Josh Clemente

MVP isn't a great target. Coming from the tech-centric, VC funded, startup land in Silicon Valley, I can tell you targeting the Minimum Viable Product "MVP" drives a lot of decision making when introducing a new product to market. It's typically the correct approach in that environment. In home services, an approach like that is more likely to hurt than help. Your service IS the product. If your service is minimally "good enough", your business is going to launch with "good enough" sentiment and reviews - a death sentence in today's competitive environment. Take the time to build the service and underlying support structure correctly from launch, and you'll not only delight your customers, but you'll be well-positioned to capture growth. For me, I hit the "easy button" on that and joined ResiBrands to help me launch and grow Pink's Window Services. It's certainly not the only way, but it was a darn good one!

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Skydio faces a significant setback in the defense sector. The U.S. Army selected a lesser-known Utah-based company, over Skydio for its Short Range Reconnaissance (SRR) program. This decision entails supplying thousands of small surveillance drones to U.S. soldiers, with the contract potentially valued at approximately $260 million. Teal Drones selection is notable, especially considering Skydio’s previous involvement in the SRR program. In February 2022, Skydio was awarded a contract for the SRR program, with a base year value of $20.2 million and a potential total value of up to $99.8 million over five years. In November 2024, the company raised an additional $170 million in funding, I assume based on being awarded aforementioned contract, so what now? Additionally, Skydio has been navigating supply chain challenges due to Chinese sanctions, which have impacted its access to critical components. The company is actively seeking alternative suppliers to mitigate these disruptions. While the loss of the SRR contract is a setback, does Skydio’s recent funding and ongoing efforts to address supply chain issues demonstrate its resilience and commitment to maintaining a strong presence in the drone industry? Or is there another Airware about to happen? https://lnkd.in/e6sQQg3n

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Really great article on Space! Highlights Rocket Lab and their mission of small launches their Electron rocket has filled. It goes on to discuss the Neutron that is a medium lift vehicle. Rocket lab focuses on the taxi service where it takes individual payloads to specific orbits, but the new Neutron rocket is meant to compete with SpaceX and its Falcon 9. The article further discussed start ups, such as Relativity Space and ABL Space Systems. I was quoted around the maturity of businesses in this segment and discussed M&A activity. I highlighted that, "... for a company to be a consolidation target it needs some enterprise value; it needs sales and employees and contracts." I further went on to say that, "... those pure-play space companies, they are going to have a harder time because it is a slower cycle, versus a company that gets into space with a diversified book of business and will probably be more successful." #aerospace #space #mergersandacquisitions #thefactorydoctor https://lnkd.in/gsNrw2cA

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🧬 This week's Austin Bio & Health Roundup covers new funding, insightful data, expanding footprints, local innovators' thoughts, recognitions, & booming developments across the Texas Bio Triangle. 🧬 💰 Funding Thoughtful AI has raised a $20M Series led by Drive Capital led by Nick Solaro. With that funding Thoughtful launched AI agents focused on claims processing, patient eligibility verification, and other healthcare back office functions. Congratulations to Alex Zekoff and the entire team! Drive Capital's investment in Thoughtful parallels their expansion into Austin putting feet on the ground with new Seed General Manager Anish Zuté. I expect we'll be hearing about more investments from them soon. Modicus Prime raised $3.5M to prevent drug product quality failures in biomanufacturing. A great example of Austin funding Austin as Silverton Partners led the round. Congrats to Taylor Chartier and team! A reminder: You may have seen some media covering SEC filings and trying to scoop startups on their funding announcements. I only announce funding when the companies do as I am not a “journalist” and I'm here to catalyze & support the builders 📊 Data Peter Walker released new Carta data breaking down the sector diversity of funding since 2022 in top. In Austin, Healthtech ranked number 3 at 13%, behind SaaS at 42% and Fintech at 13% (likely a decimal difference). Note that Carta breaks Bio & Health into three subcategories (Healthtech, Pharma/Biotech, and Med Device). Where would the sector rank when combined? Peter, any comment? 🚀 Launches, Expansions, and Milestones Neuralink, the brain computer interface company founded by Elon Musk, is expanding its presence in Texas with a new 100,000+ facility, further solidifying our region's position as a key neurotech hub. Given the recent news about the relocations of X to Austin and SpaceX to Starbase, Texas; might we see an even larger presence (maybe even HQ) for Neuralink in the future? 💡 Insights from Local Builders and Innovators Jaleh Daie, PhD shared her thoughts in SynBioBeta on building a durable bioeconomy and what it will take to get there. 🏆 Recognition Kerry Rupp, partner at True Wealth Ventures, has been appointed to the @Ascension Seton Foundation Board. Having VCs on the hospital boards (including the Foundation) will help further connect them to the innovation ecosystem. 🚩 Texas Bio Triangle Houston-based Octagos Health | The Future of Digital Health raised a $43 million Series B to advance AI-driven cardiac device monitoring. Congrats to Shanti Bansal, M.D. and the whole team! MD Anderson and Rice University are joining forces to launch a cancer bioengineering collaborative, focused on speeding up the movement of innovations from the lab to the market. What’s Next?

