This document provides information on startup funding. It discusses various funding stages including pre-seed, seed, Series A, Series B, and Series C. For each stage, it outlines considerations like the type of investors involved, average timelines between stages, and key factors to address when seeking that level of funding such as demonstrating product traction or a clear valuation. The document also provides a detailed list of documents and information needed for an investment data room to facilitate due diligence investigations by potential investors.

1. STARTUP FUNDING
Hany Sewilam | Managing Partner at AJA VENTURES

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THINK ABOUT !!!
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HOW 500 INVESTS
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THINK ABOUT !!!
 ARE YOU READY TO SEEK FUNDING?
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Financial Models
Projected Costs, Acquisitions, Sales And Revenue, Including
Your Profit Margins, Growth Rates And When You Expect
The Business To Become Profitable
Potential Customers
Prospective, Potential
Qualified, Guaranteed
Customers
MQL vs SQL
Brand Yourself
Generate Traction
Brand Is The Experience
You Deliver Customers
Your Team
Qualifications, Experiences, Education, and Background

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PRE-SEEDVS SEED
 THE SECRETS
 Angel Investors:
 Angel investors tend to be serial entrepreneurs and investors who have expertise in
a specific field and are likely pretty passionate about it. They want to make money,
sure, but they are also often in the investment world for “love of the game.”.
 Silent Partner:
 usually just want to earn some passive income and not really be involved in the
day-to-day operations of the company.
 Equity Crowdfunding:
 asking a large number of people each for
a small amount of money
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SERIES A
 THE SECRETS
 Step ONE:
 Join an Accelerator // YCombinator.
 Networking:
 Networking early and often with influential investors, whether they are Angel
Investors or VCs from leading venture capital firms.
 Micro-VS Connections:
 Micro VC is a quickly growing category. ... deal flow and enable founders to
connect with other founders to help de-risk their own companies.
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7. 7
DATA ROOM // BE PREPARED
 THE SECRETS
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Due diligence investigations
Funding Process
‫والتعريفي‬ ‫االستثماري‬‫الملف‬Investment Deck
‫الشركة‬‫مستندات‬Company Documents
‫للشركة‬ ‫والتجاري‬ ‫انوني‬‫الق‬‫السجل‬Certificate of Registration
‫الحصص‬‫توزيع‬ ‫جدول‬Capitalization Table
‫المستثمرين‬‫بين‬ ‫األولية‬‫اقية‬‫االتف‬The Term Sheet
‫والمعدلة‬ ‫المصدرة‬‫التأسيس‬‫عقود‬Amended & Restated Articles of Incorporation
‫اقية‬‫اتف‬‫الحصص‬‫مالكي‬Shareholder Agreement
‫المستثمرين‬‫حقوق‬‫اقية‬‫اتف‬Investor Rights Agreement
‫الحصص‬‫شراء‬ ‫اقية‬‫اتف‬Stock Purchase Agreement
‫انونية‬‫الق‬‫والعقود‬ ‫المستندات‬Legal documents
‫المستثمرين‬‫مع‬ ‫األولية‬‫اقيات‬‫لالتف‬ ‫السابقة‬‫المستندات‬Past terms sheets
‫الشركة‬‫أخرى‬‫اقيات‬‫اتف‬‫أو‬‫عقود‬ ‫أي‬Any other legal agreements

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DATA ROOM // BE PREPARED
 THE SECRETS
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Due diligence investigations
Funding Process
‫المبيعات‬Sales
‫البيع‬‫عمليات‬Sales process
‫المحتملون‬‫العمالء‬Sales pipeline
‫المبيعات‬‫لمواد‬ ‫نموذج‬Sample sales materials
‫العمالء‬‫أهم‬‫ائمة‬‫ق‬Important customer
‫اإلدارة‬‫مجلس‬ ‫مواد‬Board Material
‫االجتماعات‬‫محاضر‬Meeting minutes
‫المالية‬‫المستندات‬Financials
‫األخيرة‬‫للسنة‬ ‫الدخل‬‫ائمة‬‫ق‬Income statements P&L for last year
‫النقدي‬‫التدفق‬‫بيانات‬Cash flow statements
‫العمومية‬‫الميزانية‬Balance Sheet
‫ادمة‬‫الق‬‫للسنوات‬ ‫المالية‬‫التوقعات‬Financial projections for 3 years
‫أخرى‬‫مالية‬ ‫مستندات‬ ‫أي‬Any other financials
‫السوق‬‫أبحاث‬Market Research
‫السوق‬‫دراسات‬Market studies
‫واألسعار‬ ‫المميزات‬‫مع‬ ‫التنافسية‬‫تحليل‬Competitive analysis with features and pricing

