38 Lessons Learned Raising £38 Million Pounds
I am writing to offer my congratulations on your success in raising the UK's largest ever Series A funding in Quantum Computing, totalling £38 million.
That’s how the Prime Minister’s letter opened.
It has been a crazy summer for the Prime Minister and a crazy summer for me - for totally different reasons. When opening that letter, however, I felt an unusual kind-of kinship with anyone daring to call themselves a leader in a world that judges you so starkly for both your results and your conduct in equal measure.
So why did a letter from a Head of State provoke me into something short of a minor emotional meltdown? Was it simply the exhaustion following a long and arduous fundraise, or was it something deeper?
I pride myself on my leadership style, which is founded on authenticity, incorporating powerful values like cultivating love and embracing humility, employing principle-based decision-making, and encouraging curiosity in the relentless pursuit of personal growth.
So, what lesson was hiding behind the tears?
There's no question that this is a significant achievement for Oxford Quantum Circuits (OQC) and the UK. As Europe's leading quantum computing company, OQC has shown real ingenuity and innovation in its ambition and as the Prime Minister said, you should be rightly proud.
My first clue was right there - the discomfort staring me in the face with one simple word: you.
Leaning into this discomfort, I have taken the time to reflect, process and distil my learnings. I share these lessons from a place of love, vulnerability and strength. I hope they serve to benefit others about to embark on the long road of fundraising. Any maybe, in the process - I’ll find the lesson behind my tears, too.
Here are the 38 lessons I learned, raising 38 million pounds.
1. Start with the end in mind and work backwards.
It will help you realise that you probably have less time than you think.
Start now.
Give yourself as much runway as possible.
2. Assemble your dream deal team and invest in them.
Learn to love your lawyers (yes, really!) and make them vested in your success.
Trusted advisors will be critical to navigating rough waters.
Lead your dream team, and make sure they deliver.
3. Develop your team and be clear about your expectations.
Coaching your team on their investor-facing skills will pay dividends.
Remember, this is not necessarily their talent set.
We introduced our team leads to the world of VC and helped them prepare stellar self-intros.
The dynamics between you and your team are critical, so relax and have fun.
4. Develop a thorough and robust process to maximise your options and odds.
Yes, you have to kiss a lot of frogs.
Be discerning - know what you want.
Work the process rigorously (especially when you think you have a winner).
Use a project management tool (Asana worked well for me).
5. Craft a BEAUTIFUL pitch deck and evolve it with feedback.
Business is a story backed up by data.
Craft your narrative so that it is engaging and compelling.
Entwine even the deepest of diligence back to your high-level story.
Back it up - evidence wins.
6. Learn their business and language.
VCs operate a unique business model.
They speak their own language of dry powder, runway and unicorns.
If you want them to understand your business, develop an understanding of theirs
Emotional intelligence wins every time.
7. Pitch, do, review and improve your materials over time.
Your pitch will start off average at best (get out on the road sooner than you feel ready).
Then it will build towards peak performance, and you’ll feel the flow.
Then it will start to get stale.
Try to time your “Netflix Special” for your most coveted investors.
Work in ways to keep it fresh to maximise your peak period.
8. Build a rolling thunder of traction and company announcements whilst fundraising.
Nothing is more exciting to investors than hot takes on live action.
Be clear about how developments link to the plan.
Rolling thunder builds FOMO better than anything else & VCs hate missing a winner.
9. Focus
Fundraising is very, very hard.
Avoid the trap of doing other “easier” things to feel busy.
If you’re not fundraising, you’re probably procrastinating or not focused.
There is zero room for distractions. Postponing things to post-close is inevitable.
10. Prepare to be lucky
Luck happens when preparation meets opportunity.
You don’t rise to the occasion, you fall to your highest level of preparation.
The harder you work in preparation, the luckier you will get.
Prepare to negotiate (I use the Negotiation One preparation sheet.)
11. Visualise success and set positive intentions
If you can’t see yourself winning, don’t be surprised when you fail.
Imagine how you will celebrate with your team.
Plan how you will reward yourself.
Set positive intentions and visualise your best self showing up before every meeting.
12. Preserve your time and energy as your most valuable assets.
Deploy them against your prime targets.
Reduce your inner circle and narrow your sphere of influence.
Positive energisers produce higher engagement and promote success.
Find your power song. Brain Vlastakis’ pre-diligence music mash-up helped us bring the energy!
13. Embrace tough feedback as a chance to hone your pitch and your business
Get to the ‘why’ behind the ‘no’ without fear.
Accept criticism with grace and humility.
14. Record whatever you can as the volume of information is impossible to recall accurately.
VCs sometimes ask if they can record video calls.
If you feel comfortable - ask if you can, too.
Make notes relentlessly so that you at least have memory cues to help recall.
Keep your database/CRM updated and organised (I used Monday.com)
15. Securing a lead anchors the round in reality and should be your first priority.
If you don’t have a lead, you don’t have a round.
As rounds get bigger, you may need two.
Two means twice the time and double the difficulty.
16. Qualify quickly, so your time is spent with real prospects.
Figure out the key questions that rule in/out.
VC is an intelligence-gathering business, they are motivated to use your time to develop their market knowledge.
See #12.
17. Few people will understand what you are going through.
That is ok, don’t waste time trying to explain what can only be experienced.
Those that need to know - know.
If no one understands, you don’t have the right support network.
18. Stay humble and don’t get influenced by stories of CEOs dictating terms.
You are usually the seller, not the buyer.
Hard deadlines and strong-arm tactics are not wise.
