Several years ago, Boston was widely known as a difficult city to raise early-stage capital, particularly for first-time entrepreneurs. As our city has continued its commitment to foster innovation and the community within it, Boston has made significant changes in opening up its ecosystem. By creating more opportunities for startups with the introduction of syndicates, angel investing in Boston has become not only easier, but quicker.
Learn and hear more about how Boston is diversifying within the ecosystem and join us on June 16th at the Westin Waterfront for BostInno’s third annual State of Innovation. Hear from top angel investors and the seed companies they have invested in during our Boston's Angels panel starting at 2:15 p.m.
Check out the speakers below and get your ticket to be in the room:
Jon Karlen, Founder of FKA (formerly known as Atlas Venture)
Moderating the Boston’s Angels panel is Jon Karlen, who focuses on startup investments in software and online services. Karlen joined Atlas in early 2014 and sits on the boards of CustomMade, Kinvey, and PillPack. Prior to joining Atlas, he was a partner at Flybridge Capital, where he led seed investments in disruptive software businesses including Open English and Digital Lumens.
As an early advocate of the “software is eating the world” meme, Karlen also pioneered investments in Virtual Computer (acquired by Citrix), ZING Systems (acquired by Dell), and Restorando. He began his career at Greylock, where as an EIR he developed an investment opportunity in Oat Systems, an RFID software company.
Vinayak Ranade, Founder of Drafted
Ranade is the founder of Drafted, a company connecting hiring managers, candidate referral sources and candidates to fill job openings. He used the relatively untested practice of Simple Agreement for Future Equity to gain investment from Boston Syndicates, Launch and Blade.
Prior to founding Drafted, Ranade worked as a software engineer, program manager and director of engineering for KAYAK. He is also an advisor for Gradeable, a mobile education assistant for teachers.
Jennifer Lum, Co-founder of Adelphic Mobile
Lum is an entrepreneur, angel investor and startup advisor.She is a co-founder of Adelphic Mobile, a leading mobile advertising platform. Prior to Adelphic, Lum played significant roles at Apple, Quattro Wireless and m-Qube, working with Fortune 500 brands and building industry-leading mobile marketing and advertising platforms.
Lum is an Entrepreneur In Residence at MIT and was recognized in Business Insider’s “Most Powerful Women in Mobile Advertising,” Inc.com’s “Women to Watch” and Boston Business Journal’s “Top 40 Under 40". She is an investor at Apricot Capital, and her individual investments include Blank Label, Crayon, Gallop Labs and Krash.
Jonah Lopin, Co-founder and CEO of Crayon
Lopin is the co-founder of Crayon, a comprehensive marketing design search engine. He co-founded M80 Labs in 2012, and spent 2012-2014 building and launching two products: a social commerce app, and a mobile advertising app that has received more than 450,000 signups and first-year revenue of over $1 million.
Prior to M80 Labs, Lopin was the VP of Customer Success on the management team at HubSpot. He and his team built HubSpot's customer retention programs, Customer Happiness Index, Tech Support group, Professional Services offerings, and Account Management team. Lopin started his career as a consultant in the Strategy & Operations group at Deloitte Consulting, where he served Fortune 1000 companies in healthcare and manufacturing.
Don't miss your chance to hear these local leaders and get your ticket before they sell out:
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