecracker” chicken supreme with azuki forbidden rice and tiger lilly buds
• beef tenderloin on garlic chive mash and tosa-zu king oyster mushrooms
• arctic char with wild mushrooms and e-fu longevity noodles
• vegetarian option – butternut squash gnocchi
  

Dessert

• monsoon dessert platter – chefs’ daily creation