Matt Conger

"Shouldn't my 409A be 30–60% of preferred? That's what everyone says." It's a pattern, not a rule. And confusing the two leads founders to some surprising places. I asked Evelyn Tay, who leads Global Valuations at Qapita, why the discount swings so much between companies. Her answer: cap table structure. The gap between common and preferred isn't a fixed ratio, it's a function of how many layers of preferred sit above your common, and what rights each layer carries. A clean cap table with one round of preferred produces a different discount than one with seed, A, and angel preferred stacked with different terms. The more layered the preferred, the harder the common gets pressed down. Which leads to the follow-up most founders don't expect: you can raise more capital (sometimes at a higher price) and still watch your 409A drop. First, the price-per-share bump is small enough relative to dilution that effective equity value didn't really move. Second, you raised in a bad market, public comps got cheaper, and that drags your common down regardless of how your round itself looked. It's not a red flag. Markets move and early-stage valuations are volatile. But if you didn't see it coming, it can feel like a punch in the gut, especially when you're explaining the math to employees who saw the round announcement and now can't reconcile it with their option grant. Thanks to Qapita for partnering with us on this important series! #CapTable #Startups #Founders #VentureCapital #409A #Fundraising #ValuationShock #Qapita #nextNYC

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An interesting topic was discussed yesterday at the The Business Times | Straits Times Press Singapore | SPH Media "Unlocking Opportunities in the Green Energy Transition" Balancing growing energy demand with renewable sources of supply in the region where there's a wide disparity in per kwh energy prices and also the transition to green is definitely an interesting area to keep an eye on especially for those looking for green investment projects. An interesting conversation thanks for inviting Coco Veda to the discussion. Thanks to the panelists for sharing your knowledge and wisdom Melissa Moi @Yoon Young Kim Nat Bullard 🙏🏾🥥🙏🏾

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#GreenAI 𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗻𝘀𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗺𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘀𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘀 𝗯𝘂𝘁 𝗮𝘁 𝘄𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗰𝗼𝘀𝘁? (𝗣𝗢𝗟𝗟 𝗥𝗘𝗦𝗨𝗟𝗧) After running a poll on which sector in SEA stands to benefit most from Green AI, the majority of you pointed to #Power (smart grid, renewables), and I get why. There’s so much potential for impact there. But here’s the paradox I can’t ignore: 𝘄𝗵𝗶��𝗲 𝗔𝗜 𝗶𝘀 𝗮𝗰𝗰𝗲𝗹𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗴𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘀, 𝗶𝘁’𝘀 𝗮𝗹𝘀𝗼 𝗮𝗱𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗼𝘂𝘀 𝗽𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘀𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗮𝗹𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝘆 𝗳𝗼𝘀𝘀𝗶𝗹-𝗵𝗲𝗮𝘃𝘆 𝗴𝗿𝗶𝗱𝘀. In #SoutheastAsia, the rapid growth of data centers to support AI workloads is creating a sustainability dilemma:  🔺 AI workloads consume significantly more power than traditional computing.  🔺 Data centers require 24/7 stable power, often sourced from coal-heavy grids.  🔺 According to the 2025 SEA Green Economy Report, meeting this demand sustainably is proving difficult. And yet, 𝗔𝗜 𝗶𝘀 𝗮𝗹𝘀𝗼 𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗺𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗽𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿𝗳𝘂𝗹 𝘁𝗼𝗼𝗹𝘀 𝘄𝗲 𝗵𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗳𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁 𝗰𝗹𝗶𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗲. The same report shows AI-driven solutions could reduce emissions by up to 5% in sectors like power and transport through:  ✅ Smarter grid balancing  ✅ Predictive maintenance  ✅ Dynamic load shifting  ✅ Clean energy procurement for data centers #GreenAI 𝗰𝗼𝘂𝗹𝗱 𝗯𝗲 𝗮 𝗴𝗮𝗺𝗲 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗲𝗿 𝗶𝗳 𝘄𝗲 𝘀𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗲 𝗶𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗿𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁 𝘄𝗮𝘆. So here’s my questions:  • Do you think Southeast Asia is ready to scale Green AI responsibly?  • What will it take: policy, investment, or breakthrough innovation? The report: https://lnkd.in/gh44pfvC Drop me your thoughts 👇 #GreenAI #ArtificialIntelligence #ClimateTech #SoutheastAsia #EnergyTransition #SmartInfrastructure #DigitalSustainability

