Seed stage: Once an entrepreneur has evolved an idea to a business it becomes time to seek an investment of seed funding. An investor will be looking at the idea and the business plan from a feasibility perspective. The goal of the seed funding is to bring the idea to life in some way. This could be creating a limited feature version of the product or a demo version of the product.
Sometimes seed money is used for preliminary type operations ranging from market research to product development. Seed capital is not necessarily a large amount of money. It typically ranges from $50,000 up to about $700K.
Operating Documents: Organization Charts, List of Shareholders, any copy of agreements relating to options, trusts, warrents, calls, convertible securities, etc.
Financials: You will need financial statements such as cash flow and income statements, preferably audited by a third-party. You will need schedules of loans and other indebtedness, any inventory, accounts payable, accounts receivable, depreciation and amortization tables. You should also have an analysis of revenue projections, capital budgets and strategic plans that included fixed and variable expenses, gross margins and marketing projections.
Customer Information A list of the company’s largest customers in sales and any supply agreements. This should also include a list of competitors and how your product or service compares; supply agreements, purchasing policies, all surveys and market research reports pertentant to your target market and product.
Professionals: A schedule of all law firms, accounting firms, consulting firms, and similar professionals engaged by the company in the past five years. All published articles and public relation strategies. You will need a binder that includes copies of all advertising and marketing articles relating to the company within the past three years. Also include press releases and analyst and pundit coverage.