#7 February 2023: 2023 Predictions

Your monthly filter for economic data & insights that matter.

A Note From the Scale Team 

The first month of 2023 has far exceeded the pessimistic outlooks predicted for this year, but that doesn't mean we're in the clear yet. Our international economy is feeling continued pressure from the pandemic-induced supply chain hangover and manufactured inflation from the war in Ukraine. At the same time, consumers aren't slowing down their consumption, and businesses still want to expand. While some investors are holding onto their dry powder until the markets settle, Scale is deploying. We believe itโ€™s never been a better time to invest in early-stage founders, so apply for our next round of investments. Why we are bullish on the future in our 2022 review here. ๐Ÿ˜Ž

Scale invests monetary and social capital in early-stage tech founders strengthened by struggle. Weโ€™re excited to bring you monthly updates about Scale, tech, and micro and macroeconomics. - We've filtered through thousands of sources, so you don't have to. Enjoy๐Ÿฅ‚

"It's very smart to always continue to have a dialogue with investors. These relationships take so much time to build that you can't arbitrarily decide one day, we're now in market, and we're going to fundraise. Because if you're always in market, investors don't have any time pressure. Entrepreneurs are always fundraising, but there's a difference between catching up with investors, catching them up on your business, asking them questions, and asking what kind of milestones and KPIs they'd like to see to be interested versus being in market."

Daniel Fetner, GP at Alpaca & close friend of Scale

๐Ÿ‰ Meet the Scale team here | ๐Ÿ† Scale portfolio โ†’ here

At the earliest stages, we're investing $75k-$150k and white glove support from a team that has built multi-$B tech companies. Apply to Cohort IV here.

Join us on March 10th for Missouri Startup Weekend. Tickets are on sale now for 25% off with code MOSW2023 here ๐Ÿš€

๐Ÿค Collaborate with funds & founders in our Flyover Tech community (Join here) 

Join our talent network for founding team opportunities๐Ÿ˜Ž

๐Ÿšจ Scale Cohort IV application here

๐Ÿ“ˆ Macro Trend Report

๐Ÿ’ฐ Midwest Economics

  • A year-end look at flyover country VC deals - despite a national slowdown, there were still big deals in 2022 between the coasts.

  • Michigan-based RoboTire bringing theirautomated tire changing to real customers

  • An Iowa meat packing plantraised a whopping $150 million

  • The Midwest hit it's highest % of total VC funding (7.66%) since 2011

  • A little shakeup in the public equities as the broader market outlasts the Missouri public companies. When you took a beating for 12 months, you're bound to bounce back at some point ๐Ÿคท๐Ÿฝโ€โ™€๏ธ

๐Ÿ’ฐ Midwest Deals

๐Ÿ„ Midwest vs. National Macro Trends

  • Unemployment in Missouri remains low at 2.7% well below the national average of 3.7% and the Midwestern average of 3.6% โœ…

  • Thanks to decreasing gasoline prices, the Midwest Consumer Price Index dropped to 6.0% compared to the national rate of 6.5% โœ…

๐Ÿง  This Month's Recommendations

๐Ÿ“š What Weโ€™re Reading

๐ŸŽง What Weโ€™re Listening To

๐Ÿ“… What Weโ€™re Doing

  • We have started early preparations for the next Missouri Startup Weekend, taking place March 10th-12th, 2023. Check out how our 2022 winner went from idea to raising money from venture capital investors in 7 months.

  • The famous InvestMidwest is returning on April 12th, and we are supporting the efforts at Scale as a 2023 channel partner!!

๐ŸŽฎ Midwest Tech of the Month

EquipmentShare recently launched its T3 Technologies, the first operating stack to connect people, assets, and materials for construction operators to have full visibility of work throughout the project. This includes telematics and hardware tech to monitor equipment health, software to optimize rental utilization, and mobile applications for team members to clock in and off on the spot.

๐Ÿš€ Scale Portfolio Company Highlight of the Month

Kaveat is building tools for content creators to make the complicated legalese of contracts easy. We've been proud to watch their journey as part of our Cohort III, and they even won the "Consumer" category at the TLTF Summit Startup Showcase last month!

๐Ÿ› ๏ธ Resources

  • Watch the latest Flyover Tech Speaker Series session with Willy Schlacks, Co-Founder of EquipmentShare and Scale, here โœˆ๏ธ

  • Resource page for founders we made here 

  • Build a financial plan for your next 24 months in under 30 minutes here ๐Ÿค‘

  • A spreadsheet to value employee compensation here ๐Ÿ’ธ

  • Downloadable database of 5k+ investors by stage, thesis, and geo here

  • It's extremely important to have well-thought-out messaging when reaching out cold to investors, so we put together some resources here๐Ÿฅถ

  • Dozens of startup resources here 

Why should you angel invest? Because Venture Capital is the sexiest asset class that improves society while producing outsized returns, duh. Also, venture returns have proven to outperform public equities during a recession. -> If you are interested in angel investing, then sign up here ๐Ÿ˜‡

Keep up with our Medium content here ๐Ÿ”–

 ๐Ÿ’ผ Scale job openings --> here