In Moldova, we often hear that there are no fundraising opportunities for local startups that will help them scale and grow the local ecosystem. Luckily, we’ve got two investors visiting us from Armenia: Hambardzum Kaghketsyan and Ashot Arzumanyan and they are looking to invest in Moldova!

Hambardzum and Ashot founded the Venture Capital firm SmartGateVC (smartgate.vc) - a Silicon Valley pre-seed venture capital fund backed by Tim Draper and a network of entrepreneurs and professionals from the Bay Area (and wider US), Europe, and MENA.

Their key focus areas are:

- Artificial Intelligence (AI)

- Networking Infrastructure

- Security, Internet of Things (IoT)

- Emerging Biotech and Quantum Computing

They invest up to $100K in very early stage deep tech companies via US fund (Tim Draper is also investor in the fund) and help them reach the US market, mostly through Bay Area accelerators. They made 7 investments last year and 8 more this year in Armenia. From last year’s 7 companies, 4 went through Berkeley’s Skydeck Accelerator and one through YCombinator. Currently, they are looking into investing with a similar model in Moldova.

Who is the event for:

- Startups looking for fundraising opportunities and cool investors

- Entrepreneurs from any background

- Anyone interested to know more about Venture Capital firms in Eastern Europe and their activity

- The startup community who wants to mingle with other local startups

- Local investors curious to find out more about investment trends or collaboration opportunities

After an inspiring dialogue, you will have the opportunity to interact with other amazing people that will also be attending the event. Remember that at Startup Grind we make FRIENDS, not CONTACTS.

See you there!