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🔥💰️ 𝐒𝐨𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐥 𝐦𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐚 𝐚𝐩𝐩 𝐂𝐚𝐫𝐚 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐧 “𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐯𝐞” 𝐥𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐟𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐚 $𝟗𝟖𝐊 𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐥 for a few days of high traffic, after their free app went viral. Here's how we did things differently at OmniCreator 👇️ Going "viral" and "scale at all costs" were over-glorified among VC-backed startups in ZIRP (Zero Interest Rate Policy) era. Daigo Tanaka, PhD and I hated this model. Serverless or not, we focused on creating a service many people find it worth paying the money from the beginning. As a result, Daigo went above and beyond to integrate a seamless payment processing system for users from the beginning. By doing this we made sure monthly fee could pay the server cost per user. We also controlled the signup quantity and quality via invitation-only system. This allowed us to manage bugs, focus on customer success, and grow at a sustainable rate. We never intended to raise money. Our growth is much slower but we are making more than we pay. IMO that's a pretty damn good business model these days. #medtech #technology #socialmedia #socialmediamarketing #entrepreneurship #entrepreneur

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Progress Update on CalculAI: Delays, Challenges, and Pushing Forward 🚀 As much as I hoped to release the beta MVP of CalculAI this week, I’ve faced a few more hurdles—unless a miracle happens! Being self-taught and new to startups, I’m learning a lot on the fly. While using Jupyter Notebook and other tools to test and build the core functions went smoothly, building the user interface has thrown up some unexpected challenges. I’ve been dealing with missing code, incorrect page routing, visual issues, and missing functionality—all of which have caused delays. But the good news is: I’m getting closer to release! For those asking, what’s a beta MVP? 💡 The Minimum Viable Product (MVP) is a product that provides a small but valuable feature set to early users. The beta MVP may offer similar features but will have some rough edges. The dynamic chat function will already bring immense value, but other parts of the tool are still in early stages and will greatly benefit from your feedback. The vision for CalculAI is big—it’s not just about transforming material selection. I want to revolutionise the supply chain and even the design process for engineers. Taking it one day at a time, I know I’ll get ever closer to this goal. If you’re curious and want to learn more, feel free to message me or drop a comment—I’m more than happy to answer your questions. And if you’re interested in getting involved and building something that will one day redefine engineering processes, I’d love to connect! #AI #StartupJourney #MVP #TechDevelopment #Innovation #SupplyChain #MaterialSelection #DesignEngineering #EngineeringTools #CalculAI #Entrepreneurship #MachineLearning #ProductDevelopment #Startup #Investor

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STOP sending generic investor emails. Here’s what to do instead to actually secure meetings. I see too many founders doing this and failing. ✅ Do this instead: ✅ Research to personalize messages. ✅ Ask for feedback or advice, not money at first. ✅ Share some value before asking for anything - an article, a connection, etc. ✅ Be brief and brilliant. ♻️ Repost if you liked this, 📢 Comment or DM me "𝗳𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴" to hear more from me about raising money for your startup. I'm here to serve. #business #entrepreneurship #fundraising

