Thealzel Lee of Phoenix Fire Joins the Startup Coach to talk about their fund and their first investment in VoxCell BioInnovation on The Startup Talk Podcast.
Automated Transcript of Phoenix Fire Invests in VoxCell BioInnovation on The Startup Talk Podcast
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Direct from the sixth world renowned Canada’s largest city, with Canada’s biggest thinkers, visionaries and hustlers. This is startup talk featuring the founders, funders, innovators and community leaders who’ve led Canada’s startup ecosystem right here in Toronto. You’ll hear the challenges, the failures, the successes, Toronto StartUp podcast gives you the full story direct from the entrepreneurs and influencers who’ve made a difference. Now, the host of startup talk, the founder of Toronto starts this startup coach.
The Startup Coach
Welcome back to startup talk. I’m your host, the startup coach, founder of Toronto Star. It’s one of the largest startup communities in Canada. And with me today is Thealzel Lee, a general partner of Phoenix Fire, part of the Archangel Network. Welcome, fellow.
Thealzel Lee of Phoenix Fire
Thank you very much for having me, Craig,
The Startup Coach
it’s great to have you. Why don’t we get started with you telling us about Phoenix Fire?
Thealzel Lee of Phoenix Fire
Well, Phoenix Fire is a fund that’s dedicated to supporting women entrepreneurs in Canada. And we closed our first round. And we really proud to say that we have all of our limited partner investors. They’re all women. We just did our first investment in a woman founded opportunity as well.
The Startup Coach
And I understand you closed your first investment round for Phoenix fire back in March. How was that process?
Thealzel Lee of Phoenix Fire
It was actually quite a very intense and disciplined process. We came across Phoenix fire for one of our partners e fun, which is an angel investment fund based on the west coast in British Columbia. They had invested in Vauxhall and they brought voxel forward to Phoenix fire because it really felt that it was an ideal fit for Phoenix Fire, given that it was a woman led entrepreneur in a very exciting deep tech area.
The Startup Coach
So tell us about voxel bioinnovation.
Thealzel Lee of Phoenix Fire
Voxel bioinnovation is a 3d tissue engineering company. And what was very interesting was the technology that the founder, Dr. Karolina Valenti, had worked on while she was doing her graduate studies, she has the ability to develop bio inks and 3d tissues that are vascularized and mimics very much though human tumor tissues. So that’s ideal for a lot of these big pharma companies who are trying to test their anti cancer drugs at this org. So that was one aspect and the other aspect was that there was a market for what she had developed because of the 3d tissue that is in the marketplace. Very few have the same level of vascularization that Dr. Valenti was able to offer and she had attracted quite a few potential customers in Big Pharma and the third most important, it was Dr. Karolina Valenti herself. She was extremely intelligent, she’s professional, she had the very coachable she, she was a quick learner, she had the ability to attract very smart people to her team, not just fellow scientists to develop the technology that could be turned into a viable product for the customers. But she also had the ability to attract some very top notch business people business development people with a lot of deep experience in to the big pharma industry, which are ultimately her customers. What about Dr. Valenti is pitch attracted you to them.
Even though this is a very complicated technology, she was had the ability to put it into very simple terms. A lot of pharma drugs, actually, the majority of pharma drugs just do not make it to the marketplace. And they often fail when they hit the human trials. What she was offering this sector was the ability to test pharma drugs before you actually use humans by using 3d tissues that are vascularized that mimic the human condition.
The Startup Coach
Who else was part of this investment round?
Thealzel Lee of Phoenix Fire
As I said earlier, it was brought to us by E fund based an angel investment fund based in British Columbia. So that was one major angel investment fund. But there were other individuals and other local funds that were investors in Dr. Karolina valentus company.
The Startup Coach
People invest in founders, you mentioned some of the quality These Doctor Karolina Valenti a showed but what made you interested in which specific qualities made you interested in investing in her?
Thealzel Lee of Phoenix Fire
Well Vauxhall was the ideal fit for Phoenix Park as we were very impressed with Dr. Karolina intelligence and professionalism. What was really the tipping point with with us where Dr. Kara later said she was very open to our advice and our debt works, we were able to leverage our backgrounds of network to investigate not just to her opportunity, but also to promote her opportunity to others in our investor network.
The Startup Coach
What is next for Phoenix Fire?
Thealzel Lee of Phoenix Fire
We are a women led Investment Fund. We invest in early stage opportunities that are led by women entrepreneurs. So we have at least two deals in our pipeline that are under serious due diligence now, so stay tuned. Within a few months, we might get other investments, but we’re continually getting a stream of very high quality women led investment opportunities.
The Startup Coach
Can I’ll make sure that links to Phoenix Fire and Vox al bioinnovation are in the show notes and the chapter link so people can just click on them. Where can people go to find you specifically if they want to reach out to you?
Thealzel Lee of Phoenix Fire
I do have a LinkedIn profile Craig. So the certainly people can find me there.
The Startup Coach
Fantastic. I know that Danielle Graham part of Phoenix Fire is going to be at the CNE emerging innovators Pitch Competition judging the women entrepreneurs category on August 28. So if those of you interested in talking to someone from Phoenix Fire, come out and say hi to Danielle then.
Thealzel Lee of Phoenix Fire
Excellent. Thank you very much, Craig.
The Startup Coach
Thank you and thank you for taking the time to be part of the startup talk podcast.
Thealzel Lee of Phoenix Fire
It’s great being here.
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