40th Annual Small Business Forum
The Office of the Advocate for Small Business Capital Formation hosts the SEC’s annual Government-Business Forum on Small Business Capital Formation pursuant to the Small Business Investment Incentive Act of 1980. The Forum is a unique event where members of the public and private sectors gather to provide feedback to improve capital raising policy for startups to smaller public companies and their investors. Following the Forum, the Commission delivers a report to Congress that includes a summary of the proceedings and recommendations for changes to improve capital formation.
The 40th Small Business Forum took place over four virtual sessions May 24-27, 2021. Each day of the 2021 Forum featured panelists with in-depth knowledge of the issues facing small businesses across the country, spotlighting the following topics:
- Finding Your First Dollars: Navigating Your Way to Raise Early Rounds
- Doing Your Diligence: How Savvy Early-Stage Investors Build Diversified Portfolios
- Diversifying Capital Allocators: Tools for Emerging and Smaller Funds and Their Managers
- Small Cap Insights: Perspectives on Smaller Public Companies
At the end of each day’s session, participants prioritized policy recommendations on that topic to be submitted to the SEC and to Congress. Learn more about our panelists below.
Finding Your First Dollars
Megan Holston-Alexander
Megan Holston-Alexander
Partner | Cultural Leadership Fund | San Francisco, CA
Megan is a partner at Andreessen Horowitz's Cultural Leadership Fund (CLF). In this role, she connects cultural leaders to the best new technology companies and engages, empowers, and elevates Black talent, entrepreneurs, and investors across the technology industry. Prior to joining Andreessen Horowitz, Megan worked in consumer technology investing at the early-stage venture capital firm she helped launch during business school.
Maxeme Tuchman
Maxeme Tuchman
CEO and Co-Founder | Caribu | Miami Beach, FL
Max co-founded Caribu, an interactive video-calling platform for children to host virtual playdates with friends and family when they cannot be physically together. She is the first Latinx founder, male or female, to raise $1 million using investment crowdfunding, the 59th Latina in the U.S. to raise over $1 million in venture funding, and the winner or finalist in over 30 pitch competitions.
Shondra Washington
Shondra Washington
President and Co-Founder | TBC-Capital | New York, NY
A veteran of the financial services world, Shondra founded TBC-Capital to democratize access to information to help underrepresented founders in tech and consumer products raise capital and access on-demand CFO, business development, and strategy services. She is the host of CrowdHouse, offering weekly pitch practice sessions to founders via the ClubHouse platform.
Doing Your Diligence
Grace Rains
Grace Rains
Executive Director | Ark Angel Alliance | Conway, AR
Grace leads an Arkansas-based angel investor group, which pursues active investment in local startups and fosters the entrepreneurial ecosystem in the state and broader region. She also serves as Director of Operations at the Conductor, a public-private partnership with the University of Central Arkansas focused on empowering entrepreneurs, innovators, and makers.
Eli Velasquez
Eli Velasquez
Co-Founder and Managing Partner | Investors of Color Network | Amherst, MA
Eli serves as an advisor, board member, and angel investor supporting science and technology ventures. As founder of the Investors of Color Network, Eli works to connect Black, Latinx and Asian accredited investors and allies to close the racial funding gap in startup capital, build generational wealth, and cultivate investor networks. Eli also serves on the board of the Angel Capital Association.
Elizabeth Yin
Elizabeth Yin
Co-Founder and General Partner | Hustle Fund | San Francisco, CA
Using her prior experience as an entrepreneur, Elizabeth co-founded Hustle Fund, a pre-seed fund with a goal of democratizing access to funding for extremely early-stage software start-ups that might otherwise not get noticed. Previously, Elizabeth was a partner at 500 Startups, where she invested in seed stage companies and ran the Mountain View accelerator.
Diversifying Capital Allocators
Gayle Jennings-O’Byrne
Gayle Jennings-O’Byrne
General Partner and Co-Founder | WOCstar Fund | New York, NY
Gayle leverages depth of financial markets experience as the founder of an early-stage investment fund. The WOCstar Fund is focused on empowering inclusive teams and women of color to bring tech innovation to market. Gayle is also the host of the VCs Off the Record podcast, where she and other investors engage in “real talk” about capital raising and the venture capital industry.
Samir Kaji
Samir Kaji
Founder and CEO | Allocate | Menlo Park, CA
Following a career in venture and private investing, Samir founded Allocate, a platform that makes private fund investing more accessible by providing investors discovery, analytics, and access to high quality institutional firms. Samir is a member of Kauffman Fellows Class 20 and the host of the podcast Venture Unlocked, aimed at opening the playbook for raising and operating a venture capital fund.
Michael Pieciak
Michael Pieciak
Commissioner | Vermont Department of Financial Regulation | Winooski, VT
Mike is the chief regulator of Vermont’s financial services sector, including its Securities Division. A past president of the North American Securities Administrators Association (NASAA), Mike now serves as the chair of NASAA’s Corporation Finance Section. He is also a member of the SEC’s Small Business Capital Formation Advisory Committee.
Small Cap Insights
Thomas Hense
Thomas Hense
Chief Investment Officer, Equity | Fidelity Investments
Boston, MA
Tom serves as Chief Investment Officer in the Equity Division at Fidelity, where he leads the small cap, value, and income teams. Tom has held multiple roles in the organization, starting as a high yield analyst, subsequently co-directing equity research, and serving as portfolio manager for Fidelity Small Cap Value Fund and Fidelity Advisor Small Cap Value Fund.
Sue Washer
Sue Washer
President and CEO | Applied Genetic Technologies Corporation | Gainesville, FL
Sue was employee number two at AGTC, which uses a novel gene therapy platform to develop products designed to transform the lives of patients with severe genetic diseases. Sue built the company from a small academic spin-out to a leader in the field, leading the company through raising venture capital funding, an initial public offering on NASDAQ, multiple additional public offering, and two major partnerships.
2021 Forum Materials
Welcome Remarks
Martha Legg Miller, Advocate for Small Business Capital Formation
Transcripts
- Finding Your First Dollars: Navigating Your Way to Raise Early Rounds (May 24, 2021)
- Doing Your Diligence: How Savvy Early-Stage Investors Build Diversified Portfolios (May 25, 2021)
- Diversifying Capital Allocators: Tools for Emerging and Smaller Funds and Their Managers (May 26, 2021)
- Small Cap Insights: Perspectives on Smaller Public Companies Commissioner (May 27, 2021)
On September 27, 2021, the Office delivered the 2021 Forum Report to Congress. The report summarizes the Forum proceedings, including the recommendations developed by participants for changes needed to the capital raising framework and the Commission’s responses to the recommendations.
Last Reviewed or Updated: June 29, 2024