Public Venture Capital

 

When people ask me what I do, many don't really understand when I say I'm in venture capital. Yet, the world of venture capital is crucial to helping advance new and innovative solutions that, ideally, help improve our world.

 

In this episode I share how venture capital fits in the entrepreneur's journey, as well as the work I do, which is primarily in public venture capital.

 

 

Public Venture Capital

 

(0:01 - 7:00)

Today I'm going to introduce you to the world of public venture capital. Now, I say introduce because there's a high probability that you aren't familiar with this world. However, there's probably also a decent possibility that you are familiar in this world or in it, because you may have found this by way of already being in my network or following some of my activities in this world.

So the funny thing is about it, about venture capital for one, but public venture capital for two, is that many people ask me what I do. I do many things, but venture capital and public venture capital is the core. It's the most active pillar.

It's the longest world I've been involved in and it's in the bloodstream. It's in the bloodline. It's something that my family's been involved in ever since I was basically born in and around that time and growing up.

And so I was always around this world and learned a lot by osmosis, largely because I was exposed to it from a very young age, and then got involved in it myself and I've tacked on, you know, as I'm saying this, as of this day, like nearly 20 years in this space. And so what is it? Well, you're probably more familiar with private venture capital. These are like, you know, public venture capital is just kind of a niche within the venture capital world, but the private venture capital world and community, I feel, gets most attention, at least in speaking about it this way, where you get the big, you know, Silicon Valley community and the big, you know, tech companies and tech bros and all this energy that is on these social platforms and also built them, really, and have been more active within them, talking about things that relate to the more private venture capital, you know, ecosystem, we'll say, where it's about, you know, the story generally goes something like this, where there's the independent, you know, technical founder in their garage who came up with this idea for a sort of widget and tinkered away on this in multiple variations until the spark sparked, right, the spark ignited, and the flame was lit with something that it would appear or seem that people want or, you know, begin to respond to.

And with that, they, and it may work like that, or they're jumping ahead because they're not sure, and they've gone to their friends and their family, and their friends and their family say, we'll give you some money to support and help you do this. But the founder has nothing to do with finance, generally, mostly everything to do with the world of the widget that they purchased, or purchased, I should say built. And then, you know, they brought some money together, they've maybe formed a company, and they start building this thing out.

And then as more people want it, they need more capital to meet the demand and all this sort of stuff. So the journey in private and public venture capital can be very similar, but that's generally like the private venture capital, like heroes journey, right? In my experience, where along that way, these creators, these innovators find or introduced to increasingly sophisticated forms of financial options to advance their product, their business, their venture. And in that world, they'll be introduced, most likely, to venture capitalists.

And the venture capitalist is, you know, kind of an all encompassing term in many respects, but can be an investor in that can be an individual investor, like an accredited investor, or an angel, generally, like a high net worth individual, or at least meeting the accredited investor threshold. Accredited investor thresholds, which are meant to generally protect those who may not have much experience with money with investing, from investing generally into, you know, kind of greater than arm's length ventures. Is that really a thing? Well, sort of, I guess, I mean, arm's length is arm's length.

(7:00 - 7:50)

But greater than arm's length, I think, just for me means a bit further removed, right, than your immediate like friends and family circle. And, you know, are therefore, meaning the accredited investors, you know, less likely to make ill informed investment decisions, whereas if you have like, you know, mom or pop or grandma, you know, or grandpa, no experience, and somebody, you know, soliciting them to invest in this creator's widget, and they've never done anything like that before in their lives, they have no idea about the industry it's in, they have no idea what it should look like as a business. And yet, you know, they have some some nickels, you know, rubbed together.

(7:52 - 8:39)

And they, you know, ape into the thing as the terms evolved and, you know, emerged. You know, the term aping is just like going kind of all in, or similar to an investment that maybe they shouldn't be involved in or have any business participating in without kind of an appropriate risk, reward analysis, consideration of their, you know, own risk, profile, or tolerance, stuff like that. So that's what the accredited investor like threshold is, right.

