FEBRUARY 2000 BROADSHEET - Sources of Finance for Business
Before we got down to the nitty gritty of Finance for Business at our meeting on 27th January there was the AGM of the Club to get through. Quite a number of people turned up and reports, accounts and elections were proceeded with. Roy Cuthbert was elected Chairman, Nigel Wallace - Secretary, Gary Compton - Treasurer and Jim Cole - Publicity Officer. The accounts did show that we were losing out over the increased costs of the buffet combined with lost takings when people didn't turn up. Hopefully the new arrangement of charging a premium of £2 for those paying at the door will help to stem the tide.
Valerie Dring introduced the subject "Sources of Finance for Business" which was started off by Stuart Ager, Head of Innovation & Growth Unit at NatWest in London. He called his talk "Finance, the Oil of business" and showed how all the different methods lined up with the various stages of development of a company. It was also important to offset risks by tapping a variety of sources. He emphasized the value of support networks with which Cambridge was particularly favoured. He can be contacted for further information on 020 7454 2847, or stuart.ager@natwest.com. Also www.natwest.com
Our club member Tony Hooley came next and impressed us with his amazing feat of winning six prestigious business awards. He had his first ideas for a digital loudspeaker in 1994, patent in 1995 then awards, first from DTI in 1996 culminating in an EC 5th Framework award this year for £1.3M. Successively this has given his company, 1… Limited, a market value of £10M. It was very hard going at the beginning during the highest risk period, when he had to resort to his own and family money, even his pension! Again he emphasized the value of networking and the need to pay for the best advice, especially patent agents and the legal wizards. Successful retired businessmen, eg. Business Angels, were the best because their proven expertise came with the money. He ended with a clever slide showing conventional loudspeakers being eclipsed by his digital version, harking back to 11th August! Tony can be contacted on 01223 422290 or drh@uno.to. Also www.uno.to
Finally we had Richard Weir, from California, happily settled in Royston with Pharmagene plc, a Biotec company, which specialises in the formation of human tissue on which to test developing drugs. As their Financial Controller he used the Venture Capital sources almost exclusively. Again very hard work to raise the £8.6M required to expand the company from 15 to 56 staff. The cost is loss of equity and a 40% annual return to the providers. Anyone interested in finding out more of the pros and cons can contact him on 01763 211600 or richard.weir@pharmagene. Also www.pharmagene.com
The new scheme of charging a £2 premium for those that pay at the door seems to be working well. It certainly didn't discourage people from coming to the January meeting.
Please make sure you get my e-mail address right. WallaceMusic pipped me to the post with Demon years ago but they have just forwarded on to me 14 messages from people who wanted to know about membership and the Sources of Finance meeting. Unfortunately Cambridge Network got it wrong, grateful though we are for their announcement on their web page. I'll try to recoup where I can but in the meantime please make sure you get the "n" in; it's @nwallace.demon.co.uk not @wallace.
We are now up to 40 on the e-mail list. More would make communication so much easier, though of course if you look up our web site (wwweb.org/cetc) we will try to maintain hot news there, and you can use one of the forms to give information.
We get so many offerings of courses and useful leads it is difficult to know where to begin. Enterprise Link on www.enterprise.link.co.uk gives a survey of events including our own. They have a similar event to ours on 22nd March: R&D Funding - which way to go - National or European. Business Link; www.cambs.businesslink.co.uk have introduced "O2", the Progressive Management Partnership, with their first seminar at 8pm on Wednesday 2nd February at the St John's Innovation Centre. They also have IT studio seminars and workshops in February and March. Cambridge Network, www.CambridgeNetwork.co.uk, are laying on Entrepreneurship lectures at the Judge Institute on the 15th February and 15th March with a third to be arranged. CHASE have regular Pubmeets with very interesting HiTec subjects which can be discovered by tapping into chs@financialnews.co.uk. I haven't had a message from them for sometime and hope I haven't been cut off!!
The Club is very fortunate in benefiting from the sponsorship of the following organisations:-
There are also other companies who give us generous help with specific meetings and services.
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