1. ABC Inc. A Vision for the Future Investor Presentation [Date]
This is a sample template of an Investor Presentation (IP). If you’re looking for funding, you should have one, because sooner or later you’ll have to make a presentation.

2. It’s fairly typical to have a
Overview
The Business and Product
The Market and Competition
Strategy
Business Drivers and Risks
Management
Financials
Funding Requirements
It’s fairly typical to have a
“table of contents” page. This can be done with lots of bells and whistles to make it look better, but the basic structure of the presentation will usually be something like what is shown here.

3. ABC Inc: [What we’re all about.]
Business Proposition
ABC Inc. provides [service or product] to [customers, market segment] helping them to [value proposition which must be better or cheaper by at least 25%] compared to solutions available today.
General Rule: Four bullet points to a page, no more than four words to a bullet point. You’ll note we break this rule on every slide of this presentation.
It is sometimes good to include summary boxes at the bottom of the page to summarize the major message you want to convey on the slide. The subtext has been put in [ ]’s, to give you a sense of the general message each page wants to convey.
ABC Inc: [What we’re all about.]

4. This is an “establishing slide,” just let the audience know a little bit about the company and where it stands today.
History and Status
Buck Young and three friends decided to form ABC Inc. in 2001 after Buck had a chance to closely assess the widgets market
Company has gone through an initial angel round of finance
Company has partly developed patented technology and had made strides in designing proprietary CRM system
Our History and Status: [We’ve been working hard and are making progress.]

5. The Product Patented widget process
VC’s want to see that you will be able to protect your market advantage in some way to prevent entry by competitors.
The Product
Faster, better and / or cheaper – by at least 25% to have reasonable a chance against established competitors. Emphasize what the benefits are here, and save the 90-slide technical discussion on how it is accomplished for later due diligence.
Patented widget process
Increases effectiveness by 60%
Decreases cost by 40%
Backward compatible with legacy systems
Strong expansion opportunities into additional markets [X, Y and Z] in the future
A single product idea may not be the basis of a sustainable company in the long-run. If you have other markets that you can expand into in the future, say so.
Our Product: [Breakthrough advances with large barriers to entry for competitors.]

6. Our Market: [It’s big enough for you—and growing fast.]
Most presentations start with a “top down” estimate of the market, generally provided by a respected source. You want to emphasize basic market dimensions and growth prospects. Many tech start-ups stop here, but “top down” is not enough.
The Market
Forrester says that “…‘billions and billions’ of widgets in our industry will be sold, and growth will be infinite—forever.”
We’ve surveyed 20 companies in-depth, which are in our target market. Summary results:
Approx. 120 such companies in our market
Company sales revenues from $10-70 million, co.’s mostly profitable
Annual widget purchases/co.: $1-12 million, median $3 million
Growth of widget purchases: about 17%/year for last three years
Market in volatile phase currently, due to technology change
Total Market potential: $350 million (based on “bottom up” analysis)
You also have to do a “bottom up” market analysis, actually doing a survey of potential clients, or a thorough segmentation breakdown. The “bottom up” market will tell you how many potential clients are actually relevant to you.
Our Market: [It’s big enough for you—and growing fast.]

7. Our Target Customer: [Open for a change—to us.]
Customer Characteristics
Many VC’s really like to see specific customer knowledge, not only about what the customer will buy, but who specifically is the client (CEO, Mfg. Dir. may not be the same!), and how the decision is made. Thinking about a prototypical client can help you understand the business.
Typical Customer
Sales of $30 million per year
Spends $3 million/year on widgets
Profit margins low, under pressure to cut costs—and widgets are a major cost item.
Purchasing conducted by Purchasing Dept, but only with approval of Dir. Of Manufacturing. Topic is high priority for CEO.
Supplier relationships reviewed only once a year, in September
New product distributions systems (NokEric) are causing market volatility
Cost will be key factor in determining supplier choice.
Our Target Customer: [Open for a change—to us.]

8. Our Competition: [They’re tough. And nasty.]
Ukr-Maf Inc.: Have developed “personalized incentive plan” that supports aggressive sales force strategy, but product quality is poor.
NokEric Inc.: Have developed 3G-based widget sales concept, with very high quality, but can only be delivered through MMS
You should have a pretty good idea of your competitors’ business models. If they have strengths, it is OK to say so, because it will also give insights into their structural weaknesses. Be don’t expect VC’s to believe that your competitors are total fools, or that they won’t react ever, no matter what you do.
Our Competition: [They’re tough. And nasty.]

9. Strategy ABC Inc Strategy: ABC market share: 12%
Focus on ‘Middle Market’ Customer segment
Avoid dark alleys late at night, but
Provide personalized service
ABC market share: 12%
Projected steady state revenues: $40 million/year
Your strategy is your approach to the market based upon opportunities, on the one hand, and the capabilities of your competitors, on the other. If you’ve done your math right, you should be in a position to estimate your market share, and thus your revenues.
Our Strategy: [We deliver something better or cheaper for a specific market segment.]

10. Our Model: [No matter what they do, we win.]
Business model drivers really refer to features and abilities that you have that your competitors either can’t get or won’t develop because it doesn’t meet their business model. Ukr-Maf can’t get respectability; NokEric won’t rework their systems to serve this market niche.
Business Model Drivers
Sustaining Competitive Advantage
Ukr-Maf will self-destruct due to ‘legal enforcement’
NokEric will ignore this market, because $40 million is table crumbs for NokEric, but
NokEric will continue to develop MMS-based widget sales, and will move aggressively on our market with ‘remote sales’ in 2004
Critical Success Factors
Unique, sophisticated CRM system to insure bid at appropriate moment
R&D Dept. will reduce mfg. costs by 50% to insure competitiveness using patented ‘Shrink-O-Widget’ technology.
CSF’s are what you really have to do well to win in your target market. These are “endogenous” factors—those under your control.
Our Model: [No matter what they do, we win.]

