Entrepreneurs Meet Venture Capitalists. Venture Capitalists Meet Entrepreneurs.
The Central Coast Venture Forum will hold its seventh annual investor conference today at Fess Parker's Doubletree Resort in Santa Barbara. The day-long conference is the largest of its kind on California's Central Coast, a technology corridor encompassing northern Los Angeles, Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo Counties. Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton is the senior founding sponsor and chief organizer of the conference.
"This year's Forum will be our best ever despite a challenging economic environment," said Joseph Nida, Central Coast Venture Forum chair and partner in Sheppard Mullin's Corporate Practice Group. "This year's group of presenting and participating companies are the strongest yet."
The Venture Forum brings together venture capitalists, angel investors and corporate sponsor attendees who gather to listen as the region's entrepreneurs showcase their business plans and demonstrate their products/services to the investor audience. Companies selected to present their business plans at CCVF represent breakthrough technologies, dynamic business opportunities, and compelling business models that can shape the future of their respective industries, and bolster continuing business growth in the Central Coast corridor.
The featured speaker for this year’s conference is Tim Draper, Founder and Managing Director of Draper Fisher Jurvetson (DFJ). The Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm is the leader in start-up venture capital, having invested in more than 150 high-tech companies. Hotmail, Goto, NetZero, Kana, DirectHit, and Interwoven are among DFJ's previous portfolio companies.
The Central Coast Venture Forum is a non-profit organization dedicated to linking the most innovative, fastest growing private companies in Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, and Ventura counties with leading business and financial experts throughout California’s Central Coast. CCVF’s sponsors, investors, emerging companies, and entrepreneurs have seen more than $110 million invested in selected businesses from the Forum since its inception in 1996.
Sheppard Mullin has more than 370 attorneys among its eight offices in Santa Barbara, West Los Angeles, Los Angeles, Orange County, Del Mar Heights, San Diego, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C. The full-service firm provides counsel in Antitrust and Trade Regulation; White Collar and Civil Fraud Defense; Business Litigation; Construction, Environmental, Real Estate and Land Use Litigation; Corporate; Entertainment and Media; Finance and Bankruptcy; Financial Institutions; Government Contracts and Regulated Industries; Healthcare; Intellectual Property; Labor and Employment; Real Estate, Land Use, Natural Resources and Environment; and Tax, Employee Benefits, Trusts and Estates. The Firm celebrated its 75th anniversary in 2002.
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