Let's start brainstorming about a FundCamp in the Bay Area

[Frederic Baud]

Mark, Hassan, Antony,

Was good talking to you about FundCamp last Saturday at BarCampBankSF.
I'm throwing a couple ideas on paper to see if some of them makes
sense.

I'm posting this on the FundCamp Google Group - http://groups.google.com/group/fundcamp
- so that anyone interested can follow the conversation. Maybe you
could join the group to be including in the mailing list for future
posts (it is very small for the moment ;-) ).

I think that to organize a successful FundCamp, it may be interesting
to rely on different building blocks. Even though the Bay Area is so
vibrant that it does not necessarily need all of them, I'm making a
list of what seems necessary for a country like France.

- a regular meet-up place for entrepreneurs: OpenCoffee -
http://www.opencoffeeclub.org/ - has been a great place in France (and
certainly in UK as well for seedcamp) for providing a regular contact
with the startup communities. It has allowed us to communicate and
refine the FundCamp France process by testing live a couple of ideas.
There does not seem to be an OpenCoffee in the Bay Area yet, but there
are probably similar initiatives that could serve the same purpose.

- regular catalyst events: I'm organizing a SparkCamp - http://barcamp.org/SparkCamp
- on April 18 & 19 in Paris. Very similar to the Startup Camps -
there's one coming in SF May 4 & 5 http://www.startupcamp.org/sc5sanfran_register.html
- SparkCamps are oriented to creating critical mass on projects and
should help the different actors (entrepreneurs, investors & coaches)
getting acquainted with the dynamics that FundCamp is trying to put in
place.

- active angel investors groups: I think that angel investors that
embark in a FundCamp should be able to form a cohesive and active
group. The fundamental concept in FundCamps is that this is the
investors who propose their service and not the reverse. They must
then show a clear picture of the help they'll be providing to
entrepreneurs.

Let me know what you think about this and what would make sense for
the Bay Area.

I'm thinking that maybe we could organize a conf-call after
SparkCampParis. I could then give you some feedback on how it went and
what we learned. In the meantime, do not hesitate to throw emails at
me if there is anything you'd like to discuss.

Cheers,

Frederic