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This is a short AI interview I did with Channel News Asia a while back. This interesting AI piece covers how DeepSeek compares to the leading chatbot, ChatGPT, produced in Shanghai by CNA’s Tan Yew Guan as he brought several professionals in Shanghai together for a chatbot showdown. Watch the full video : https://lnkd.in/gf4YFN6H

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"Carbon Markets 2.0" Davos 2026 saw a significant announcement: the Philippines' first Carbon Office, powered by digital infrastructure, representing 3.6 million hectares and 347 million coconut trees. Why does this matter for global markets? Because it's a blueprint for Carbon Markets 2.0—where real-time dMRV (digital Monitoring, Reporting, Verification) replaces manual, episodic audits. The key features: Full traceability and data provenance for every credit Immediate value delivery to farmers rather than multi-year cycles Interoperability with Article 6 frameworks This is the infrastructure shift we've been advocating. At CarbonFi, our stack mirrors this vision: athlasverity.xyz provides the verification layer that institutional investors demand carbonfi.io serves as the infrastructure backbone for issuance and compliance carbonfiapps.xyz creates the liquidity venue where verified assets meet demand Markets scale when they work for the people and deliver impact. Technology makes that possible. The Carbon Markets 2.0 era is here. 🔗 Platforms: Infrastructure: carbonfi.io Marketplace: carbonfiapps.xyz Verification: athlasverity.xyz #CarbonMarkets #Article6 #ClimateFinance #dMRV #Innovation

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Discover why sovereign wealth funds are increasingly embracing venture creation, as discussed by Mandalore Partners. Explore Corporate Venture Capital-as-a-Service with insights here: https://lnkd.in/emh5xAqn #VentureCapital #Innovation

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SURVEY RESULT ➡️LACK OF DEVELOPMENT PLANS One thing that really stood out to me in this year’s root/edge x Women of Renewable Industries and Sustainable Energy (WRISE) Clean Energy Salary & Sentiments Report was the development gap, and honestly, it’s bigger and more important than most leaders realize. 📄 You can access the survey here: https://lnkd.in/g2ANR7wY When I went through the data, one number kept jumping out at me: ➡️ 77% of professionals do not have a development plan. ➡️ Yet almost half, 46%, say development plans are “very” or “extremely” important. When you look deeper, women are significantly more likely to be left without formal growth support. That matters. This was one of the areas where I personally spent a lot of time with the team digging into percentiles, functions, organization types, because it just kept showing up, over and over again. Here’s the truth: ➡️ People want to grow. ➡️They want clarity. ➡️They want someone to invest in them and show them what the next step looks like. We talk a lot about retention in this industry, but this is where retention is actually won or lost. The data couldn’t make that any clearer. If we want people to stay, develop, and lead, we have to give them a path. Talent doesn’t leave companies… it leaves uncertainty and a lack of direction. #rootedge #wrise #personaldevelopment #developmentplans #salarysurvey #retention

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F6/26 2Q: According to the company, both Trial and Seiyu results significantly exceeded internal guidance, primarily due to unspent SG&A costs. GPM also ended up roughly in line with the company’s slightly ambitious plan. We believe that Seiyu’s same-store sales growth remained positive from Oct and trended favorably versus guidance. In 2Q, Seiyu saw the materialization of the impacts of revised trading terms as well as 1H rebates.