(8:39 - 10:07)

So it just means like you have a certain, you know, you've certain basically, it's, it's kind of a big list of criteria, but to net it down for our purposes today, if you want to look into it, look it up. Or maybe I'll put a link in the description, if I remember. But easy enough to Google anyways, it's just basically that you're earning a certain amount of money, reasonably stably over a couple years, or you have a certain asset threshold, it means you have the wherewithal to both make generally informed decisions, it is interpreted to mean.

And also, you know, more likely than not that with that, if you make a decision, you may, you know, make an investment into something you may do so responsibly. And if you fail, if that investment, you know, goes to zero, that you could still withstand the loss. So not to digress too far into what an accredited investor is, but just to give some context.

So like, as you're emerging, let's say it's you, this creator, and you're emerging with your business. And, you know, some good things are happening. And there's some good energy there.

(10:07 - 11:31)

And some people are talking, and you're at a barbecue with your friends. And, you know, a friend of theirs, or a friend of the family, or something's at this barbecue, and they're in venture capital. And you know, you're introduced to this individual.

So they may fit this profile, or they may be a money manager. So they might have a fund and run a fund. So maybe their fund is like a niche fund that let's say, you know, this is topical these days.

So let's say that your product, your platform, your solution, whatever it is, is in artificial intelligence, let's say it's AI. And so let's say that this fellow or woman, you know, is running this fund. And this fund could be a niche fund specific to AI startups, right? So they're interested in me and you, because what they do is they very specifically look to help AI startups move to the next level.

(11:33 - 16:09)

So that's kind of when you've like, you know, you've done your friends and family round for a little bit of money to kind of like, get a couple of I's dotted, T's crossed, a couple maybe legal, you know, documents prepared, your registrations intact, your intellectual property is secure, this kind of stuff. And then you got more work to do, you got to build this thing out. So you're gonna need more capital, potentially, most likely, because many, you know, businesses that are solving larger problems, or even have large audiences that are waiting, there might be a need to like bridge capital between the time that you take the order and fulfill it, you know, there is your cost of goods to produce the product.

So you might need some capital to help bridge if you're getting some orders or to bring on some more equipment or any of these types of things. Or perhaps you have, yeah, even larger orders of an industrial scale to get into like a shop or something. And you have to produce X number of units to get into the shop to fulfill the orders inventory.

Well, in a situation like that, you know, I'm misdirecting a touch and not sure, you know, a venture capitalist can participate with a debt facility also in a situation like that, depending on the numbers that might be a loan and not an equity investment. But a lot of the funds that I see and refer to are for like earlier stage stuff in a particular niche, earlier stage business in a particular niche, maybe pre revenue, maybe early stage, you know, early growth, you have some numbers and data, you know, you're starting to track a little bit with some KPI, some key performance indicator metrics that can qualify a bit past performance, and maybe give some clues on future potential, right, on where the business can go. And so a venture capitalist will start to show up with that next tier of capital, seed rounds, you know, A rounds, and these rounds kind of grow as the company grows in the private world.

So the venture capitalist is an investor, sure, but can also be involved in the ecosystem a whole bunch of different ways. And that can include helping work with these companies, assisting these companies, advising, there's a whole, you know, sandbox of this stuff. And it depends which type of, you know, community you're dealing with, you're working with, because the public side is similar, though, the key difference is you're a publicly traded company, or you're going to be soon, or similar, right.

So the audience is a little bit different, where the private venture capital community, depending, many are exclusive to kind of the private venture capital, or as they call it, VC kind of journey, where, and I'll say this, and don't pursue one public until much more advanced or evolved stage of the business, where in the public venture capital side, there's still like an earlier stage world, pre revenue, early growth, things like this. But they're publicly traded. So there's a liquidity component there.

(16:10 - 16:51)

And the investors in the public venture capital world, generally speaking, most that I come across really don't like the private, the private stuff, they feel there's an additional layer of risk being private. Their investments are illiquid, until they are public. It doesn't mean necessarily that they're going to blow their positions, but they have the option to rebalance their public portfolio of public holdings, depending on how the company's performing, right.

