Financing+your+Inventioneering

=__Financing your Inventioneering__=

So you want to be an Inventioneer. You already have a couple amazing ideas, a set of skills that makes you the perfect person to realize your ideas, and have decided to take the plunge. There's only one problem: you have saved up just enough to get by for the next 6 months while you work on your idea, but need to be able to buy some equipment, create a website, and bring on a couple of employees, on salary, to really get this thing off the ground. Where do you turn? This module is designed to take a look at how startups get financed.

=__First Things First: Vocab__=

Before we get in to what these different kinds of funding are, get acquainted with the vocabulary, and we'll fill in definitions as we go. Basically, angel investors are the first investors you will get in your company, possibly when your business is only an idea. Once you have broken even, or are well on your way, you can start approaching venture capital firms, or VCs. In the VC world, a home run is an initial public offering (IPO), which is where your company becomes publicly traded. Don't worry if you're confused now, it's actually all quite simple.



A great place to start is with this video introduction from Khanacademy.com, given by an ex-hedge fund manager, on how seed funding works:

media type="youtube" key="8OCjwBkMJ_E" height="345" width="420" Also make sure to check out the following videos on the following stages of seed funding.

=__Writing a Business Plan__=

A business plan is used to show investors why they should invest in your idea. Writing a business plan, at least a rough one, often helps to clarify exactly what your business is going to do. You may already have all of this figured out in your head, but your investors will want to see it on paper. This is a link to the U.S. Small Business Administration, which has a surprisingly thorough outline of how to put together a business plan.

http://www.sba.gov/category/navigation-structure/starting-managing-business/starting-business/writing-business-plan

=__Entrepreneurship Competitions__=

There are many funding sources that have competitive application processes, especially at ASU. Here is a link to the seed funding opportunities available at ASU:

http://entrepreneurship.asu.edu/find-funding/asu-funding-opportunities

=__Getting Legal__=

Now that you're familiar with the different types of funding available, and have your business plan written, you'll need to create a company to be able to legally issue shares to your investors.

If you want to start this business in Arizona, the Arizona Commerce Authority is the place you need to go:

http://www.azcommerce.com/services/small-business-services.aspx

Here you can find info about the different types of legal entities you can form, and the different benefits and liabilities each incurs.

=__And off you go__=

Hopefully this has been a nice springboard to get the finance side of your business off the ground. From here it's all about creating a profitable business.