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Since 2016, SpaceX has launched ~300 Falcon 9 rockets into space. Every single one has been successful. The consistency is remarkable, but how did they achieve this across different weather conditions, payloads, and rocket designs? The answer is testing… and lots of it. On the surface, testing hardware is relatively simple. Build it, test it, see what breaks. Rinse and repeat until you have a robust product. This works great in theory, but it’s much harder when software is antiquated and the data volumes are overwhelming. As the number of variables increases, the number of trials needed increases exponentially. Let's do some quick math assuming we want to isolate different numbers of variables… 5 variables → 120 trials 10 variables → 3,628,800 trials 20 variables → 2,432,902,008,176,640,000 trials (2.4 quintillion) You get the idea. For complex hardware (like Falcon 9), it’s incredibly difficult and expensive to test all aspects of a system. Yet there are significant real-world consequences when mission-critical hardware fails. This is why Nominal is so critical. Nominal’s software platform streamlines testing and deployment of complex hardware so engineering teams can speed up innovation cycles and lower costs (and angst) in the process. It’s a godsend for industrial companies and is going to play a key role in enabling America’s manufacturing future. Overmatch is excited to be part of Nominal’s Series A and support Cameron McCord, Bryce Strauss, and Jason Hoch as they build the modern industrial data stack. We invested alongside Paul Kwan and Alexa Liautaud at General Catalyst; Bilal Zuberi and Josh Wolfe at Lux Capital; Delian Asparouhov and Trae Stephens at Founders Fund; Ross Fubini at XYZ Venture Capital; Semil Shah and Aashay Sanghvi at Haystack; and Matthew Colford and Baris Akis at HUMAN CAPITAL.

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A blistering funding run has me revisiting a question I posed after Q3's VC funding data came out. Was Austin's modest $1.6B in H1 2024 signaling a slowdown or was Q3's $1B surge the real indicator? November's explosive activity gives us our answer: 💥Tricentis: $1.33B raise ($4.5B valuation) New 🦄 💥FireFly Aerospace: $175M ($2B valuation) 💥Ladder: $105M 💥Halcyon AI: $100M ($1B valuation) New 🦄 With these mega-rounds, Q4 is already approaching $2B with several weeks remaining. I am hearing about more significant rounds in the pipeline, though I don’t know whether they will announce in Dec or early '25. What a difference a quarter makes! Austin sits at ~$4B YTD, knocking at the door of 2023's $4.2B. The first half numbers now look more like timing quirks than a true slowdown. Our sector diversity (seen here in AI, Space, Bio & Health and Cybersecurity) reinforces what Peter Walker's analysis shows below; Austin's strength comes from our broad foundation & tech convergence. As Peter notes in his original post, "Austin is good in many areas, great in few." I see this as a strength, not a weakness (not implying that he was making this implication either). With ATX consistently ranking somewhere between 5th-7th in funding, and having strong momentum metrics, we have a bright future ahead. What's Next?