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I knew about Singapore’s success story. What I didn’t know, and learnt reading Lee Kuan Yew’s memoir, is that when designing their welfare system in the 60s and 70s, he studied Western Europe’s in depth, decided it was bound to fail, and built the opposite. (He didn’t love US healthcare either). And how blunt and unapologetic he was about it, and how prescient it all sounds today: “Watching the ever-increasing costs of the welfare state in Britain and Sweden, we decided to avoid this debilitating system. We noted by the 1970s that when governments undertook primary responsibility for the basic duties of the head of a family, the drive in people weakened. Welfare undermined self-reliance. People did not have to work for their families well-being. The handout became a way of life. The downward spiral was relentless as motivation and productivity went down. People lost the drive to achieve because they paid too much in taxes. They became dependent on the state for their basic needs.” He tried to carefully balance individuals’ desire to compete with the solidarity that makes citizens feel part of a national community. But instead of relying on welfare to provide security, he focused on helping people accumulate assets by keeping taxes low and encouraging high savings rates for ill-health and retirement. Singapore capitalized on its young population and massive growth to build individual wealth, preparing for when aging would pressure healthcare and financial systems. As he wrote in the late 90s: “Because we made the difficult decisions early, we have established a virtuous cycle-low expenditure, high savings; low welfare, high investments. We have accumulated assets during the last 30 years of strong growth with a relatively youthful workforce. In the next 20 years, our economic growth will slow down as our population ages. Private savings rates will decline, and health care costs will rise sharply with more old people, just when taxpayers as a percentage of the population will decrease. We can partly meet this problem by taking steps early to ensure the old will have larger Medisave savings; the better answer is to attract educated and skilled immigrants to enlarge our talent pool and increase both GDP and revenue.” This rings even more true today and Singapore’s assets have kept on compounding, making it more and more attractive to the wealthy and the educated. Now compare that with countries like France doubling down on its pay-as-you-go retirement and lowering the retirement age in 1981, fully aware it wasn’t gonna be sustainable with the demographic changes ahead. And now stuck in intergenerational warfare. The result? Singapore went from 1/3 of France’s GDP per capita in 1970 to nearly double today. One country in a positive loop of low taxes, high savings, and talent attraction. The other (like many others in Europe) in the opposite spiral. How do we break the spell?

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FISPAN announced the close of its US$30m Series B financing yesterday, led by sector specialist Canapi Ventures. Shameless plug, Rhino invested US$5m into the round and we have now participated in, or led, 6 financing (primary and secondary) in the business, investing over C$38m. Fispan has made ERP banking table stakes with the most forward thinking bank partners; earning them new business, new deposits and new revenue opportunities. For middle market corporates the office of the CFO has become fragmented: too many point solutions, too much context switching, too little interoperability. Fispan delivers what one bank partner described as “getting our products onto software vendors shelves” - embedding core banking within finance teams financial cockpit - the ERP. A strong endorsement of ERP banking and Fispan's customer focus is the ramp of total payment volume (TPV) for Fispan compared to AvidXchange - a stand-alone accounts payable automation workflow solution (founded in 2000, 18 years before Fispan). Fispan has exceeded AvidXchange's TPV with <4% of the invested capital. Remarkable. Very excited for the next step! Lisa Shields, Dana Theobald (Tong), CPA, Mike Monty, Bill Crowley, Zack Manning, Arvin Wang, Tom Davis, Joe Maxwell, Brittani Roberts

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Most VC's and PE funds still think success is measured by how expensive their office lease is. I'm currently drafting a mandate. We will not invest into companies wasting capital on major city centre offices. Let's use a tech startup in Bangkok as the example. A tech startup raises $5m. Then burns $500k a year on some glass tower office because apparently that's what "serious companies" do. Meanwhile their staff are stuck in traffic for 3 hours a day, paying inflated rents, buying overpriced coffee and slowly hating their lives. For what? Zoom exists. Cloud infrastructure exists. AI exists. Did Covid teach the investment world absolutely nothing? If your company needs a luxury office in the middle of a city just to function, your business model is weaker than you think. Now imagine taking that same company and placing it into a rural community. Lower operating costs. Lower staff turnover. Higher quality of life. Better loyalty. Better long term economics. And here's the part most investors completely miss. When you invest into rural communities, your capital actually creates economic ecosystems instead of just paying another billionaire landlord's mortgage in a financial district. I don't invest for appearances. I invest for returns. Your staff will thank you. Your balance sheet will thank you. And frankly, the future will probably thank you too.