(16:52 - 24:37)

On the private side, I feel that the general take is that taking a company in private VC world, public too early, could mean that it struggles when it gets public. Maybe it hasn't fully dialed in its product market fit, which is if we're talking about this for the first time, right, is figuring out your product you're offering, and the audience that that is serving and getting that, you know, dialed in so that you're just very clear. And not just any audience, the audience, obviously, that like converts that engages and purchases your product, supports your business and all this sort of stuff.

So, the private side feeling that going public too early, there's some risks to the business. There may be some other pressures like that just described that, you know, some shareholders may want to, you know, get out earlier and that might add other pressures to the business. There's also a common interpretation, those of us who have a lot of experience in it, that running a public company is actually like running a second business alongside your other business, because it's its own world that comes with all its own kind of requirements and legal considerations and disclosure obligations and all kinds of stuff, right? So, my world, personally, is more in the public venture capital world.

So, you know, my family's background is very much in what we call like, you know, the junior markets, junior venture capital, which is about these early stage, often pre-revenue, early growth stage, you know, businesses. And in junior mining, as a mining business, these require a lot of money, right? They require significant capital to move these projects forward. You can raise some privately, but at least in Canada, and last time I checked, don't quote me on this, I don't know that the goalposts have moved much, but generally speaking, you kind of have a cap on like 50 shareholders privately.

And when you have more than 50 shareholders, you have to become a reporting issuer. And once you become a reporting issuer, you're quasi-public, you have a lot of those obligations, but you're not trading on an exchange. However, if you kind of pass that threshold, you're generally on path to be heading that direction.

So, when you're dealing with companies that require more significant resources to advance their visions, then the public venture capital route in Canada is where I feel you get kind of guided where the need emerges, especially in mining, right? Like you could say, okay, I own this property and I want to drill it to see if we have a whole bunch of gold there. Well, you can very quickly spend a million dollars doing that and it can go real fast. Like we're talking like a handful of holes, a bit more depending on the depth, right? Think of how many meters you'd want to drill.

Well, like ballpark at present, the cost is about 500 bucks a meter all in your drilling expenditures, right? Now, why are you drilling that? Well, you're drilling to see if you even have a resource that's there at what grade to even consider if potentially there may be an economic deposit in that location. But that takes a ton of work because then there's all these different categories you need to meet and criteria you need to meet to match the or to meet the different to arrive or to achieve the different categories of defining your resource, which are based on probability, right? How probable is it that that is the average grade of your deposit and that that is as big as your deposit is or the size of your deposit, similar. So, that takes more money, right? So, you get into this realm where you need to raise more money and mining is prominent and resource is very prominent world in public venture capital arena and one that my family has been involved in for a long time.

So, that's where I started. But I've also been involved in other ventures, tech, entertainment, dabbling at present in life sciences and each of these different areas, depending on what you're working on, have their own capital needs and they vary from industry to industry and project to project. But that's what it requires, you know, it takes a village because these ventures, you know, need resources to grow.

It's quite a bit different than like permissionless business, which I've talked about before and like solopreneurship, which I'm also involved in and I also enjoy because in a solopreneurs venture, it's you, right? Or it's me and I'm doing my thing and I don't need to ask permission per se of others. That's why it's called permissionless to build the thing I'm building. So, think of like to grow my audience, to grow my community, you know, to build a community, to offer an online course or other services or similar.

And, you know, you can just do that in your world, in your niche and you can grow and away you go. But this world requires like, you know, a number of experts in different fields coming together to elevate the possibility of this venture. And so, working in this world as a venture capitalist, it's a combination of investing, you know, from my desk deal making, from my desk, you know, advising, managing, administrating.

(24:40 - 45:31)

It comes with a lot of different hats, right? So, I like to have equity in what I'm working on and I like to be involved. You could also have active and passive investors, active or passive VCs, venture capitalists in your projects. Some like to be more involved in management, some want to be less.