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I track Venture Capital funding so you don't have to! 1KOMMA5°, a German home electrification startup secured a substantial $156 million (€150 million) pre-IPO round co-led by G2 Venture Partners and the California State Teachers' Retirement System (CalSTRS), and saw participation from 2150, Norrsken VC, Hamilton Lane, b2venture, Eurazeo and other existing investors. Focused on providing end-to-end solutions for residential solar, energy storage, and EV charging. This funding aims to fuel their expansion across Europe and Australia as well as development of their energy management software, with plans for a potential IPO in 2026. InoBat: The EV battery maker has charged up its growth with a $104 million (€100 million) Series C investment round. The round was backed by strategic investors Amara Raja Energy & Mobility Ltd and Rio Tinto, with contributions from GOTION HIGH-TECH, Slovakia's sovereign Lilium, Bromo Capital, and more. InoBat aims to scale production of European-designed battery cells, launch an energy storage business with Gotion, and expand into Slovakia, Serbia, and Spain. Bluenote, a GenAI platform for biotech companies, secured $10 million in funding, with Lux Capital leading the round. Additional investors include Elad Gil, Anthropic & Menlo Ventures' Anthology Fund, McKesson Ventures, Avichal Garg/Electric Capital, Moxxie Ventures, Carbon Silicon Ventures, and notable figures in AI and life sciences like Othman Laraki, Fidji Simo, and Mike Nohaile. Mindgard, an AI security startup has raised $8 million, led by .406 Ventures & saw participation from Atlantic Bridge, WillowTree Investments, IQ Capital, and Lakestar. Mindgard offers Dynamic Application Security Testing for AI (DAST-AI) to identify and fix AI-specific vulnerabilities. @Tenor, an AI-driven leadership development platform, has closed a $5.4 million seed round, led by Base10 Partners, with participation from Reach Capital and other angel investors. Tenor helps managers refine their communication skills using realistic voice AI simulations. Habacus, a student-focused fintech, has secured $5.2 million (€5 million) in funding, with P101 leading the round and participation from CDP Venture Capital SGR. Habacus provides financial services aimed at the student population and seeks to grow its community to 100,000 students by 2026, while expanding its AI tech + service offerings. Tetsuwan Scientific, focused on autonomous robots for science experimentation, raised a $2.7 million pre-seed round led by 2048 Ventures. Additional investors include Carbon Silicon, Everywhere Ventures, and angel investors. They're building AI-powered robots, and their first AI-powered robot is already being used in a rare disease gene therapeutics lab. Cheers! #funding #startups #innovation #investment #AI #biotech #fintech #energy #venturecapital #technology

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The space frontier, biology, Austin, new types of humans, a startup university, & why I would go to space camp 3 times. Just a few of the topics in the Austin Next episode, I just recorded with Eliah Overbey, bioastronautics professor at the University of Austin (UATX). Look for the episode next week.

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“AWS for CNC Machining” - this is Machiineit's north star. After talking with dozens of VCs, entrepreneurs, shop owners, and consultants, we’ve decided to take our first real steps toward building the dream by bootstrapping a “job shop” into existence. Many people have advised against VC money at this stage and have encouraged us to instead use our combined 36 years of aerospace precision machining experience to just “build a great shop.” In committing to this, our goals are to: - Have a real production environment to develop and test our software. - Work with contract CAM programmers to ensure our systems and processes are optimized for remote programming. - Use the “latest and greatest” off-the-shelf software and technology to be as tech-forward, lean, and profitable as possible. - Cash flow our way to growth. We’ve allocated about $100k to purchasing machines, tooling, and a CMM. With all of this said, we’d like to talk with people who need parts made. There is no sense in purchasing machines without knowing the work that will go on them. So, if you need parts machined and are willing to take a chance on two aerospace guys from Portland, please reach out! #CNC #Machining #Manufacturing #Reindustrialize #Gcode #Vericut #Startup (09-03-24 edit) - While the bootstrapping idea was a noble pursuit, we've decided that our best chance to chase our "pie in the sky" dream is to leverage VC investment and partners. https://lnkd.in/e3bbwVJJ

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At long last, it’s takeoff time for urban aviation. The Federal Aviation Administration's approval this week of electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) vehicles in the U.S. marks a significant milestone for the burgeoning air taxi industry. eVTOLs promise to revolutionize transportation by offering a faster, cleaner, and more convenient mode of travel, particularly in congested cities. These next-generation aircraft could drastically reduce commuting times and alleviate traffic congestion. What’s really cool is that these new regulations are the first for a completely new aircraft category since the 1940s. They cover many aspects, including design standards, pilot certification requirements, and operational procedures. The FAA has been working on developing these regulations for several years, resulting from extensive input from key industry players, aviation experts, and the general public. This approval is also a major win for the eVTOL industry including companies like Joby Aviation, Archer, LILLIUM GmbH, and GE Aerospace. It's expected to attract a huge amount of investment and speed up the development of commercial air taxi services. Traditional airlines are also embracing the future of flight. Southwest Airlines and Archer are moving forward with ambitious plans to establish eVTOL routes connecting South San Francisco, Napa, San Jose, Oakland, and Livermore, California within a few years. However, there are still some hurdles to overcome. Building the necessary infrastructure, gaining public trust, and ensuring safety are crucial challenges that must be addressed before air taxis begin zipping over major American cities. Read more: https://lnkd.in/e-NqhPb4 #aviation #eVTOLs #mobility