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DATA ROOM // BE PREPARED
 THE SECRETS
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Due diligence investigations
Funding Process
‫التسويق‬Marketing
‫والرؤية‬ ‫البصرية‬‫الهوية‬‫ات‬‫ملف‬Branding guidelines/vision
‫الفعال‬‫وخطط‬ ‫االجتماعية‬‫الشبكات‬‫مواد‬ ‫مثل‬ ‫التسويق‬‫معلومات‬‫ادمة‬‫الق‬‫يات‬
Marketing information
‫الفريق‬Staff
‫الرواتب‬‫مع‬ ‫التحاقهم‬‫وتاريخ‬ ‫ومناصبهم‬ ‫بالموظفين‬ ‫ائمة‬‫ق‬
‫المخاطر‬‫وخطط‬ ‫الشركة‬‫مناصب‬ ‫في‬ ‫المستقبلية‬‫التوظيف‬Future critical roles and hiring plan
‫ائمة‬‫ق‬‫الموظفين‬‫بين‬ ‫العقود‬‫والشركة‬All employees’ contracts
‫التقنية‬Technology
‫النظام‬‫هيكلة‬System Architecture Diagram
‫البرمجية‬‫الواجهات‬‫مستندات‬API Documentation
‫البيانات‬‫قواعد‬ ‫هيكلة‬Database Schema
‫التوسع‬‫خطة‬Expansion plan
‫اديها‬‫تف‬ ‫وطرق‬ ‫المخاطر‬Risks and its mitigation plan
‫االصطناعي‬‫الذكاء‬‫أو‬‫الضخمة‬‫البيانات‬‫تحليل‬ ‫أو‬‫اآللة‬‫تعلم‬ ‫مثل‬ ‫خاصة‬‫ات‬‫مواصف‬ ‫أي‬Any details for
special topics such as AI, ML or big data
‫ومستنداتها‬ ‫والعتاد‬ ‫األجهزة‬‫صور‬Hardware documents and pictures

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DATA ROOM // BE PREPARED
 THE SECRETS
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Due diligence investigations
Funding Process
‫المنتج‬Product
‫المستقبلية‬‫اإلصدارات‬‫خصائص‬‫أو‬‫للمنتج‬ ‫الطريق‬‫خارطة‬Product road map
‫الحالي‬‫المنتج‬‫من‬ ‫صور‬Screenshots of the product
‫الفكرية‬‫الملكية‬Intellectual property
‫والمنتظرة‬ ‫الممنوحة‬‫االختراع‬‫براءات‬Granted and filed patents
‫التجارية‬‫العالمات‬Trademarks
‫الفكرية‬‫الملكية‬‫واستراتيجية‬ ‫خطة‬IP strategy

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SERIES B
 THE SECRETS
 Step ONE: Pitch Materials
 Write a Financial Plan and a Pitch Deck
 Then (MVP) Minimum Viable Product
 (MMP) Minimum Marketable Product
 (MMR) Minimum Marketable Release
 (MMF) Minimum Marketable Feature
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SERIES B
 THE SECRETS
 Be Ready: Your Numbers?
 Series B funding is the most challenging round for a startup company.
 Step ONE: Show Strong Achievements
 Step Three: Engage Lawyers
 Engage specialized venture capital lawyers if you haven’t already. You’ll need their
expertise to:
 Agree on business valuation
 Negotiate investment terms and prepare a term sheet
 Draw up contracts
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SERIES B
 THE SECRETS
 Step Four: I am Ready?
 I have proven that I can become one of the market leaders
 I have proven that I can recruit and retain quality talents with a strong corporate
culture
 I can show that the story is just starting
 Each fundraising is unique
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SERIES B
 THE SECRETS
 Step Five: Healthy Growth
 You should master the following topics with data points:
 CAC: what are the acquisition channels? What’s the Sales cycle (of every channel)? What is the CAC by
channel? - Customer acquisition cost
 LTV: what’s the margin per client (with client segmentation: by type of client, geo etc.)? How do you
generate repeat and upsell in order to get a healthy LTV/CAC ratio for each channel (payback <12 months,
LTV/CAC > 3x)
 You have demonstrated that several paid acquisition channels work well and are scalable at the moment
you raise the Series B
 Your net churn is ideally very negative, negative or close to zero. Visual impact of churn on your revenues
below.
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Net Negative Churn is achieved when the total additional revenue generated from existing customers is
greater than the revenue lost from cancellations and downgrades. When your recurring revenue grows
without the addition of new customers, you're achieving positive net revenue retention.

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SERIES C
 THE SECRETS
 Later-Stage Investment: Go, Go, Go
 A Series C Funding Round generally occurs to make the startup appealing for
acquisition or to support a public offering.
 A Series C Funding Round can be when you have
A clear and reliable valuation of your company.
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FUNDING ROUNDS //TIMELINE
 THE SECRETS
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The average duration between a Seed round and a Series A is 18 months
compared with 20 months between an A round and a B round. The average time
lapse reaches a maximum at the B and C stages and decreases afterwards.

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MENAVCs
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READ MORE
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READ MORE
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READ MORE
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21. MORE ABOUT HANY SEWILAM…
Hany Sewilam is the CEO of ITEX. He has extensive strategy, operations and
marketing experience across the technology, media, SMEs, products and services
sectors.
He was most recently the Managing Partner and Business Development Head of
AJA Ventures, working closely with leading global and regional companies, as well
as, the startup and VC ecosystem. He has advised Fortune 500 companies as a
senior consultant with AJA Ventures and led teams at Creative Sense, Pulse
Group, Jobardo, SuperLady, Eduneer and Orkanza while working in the U.S.,
Middle East, and Africa.
Hany holds an MBA and two bachelor's degrees in business administration and
finance. He is a board member of ENTR in Silicone Valley and The SuperLady
Enterprise Forum.
Hany is a regular speaker at major regional events on Sales, Marketing,
eCommerce, Technology, Business, Entrepreneurship and startup's issues.

22. THANKYOU
+1-832-640-7602
HanySewilam@gmail.com