Our Angel Investment Returns Review on AngelCentral syndicated deals (2024)

Angel Investment Returns Review

AngelCentral is an active Angel Club that started off as an informal group back in 2017. In 2018, we formalized into a company in order to be more systematic and deliberate in what we do for angels. 

Our vision is to build a community of high-quality angel investors in Singapore and ASEAN, with angel members who don’t just do well as angel investors but also do the right thing for startups and founders. At the same time, we also recognize our ecosystem is relatively young and so focus a lot on peer-to-peer learning among angel investors in addition to providing lots of deal flow and syndication administration services.

As of end 2024, we have 139 angel members and reviewed almost 900 startups during the year. Cumulatively, our club has funded about S$35M since inception of which more than 70% are syndicated via our syndication administration services. We have also run over 100 workshops on topics like Angel Investing Masterclasses, Legal Masterclasses, Due Diligence Masterclasses and deep dives into various startup sectors. In total, we have trained over 1000 angel investors in the ASEAN region.

Angel Investments in 2024

2024 was a continuation of 2023 in terms of subdued funding activity across all stages and sectors. What was different from 2023 is that we saw many new members sign up attracted by the possibility of more attractive valuations and also we saw a 20% growth of more startups seeking funding. In terms of actual quantum funding, we are flat compared to 2023 at about $3.5M. Like 2023, this  is a low from the high of almost S$6M back in 2021. Our club data reflects the broader climate and is corroborated by our Angel Behavior Survey 2024 and also by external reports which also noted continued slowdown in funding.

In total for 2024, we had 6 new syndicates and 7 follow on rounds. We also experienced a few  failures for older syndicated startups. Since inception, our angels have created 35 syndicates of which 6 have failed or closed down. 16 have uprounds. 

And as an academic exercise, we have been calculating the angel investment returns for a hypothetical angel who participates with the same sum in each and every syndicate.  As a recap, from 2Q2018 to 3Q2024, we helped angel members create a total of 35 syndicates regionally. These startups included startups from Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia and Thailand. This is testimony to our regional reach for dealflow.

AC Syndicate Qualitative Analysis

AngelCentral analyzed all 35 startups that we helped our Angels create syndicates for. Syndicated deals have deeper curation as it’s a group effort by multiple angels who want to invest in a startup. Frequently, there is also a lead angel organizing.

Some terms used :

• “Upround” is counted so long as there is new money raised at higher valuation; Can be any instrument but the raise must be of minimum USD$100K or more;
• “Ongoing” is counted if the startup has no fund raising activity since our round and is a going concern;
• “Downround” is counted if the startup raised more money on a down round
• “Closed Down” is counted if the startup is inactive or on verge of closing down.

Some assumptions made :

• Same amount invested per syndicate
• Invest in all 35 syndicates since end 2Q 2018 to 3Q 2024
• Upround is based on new financing valuation or exceptional (>3X) revenue growth
• Data source is actual funding rounds

Our angel investment returns

We are happy to report that if an angel participated in every syndicated deal, the performance is pretty good. Take a look at the tables below.

Status	As at 3Q2024
Upround/Rev >3X	16
Ongoing	10
Downround	3
Closed/Failed	6
Some of our Up rounds Startups	Motorist, Nimbus, ParcelPerform, Ailyitics, Blood, Neuron

 

Data as of end 3Q2024	TVPI
AngelCentral Syndicates	1.69
Syndicates IRR	18.26%
2018 Vintage Global VC (median) 2019 Vintage Global VC (median)	1.69 1.33

Nb: Global VC performance numbers are from Angelist.

Comparing against USA VCs of similar vintages, our syndicates as a whole have generated returns that are comparable or above the median. This is a good endorsement of the quality of our dealflow and angels who are basically picking startups better than the average VC in the USA.

Unfortunately, there is no data on ASEAN seed VCs that will allow us to compare against our direct VC peers. 

In summary

AngelCentral provides angel members with sizable deal flow, quality learning and also experienced syndication administration. While we measure our impact by the 1000+ angels touched and the S$35M funded into startups, we also want to know if our angels are getting good returns.

We are happy to report that based on the AC Syndicate returns analysis above, the data shows that our club’s curation is working and is of good quality at AngelCentral. We believe that as our community grows and we help each other find and evaluate startups better, the curation  and so returns will only get better with time. So, if you are keen to learn more about angel investing and want to join a group of really passionate and sincere angel investors, do find out more about AngelCentral membership.

If you are interested in our yearly review, view our angel investment returns in 2021, angel investment returns in 2022 and angel investment returns for 2023  for our syndicated deals.