Sometimes though you need more backing than these routes can offer you. Sometimes you need someone with a lot of capital to put their faith in you and get behind your idea. By finding an investor to back your plan, you can get much more financial support to match your budget and your requirements. You will most likely give up some of your profits or your ownership, but for some projects this is still the most viable option available.
If you’re hoping to get an investor interested though, you need to make sure that your project is one that’s likely to catch an investor’s eye. Not every idea is going to be appealing to an investor, maybe because they can’t see the demand, perhaps because it involves too much risk, or in some cases because they simply don’t like what they see.
Paying close attention to the latest trends in angel investments is one way to get around this problem. By knowing which kind of things investors are currently looking for, you can make sure that your project is likely to be appealing and make it a lot easier on yourself finding backing. Read on to get an idea of the kinds of projects that might currently generate interest from the right people.
The Latest Trends in Angel Investments
The Web: As you might expect, technology and the internet in general is currently a big area of interest for investors with internet-based-companies bagging more dollars than healthcare companies last year – the first time that this has ever happened.
Health -Care: That said, health-care start-ups are still popular prospects and still manage to find a lot of investment. If you have a pharmaceutical company, or you’re developing something for use in hospitals or homes, then you should still be able to find backers.
Mobile: Similarly, mobile technology also seems to be the way forward with more and more investors putting their money into mobile companies as well. This might come as interesting news to all of the entrepreneurs on Kickstarter currently looking to fund their iPhone docks and cases.
Not much further down the list, electronics have also been very popular over the last year. If you’re building a gadget or some sort, or something related to gadgets, then you may once again be surprised to find a lot of interest out there for you.
How Investors Are Operating
Throughout 2012 the most common investment size was $600,000. That might sound like a healthy figure, but it is down slightly from 2011 – when $625,000 was the most popular sum. The good news though is that the last quarter of 2013 was more promising than the previous three, suggesting that the average size may be growing once again.
Another interesting trend is that investors are now more likely to team up. Rather than working with a single individual then, you might have two or more investors behind your project – this was the case for 70% of investments last year which was up from 64% and 41% in the previous two years.
The average value of companies to receive angel investments in 2012 was $2.5 million, but don’t be shy to give it a go if you’re earning less. With the right idea, a great pitch and healthy dose of passion, you never know!
