By Scott Parks, Director of Marketing, LSN
June 8th was the 5th Redefining Early Stage Investments (RESI) conference, and the first at Houston’s Texas Medical Center’s Innovation Portal (TMCx). With nearly 500 registrations the 100,000 square-foot accelerator space was filled with CEOs, scientists, entrepreneurs and more than 150 investors (from LSN’s 10 investor categories including: Family Offices, Hedge Funds, Venture and Private Equity). The venue served as an exhibition space as well as a partnering forum for investors and entrepreneurs who compressed a total of 700 meetings into a single day in order to network, build relationships and close investment rounds.
LSN’s CEO Dennis Ford comments, “It can be overwhelming and we absolutely love that aspect. We want to give everyone who comes here more opportunities than they can make a decision about, because if we’re doing that, we’re doing our job. We really want to inundate everyone, for one day, and submerge them in this early stage investor world to let them get a lot of bang for their buck instead of stretching it out over a period of several days. We want to give them as much value as possible.”
Throughout the day, and in several conference rooms, panels and workshops provided platforms for investors to communicate directly to fundraising entrepreneurs. Topics covered included biotech angels and venture philanthropy. The event offered firsthand accounts from investors explaining their current investment mandates and procedures for identifying and qualifying candidates.
RESI@TMCx provided the platform for early stage investors and life science entrepreneurs to make a compelling connection, and is a result of partnerships between Life Science Nation, Texas Medical Center, Johnson & Johnson Innovation, and JLABS (JLABS @TMC).
Those who missed the Houston event will have only 90 days to wait until RESI comes to Boston on September 16 at the Westin, Copley. For now, the RESI conferences are limited to 3/year (Boston-Fall, San Francisco-Winter, Houston-Spring/Summer). As interest and attendance continue to grow, so too will RESI’s frequency and geographic footprint.
RESI BOSTON Now Open for Registration
Registration (with early bird pricing) is now available for RESI Boston (September) and RESI SF (January).
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