Atto

🌱 As another year comes to a close, we’ve spent some time reflecting on what we developed throughout 2021 and how the Atto community has grown this year. It’s been another big year for Atto.

💭 Over on the Atto blog, we’ve shared a snapshot of what Kate Kendall and Lana Weal from the Atto team have been up to, including:

💯 Atto has now supported over +115 female founders through our programs!

🚀 Atto ran multiple programs for female founders in 2022 which included new membership tiers for the Atto Academy community membership, the Atto Aspire Pre-Accelerator 2022 with 18 founders from 14 startups, and the fourth batch of the Atto Accelerator 2022 with 15 founders from 10 startups.

📅 We hosted many public and private community events breaking down the realities of building startups. Over on our Youtube channel, you can find Masterclasses and events on how to build startups, DAOs, NFTs, and AMAs with Atto founders.

🎉 A huge congrats to the founders who went through the Atto Aspire Pre-Accelerator, Atto Accelerator, and Atto Academy programs in 2022. We loved supporting you and helping you focus to make big things happen quickly.

⭐ A big thank you to the Atto educators, judges, cheerleaders, advisors, supporters, community members and partners who have worked with us on this mission to empower more women to create impactful companies.

🎊 The Atto team are signing off for 2022 and we’ll see you in 2023 for a new year and new programs. The Atto team are looking forward to the holiday season, taking a step back from work to reflect a bit more on all these great wins, and come back to 2023 with more fire to support female founders reach success.

💬 If you have any feedback for Atto or would like to get in touch, feel free to send us a message here: https://www.atto.vc/contact

Read Atto’s Year In Review for 2022:
https://www.atto.vc/news/2022-year-in-review

Wondering what DAOs are and how they can impact your startup?

According to Kevin at AirTree, the definition is still a WIP: "DAOs or Decentralised Autonomous Organisations: a Web3 native model of collaboration, challenging the traditional model of a corporation."

This is a new model which challenges the traditional model of corporations as they allow organisations to be without a hierarchy, decentralised and essentially borderless.

During this Atto Masterclass, AirTree's Investment Manager Kevin Lu shares:
- what DAOs are and how big the industry is already,
- the different types of DAOs (product, services, investment, social, and public goods),
- the components of DAOs (contracts, community-led initiatives, tokens),
- why people start DAOs, and their pros & cons,
- case studies and practical applications
- how they can improve flaws in traditional corporate models.

Atto | Atto Masterclass: Intro to DAOs for Startup Founders with Kevin Lu, Airtree Wondering what DAOs are and how they can impact your startup? During this Atto Masterclass, AirTree's Investment Manager Kevin Lu shares more about what DAOs are and what startup founders should know about them.

"It is not a disadvantage; it is merely a different way of thinking… Once freed from archaic schooling practices and preconceptions, my mind opened up. Out in the real world, my dyslexia became my massive advantage: it helped me to think creatively and laterally, and see solutions where others saw problems"
- Richard Branson, Virgin founder dropping out of school after his dyslexia was treated as a setback.

At Atto, we always advocate for women to do business on their terms. We encourage them to test early with customers, use no-code tools to build MVPs, and to stay as independent as long as possible so that they can retain ownership.

We encourage founders to listen to good advice - but then do things that align with their values, their vision and their goals for their lives.

Over on the blog, we’ve put together a list of 10 impressive neurodiverse female founders who are carving their own path in business.

Angela Henderson - Angela Henderson Consulting

Barbara Corcoran - Shark Tank

Cherie Clonan - The Digital Picnic

Delphine Genin - Delphin Genin Atelier

Denise Duffield-Thomas - Lucky B

Jo Malone - Jo Malone London

Leonie Dawson - Leonie Dawson

Sair Buckle - Overtly

Susie Hopkins - Lilo Wellness

Vanessa Castañeda Gill - Social Cipher

Read their bios and get inspired by what's possible:
https://www.atto.vc/news/neurodiverse-female-founders

"..every hour spent on customer development has saved 5, 10 or even more hours of writing, coding, and design."
- Cindy Alvarez, Lean Customer Development

Recently, Atto's founder Kate Kendall was revisiting Cindy's insightful book on lean customer development - a highly recommended read for early-stage startup founders.

