efmrings.com

Why establish it?

Cause it’s awfully lonely out there for first time / emerging fund manager , it’s a very competitive industry so you need a support network that is non-conflicted where you can basically “open the Kemono” and “dish out your laundry “ in a safe environment that encourages collaboration

How is a ring formed?

A ring is made up of emerging fund managers that are in different geographies, this ensures that the GPs are assured that its highly unlikely that the GPs would cross dealflow or LPs.  On the contrary , one of the advantages is the possibility of sharing LPs.

What is the criteria to join?

You need to be a General Partner of a fund on your first , second or third fund.  Not a partner, not an analyst, a person where the discussion lies with you , because some of the issues you will discuss with your fellow Ringers are what to do with a bad analyst , or a way to promote a partner to General Partner, your firm’s succession planning, etc…

How does the Ring “meet”and communicate ?

We start with the simplest format, Zoom for “meeting” and Whatsapp for communication.

We can later on move to other tools ( Slack ) or build an app etc.. but “the MVP” needs to be simple , zero friction for adoption ( everyone has Whatsapp and Zoom ) 

Any fees to join?

Initially now, this could be determined later on. I will cover the initial fees and setup for “the tech” and the initial staff for the logistics of setting up the Zooms , setup the Whatsapp groups 

Later or if we see it taking on a life of its own, we can start thinking of a membership fee for the GPetc.., but we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.

The 4 commandments of efmRings

1. Thou shall not be an asshole
2. Thou shall be full open and transparent with their Ring members
3. Thou shall only talk about VC related matters
4. Any valuation of 1, 2, or 3 and you are out of the ring

What happens when you have two or more people from the same geographical zone that want to join efmRings?

Then you will need to wait till The Ring “fills up”, in other words , let’s say we have 9 Geography zones. North American West , North America East, Latin America, Europe West, Europe East, Middle East, Sub saharan africa, South East Asia , Asia , Australian 

A ring needs to fill before another ring is established, now you can say, well there are way more GPs in North America West than anywhere else,  well tough luck, the North American Ringer, along with the available ring members need to reach out to fill the ring, this indirectly force a diverse ring , gets a critical mass of ring members, and allows GPin “fringe geographies “ to get the right exposure 

Now if the math gets out of whack where the ring backlog gets overwhelming, then we need to give thought in having some “rare “ geographies not present in every ring, ( for every 5 rings there will be a ring member from MENA ) 

Shall each Ring have a ring elder ?

I’m currently leaning to yes, they should, we can select a seasoned VC, who’s built a firm to be a Ring Elder, I’m sure many Elders would welcome the opportunity to “School the Noobz” but we can start ring creation and add Ring Elders later, just in case many will be hesitant to join since the organization would not have any credibility at the beginning. 

How do decision get decided inside the ring? For example,  which city do we meet physically at for our 2 year Ring reunion, etc… ? 

We roll the dice, if you played WoW, you’d know what im talking about.  And if you have won a roll, you cant roll the next 2 decisions ( ⅕ the group ) so if a group is 10, you cant roll for the next 2 roll if you won the last roll.

Who owns efmRings ?

No one, eventually a board would be established and it will have its proper governance, but If I’ve learned anything , efforts initially need a champion, so at the start to keep things simple and streamlined i’m writing its manifesto.  But nothing is set in stone , we can change it all at one point if we develop the mechanism to do so.

What are the initial geography rings?

• North America WEST 
• North American East
• Europe West
• Europe East
• MENA
• Sub Saharan Africa
• South East Asia
• Asia
• China

Will the rings have names ?

Yes , each ring will have a cool name the ring members decide on 

How do you decide the name ?

Pay attention, this was answered above, you roll and the winner gets to choose the name 

What information is submitted to be accepted ?

Fill This Form

What about confidentiality ?

What happens in the ring , stays in the Ring, if you leave any information, a fund will be setup for the sole purpose to sue your ass for violating that confidentiality 

When are we gonna officially Launch ? 

As soon as we fill the first ring 

Will there be an App for this ?

Yes, being developed as we speak

Why do this when you have organizations like Kauffman?

Kauffman is wonderful program, and it really does what EMFRings is setting out to do, but at the same time there are a bunch of matters that makes the Kauffman program or ones similar to it limited in their reach.  The first is cost, not every emerging fund manager can afford $80K for the Kauffman fellow program.

Second is capacity, the program takes 80 students a year but there are thousands of emerging fund managers out there and Kauffman cant support them all.

The third is the time commitment,  not many can afford the time  to be in the US for 9 trips in two years.

So these wonderful programs are great, but by definition they are limited in reach, and hens why we need the EFMRings out there to help fill the support gap.

What do we discuss in our Rings?

We only discuss matters to our funds and the VC industry, don’t talk about anything else, especially your political views.  With a diverse group of geographies, ethnicities, religions, etc.. we are bound to have members on the extreme side of the fence, so ONLY talk VC

What about the PE folks ?

Maybe later on once the VC group matures, but for now it’s just the VC emerging fund managers.