Generally speaking, if the management team is more experienced, you don't necessarily need to be more hands-on. But if it's a smaller team, a newer venture, you know, a less experienced team in the area that you're operating in, or let's say even differently, but similarly, a less experienced team in the capital markets, we call it the, you know, the world of public, you know, venture capital and venture capital generally, then that's another scenario where, you know, there may be opportunity, but also a need potentially to be more involved to help steer things in the right direction. No two scenarios are the same, but they play in the same sandbox, right? These worlds are guided by the securities commissions, which have a variety of regulations about how participants must operate in these areas.

Those guidelines evolve and change as appropriate over time, but they set the rules, basically. That is the sandbox and these are the standards that need to be uphold and the processes and the methods and similar, right? The bridges to that are your legal teams, you know, or let's just say, you know, corporate lawyers, securities lawyers that bridge those regulations to operations. They, you know, interpret deep, leaky tabs on those regulations and then interpret them in alignment with the case of the particular venture and help help keep everyone out of the doghouse, which no one wants to be in and me certainly have no interest being in either.

It's just not worth the headache. Some people think they're smarter than everybody else. I just, I'm just in a world that I am passionate about building new ventures, new businesses, new solutions to contribute to the world, have positive impacts in the world.

I enjoy building, I enjoy building companies and working with others and, you know, the excitement and energy of all of this and, you know, trying to skirt the rules or similar is just not worth the headaches, just straight up. So that's a pro tip at the same time as it's a footnote. But so in that world, right, there's the sandbox of how things get done and then there's the work you have to do to get things done.

So it's very much art and science, right? And it depends on a case by case basis of, you know, maneuvering and executing. So for my part, having been doing this for a while, I've run public companies in a variety of management roles, everything from VP, VP of communications, VP of investor relations, I've served as a director of multiple companies, served as president CEO, president and CEO of these companies. So I've held most of the like senior executive roles in these companies and have had, you know, a full variety, a full kind of basket of of results, success, a couple of misses, mixed bags in between projects, you know, currently in the works.

Some work, some don't, not everything works. These are, again, earlier stage ventures and they are known to be higher risk, but as such, they're also known to be high reward. So if the stars align and lightning strikes and everything clicks and they take off and not just take off, but like the whole business takes off, right? You make a major discovery.

You start selling tons of product and, you know, you start growing an exponential number of users to your software, like any and all of this stuff, right? That's what I mean by takeoff. You know, then the value of the company appreciates. And if you own the position, if you own equity in that company and the value appreciates, then your net worth is, generally speaking, growing.

Your wealth is growing. Your position, you know, at minimum, certainly is growing. So it's the world and we're not talking about like, you know, making 5% here or there, you know, the banks offer people, as I imagine you're aware, you know, GICs and stuff to make a couple percentage in your savings account by putting your money there.

You know, that's not what you're playing for when you're playing in this arena. When you're playing in this arena, you're looking at ventures, at least for my part, that could realistically grow 10X, 20X. And if like by realistically, like in this, you know, breakdown, there could be some like subjective language.

So I just want to keep qualifying it that, you know, realistically, what does that mean? It means you can make a logical, rational case. You could present a reasonable argument as to why upon success, this company could be worth or valued a lot more than it is, meaning 10X, 20X, or even more than it presently is. And that's what you're playing for, right? The money in this world, sure, it can be a job, you can get a, you know, you can lock up a gig or something with a company that is in public venture capital or is even a private startup.

And then the company will pay you and whatever for your service, whatever it is, let's say you're a graphic designer or something, you're a social media expert or something, that's great. But the real lift is in the success, you contributing your work as part of a bigger team, and you collectively succeeding in the attainment of your goals, reaching your milestones, and the value of the company growing, let's just say 20X. And what does that mean? Is that 20X ultimately forever? Well, you know, things change, circumstances change, it depends on the time frame.

I mean, look, the value of your company could increase 10X or 20X, it could even increase 100X, there's, and more, really, I mean, there are examples depending on when your entry is, when you first get involved, but is that forever? Well, it depends how the company continues to perform at those levels or along the way or as your company is tracking to those types of multiples. The company could be acquired, you know, it could merge with another company, you know, your company, you could sell the rights to the product, the market could change, and nobody wants your product anymore. So you can go all the way up to those types of valuations.