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Stop focusing solely on your pitch deck: (Here’s how Jensen Huang got funding for Nvidia) 𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗡𝗼𝘁 𝘁𝗼 𝗗𝗼: - Don’t wait until you need money to start building relationships. - Don’t focus only on the pitch—investors want to know you first. 𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘁𝗼 𝗗𝗼: - Start networking early: Connect with investors months before you need funding. - Attend investor events: Be present at key industry events, webinars, and conferences. - Make yourself visible on LinkedIn: Consistently share updates about your product, company milestones, and industry insights. This builds trust over time and keeps investors engaged. - Provide value first: Offer insights, introductions, or support to build a relationship before asking for money. 𝗞𝗲𝘆 𝗟𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗼𝗻: When Jensen Huang was ready to start Nvidia, he was introduced to Don Valentine, one of the most well-known venture capitalists. Even though Huang was nervous and felt he gave a terrible pitch, the relationship he had built beforehand was what mattered. His former boss had already vouched for him, and Valentine had trust in him before he even walked into the room. Valentine’s parting words were blunt: “If you lose my money, I’ll kill you.” Huang’s story shows that the strength of relationships can outweigh even a poor pitch—trust and connections often matter more than the perfect presentation. Start building relationships and not just pitch decks. Pitch decks are for intriguing investors, not convincing them. The convinced part happens when they 𝗸𝗻𝗼𝘄, 𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲 and 𝘁𝗿𝘂𝘀𝘁 you. -MK

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🧬 This week's Austin Bio + Health Roundup highlights significant data trends, my stance on covering funding announcements, new partnerships, and action across the Texas Bio Triangle. 🧬 💰 Funding: The Way I Plan to Cover Funding Announcements You may have seen reports of a local Bio & Health startup’s funding round through an SEC report filing. While some outlets have covered this, my position is not to. I prefer to support our builders directly rather than trolling the filings for scoops. There is plenty of real investigative journalism that our city would be well served by if that is where they focused. Remember I am not a journalist and I am not the media. When the company is ready to announce their round officially, I’ll gladly shout it to the rooftops. 📊 Data Peter Walker at Carta reports that in 2017, Biopharma and Medical Devices captured just under 10% of all VC dollars. By 2023, this figure rose to 17.7%, and in Q1 2024, it reached 24%. The overarching tailwinds favor our sector and region with trends towards Bio & Health and the physical & digital intersection. Energy and hardware, two other sector blossoming in Central Texas, also saw similar share gains. 🤝 M&A and Partnerships Sensi.AI, a 24/7 senior care intelligence agent, is partnering with Caring Senior Service to deploy SensiAI’s platform in Caring’s 50 locations across the US. This partnership allows seniors a better opportunity to age gracefully in their homes. 🚩 Texas Bio Triangle BioMedSA is hosting an event called Women in Bioscience, Thursday June 20th. It’s designed to connect and empower women in the bioscience industry across Central Texas, and features Randi Brosterman Hutchens discussing "Building your Personal Board." Find the link to the event in the comments. Houston-based Lokum, a staffing solution to connect clinicians and clinical staff to health care facilities, has raised a $700K pre-seed round. Congrats Ayoade (Joy) Ademuyewo on the raise. What’s Next? #AustinNext #LifeSciences #Healthcare #Biotechnology

