Tech Coast Angels are the Blue Angels of angel investing. TCA is the premiere Angel group in the U.S.; TCA-OC may be the best of its networks, 30% avg. return over 20 years.
“Green Dot was our home run,” Grant Van Cleve, Pres. of TCA-OC tells me. Green Dot sells prepaid MasterCard and Visa Cards. It went public in 2010.
I walked into UCI Applied Innovation to one of 20 “sessions” the Angels hold each year—where early-stage cos. pitch for funding.
Would there be a Green Dot this morning?
An Irvine firm leads off. The Pitch: the liquid biopsy market with patented tech that yields targeted samples for more reliable diagnoses. The WaveSense team also sells their chops. They’ve built cos. before. They ask for a $2M convertible note.
Next a Hollywood growth-stager. Its pitch: The athletic market, an ozone-based product that sanitizes and deodorizes duffel bags, gym bags. It’s their second pitch to the Angels. They used Kickstarter to fund product development after the first pitch failed. Now they’re back in The Show with a product they’ve begun to sell—they ask for $3M with a 20% discount. This team adds sizzle. NBA legend Kevin Garnett is on its board, and a new veteran team member is taking meetings with USC and the NFL’s Saints.
The Angels confer over lunch. Van Cleve explains deliberations: “No thumbs up or down. If 1-2 raises their hand, they [talk] directly with the entrepreneur, potentially writing a check into a round another leads.
If there’s a critical mass, 8+, we start due diligence.” After that TCA-OC might lead, put in at least 40% of that funding round, guide negotiations over terms, likely get a seat on the Board. Alas, the Angels won’t be doing that this morning — “limited traction among the members,” Van Cleve reported. “All interesting ideas, with potential to impact their spheres. But things like a lack of valuation cap, worries about market size, etc. stopped readiness to write checks.”
The ozone guys are good guys, a few of them ex-athletes-turned professionals-turned entrepreneurs— seeking time and funding to feed the dream. I wanted their impression of the Angels, so I talked to pitchman Ray Edwards, co-founder of Trizone.
He’d just been lead to financing Derek Jeters’ Players Tribune. He had “heard” of The Angels.
“This is the Big Leagues,” Edwards said.
“So in other words if you can get checks here?” He smiled.
The Duke: MM’s story on the land sale under the Newport Tennis Club (opposite) has a rare photo (p. 11) from Newport’s other tennis club, Palisades, formerly John Wayne. “ONLY time John Wayne touched a tennis racquet,” owner Ken Stuart tells me.
The Duke secured the land for free and a 45-year lease. “He thought it’d be a good thing for Newport Beach.”
