May 20, 2020
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.
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.