And you can come all the way back down because the winds have changed. All these things happen, right? And can happen. So as a participant in this world, you need to devise your own strategies that both, well, not for me to tell you what to do, but what I do is I devise strategies that, you know, give me the best opportunity for upside and for realizing upside, managing as best I can the potential downsides that are within my control, because there are still, you know, potential downside risks that are outside of my control, and a whole bunch of them.

So at least control the ones I can. And participate actively and execute effectively, you know, at a top tier and here's the best practices and all, you know, regulatory, you know, levels and requirements and all that good stuff, right? To operate and to participate in this world. And if done right, and if it works right, you can do exceptionally well, right? That's the world.

So personally, I like public venture capital better than private. I feel there's additional risk in locking up my investment capital in private ventures, even private ventures that promise to go public. Uh, you know, I find this all or not always, but there's often right, it's part of the journey of building these types of businesses also, where I can be presented with an opportunity, this pre public, like a pre listing opportunity.

They say, and you know, we're gonna go public next summer or something. Well, okay, but what are the factors? Well, maybe the market conditions change, maybe they aren't able to raise the money they want, maybe the results they get in the meantime, aren't sufficient, or the work they done doesn't generate sufficient results. In the meantime, before they intend to list, their listing process, they still need to be approved, approved on exchange, to come to trade and things like that.

So there are still risk factors in that process, even if it's with people that know what they're doing and know how to do it. Right. So it depends.

It is for me, I just make that call or not. It's something I feel like getting involved in. But that's the journey.

And for me, I prefer companies that are listed. And, uh, you know, companies that have the right kind of boxes ticked. There's a whole bunch of criteria that I look at when evaluating these types of companies.

I wrote a book that I don't know if it's the right title, to be honest, of the book, but it just felt right when I did it. My first version years ago, the book is called the penny stocks Bible. And now the connotation of that word, penny stocks is usually negative because this world comes under attack often enough from those who think, oh, it's high risk.

And it's all a bunch of, you know, games and all these shysters and all this kind of stuff. Well, it's high risk because of the ventures by nature, high risk. And then within that, you can occasion or on occasion and occasionally have people who try and take advantage of people in the business.

But that's not how I was raised. And that's not the sandbox I play in. It's about what are we doing to build this business? And does it work or does it not? Does the money go where it's supposed to go or does it not? You know, and, um, in my world, the ventures I'm involved in and the companies I help operate and, uh, and certainly, you know, um, companies I'm involved in deeply or build around myself, um, that I control on some level or have deep influence over, like that's the bar, that's the bar I'm always calling everybody to, that's the bar I'm operating with.

And, um, that's, that's what my expectation is, right? If we're raising money to drill this, you know, there's GNA, which is, you know, your general, um, you know, operating expenses and stuff. But like, if we're raising money to drill that money's going into the ground to drill, right. And our reward is if we're right.

And so, um, you know, things like that, but I have this book, it's called the pending books Bible. It goes through like a ton of the fundamentals of public venture capital and, uh, uh, the, the various like terms and components and, and my strategies, generally some tools and resources about, uh, learning more about the business, investing in these types of companies. Um, the criteria that I look at, that I consider to be most important in evaluating these types of companies, um, you know, for investment or my, my participation in management.

Um, so I'll leave a link for that below and, you know, I invite you to check it out if you feel that, uh, resonates for you and with you, if you want to dig a little deeper, but with these types of companies, I operate in a number of different ways, depending on the scenario. Um, as a, as a deal maker, as a connector, um, I have a lot of experience in, uh, mergers and acquisitions, corporate finance, um, uh, communications and more. I have a very good network of people around the world that I've developed over the years.

And, um, it continues to grow of which you're welcome to join, feel free to reach out to me, but, uh, um, but it depends. So if I'm talking to a company and maybe the company is looking for a new project and so I say, sure, fair enough. Uh, I get kind of their criteria, their mandate, what they're looking for.