Put yourself in their shoes and understand their business.
Don’t let efficiency trump effectiveness.
19. First, seek to understand, then be understood when communicating.
Fundraising is sales, and great salespeople are great listeners.
You will say more with less if you understand who you are talking to.
Don’t just show up and throw up (your pitch!).
Always tailor your pitch to your audience.
Again, emotional intelligence wins every time.
20. The phone is your friend when building relationships.
There is so much power in your voice.
That power is often lost when you type.
FaceTime (or Zoom, Teams) is better, and time in person even better.
E-mail is good for confirming understanding, not creating it.
That said…
21. Getting your writing right is critical to fundraising.
You will write a book worth of words to write one deal - choose them carefully.
How you write is very important - always avoid templated e-mails.
Unchecked (by someone else) communications will cost you - don’t do it.
You won’t write your way to people writing big cheques (see #20).
22. Pick your battles or lose the war.
As with any negotiation, focus on that which really matters.
Know when to hold and when to fold.
What is important to you may not be to others - figure out the agendas and dynamics at play.
23. Keep your board close enough but not too close.
Find the balance with your board.
Accept that it's unlikely that you can keep everyone happy.
24. Imagine you are holding a fragile ball made of wafer-thin glass.
Hold it too tight, and you will crush it.
Too loose, and it will slip through your fingers and smash.
Only you can hold the ball - no one else.
The fragile ball is the deal - you put it down only when cash is in the bank.
25. The deal will seem hopeless more than once, but there is always a way forward.
Don’t panic.
Focus, prioritise and execute. Channel Jocko.
Execution creates momentum, and momentum creates options (see #4).
26. Relentlessly seek and speak the truth; it is your North Star through the chaos.
Investors are trying to get to the facts - help them.
Understand the difference between ambitious optimism and hype.
Be candid about the risk factors to demonstrate how you think and face reality.
Great value is created by doing hard things, don’t hide difficulty - confront it.
Own when you fuck-up or miscommunicate.
27. Beware of “deal heat” - in others and yourself.
Deal heat - the emotional impact of the deal-making process - is real.
Staying objective gets harder as you get closer to a deal.
You will be exhausted - you need to develop deep resilience.
Like with any high-performance endeavour, you need to focus on wellbeing.
28. Figure out your “why”, and never lose sight of it.
Startups fail because the team quits or you run out of money.
Keep your team in your heart and the money on your mind.
Do not quit.
29. Try not to take it personally when people lack humanity.
The investor community can have sharp elbows and tongues.
This process can make people jaded, but you need to remain energised.
Whoever said business is not personal was either full of crap or never really put themselves on the line.
30. Focus on doing the right thing vs being right, and you will avoid most arguments.
Winning an argument and winning hearts and minds are not synonymous.
The art of resolving divergent perspectives is the art of deal-making.
The high ground is usually the right path. When they go low, go high.
That which you focus on grows - focus on success (see #6, #9 & #11)
31. You are the primary punching bag in a frustrating process.
Learn to take a punch.
Take a walk.
Get back up and move forwards.
32. It is not the critic who counts, but there will be many of them.
Listen to their words but don’t take them to heart.
Use the naysayers as fuel for your fire in the arena.
Take criticism from those you would seek advice from.
33. You will experience magic even in your darkest moments.
Hold those moments and words of encouragement/praise close.
Ilana, I would follow you into the sun.
Use those magic moments as fuel (turn anything you can into fuel).
Learn to take a compliment and respond graciously.
34. You will experience sexism and other “isms”.
If it exists in culture, it is often amplified in the investment community.
Be prepared for it and walk through it.
The best approach is to get competing offers and reject the dirty money.
35. It is all about you... and your team at this stage of a venture.
They say early-stage VCs bet on the jockey, not the horse.
They prefer to bet on a solid stable so showcase your team.
That said, they will not invest unless they are totally sold on you.
36. The aftermath.
Fundraising is protracted, with many false dawns - so there is rarely a climatic finish.
This will leave you feeling very empty on many levels.
There is no round of applause or standing ovation.
Being prepared for this helps, but it still sucks more than it should.
37. Memorialise the journey while it's still fresh.
Capture your musings and lessons as they are invaluable to your future self.
Next time you will be so much better if you learn from the experience.
A good time to do this is during the aftermath.
Pay it forward - share the love with others.
38. Take the W
If you had failed, it would have been on you.
Ipso facto - the win is on you too.
Be proud of yourself.
Take the win and use it as a platform for authentic confidence.
You did something that no one can take away from you - ever.
Give thanks and celebrate, but also own it for you!
There is huge learning and growth involved in both success and failure. Whilst there are literally books on “Learn how to take a punch” in business, the last time I checked, the shelves are pretty bare when it comes to “how to take a win”.
Like many women, I suck at owning and celebrating my successes. The art of accepting these hard-fought, hard-felt milestones should not require the intervention of government - but for me it did.
So, here we are.
We did it. We achieved the near-impossible. None of this would have been possible without our incredible team and a tonne of support, for which I will be eternally grateful. I did it. And I am rightly proud.
1 - Yes, women are worse at this
2 - A fair bit of data suggests that what we have achieved is near impossible.
Less than 1% of companies that seek VC funding are successful in raising.
Of those, less than half raise a subsequent round.
Companies run by women receive <2.3% of those funds.
Multiply in the added risk factor with Deep Technology - defined as high-risk technology that may never work and may never find a market fit.
If you hadn’t noticed, the venture capital markets aren’t doing so great right now either.