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It was a pleasure to speak on a panel at Hong Kong FinTech Week yesterday, specifically about fundraising in healthtech. While ostensibly focused on healthtech, the reality is that fundraising is similar across early stage startups no matter what vertical you are in. Some lessons from the session: 1. Founders need to understand the Ideal Investor Persona (IIP) for their current business stage and financing needs. For example, need cash soon? Usually, Angels are a better choice than VCs. 2. Treat fundraising just like selling your product. Besides knowing your IIP founders should treat it like a sales process: Use a CRM, have weekly tracking meetings, manage the funnel, have a disciplined sales process, etc. 3. Focus more on the customer problem and how you solve that and less of the details of your product. 4. Ensure you are well-educated on the market dynamics of your vertical. Are there regulatory hurdles, like FDA approvals needed? Is your go-to-market sound? For instance, selling to large institutions like insurance companies is really hard. How can you make this a revenue generating company with product market fit as quickly as possible? Thank you to my fellow panelists Fred L. (Gobi Partners)and Scarlett Chen 陳思佳 (Verge Healthtech Fund) and our great moderator Joseph Ho (Hong Kong University) 🚀 👏

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🌏⚡ URGENT: The world stands at the edge of an #AI-powered transformation — As we transition from Google search to advanced AI platforms, global electricity demand is set to skyrocket 10x in the next decade. 💻🔋 How do we responsibly power our future? Solar, wind, and fossil fuels alone can't deliver reliable, climate-friendly supply for our digital society. The answer is NUCLEAR INNOVATION — but it must be safe, clean, and zero-waste! 💡🔬 Current Reality: 31+ countries depend on uranium nuclear reactors: 🇺🇸 🇫🇷 🇨🇳 🇷🇺 🇯🇵 🇬🇧 🇮🇳 🇦🇪 🇹🇷 🌎 … *Thorium reactors are the clean-energy future, with India 🇮🇳, China 🇨🇳, Norway 🇳🇴, Canada 🇨🇦, and others leading innovative R&D. 🚀 Introducing: THOR-REGEN™ by Finamatrix Singapore’s ONLY security-cleared, ultra-safe thorium molten-salt microreactor (Patent-file: 10202501521Q) Algae-bioremediation for ZERO radioactive waste ♻️ — converting waste into biochar for recycling reactor alloys. Carbon-negative, emission-free electricity for data centers, grids, and smart cities, supporting national security & NASDAQ-ready credentials. Cybernetic feedback loops for ultra-reliable, walk-away-safe operation 🧠⚡ 🌟 Why THOR-REGEN™ matters: Fully modular — scales from 2 to 200 MWe. Potentially Powering Singapore with footprint <10 football fields <95% capacity factor, >99.999% reliability. Singapore patent-file cleared by national security scrutiny — a WORLD FIRST! 🇸🇬🏅 Singapore, Asia, and the world can achieve prosperity AND sustainability — but only by acting boldly with game-changing tech like THOR-REGEN™. Let’s lead the global AI and clean-energy revolution! 🔝🌐 #PPA #licensing #partnerships available. #NuclearEnergy #CleanTech #AI #Sustainability #Singapore #THORREGEN #BioInnovation #DigitalFuture #ClimateAction #Finamatrix #GlobalEnergy https://lnkd.in/gZukqzPc