And maybe I have someone else in my network who I know has these types of projects. So I'll give them a call or I'll, I'll send them a note and I'll connect them. Then they can explore whether that works.

Right. And, um, you know, if it does work, then I'm generally, um, you know, compensated or worked into the venture in some way or similar, right. Invited to, to be involved.

Um, if there's success and everybody gets their way, everybody wins. Right. And then there's a new venture that's on its way.

Um, so, you know, I advise companies because of my, um, experience as well. I can look at a company and if they don't know, um, and, and they're sharing with me, I could certainly share with them what I feel they're missing or need. Um, you know, there's a language in public venture capital.

There's, there's like a, there's, there's some key pillars and some key boxes you need to tick, some key things you need to have, and you need to communicate properly, uh, the language of the world to succeed. Um, and at least move forward, right. Um, with the things you can control and advance your venture in this world.

So I help companies that may have less experience in that also just shape tune, fine tune their intentions, uh, their strategies and similar that then helps them break through that then helps them receive greater support and, um, and resources and, and, you know, partners and similar. Um, if there's specific kinds of partners that these companies are looking to work with, um, we can chat about those or if there's certain things they need, I may have, uh, those contacts, my network. So, um, so I fill that type of stuff in where appropriate.

Uh, my primary work, uh, present as of this, um, uh, as of this, you know, taping here, recording is as an advisor, you know, I've worn the senior executive hats. I have the experience, I have the, um, the, the ability and the, and the, the perspectives that help companies. And so I offer the, that predominantly from that seat.

And then as a subset from there, if there's other things I may be able to add that could compliment, then, you know, I consider and explore them if they're appropriate, depending upon the scenario, but that's, that's like the high level. Right. And when I get involved, I like to build an equity position, um, and go from there.

I'm also looking to, you know, be around for a while. They're not overnight, uh, engagements. Um, they usually, you know, at least a year, but the work of these types of companies can take years to, to work on.

So, um, this is like my deepest world, my deepest core world in the, uh, work that I do. And beyond that, you'll see all kinds of different things that I'm into, right. You'll see me, uh, uh, creating content.

You'll see me in the, in the arts. I've explored, you know, film and I've explored, uh, um, you know, performance related work and music. And, um, you know, I'm considered generally, uh, bit of a spiritual cat, more of a kind of a hippie spirit, which is just a part of who I am.

(45:31 - 46:24)

Also a function of my experiences and, you know, how I've, uh, worked through and, and reflected and grown from my experiences and, and reconciled those with my life in the world and in the business I do. So, um, you pick up a lot of those vibes if you're just following me, depending on which channels, um, but generally through all of them. Um, and you know, I flow, right.

But even with all those other worlds, all of those worlds apply to the venture capital world, right. Venture capital is interested in it. And this, this arena is worth, or is, is interested in, I should say, whatever everybody's interested in.

(46:24 - 47:24)

Right. So if everybody today is just crazy hot about gold, venture capital has, you know, um, has an interest in an appetite, we'll say for gold related things. If everybody's interested in, um, you know, AI, okay.

We know it. Everyone's interested in AI right now. You know, money is interested in AI.

If the users are there for AI, everybody's eating up the tools and using the tools and think the tools are spectacular, then the money's there, right? Everybody needs gold. Everybody wants gold because they're scared of what's going on in the financial system. So gold is starting to run the price of gold.

Demand's going up. Money's there for gold, right? And so this is like in any world. Um, so it applies to anything.

(47:24 - 51:50)

So for myself, I've learned the fundamentals through mining, but those fundamentals in venture capital and public venture capital, um, you know, as a particular realm that advances resource projects very efficiently, um, those fundamentals apply to any sector. And I recognize this a long time ago where learning them in one sectors is valid, but where it can also have play in other sectors that could be moving as well. So it's like a transferable awareness.

