Venture Studio Family

Paid online community for venture studios. Membership includes: 2 annual virtual pitch days with investors who are actively interested in venture studios; Access to our investor-focused virtual conferences and opt-in networking lists (10k+ contacts across 14 events); Monthly Zoom meetings with fellow members on how to attract the best founders, raise capital & build ventures; A growing library of playbooks, decks, recordings, and other resources.

Founder

BDR Academy

We have experience in creating and promoting ~30 online courses for 120,000 students. Originally the company was named HYLS. Our current project is BDR Academy. Generally, we teach non-native English speakers – how to become a great BDR for B2B SaaS products on a 5-month online course.

POGUMAX – interior videomapping

We developed software for indoor projection video shows. We have 1000+ customers: hotels, restaurants & cafes, kindergartens & schools, museums & theaters. Selling software & projection kits.

Electronics E-commerce

I was reselling electronics through a social media platform. This was my first company. Started at 16; sold it at 17.

Venture Studio Community, Podcast, Research, Conferences, & Investment Syndicate. 3x entrepreneur

I host virtual events for investors & startups. I published 3 Big Venture Studio Research papers (2023, 2024, 2025) and launched a Venture Studio Family community. I’ve created 4 profitable companies from scratch:

1. E-commerce – dropshipping, reselling electronics on social media. I sold it when I was 17 years old.

2. Projection technologies – POGUMAX, a company developing projection mapping software and selling projection kits. We have 1000+ clients: cafes & restaurants, kindergartens & schools, museums & theatres.

3. Online education – originally named HYLS, we launched 30+ online courses with 120K+ students. Our last project was BDR Academy, where we taught aspiring BDRs for B2B SaaS companies on a 5-month online course.

4. VC/PE/Family Office/Venture Studio 100% virtual conferences – we had 5648 regs for our Early-Stage Virtual Conf in Jan 2025.

Sometimes, my producer/assistant helps me to answer comments & messages on LinkedIn (sorry if "my" answers here might be without the context of our previous conversation). True my email maxpog@inniches.com 😁

Angel & Accel Virtual Conference kicks off on Zoom in an hour - and after the Main Stage we’re opening our private Networking Zone for active event supporters + ticket holders.

What to expect in the Zone: fast intros, warm leads, and investor-hosted rooms. You’ll be able to bounce between tables and meet:

— Jon Langbert @ Seneca
— Hassaan Mahdy @ EdVentures
— Mehmet Gonullu @ Yassi Ventures
— Casey Van Maanen @ GTMfund
— Camille Hardman @ Voluntas Group
— Joseph Choi @ richFunding, Inc.
— Aditya Aggarwal @ Inverto Ventures
— Bettina Briz @ Angel Investor
— Kgosietsile Thato Matsafu @ Matsafu Capital
— Charlie Wemyss @ Backpocket VC
— Alexander Galambos @ AG:AiPi Solutions
— Sudha Reddy @ LvlUp Ventures

Want in? Grab your ticket (includes Networking Zone access): https://lnkd.in/dszKZk_t

See you in the room. Let’s make great matches today.

Max Pog

Angel & Accelerator Virtual Conf - free on Zoom, Sep 25, 2025 – RSVP in featured. 4x entrepreneur

We’re building a platform where founders can book 1:1 pitchcalls.com with relevant active investors. Some insights & plans after talking to 100+ investors:

How it works: 
– Investors connect their calendars to accept 10-min pitch calls directly and set their criteria (industries, stages, geos, founding team experience, traction metrics, etc.) to define which startups can pitch them. 
– Startups see matched investors after taking a quiz and can schedule pitch calls.

1. We accept only about 1/3 of investor applications because many either don’t have deployable capital right now (we want founders talking to someone who can invest immediately) or their main business isn’t investing but providing services to startups, e.g. advising (which isn’t great if the goal of a startup is to fundraise).

2. Around 50% of the investors we talked to want to see the deck before the first call because: a) it saves them time b) they want to be prepared

We’re doing it the opposite way: sending the deck to investors only after the call because: 
– Early-stage investing is more about believing in the founder/team 
– Talking to a founder on a Gmeet call is a better predictor of “believe/don’t believe” than seeing a deck (reminds me of the CV story in the screenshot) 
– Initial filters (team, traction, sector, geo, etc.) already ensure 90% targeted calls 
– Investors don’t need to prepare or decide before the call – it’s just 10 minutes, not a typical 30-min call commitment.

3. To make it long-term interesting for investors, we need quality startups. Our current hypothesis: startups with commitments in their round can schedule more calls (5-10) compared to those with no commitments yet (only 3). When a startup is already validated by investor interest – they’re stronger on average than those without investors.

4. Deal flow is usually not a problem for investors – some even shut down their websites to reduce inbound. Most deals come through their network. Some use tools like Harmonic, Specter, or PitchBook to target relevant startups.

5. Investors want to talk to other investors to find new deals and share their own to attract co-investors. And they also want to talk/pitch to LPs.

6. Someone shared the idea that fundraising shouldn’t be easy (it filters for the strongest founders) and that many investors shouldn’t invest and many startups shouldn’t fundraise. I thought about this for a while. But progress means making things easier. If we succeed with the platform, founders will connect with active investors without cold outreach, intros, or months of fundraising. That would be wonderful.

Creating marketplace is hard, we're working on improving UX & attracting investors (mainly through our Zoom events). In October, we’ll also experiment with small, targeted networking events (in contrast to our big international conferences) – e.g. US HealthTech VC or Fintech VC – to make more relevant connections between participants.

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