JabuAfrica is hosting their fall event this November at Triton
Brewing Company. After great event with Triton last year,
they have stepped up to host this year’s celebration. The
event will feature a full African market, and special guests
including musician, Stasia Demos Mills . Accompanying
Indianapolis’ finest local brew, appetizers will be served from
Indy’s best Ethiopian restaurant, Major.
JabuAfrica is excited to celebrate all of the friends and family
that have offered their support,...
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How do you make traditional phone service and
client/relationship management software not only extremely
affordable but also innovative and fun? Give it to a couple of
Purdue student “geeks” and turn them loose on the business
world.
Since 2007, Cameron Weeks and his business partner Bracken
Fields have been building a better phone system, and out of it, a
phenomenal young company. In 2011, they grew their team to
support the new client base they were reaching and at the same time
developed...
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This year's TechPoint Summit was filled with inspiring stories, new
ways to innovate and many developers reaching out with their
product and to others products as well. One positive side that
has arisen in response to the down turn of our economy is
the strong urge for new development and innovation within
the world of Technology. The drive and excitement needed
to fuel this was filling the air
during The TechPoint Summit and events leading up
to it! When
speaking to innovators, developers and...
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When considering entering into a partnership or making a private
investment in an early stage company, beware of the “idea
guy”. This is a title sometimes used by entrepreneurial
minded individuals who don’t contribute to the growth of the
company through development, sales or management but develop
concepts (ideas) for products or services for some market
opportunity.
From my experience, idea guys often have little ability to manage
cash flow or people. Without the proper partners in...
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The Grand Opening of Triton Brewing
Company took place over Labor Day Weekend,
2011. Triton offers many favorite beers from
the Midwest including a unique blend of their very own
brewed beers.
Triton beers that are offered: Four Barrel Brown, Deadeye
Stout, Rail Splitter IPA, Field House Wheat, and Magnificent
Amber.
To brew their beer, Triton uses reverse osmosis filtration.
They build their own water "recipes" to ensure perfect
calibration in all of their beers.
Triton Brewing Company is a...
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As stated in
Part 2 of
this series, a business’ capital strategy is both
directed by the market strategy and leadership
team required to carry out the strategy as well as
directing to the market strategy and team. A
solid capital strategy is based on understanding where you are and
where you need to go.
The first step in developing a capital strategy is to
know
your revenue projections. If you had the money and
team you need, what can you sell and when? In developing a
market strategy the...
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In the matrix of developing a good business model a business will
have:
- A well developed market strategy;
- The correct leadership team to carry out the market strategy;
and
- A capital strategy capable of funding the market strategy and
team through growth.
Each feeds the other:
Most entrepreneurs are good at spotting a market opportunity but
are weak in developing the opportunity into a market strategy,
leadership (developing the correct team) and capital strategy, yet
each is pivotal in business...
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Over the last three weeks I have visited the west coast twice and
Toronto once to help clients work through funding rounds and
strategic acquisitions. I also visited with two angel
investment groups which I work with. The primary purpose of
each trip was to help clients develop and realize their capital
strategy for growth. While most of these entrepreneur clients
are in technology fields, others include a tax planning firm and a
Bollywood project out of Toronto.
It does not matter what world...
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One of our
very own, Eric Davis, is being nationally recognized for his
success in the October issue of The ABA
Journal. Eric has long been a leader in entrepreneurial
expertise and business law, and is a strong exterior source
contributing to our firm, Alerding Castor Hewitt, LLP. The
article discusses about how Eric jump-started his career and
the many roads on which it has taken him. In the
article, Eric considers himself a "hybrid" because he does not
necessarily fit in just one firm....
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The following is a guest post by a fellow
Gravity Ventures member and
friend, Dr. Tony Ratliff:
Learning to Pitch Before You Start Raising Capital
By Dr. Tony Ratliff
It only took about six months of deal flow and a handful of
“pitches” before I realized that most entrepreneurs are really,
really bad at “selling themselves” and “pitching” their ideas and
companies to investors.
I cringe every time I listen to a great start-up idea or read a
well-written business plan, and then watch in horror as...
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I don't often re-post articles in full glory, but I couldn't resist
with this one. This is a great article from the OMMA (a
magazine of online media, marketing & advertising).
There are some great quotes from quite a few movers and
shakers in the Indiana technology area. As a technology legal
counsel located in Indianapolis, it warms my heart to see this kind
of great press for the area. Personally, I think all
technology firms should move or open offices here.
Big hat-tip to Jay Baer for...
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With genetic engineering becoming a
hot topic in the news since the cloning of Dolly the sheep, we
acknowledged how ecstatic we are to have partner Brian Hewitt at
the firm for the past two years and honored him with a personal
clone. Brian’s “clone” does not hold the common clone
characteristics of life, but it was just what the office needed, a
bobble head version of Brian himself. We have been extremely
fortunate to have Brian’s addition to the firm over the last two
years and he has...
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Once again, Alerding Castor Hewitt sent at team to participate in
the
O'Reilly's Irish Bar &
Restaurant golf scramble, benefitting
The Alliance for
Responsible Pet Ownership.
On Monday, June 20th, Team ACH assembled a crack team of two
litigators, the client relations manager, and our Butler intern -
who just happens to also be on the
Butler Women's Golf Team - for an fantastic day out of the
business law office and onto the links.
Maribeth, Meg, Scott, and Chris
Ready to get our Rory McIlroy...
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Following the launch party on June 2nd,
JabuAfrica has
instilled their mission, spirit, and passion in the
community. The mission
of the nonprofit organization is to provide financial and emotional
aid to orphans and families who run orphanages throughout
Africa. JabuAfrica came
together during the adoption process of Dave Castor, managing
partner at Alerding Castor Hewitt, and his wife Sarah.
The Castor Family came together over the course of several...
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Determining a valuation for a pre-revenue company is a difficult
process. A Harvard VC formula does not make sense at this
stage as available P/E ratios essentially compare apples to
oranges, cash flow projections are too untrustworthy to use a DCF
method, and there is no such thing as a true market comp.
Investors must rely on qualitative factors in connection to
valuation formulas to determine how much they think the thing is
worth. Some qualitative factors include:
• Is the...
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"A champion is someone who is ready when the gong rings - not just
before, not just after - but when it rings."
-Jack Dempsey
Tooting your own horn, ringing your own bell...We've decided to
bang our own gong.
Welcome the newest fixture to the Alerding Castor Hewitt office,
the official New Client/Wrapped Mediation Gong.
The litigation and transaction teams didn't have a celebration
worthy of new business, so partner Michael Alerding came to me with
the idea to buy a ship's bell to ring for each...
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There is a new Seventh Circuit Court of
Appeals opinion that is likely to have a significant impact on SaaS
providers. In Digitech Computers,
Inc. v. Trans-Care, Inc. (link
here), the 7th Circuit focuses on a SaaS agreement
for Digitech to provide certain management software licensing
components for Trans-Care (an ambulance and medical transportation
service). The Court ultimately upheld a
breach of contract claim in favor of Digitech, significantly
reduced Digitech’s damages award, and...
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We’re excited to
announce that David Castor will be partnering with Tinderbox to
present a webinar next week, How the E-Sign Act Benefits
Your Business. The E-Sign act was signed into law in 2000.
This act allows more business to be conducted digitally. It also
provided an opportunity for businesses to enhance their transaction
experiences. David will present the E-Sign act and talk about the
ways that it can impact your business transactions to be digitally
streamlined and more efficient. To...
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