It's a transferable basket of skills and abilities that give you the real fundamental ways to engage with, you know, business to engage with, um, entrepreneurship. And I like to call it exponential entrepreneurship because of the, what we call blue sky potential of where these things can go. Like I said, I like to play for ventures that I look at and believe when I evaluate them that they could, um, that they could grow, you know, five X, 10 X, 20 X plus, right? Really? I like 10 X to 20 X. Really? I like 20 X plus.

Like if you can see that big blue sky, if I look at something, I go, okay, all these pieces are here. If this works, if this clicks, this could be a 20 X, you know, uh, possible journey for this company and, and like real, you know, realistically, reasonably, rationally, potentially there's a buyer at that level, potentially, uh, you know, another, another number of amazing things can happen at that level for the company take on, you know, uh, a whole new life, new management come in that level, like senior, senior, senior heavyweights or similar. If I can see all that's possible, then that's something I want to be involved in, especially if I can be involved in that, you know, early, if I can be involved in that before that.

And so the journey from where you start to those achievements is, you know, what you're playing for, what you're contributing to. So it's a really fascinating world. It's, uh, it's a moving target of it.

Trends come and go, you know, there's sectors, like I said, there's like resources, there's technology, there's, uh, life sciences, there's, there's entertainment, um, there's industrials, there's all kinds of stuff. And then within these sectors, there's subsets. So like in mining, there's, you know, precious metals like gold and silver, there's base metals, like copper, uh, as an example, um, battery metals, you know, like lithium, uh, graphite, cobalt, um, you know, energy resources like oil and gas, uh, uranium.

You get into technology, of course, there's software, there's hardware, um, you know, you get into life sciences, it could be, uh, biotech, it could be, uh, cannabis, just been, you know, kind of an up and down and around, uh, sector of it all. Um, but just as examples, right? Entertainment, you can get in entertainment, what you're doing in entertainment, could be music, could be film, uh, could be, um, you know, could be scripted film, could be unscripted, could be documentary, uh, could be, um, related platforms, all kinds of stuff. So part of the world, part of the journey is finding things that, you know, excite you, that you're interested in, that you like, uh, that, um, marry with what you know, marry with your skill sets of what you know and, um, what you feel comfortable in.

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But then also with the components of, uh, enough meat on the bone, as we say, to be real, right kind of people, right kind of venture, right kind of focus, but with significant amount of blue sky, everything lines up and works well. So this is my kind of breakdown of the venture capital world. As I said, it's, it's, it's pretty niche.

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People know about it, but unless you're in it, you don't really know a lot about it. And a lot of people ask me like, what do you do? And they see me do different things. They see that I'm in or a dabble in these entertainment, you know, whenever, um, that aligns and the phone rings, uh, and, you know, to be fair that I feel like it, and it's fun for me and, and, um, certainly in ways that help me grow and, and, uh, inspire me and all this, um, when people see me do different things, but when I talk to most, they don't understand what it means when I say I'm involved.

So, um, there's a bit of a breakdown. You can look at me predominantly as a strategic advisor to, uh, public companies in the public venture capital arena, but primarily with early or early growth stage companies, um, that are listed on by and large, you know, Canadian, but also potentially North American or other, you know, reputable, um, public stock exchanges. So this is my core world, more in it to come working on some very cool stuff right now and more pipeline.

So if you're interested in this world, check out the book again, uh, links below you're invited, happy to, um, to, to guide you to that, which I feel is a pretty good resource that has deeper and breaks a lot of this stuff down. Um, you know, how this stuff works and what you're actually looking at, where to go to find it, learn more about it, all that good stuff. And, uh, if you want to connect with me, talk about the projects that you're working on, you think you're building, want to build, um, similar and, and more in this world.

If you're CEO of a publicly listed company or soon to be, or similar, hit me up, drop me a line and happy to take a look at what you're doing and chat more about it. It's all good, but, uh, this is venture capital and the public venture capital world, highly worth taking a look at, in my opinion, I hope this has added some color for you and expanded your awareness of, uh, of this whole, this whole sandbox, this whole arena we play in, in this world. So until next, next time, until my next episode, hope you're having a great day and we'll chat with you soon.