Growceanu Angel Investment, the leading angel investing network in Romania, hosted the first edition of Invest in Moonicorns, a two-day event dedicated to angel investors in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). The event took place at the Faber centre in Timisoara, Romania, on 27 & 28 October 2023, and featured speakers from seven cities around the globe, including Seattle, London, Paris, and Riga. One of EBAN Board members, Nina Dremelj, participated and represented EBAN in Timisoara.
The first day of the event was a day of relevant content. Miruna Girtu, Venture Partner at Syndicate Room and Tutor at Oxford University’s Saïd Business School, opened the conference with a keynote on the lessons learned from 100+ superangels. Then attendees, who are currently investing in early stage startups or considering it, also learned from several panels that followed.
The first panel looked at portfolio diversification on different asset classes according to risk. This gave the early stage startup asset class a clear positioning in a high net worth individual’s portfolio. From then on, the conference focused on the different stages of angel investing: finding good start-ups, evaluating them and making good investment decisions, the meaning of ‘winning’ in this context and how to get there. The topic of support from regional and national authorities was followed by some wonderful success stories from angels and founders: two examples of successful startups that are continuing to grow (Bright Spaces and Rayscape) as well as an example of a successful exit (SmartBill’s acquisition by Visma).
The second day was dedicated to experiences, where the participants visited the Constantin Brancusi exhibition, the Timisoara Art Museum, and the Turn Signals design exhibition, as well as the city’s historical centre.
“We are keen to strengthen relationships between investors in the CEE region, to fund more brilliant founders, and to have a more prosperous ecosystem. We see a lot of fragmentation in Europe regarding early stage investments and our aim is to connect people and leverage resources together” said Ciprian Man, Growceanu co-founder.
“Business angels are instrumental to startups’ success and such a gathering of great business angels is key to improving the region’s dealflow.
The grit and resilience the region has is fundamental to the success that founders with (Eastern) European DNA experience – these founders will emerge as builders of the companies of the future and their backers will partake in their success.” Alex Agatinei, How to Web
“The event offered in itself a great platform for networking and knowledge sharing between relevant key players, a really great tool to enhance the good spirit and communication between investors, start-ups – and all other professionals.
A big thank you to the team who managed to put together such a great first edition of Invest in Moonicorns. The bar was set very high at this inaugural edition, I wish you many more great ones!” Ileana Glodeanu, Attorney at Wolf Theiss.
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Growceanu is an investment platform founded in 2018. Through Growceanu, investments have been facilitated in Bright Spaces, Rayscape, EmailTree AI, Kinderpedia, Sitter, Milluu, Oncochain, Metabeta, Telios, Upgrade Academy, Sypher, Streams Live, Ulpia, The Data Analysis Bureau, Artivive, Codewell, Medinav, Licenseware, Aqurate, Procesio.
The Growceanu platform targets in particular start-ups in the PropTech, EdTech, SmartCity, Enterprise, Marketplaces, FinTech and MedTech fields, based on approaches in the technology areas: Artificial Intelligence, SaaS, Data Science, Digital Mapping, IoT.
