A small crowd of well-dressed individuals assembled in the Glass House, a pavilion on the 8th floor of the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Jakarta, yesterday morning. Some were businessmen from traditional sectors like oil and gas, or food and beverage. Some were lawyers, others digital entrepreneurs, and a few were experienced VCs and private equity investors. Overall, there were close to 100 people. Each of them might turn into an angel investor, ready to put their money at work in Indonesia’s tech sector.
This is really good news for local startups.
Angels training angels
The purpose of the event was to introduce high-net-worth individuals to the ins and outs of angel investing in tech startups. How is it different to other types of investment? How can angel investors contribute to the success of a company? What exit scenarios can be expected?
The day-long event was led by Tugce Ergul from Angel Labs – a San Francisco-based organization that sees itself as the world’s “first investment accelerator.” Angel Labs holds these kinds of workshops all over the world.
Tugce herself is an experienced investor. Years ago, she was looking for tech investment opportunities in emerging markets with her fund Startup Labs. The experience opened her eyes to a gap in the ecosystem: missing from those markets weren’t necessarily ideas or tech talent, but smart money to finance them.
Tugce Ergul of Angel Labs
“Our biggest problem was that we could not find co-investors in any of these [emerging markets] Startup Labs was looking at three or four years ago,” Tugce recalls. “We would meet amazing startups, but we could not invest in them, because we always co-invest with local players. There were only a few good local players. As a fund, we shifted our focus to [the US]. But I wanted to get involved in this initiative to create more investment. We were not going to wait and hold back until a miracle happens. We’re now active in 38 countries, and we educate investors in all of these places.”
Angel Labs builds connections in a country by partnering with wealth management groups, or investment banks. It asks them to invite their clients to one of Angel Lab’s workshops. “The second layer,” Tugce says, “is to find one or two people who will champion the initiative – a wealthy individual who knows all the billionaires in the country, so he can invite his friends.”
A new angel investment club is born
For the Jakarta event, Tugce had found her champion in Shinta Dhanuwardoyo. The two women share a mission: improve opportunities for promising entrepreneurs – and create wealth for smart investors at the same time.
Shinta Dhanuwardoyo organizes ID Byte, an event series that connects the dots between capital, entrepreneurs, and local and international knowledge networks. The angel investor workshop in collaboration with Angel Labs was just one event among many in ID Byte’s schedule, but possibly the most impactful in terms of outcome.
The visible interest in learning about angel investing from a strong turnout of newcomers is a good signal for early-stage startups. What’s more, Shinta took the opportunity to announce the emergence of her own angel investment club: Angel eQ. The club already has 15 committed members, including private equity investor Sandiaga Uno, venture capitalist Donald Wihardja, celebrity investor Erick Thohir, Erik Meijer of Indosat), and Harry Nugraha of Intel, and Air Asia’s Tony Fernandes.
Some members of Angel eQ were present during the workshop and acted as facilitators, leading roundtable groups in discussions and sharing experiences from investing in Indonesia’s tech sector. Angel eQ members themselves are being mentored by Tugce from Angel Labs.
With so many angels, will it rain funds?
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