Top 5 tips for closing a Series A financing
This post by Andy Sack offers the following tips.
As you might expect, I am not sure I agree with number two. If you have a good attorney, he or she is your collaborator, not someone who needs to be managed. Otherwise, a good set of tips.
1) Get everyone to agree to a timeline, especially the venture partner and investor council. Send an email around and manage everyone to that timeline
2) Don't let the attorneys run the deal. There's a healthy balance that you need to strike in managing your attorney as well as investor counsel. On the one hand, you want to keep your eye on the closing of the financing and keep everyone moving forward expediently. On the other hand, you don't want to annoy or offend the attorneys -- they can make your life tough.
3) Stay in close communication with the lead vc partner -- in this case, I tried to talk with John Ludwig every day just to make sure he wasn't getting frustrated with the process.
4) Know when to give and when to hold-- in every deal I've done, you inevitably have to give on points that seem important but in retrospect aren't. If there's an easy point to give on -- do so. It'll build credibility and flexibility (hopefully)
5) Get it done -- the most important thing to remember is the deal isn't done till the money is in the bank.