Cindy breaks down how to develop products that people will actually use and buy.

This book is a practical guide shows you how to validate product and company ideas through customer development research—before you waste months and millions on a product or service that no one needs or wants.

At Atto, we always talk about testing MVPs early with cheap or free no-code tools - and the importance of generating revenue as early as possible.

Many founders startup businesses because they want to make an impact - and focus less on the product that they're trying to sell. Make sure you don't make assumptions about your customers and validate your hypothesis quickly with good research methods - like the ones recommended in Cindy's book.

Find out more about the book here: https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/18492257

"Women often work better in a community. Often they're critical of or set limits on themselves. Being around others can support you and push you further." - Lisa Miller, Wedgetail VC

Throughout 2022, we’ve had some really impressive founders share with us:
- what getting started looked like
- what was important in the first years
- what it was really like raising funding
- tips from building and leading teams,
- and so much more.

We started this event series as we wanted to share insights with our community of emerging female founders about the realities of building a startup. In an intimate setting, it’s a chance for emerging female founders to learn what it’s really like building a startup right now.

Learn lessons on how to build startups from:
- Shahirah Gardner - Finch
- Lisa Miller - Wedgetail
- Heidi Holmes - Mentorloop
- Gemma Lloyd - WORK180
- Alex Sinickas - Milkdrop
- Sarah Agboola - mtime

Read some more of our lessons from Office Hours with successful female founders:
https://www.atto.vc/news/lessons-atto-office-hours

This week, we wrapped up our Atto Accelerator 2022 batch! 🚀

So proud of the teams and how far they’ve come. ⭐

A huge thanks to our judges for their usual insightful questions that have encouraged our founders to think even bigger and make even better decisions to reach their goals. 🥅

The amazing judges:
🚜 Aprill Enright-Allen, Tractor Ventures
🌱 Judy Anderson-Firth, Euphemia
🦊 Rachael Neumann, Flying Fox Ventures
📣 Siân Simpson, Public Rally

The Atto Accelerator is a 12-week program focused on getting founders to product-market fit, revenue and beyond. We're looking forward to seeing what these founders do next! 👀

A huge congrats to the founders for all their hard work over the past few months. With support and focus, big things can happen quickly! 🏆

Meet the 10 Atto Accelerator 2022 startups:
- Anastasia Soulship, founder of SoulShip
- Anita Noller, MBA & Jessica Wong-Saunderson, founder of MumbleMe
- Dr. Anushi (Kulasiri) Rajapaksa, founder of Misti
- Athy Giannopoulos, founder of StrataBoss
- Bhagya Wijethunga, founder of Global Diet Aids
- Debora Sharp Ellingson & Fernanda Martin del Campo, co-founders of STONE TULIPS
- Laura Green, founder of Lipsy Loo
- Paz Pisarski, founder of The Community Collective
- Vivian Wang, Celeste Yang & Yining Yu, co-founders of My Mind Journey
- Yesha Patel & Nehal Jain, co-founders of After

Learn more about their startups over on the Atto blog:
https://www.atto.vc/news/atto-accelerator-2022-batch

🌱 Wondering how startups are different to small businesses?

🚀 Want to understand the steps startups go through to get to product-market fit?

💰 Thinking about different funding pathways?

In this 27min Masterclass, Kate Kendall shares useful resources, models and perspectives for early-stage founders launching new ventures.

Kate talks through how traditional startup founders need to be hyper-focused on growth in the early stages. They need to be solutions minded as they’ll be testing, learning and figuring out their business model and pricing to reach product-market fit.

Focusing on a more sustainable approach to building businesses, Kate shares more about the indie way and how tech companies can be built through tiny wins and mindful amounts of investment - in contrast to the “growth at all costs” or “unicorn or die” Silicon Valley ethos.

Watch the recording to learn more about startups, the indie way and the different types of businesses and entrepreneurs.

