TiE Institute is an annual program to help aspiring and early-stage entrepreneurs understand the fundamentals of building and launching a startup from successful entrepreneurs, seasoned executives and domain experts in interactive sessions. TiE Seattle has gathered a group of successful entrepreneurs and subject matter experts to conduct a series of webinars to help them successfully build and launch a startup. TiE Seattle was founded in 2000 by a group of successful entrepreneurs to support entrepreneurship in the greater Seattle area. TiE Seattle hosts numerous programs and events throughout the year to bring together entrepreneurs, intrapreneurs, mentors, advisors, service providers and investors, thereby growing the network and strengthening the platform. TiE events are sponsored by the leading VCs, enterprises and law firms fostering entrepreneurship in the Seattle startup ecosystem.

Key Takeaways

Session 1 Essentials of Startup Formation

- Founders must incorporate as soon as possible as they are otherwise personally liable for all their actions.

- A C-Corp is the best way to incorporate as #investors prefer this form of incorporation, and it provides the greatest flexibility regarding ownership structure.

- The best state to incorporate in is #Delaware, as most investors prefer Delaware as the state of incorporation.

Great to hear Madhu Singh, attorney, Foundry law group share her insights on the topic during the fireside chat after the presentation on #Startup Formation. It's always valuable to hear from experts in the field, especially regarding legal matters.

Session 2 How to vet a startup idea

- First, develop a positioning framework describing your problem and for whom.

- Conduct at least several dozen structured customer development interviews to identify the right customers and their pain points.

- Develop the TAM (Total Addressable Market) for your solution both from a top-down perspective as well as a bottoms-up one

- Figure out your competitive moat that will keep your competition at bay

Session 3 Fundraising Fundamentals

-It is important to understand how a Cap Table is structured and to maintain it properly at all times as it documents the equity holdings of all the stakeholders

-There are 2 ways to fund an early-stage startup - Convertible note or SAFE. Both methods are generally popular with investors

- In negotiating a preferred stock term sheet, know what’s negotiable and what is not. Mainly, the stock price, valuation and board composition are negotiable.

Session 4 How to Build a Killer Investor

- Get introductions to VC firms from other founders who know the firms well

- Your initial pitch to the VC firm aims to generate interest and not close the deal.

- Keep your slides down to 12 to 15 slides. Have an Appendix of another five slides to get into details if necessary

- Bring no more than three people to the pitch. The CEO should do 80% of the talking,

Session 5 Fundamentals of Business Modeling

- For your business model, you should build a 5-year forecast to show investors how big your business can become

-  Capture your key assumptions on a separate tab so investors can easily understand how you have built your model

- Test different sources of customer acquisition and use those metrics to forecast revenues

Video Recordings

Session 1 Company Formation

Session 2 How to vet a startup idea

Session 3 Fundraising Fundamentals

Session 4 Investor Pitch

Session 5 Business Modeling

Module 2 Key Takeaways

Session 1 IP Protection

- It is important for startups to develop an IP strategy for their company to protect the intellectual property they have developed.

- To save money, startups can initially file a provisional patent application for more time to file a full-fledged one.

- Filing international patents can be expensive, so decide if it is necessary if you plan to sell your product internationally.

Session 2 Go to Market

-Before you develop your GotoMarket strategy and invest in marketing, you need to ensure that you have achieved product-market fit

- First, segment your target market and develop personas for each of your target audiences

- Develop your product messaging and differentiation

- Understand where your customers congregate and target them accordingly

Session 3 Sales Strategy

- Tier your market and decide where to focus your sales effort. Align your sales organization to these tiers.

- Create an Ideal Customer Profile for your customers. Find the common attributes that distinguish them.

- Map the customer journey. Create content for each point in the customer journey.

- Hire hustlers as salespeople. Make sure that they have an entrepreneurial spirit.

Session 4 PR and Branding

- PR can be a compelling and cost-effective way to promote your company and product.

- Develop a story around your product and company that is tied to key trends happening in the industry. This is the best way to get the interest of journalists.

- Develop your product messaging and create a creative brief to help the PR agency develop a compelling PR strategy for you

Session 5 Company Culture -The speaker introduced the Team Operating Framework of Vision, Purpose, Culture and Brand.

-The Vision is what you are aiming to do, e.g. Microsoft’s vision is a computer on every desk

-The purpose is why you are doing it e,g, Increasing human knowledge and productivity through computers on every desk and in every home

-Culture is the rails on how you interact, and operate-The Brand is the place in people’s minds.

Video Recordings

- Session 1 IP Strategy

- Session 2 GotoMarket Strategy

- Session 3 Sales Strategy

- Session 4 PR and Branding

- Session 5 Company Culture

We wrapped up Module 1 and Mod 2  of the TiE Entrepreneur Institute. The sessions were extremely informative! BIG Shout to Shirish Nadkarni for conceptualizing and executing this program. Thank you to all our speakers - Brenton Twitchell, Madhu Singh, Henry Huang, Pradnya Desh, Craig Sherman, Sudip Chakrabarti, Andrew Klein, Julie Reed, Sneha Lundia, Sanjit Singh, Belinda Young and Andrew Wright for doing a great job with these sessions. Thanks also to our generous sponsor Wilson Sonsini. The wrapup networking session was excellent; attendees met with the mentors and the leadership team. TiE Institute is an annual program to help aspiring and early-stage entrepreneurs understand the fundamentals of building and launching a startup from successful entrepreneurs, seasoned executives and domain experts in interactive sessions. TiE Seattle has gathered a group of successful entrepreneurs and subject matter experts to conduct a series of webinars to help them successfully build and launch a startup.