11. Rollout: [We can make it from here to there.]
ABC Inc. widgets are ready to ship
Reference customers are thrilled with the beta version
“Best widget I’ve ever owned” – CEO, Reference Co., Inc.
Strategic partners ready to promote our widget
“We see a huge demand for ABC widgets” – VP Sales, Big Corp.
Value Added Resellers have been recruited
Advertising & PR plan is in place
Analyst meetings went great
Major launch event scheduled at WidgetWorld Expo
VC’s know that products don’t sell themselves, and want to see that you have a specific plan for getting your product out to market effectively and efficiently.
Rollout: [We can make it from here to there.]

12. Our Key Risks: [Not so bad. Take ‘em or leave ‘em.]
Slow market uptake
Key man risk: Ukr-Maf “retaliation”
Failure of key internal initiatives (Shrink-O-Widget)
Nuclear war
As a rule of thumb, you should never have more than three key risks, and you will not usually have less than two. Thus, if you have 4 or more key risks, you don’t have a deal—go back to rethink your concept. Incidentally, there are thousands of minor risks—like nuclear war. You don’t really need to put those in the presentation.
Key risks are “residual” or “exogenous” risks—risks that you can’t eliminate, no matter what. Therefore, these are the risks that you are asking to investor to take. If he doesn’t like these risks, then the discussion is over, because there is nothing you can do about them.
Our Key Risks: [Not so bad. Take ‘em or leave ‘em.]

13. Our Team: [Experienced. Successful. Up to the job.]
The management team is crucial, and you want to show a balanced, experienced team with good credentials. Unfortunately, this is often hard for a start-up to do. One approach is to assemble a “virtual” team where some people are expected to join if offered the job upon funding – sometimes listed as “to be hired.”
Management Team
CEO: Buck Young, 28
Buck has had a middle management job at NokEric, where they think pretty well of him and he’s had a chance to take a close look at the future of the widgets market. He thinks he’s smarter than everyone else, and therefore expects a VC to finance his scheme.
CTO: Ben Had, 54
Ben has worked all over the place, most recently at Cistel. He’s a real adult with kids, salary, mortgage, the works. He worked with Buck a few years ago, and Buck sure is a sharp kid—especially if he can convince a VC to finance this project. The idea’s great, well, as far as a CTO can tell. Ben carries an ABC business card, but he hasn’t quit his job at Cistel yet.
CFO: Guy Big, 48
Guy is a Senior Vice President at Goldman Sachs. Buck met him at a cocktail party and asked if he could “use Guy’s name as a reference”—which he has. Buck reckons he’d be pleased to let Guy know about his proposed position—even offer him a job—if the VC finances the deal.
The chance of a Goldman Sachs Sr. VP leaving to join this outfit is about zero—and the VC more than suspects this. On the other hand, Buck probably did meet Mr. Big, and that’s something. The VC is looking more to Ben—who’s actually held a job in the industry—as a counter-weight to Buck, whose ambition might exceed his judgment.
Our Team: [Experienced. Successful. Up to the job.]

14. Fin. Performance: [Balanced. Achievable. Pretty appealing.]
You don’t need a whole lot of detail here. The VC is just trying to answer the following questions: 1) How big does it get? 2) Does the growth look manageable? 3) Is the profitability within norms? 4) How much cash does it need?
Financial Highlights
Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Year 5
Revenues
Annual Growth -- 14% % % %
Pre-Tax Profits
Pct of Revenues (55)% (8%) 2% 12% 11%
Cash Investment (2.1) (0.9)
Show as few decimal places as possible. So, don’t show revenues as $12,435 million: 12.4 or even 12 is fine. Same for percents. Growth of 14.27%--how good a manager are you? Showing growth as a simple 14% is fine. This is not an accounting exercise, it is a decision-making one. Approximations are fine.
Fin. Performance: [Balanced. Achievable. Pretty appealing.]

15. Our Funding: [Reasonable to accomplish specific goals.]
You need to say how long the money will last, and what is expected to be accomplished during that period.
Funding Needs
Series A Funding: $3.0M
Milestones to be achieved (24 months)
Establish sales for initial product
Sales run-rate of $3.5M by end of 18 months
Profitability by the end of 24 months
Use of funds
Key management hires $400K
Other technical & support staff $500K
Product packaging & COGS $400K
Sales & marketing expense $950K
General operating expense $750K
Don’t forget to include what the investment is to be used for. Be reasonably specific. Don’t just say “to run the business,” but show that some thought was put into determining the amount being asked for.
Our Funding: [Reasonable to accomplish specific goals.]

16. Investor Performance: [Fair Valuation. Good Returns.]
Not everyone likes to include a deal summary, because it can contain transaction details which might properly be the subject of negotiation. However, some VC’s like deal summaries because it tells them clearly 1) how much cash is needed and 2) what their expected returns are.
Deal Summary
Be careful with the pre-money valuation. If it’s too high, the VC may think you’re simply unrealistic and not professional, and may dismiss you out of hand. On the other hand, it is your opening negotiating position, so you want some latitude for later discussions.
Pre-Money Valuation: $1.5 million
Cash Investment: $3 million
Exit Valuation (Yr 5): $30 million
Proposed Investor Share: 66.7%
Return to Investor (irr): 46%
Cash-on-Cash Return Investor 6.7x
Investor Performance: [Fair Valuation. Good Returns.]

17. Questions ABC Inc.: [Invest in us.]
By Steven Kopits, ,
&
Daryl Scott, Scott Technology Group, Inc.