Atto | Intro to Tech Startups with Kate Kendall Learn more about what a tech startup is, the indie way and how founders need to personalise their approach to launching a business. Wondering how startups are different to small businesses? Want to understand the steps startups go through to get to product-market fit? Thinking about differ

"Anything good will take time to build." - Jane Kou, Startup Partner Lead, Stripe

Last month, we had Jane join us to share her experience of building a digital product - and interviewing 50+ agencies in order to find the best one for her startup idea!

Jane Kou is an experienced startup founder and mentor. Going through the process of hiring a development company herself and conducting 50+ interviews with agencies, Jane will share her process to hiring the right development team for your startup.

At Atto, we always talk about how to test ideas quickly with no-code tools. Complex, new and unique technology takes time to build. There are ways to test small ideas quickly, but once you want to create a custom platform, it's a good idea to find the right tech team to support you.

During the Masterclass, Jane shared her best tips for how to find a development agency, what to ask them, how to review their previous work, and how to budget the build with your agency.

Watch the Masterclass with Jane:

Entrepreneurs are often viewed as outliers. You’ve got to think differently to imagine a different future - a more positive future that entrepreneurs and their startups can help to change.

Neurodivergence is a difference in how the brain works. 15-50% of the world’s population exhibit some sort of neurodivergence.

Our uniqueness can be a part of our superpower.

At Atto, we always advocate for women to do business on their terms. We encourage founders to listen to good advice - but then do things that align with their values, their vision and their goals for their lives.

Here we’ve put together a list of 10 impressive neurodiverse female founders who are carving their own path in business.

Meet 10 Neurodiverse Female Founders to watch
- Angela Henderson - Angela Henderson Consulting
- Barbara Corcoran - Shark Tank
- Cherie Clonan - The Digital Picnic
- Delphine Genin - Delphin Genin Atelier
- Denise Duffield-Thomas - Lucky B
- Jo Malone London - Jo Malone London
- Leonie Dawson - Leonie Dawson
- Sair Buckle - Overtly
- Susie Hopkins - Lilo Wellness
- Vanessa Castañeda Gill - Social Cipher

Read the full blog over on the Atto website to :
https://www.atto.vc/news/neurodiverse-female-founders

"Often the hardest part of anything is just getting started." - Sarah Agboola, Founder of mtime

Wondering what it takes to build a scalable business?

Over on the Atto blog, we've shared our top lessons from Office Hours with successful female founders.

During these Office Hours sessions, we discussed getting started, building a team, sourcing capital, finding customers and global scale.

Last week, we heard from Sarah Agboola from mtime and she shared with us inspiring quotes about launching and scaling her business.

LESSONS FROM OFFICE HOURS WITH FOUNDERS:
+ Shahirah Gardner - Finch
+ Lisa Miller - Wedgetail
+ Heidi Holmes - Mentorloop
+ Gemma Lloyd - WORK180
+ Alex Sinickas - Milkdrop
+ Sarah Agboola - mtime

Read all the lessons from the founders: https://www.atto.vc/news/lessons-atto-office-hours

Want to hear our key lessons from speaking with successful female founders?

Throughout 2022, we’ve had some really impressive founders share their story with us during Office Hours where we discussed:
+ what getting started looked like
+ what was important in the first years
+ what it was really like raising funding
+ tips from building and leading teams,
+ and so much more!

So far in this inspiring event series, we've learned from:
+ Shahirah Gardner - Finch
+ Lisa Kate Miller - Wedgetail
+ Heidi Holmes - Mentorloop
+ Gemma Lloyd - Work180
+ Alex Sinickas - Milkdrop Pumps

Join us for our final office hours session for the year with Sarah Agboola this Wednesday 2 Nov, at 1pm AEDT.
https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/atto-office-hours-with-sarah-agboola-from-mtime-tickets-399346304547

Read our lessons from Office Hours with successful female founders:
https://www.atto.vc/news/lessons-atto-office-hours

Atto | How to Build Startups Office Hours with Female Founders Throughout 2022, the Atto team ran regular one-hour drop-in sessions featuring leading female founders. First we start of with their founder story - a 5min summary of what’s often multiple decades of work and steps to get to this point. We started this event series as we wanted to share insight