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The companies and founders taking part in the Techscaler Singapore cohort 2 programme between 26th October and 14th November. - Rethink Carbon, a climate tech startup helping landowners, communities, investors and policymakers make smarter, faster and more sustainable land use decisions, will be represented by COO and co-founder Zoë Russell. - Seluna Ltd, a medtech startup using ethical, clinician-focused machine learning to accelerate diagnosis of paediatric sleep apnoea and respiratory disorders, will be led by CTO and co-founder Yola Jones. - ThermaFY Group, a climate tech company empowering households and communities to live in energy efficient homes, is led by COO and founder Amanda Pickford. - Tiny Air, which is developing technology to decontaminate and inspect surgical instruments , is represented by director and co-founder Chris Helson. - Virtual Reality Empathy Platform Ltd, which is developing a VR learning platform called LifeLens to raise awareness of lesser known sensory and cognitive challenges of dementia and ageing, will be led by CEO and co-founder Kevin Gordon. - Wristbud/Interactive Health Limited, which is developing wearable technology to support mental health, will be represented by COO and co-founder Jay Evans. - Danu Insights, building AI-powered tools to accelerate innovation by helping scientists design faster, smarter, and more impactful experiments, will be represented by CEO and co-founder Stefan Bostock, DPhil. - Connecting Hands., building a culturally responsive digital health platform that empowers mothers affected by postnatal depression, is led by founder Tolulope Abikoye. - Trials Link, a digital platform for clinical trials recruitment platform enabling real time clinician and patient engagement, is represented by CEO and co-founder Osman El-Koubani. - MyWay Digital Health Ltd, a company creating innovative software to manage long-term health conditions , is represented by CTO and co-founder Scott Cunningham. Anaïs Guillemaud, Head of Scaleup Growth Acceleration Programmes at CodeBase, said: “The second Singapore programme offers a unique opportunity to explore one of Asia’s most dynamic startup ecosystems, where our focus in this cohort is around growth stage medical and health tech plus climate and energy tech companies looking to expand into Asian markets.”  Full article on DIGIT.FYI ➡️ https://lnkd.in/gHd8HcXD

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I recently spoke with DealStreetAsia about why Asia is emerging as a defining market for climate and deep tech. For over fifteen years working in Asia, I’ve seen one paradox persist. The region combines strong economic fundamentals with some of the world’s highest exposure to energy, water, and climate constraints. At the same time, scientific progress in storage, materials, and process technologies is accelerating globally. The opportunity is to align that progress with the operating realities of Asian industry. At Antares Ventures, our work focuses on the hard problems behind the future of energy, cities, food, and humanity. These are concrete industrial needs where defensible technology and capital-efficient models can scale, and where Asia’s industrial groups and family enterprises can play a defining role. This is why we spend significant time building and refining a library of theses—grid technology, industrial heat, green hydrogen, data-centre cooling—before meeting any startup. With our global mandate, we take an origin-agnostic but region-committed approach. Breakthroughs may begin in North America or Europe, but their most meaningful pathways are in Asia. Expansion into the region is therefore a condition when we invest globally. Our current thematic work, Beyond Carbon and Silicon, reflects how these efforts come together. Across Singapore, Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, and Bangkok, we have seen a clear shift among corporates and family groups who recognise how climate constraints and the rise of computing are reshaping the next generation of infrastructure—and creating a multi-trillion-dollar opportunity. At the same time, the ecosystem will only strengthen if more investors take a long-term view on deep tech. Our ambition may influence who we partner with, but we continue to collaborate with corporates, family groups, generalist VCs, and CVCs who are willing to take that view. The priority is to make these models investable across Asia’s growth markets. Thank you to Marsya N. for the depth of our conversation. You can support their journalism by subscribing to DealStreetAsia and reading the full discussion here: https://lnkd.in/g6ityzUT For those working along similar lines, I welcome the dialogue.

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