We are delighted to announce that we have invested in Inhouse Ventures, a marketplace for startups helping founders, industry leaders and VCs to match, advise and invest faster, making the ecosystem simpler to navigate.
What does Inhouse Ventures do?
Inhouse Ventures helps match and connect investors and startups through their online marketplace. For startups, the platform provides a valuable avenue to engage with industry leaders, enhance product development, and expedite market entry. Utilising the matching system, startups can seek advice and secure investments more seamlessly, fostering their ability to build, innovate, and thrive.
On the flip side, for investors and advisors, the platform simplifies the intricate process of identifying startups that align best with their investment criteria and business objectives. Users can peruse business profiles, investigate those that resonate with their goals, and initiate meaningful connections and meetings. By establishing an online profile on the marketplace, Inhouse Ventures fast-tracks the creation of meaningful matches and conversations, catalysing accelerated growth for startups.
“The Inhouse Ventures team has worked with over 1000+ businesses and understand the pain that founders face everyday. So we've built Inhouse Ventures as a new way for businesses to succeed and grow. We’re helping the Australian startup ecosystem succeed faster.” - Elliot Spiegel, Founder of Inhouse Ventures.
Why did Scalare invest?
The Market
The Australian startup ecosystem presents a dynamic landscape of both opportunities and challenges for founders seeking investment and investors searching for companies aligned with their investment profiles.
Founders often grapple with the challenge of securing funding, as the relatively smaller pool of venture capital compared to more established markets can make it challenging to attract significant investment. Moreover, navigating the regulatory landscape and accessing resources for scaling can add layers of complexity.
On the other side of the equation, investors face the complexity of identifying startups with high growth potential in a diverse and rapidly evolving market. The need to understand sector-specific nuances, assess market trends, and establish strategic partnerships further complicates the investment decision-making process. Bridging these gaps requires concerted efforts to enhance transparency and foster collaboration within the ecosystem, ultimately contributing to the growth and sustainability of the Australian startup scene.
The Team
Founded by a proven business-building team with rich industry experience, Partner and investor Elliot Spiegel brings extensive industry experience and a track record of advising businesses from Pre-Seed to Series A and B.
Specialising in growth marketing, Elliot excels in navigating the rapidly evolving digital acquisition landscape, offering invaluable support to businesses at various growth stages for accelerated scaling.
Chad Stephens, Inhouse Ventures' business partner, boasts a successful history of founding and exiting startups, including notable listings such as realestate.com.au (ASX:REA) and Rakuten (TYO:RKUNY). His profound understanding of the startup technology sector positions him as a crucial advisor for the team.
Mark Cameron, another key member of Inhouse Ventures, serves as an advisor to government entities and publicly listed companies, guiding them in innovating and transforming their digital strategies.
His ability to teach founders how to build game-changing tech and implement effective strategies ensures they drive profitable revenue and scale. Scalare is confident in the team’s capabilities in the technology landscape and its deep industry knowledge and passion for solving its challenges.
The Product/technology
The Inhouse Ventures marketplace has been designed and developed for greater transparency and convenience, with features to enable the ecosystem to connect and move faster in a less fragmented way.
Founders can discover new investors and VCs through the weekly email that goes out to 5,500+ subscribers. Or they can create their own listing and pitch video that goes onto the platform and investors/VCs can learn about the founder first before meeting.
The team have developed a unique data layer on 80% of the Angels, VCs and Family Offices in the ecosystem to enable a more efficient and automated matching process, and this is currently being further developed into an AI offering. The commercial model is based on Founders, Leaders and Investors paying for their videos to be listed and receive matches. Inhouse Ventures also has a success fee percentage model.
MOMENTUM
Inhouse Ventures has grown a rich database, with over 5.5k subscribers (founders, investors and VCs) and an average 20k impressions per week. This subscriber base is now well developed with founders and investors, with over 300 videos created and close to 2000 matches this year.
The platform was first monetised in December 2022 and revenue started growing as the brand and word of mouth continue to evolve. Furthering its growth, Inhouse Ventures is ready to x5 its current metrics and x10 revenue by the start of FY25.
Inhouse Ventures has helped power scaleups such as parking app KERB, commercial property platform Sidespace, moving home platform Hood AI, AI media TRENDii and AI styling app Threadicated.
One of Scalare's own portfolio companies, Cloutly joined the platform to help scale their customer review generation platform.
“The power of Inhouse Ventures to match and intro using unique data and video can't be underestimated. Partnering with Inhouse Ventures, we've been able to tap into an exceptionally curated network of ideal partners and customers. It's been a solid GTM investment for us so far.” - Lachlan Fea, Co-Founder, Cloutly.
In pursuit of their mission, Inhouse Ventures is channelling profits towards supporting Australia’s next generation of founders, specifically those in the post-product but pre-revenue stage, such as ventures GoTradie and EdTripper. Their investment criteria prioritise founders addressing global issues with industries characterised by a customer base perceived as ‘digital laggards’.
Investment & Engagement
Scalare will be working closely with Inhouse Ventures to deliver support in a range of business areas. James Walker, a founding partner of Scalare Partners, will join the Inhouse Ventures board as Non-Executive Director and support Elliot and his team with their expansion plans.
Scalare is excited not only to become an investor and advisor in IHV but also to form a deep partnership based on our mutual passion for helping founders find capital, grow and scale, and assist investors and advisors to match within their verticals of interest. If you wish to discuss this further, please contact James for an introduction to Elliot. And we encourage you to further explore the Inhouse Ventures marketplace.
🚀 Special Offer for Founders: Match With Your Next Investor!
Are you ready to join Australia's #1 Marketplace For startups & investors? Inhouse Ventures has created a generous offer exclusive to the Scalare community, offering Founders 25% OFF from now until the end of Q1, 2024. Simply create an account and use the promo code 'SCALARE'.
About Scalare
At Scalare, we’re on a mission to create a greater impact by building a collaborative network that connects exceptional founders, advisors and investors in a unique and powerful partnership, because real transformation and growth takes more than money.
Our unique collaboration and partnership model provides clear pathways to global investors, experts and markets. We plug existing skills gaps in our portfolio companies from our best-of-breed advisor network – to bring, expert resources exactly when needed to facilitate growth and deliver exceptional returns to investors and founders alike. Find out more >
Stay updated on all Scalare Community activity by following our LinkedIn page.