SeedBlink Blog

Editorial written by Ionuț Pătrăhău, Managing Partner & Corporate Development @ SeedBlink. 
In addition to his vast experience in banking, Ionuț Pătrăhău also worked in the medical services field, being former CEO of the private health network Regina Maria and co-founder of the Brain Institute, a neurosurgery center developed in partnership with the Monza Hospital.

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Have you ever thought that a professional approach to investment-related documents can be seen as rigid behavior, an obstacle in the process of financing a startup due to the fact that, customary the money raised on a crowd-funding platform is “dumb money” and so should be the terms imposed after the round?

I am sure you have thought about it, even if SeedBlink proves otherwise: on one hand we’re not an equity crowd-funding platform and on the other hand, we’re making sure we approach the investments professionally, to the benefit of all those involved in the round.

What exactly is SeedBlink?

No matter what we call it, SeedBlink is a place where investors can find essential tools with the help of which their investments are more professional and efficient.

Clearly, this does not happen automatically, and some experience is required, as well as the habit of working in this kind of environment in which every small decision is part of a chain, characteristics suggested and facilitated by the platform. These decisions are taken individually though, without interference from a multitude of external interests.

In this context, how does SeedBlink help the startup ecosystem evolve? Would it not be better to be just a platform that does not encourage any side, where supply and demand meet as per the concept of “the invisible hand”?

We don’t believe so. We consider that the main requirement of the startup ecosystem is to unite investors in a system where there is plenty of predictability, transparency, and knowledge - not necessarily in this order.

What better place for startups in their effort to attract funds, to best showcase their differentiator and the competitive advantage vouched by the high quality of the founding team than an investor-friendly platform, where all investment appetite is united in one ecosystem?

We are a crowd-investing platform and this is the direction in which we develop our features for investors, trying to build an environment that is as friendly and as intuitive as possible, that can transform the investors into small, individual VCs which follow the rules of the bigger ones, but keeping the decisions at the individual level.

Let’s return to investment documentation.

Whenever the co-funding of a project is not ensured by a VC, our team comes in with our own documents, individually crafted, taking into account the maturity of the founding team but also the development stage of the business.

“Down round protection”, “liquidity preference”, “reserved matters” as well as the usual “tag” and “drag along” clauses are in the general part of our contracts, showing that we’re a seasoned interlocutor who does not compromise on important principles and rules. I believe there is no need to highlight the importance of this approach to investors; those should feel protected throughout the investment process, from start to exit.

At the end of this discussion, let’s turn towards the founders who should know that a professional approach to funding documentation offers them a much better perspective in the following rounds, where they enter with their lessons learned and governance principles in place; all of these being necessary conditions in the following stages of development.

Investors must understand that a solid relationship between them and startups, a relation in which no relevant aspect is left not covered by documentation, is a healthy relationship that can only benefit both parties.

In the end, we’d reiterate the conclusion: we are a crowd-investing platform where investors can find the safest investment conditions while startups find a professional work environment as well as the availability they are looking for.

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SeedBlink is a full-service investment platform that enables everyday and accredited investors to access curated European tech startups through equity crowdinvesting and angel syndicates.

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