Ben Chiarelli of Cellibre: How to Keep Asking Until You Get a Yes
Ben Chiarelli is the co-founder and CEO of Cellibre. Cellibre is a cellular agriculture company that employs an organism-agnostic approach to turn cells into specialized, sustainable factories for the manufacture of globally significant products at scale. He is also the Founder, and Managing Partner of Divitempus Ventures, a venture capital and private equity firm that’s focused on investing time to create value.
Ben has held roles at Synthetic Genomics, Millennium Health, and spent nearly a decade with JP Morgan's Healthcare Investment Banking Group where he executed over $20 billion of transactions. He is the Founder and director of the 3221 Foundation, a scholarship charity founded in his brother's honor.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn
- Speed round with Ben Chiarelli
- Ben talks about the biggest offer he couldn’t refuse
- Ben shares his fundraising experience and what he had to do to make it successful
- What founder should not do when they get a no
- Utilizing warm intros to get investors interested in your deck and maximizing cold emails to schedule that first meeting
- How to get past the fear of appearing desperate when reaching out to VCs
- Ben discusses how he decides on who to say yes to
In this episode…
It’s not easy to get funding for your business idea but imagine needing to get funding for a business idea that poses a barrier on venture capitalists to invest?
Ben Chiarelli had to raise capital for a federally illegal business. He knew it would be tough because of the vice clause that makes it impossible for institution-funded venture capitals to invest in tobacco, firearms, and cannabis-related business. Ben began his search for funding in 2017 and in July 2019, he finally raised the money he needed after getting 384 NOs. So how did Ben turn the tide in his favor?
Join Stephanie Sims as she speaks with Ben Chiarelli of Cellibre on this episode of What’s Your Ask where they discuss Ben’s fundraising journey, the lessons he picked up along the way, what founders can do when they get a no for an answer, and how they can get investors interested enough to look at their deck. Stay tuned.
Resources Mentioned in this episode
- Cellibre
- Ben Chiarelli on Linkedin
- Nuts.com
- Niko Bonatsos
- Finance-Ability
- Stephanie Sims
- Stephanie Sims LinkedIn
Sponsor for this episode...
Finance-Ability is a boutique consulting firm dedicated to helping business owners and startups find their best options for growth funding. Founded by financial strategist and transaction expert Stephanie Sims, Finance-Ability can help any business owner identify the right funding partners and get through fundraising as painlessly as possible.
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