Background:
Maor Investments, founded by Phillippe Guez and Eric Elalouf, is a Luxembourg-based VC fund and has become a leading growth investor in the Israeli tech ecosystem. With a local team based in Tel-Aviv, Maor enjoys extensive sourcing capabilities and is an investor in some of the most rapidly growing Israeli tech companies, including Minute Media, Aidoc, BlueVine, Coralogix and WSC Sports. They recently conducted the fundraising of their second fund using DocSend’s virtual data room.
The Challenge
Ido Hart, Partner at Maor Investments, expressed the need for Maor Investments to securely share sensitive financial documents with potential limited partners (LPs) as part of the fundraising process of their new fund. Additionally, they needed data and insights to help them prioritize follow-up with interested parties.
The Solution
Ido and the Maor team rely on DocSend’s virtual data room (VDR) to securely share decks, legal documents and other materials with potential LPs and investors. Thanks to DocSend’s analytics, firm partners are able to gauge potential investors’ interest in their fund and strategically follow-up with the right stakeholders.
Securely sharing investment materials with ease
As a venture capital firm that invests in rapidly growing startups, the team at Maor Investments is constantly trying to keep up to speed with the level of innovation of their own portfolio companies. As part of the fundraising process of Maor’s second fund, Ido needed a solution that would protect his firm’s sensitive documents that are shared with potential investors and LPs.
Ido had first heard of DocSend from portfolio companies of his firm, who were using DocSend to raise their capital. “In the last two years we saw a lot of our portfolio companies were using DocSend. We were impressed to hear how you could restrict access to certain viewers and set expiration dates,” Ido shared. After initially trying out the software, Ido upgraded to the Advanced plan, so his entire firm could have more control over the materials they send out to potential investors.
Ido appreciates how he can easily integrate DocSend with Microsoft OneDrive, where his team members create and collaborate on all of their internal files. Once documents are ready to be shared with potential investors, the team can easily upload investment decks, spreadsheets and other types of documents from OneDrive into their DocSend account - fast and secure.
When searching for a virtual data room, security was our top priority. We felt that DocSend provided strong security features, including access restrictions, authentication, and NDAs, that would allow us to better control the documents we are sharing with potential investors.
Protecting virtual data rooms with built-in NDAs
Some investment firms rely on a separate software to manage non-disclosure agreements (NDAs). This can easily become a disjointed experience for signers, often with those requests getting lost in potential investors’ inboxes, thus delaying the entire due diligence process.
The team at Maor Investments wanted a seamless way for potential investors to sign an NDA before accessing investment materials, all within their virtual data room. Security and compliance are critical for Maor Investments, so they needed a way to ensure all potential investors were easily agreeing to their privacy terms before reviewing due diligence documents.
With DocSend’s NDA, Ido can easily protect his virtual data rooms. “I really like the flexibility of DocSend’s NDA feature and its ability to upload different NDAs for different investors, despite showcasing the same data room of documents. For less sensitive materials, with one click, I can remove the NDA functionality,” Ido shared.
NDAs embedded within DocSend have been very convenient when raising our second fund from LPs. The investor can easily sign the NDA and access our data room of investment documents, all in one click and within the same viewer experience.
Setting up a virtual data room in less than a day
In a remote fundraising environment, the challenge many investment firms face is maintaining a high level of security over sensitive information and doing so in a timely manner. Working with potential investors across Europe, Maor Investments needed a secure way to have more control over the documents they were sending out internationally to potential investors and LPs.
During their initial search, Ido was looking for a cost-effective data room solution that prioritized security and customization. “We have seen many different data room platforms and been consumers of probably twenty different data room solutions before encountering DocSend. We found DocSend to be by far the best in terms of the user interface, and at the same time very cost-effective as a virtual data room,” Ido shared. When he first came across DocSend’s VDR, Ido was impressed to see that he could restrict access to specific email addresses, set expiration dates, and require an NDA for access to certain materials. Additionally, members of his execution team could customize their VDR with a unique banner and personalized logo.
With DocSend, Ido was able to create different data rooms to showcase the impressive work of his firm and their portfolio companies. “We create data rooms by the funnel stage of the fundraising process. One of our VDRs contains a teaser deck that we send out as an initial overview to potential LPs. Another VDR we create holds investor committee memos, fund performance spreadsheets, legal documents, purchase agreements, certificates of incorporation, and more, to investors that are committing to partner with us,” Ido shared. With a vast list of sensitive files to keep track of, the team at Maor Investments can find peace of mind, from relying on DocSend’s virtual data room for potential investors.
One of the things we like the most in DocSend is its super intuitive user experience and that it’s completely self-serve. This allowed us to set up a full virtual data room in less than a day, and easily share it with a broad audience of different potential investors, even while being on the road.
DocSend’s document analytics optimize investor prioritization
While most virtual data rooms provide only a broad glimpse of user activity, DocSend’s virtual data room showcases page-by-page engagement metrics that arm partners with critical insights on where to prioritize their time. “The feature we were most excited about trying was tracking what pages viewers spend the most time on and which potential investors were the most interested in our firm,” Ido shared. “With DocSend, we are able to smartly deal source and prioritize potential investors through viewing their document analytics,” Ido shared. For example, if a potential investor spends a long period of time carefully reading their overview deck, Ido would know that this might be someone who is seriously considering investing.
Refining messaging to investors with analytics
Additionally, Ido relies on DocSend’s analytics to inform data-driven decisions on how to best update investor materials. “DocSend’s analytics are really helpful for us to see which slides matter most to potential investors. We are constantly updating our materials, so when we make changes, we focus on sharpening the message of the most viewed slides, while getting rid of redundant slides which attracted no investor interest,” Ido shared.
As the team at Maor Investments completed the fundraise of their second fund, they were able to optimize the impact of their investment decks. By prioritizing what matters most to their investors with DocSend’s analytics, Ido and the team at Maor Investments told an effective narrative about their firm that resonated with their audience and helped them secure their funding.
