Saturday Office Hours
I provide free “office hours” to give feedback to entrepreneurs about their start-ups and their ideas. (I will also take calls from non-entrepreneurs when pre-cleared). These office hours can be booked for 15 minutes calls via telephone or internet-audio.
You must, however, pass an intelligence test in order to get a call from me. Here it is: you must leave me with your telephone number, in a proper format. You must also answer the call when I call you. 75% of people pass this intelligence test.
You may need to book several weeks into the future to find a free slot (pan forward if everything appears booked).
The time picker shows these times in your local time zone for my office hours. (FWIW, I am generally in the USA/Eastern timezone, 5 hours earlier than UK/Ireland, 3 hours later than USA/Pacific, ~12 hours later than China).
Please include a note of the call subject and a telephone number. The phone number is generally the preferred option, but facetime audio or whatsapp will work if calling internationally. You must leave a phone number, because sometimes I’m stuck in an airport somewhere without internet and you will miss the appointment if I can’t call you.
Make sure you select the proper country code. I’m not going to try all of the countries on the planet in the hopes of finding you. :-/ Most people who call me are not calling from any one country. I have no reasonable way of guessing what your country is.
[After doing this for 10+ years, I can tell you conclusively, for those that think it’s only residents of the USA that don’t know about country codes for phone numbers: Nope, actually, lots of other people from lots of countries are equally daft on this topic.]
SOSV invests in hardware, life sciences, and global software/marketplace startups through our startup development programs (HAX, IndieBio, Orbit Startups, et al). We don’t invest directly in later-stage VC deals other than those that we initially invested in through our startup development programs.
SOSV startup development programs are a mix between the “Studio” startup development model and earlier stage “accelerator”-style programs; although SOSV’s programs provide more financial and resource supports than any accelerator program and take less equity than any traditional studio programs.
Although we do occasionally accept applicants that previously went through accelerators, you definitely don’t need to have already gone through any of the traditional accelerator programs (TechStars, YC, 500 Startups, et al) to get into SOSV – in fact, for deep tech startups like we specialize at in HAX & IndieBio, it’s really not necessary to go to both an accelerator and SOSV’s programs.
For more information about SOSV, or to apply to our programs, please see sosv.com. I am not on the selection committee, so contact the appropriate SOSV programs directly for consideration.
If you have already raised more than $1-2m and have more than $1m in annual sales, or a staff of more than 8-10 people, it’s possible that an accelerator, or even an SOSV startup development program, is not the right approach for you.
No-nos:
- asking me to invest in your startup.
- asking me to invest in something else.
- asking me for charitable donations
- asking me for referrals to other investors when we don’t know each other very well already
Contact chris.lewis (at) sosv.com if you need to make any special arrangements or ask any special questions. Chris Lewis works in my office.