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The Shuttle was a Frankenstein of a vehicle. 1 massive solid, several liquids, non-centre COG, 2 additional solids - all manufactured in different US states. Once upon a time, a (very) senior NASA told me that NASA has become a "Self Licking Ice Cream Cone" when talking about the politics behind how money was allocated. Everyone says new-Space is successful because it's vertically integrated. That's partly true - but the truth is deeper. The reason new-Space is successful is that they treat internal teams as collaborators, with flexible Requirements that may need to change. They use them as internal contributors rather than formal contracts that may not change The NASA approach is the opposite - they treat internal stakeholders as external parties. This is where "shall" statements come from - legalese as requirements are quasi-contracts that enable the suing of 3rd parties for missed contracts. NASA are improving - but not as fast as new-space. Collaboration, flexibility, urgency - that's the three-part recipe for modern systems engineering success.

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As a founder, asymmetry is your superpower. This is how you use it to win 🇺🇸🇺🇸

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🧬 This week's Austin Bio & Health Roundup features key insights from other regions, exciting funding news, major research advancements, and significant developments across the Texas Bio Triangle. 🧬 💡Insights from Other Regions & My 2 Cents Patrick Sisson in Bisnow reported on the Research and Development District in downtown San Diego, a 1.7M sqft multi-use life sciences project. Costing $915M, it has 0 signed tenants just months before opening. Don’t forget that the San Diego region is one of the world’s top Bio & Health clusters. The critical issue: "To this day, much of the life sciences real estate in San Diego tends to be more office park or campus-style sites that aren’t in walkable urban neighborhoods." So, what does this have to do with Austin? You need alignment between location, infrastructure, & sector. I am not convinced that 80%+ of Bio & Health companies work downtown. Keep this in mind when people pitch a downtown Austin Life Science Innovation district. 💰 Funding Workweek, a publishing platform for business professionals, closed a $12.5M Series A.  This is in the Roundup because their vertical, run by Blake Madden, focuses on healthcare. It’s also another case of Austin funding Austin as the round was led by Next Coast Ventures. Congrats Adam Ryan! Koda Health, a digital care coordination company for advance planning, raised its oversubscribed Seed+ round led by Austin’s own Ecliptic Capital. Super pumped for you Tatiana Fofanova, Ph.D.! 🔬 Research & Medical Advancements Eliah Overbey, Professor of BioAstronautics (what a cool era we live in) at Austin’s newest university, the University of Austin, published a series of studies in Nature on what space flight does to humans. Professor Overbey led a multi-institutional research team that obtained 3,000 samples from the SpaceX 2021 Inspiration 4 flight, resulting in a “10-fold increase in publicly available human space cell health data." 🏆 Recognition Christian Keil & Ryan M.’s BuildList, a viral database of critical tech companies, features numerous Austin companies including Paradromics Inc. & Harmonic Bionics, Inc. in Bio & Health. Way to go Matt Angle and Mark Hunter! 🚀 Launches, Expansions, and Milestones Wheel launched Horizon, their new AI virtual care platform with predictive care pathways and configurable, patient-centered care programs. Amazing work Michelle Davey! Keyspan is bringing their affordable biomarker testing and personalized coaching to Austin Simply Fit to enhance their fitness programs. Kudos Nate Taylor! 🏙️ Community Join the BrainCheck-Alzheimer’s Association brain health panel on June 20th, featuring Briaincheck CEO Kim Rodriguez. Link to the event in the comments. I’ll be attending & hope to see you there! 🚩 Texas Bio Triangle Solugen, a synthetic biology unicorn, secured a $214 million loan from the Energy Department to build a Bioforge, marking a significant step for Houston’s industrial bio sector. What’s Next?

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Big Company or Big Network: Which is the better partner? When you think partnerships, It’s easy to think of collaborating with companies. But have you considered partnering with a network? When I was in Austin, I struck a deal with Capital Factory. Community of 100,000 entrepreneurs. Portfolio valuation of $21 billion. This partnership opened doors to New brands, New investors, New level of growth. The takeaway? Partnering with a network doesn’t just add value— it channels it 🔮 #Networking #Innovation #Entrepreneurship

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