Last night I sat at the monthly Atlanta Technology Angels I sat on a panel with Mike Dowdle of Generation Station, Merrick Furst of Profounder, Wayt King of Shotput Ventures, Glenn McGonnigle of TechOperators. Fine group of men. Our topic for the evening was “where are the fundable deals in Atlanta?” I had two points that I wanted to share last night and today.

One was that there are a lot of angel type deals getting done. ATDC recently surveyed its member base. The results were astonishing to me.  While the numbers are raw and need some massaging, over the course of the past year approximately 60 startups took in a seed or angel round raising over $18 million in the process. That is not counting those companies, and there are quite a few, that took in venture capital.  ATDC's great social experiment of 2009 was a success.  

Two was that mentoring by angels is very important. Not sure how this went over with the group but I believe it to be true. Atlanta needs more angels out tinkering with startups. The example that I gave was the one of SkyBlox pivoting to ScoutMob. From my understanding an angel played a big role in that move. I also find it interesting that at the same time the Atlanta event was transpiring that there was an old and new school angel investing clash in Chicago that mentioned the importance of mentorship at least twice.

Those other guys had good points too.  Mike on how long it takes to raise money,  Merrick on how we need to be more honest with entrepreneurs so that they can create a fundable deal, Wayt on the lack of entrepreneur scrappiness (which by the way was generally agreed to by those in the room), and Glenn on how this is a separation between the types of deals angels in Atlanta want to fund and the types of startups being created.  

Great conversation. It was a good night.