How to Find Your Angel Investor

By Joanna L. Krotz

As a rule, angel investors are wealthy people who like to bet on early-stage startups.

They offer first-round financing, bridging the gap between bootstrapping and institutional capital, with the hope that their high-risk seed money will return big rewards.

Numbering about 260,500 nationwide, according to Jeffrey Sohl, director of the Center for Venture Research at the University of New Hampshire, angels work on their own or by joining private networks that pool money, share expertise and divvy the due-diligence tasks.

The range of individual investments runs from $10,000 to $1 million, with deals typically between $25,000 and $100,000. Group or network ventures usually run $250,000 to $750,000 each.

Who are these angels?
Jeff Pulver could be the angel poster child. Trained as an accountant and bonds trader, he began investing in emerging Internet technologies more than a decade ago, notably as co-founder of Vonage, the VoIP phone service. "I have a history of getting involved early in such markets," says Pulver, who's also poised to reap the benefits of his early bet on Twitter--the social networking company has recently been valued at a staggering $1 billion as it hurtles toward a public offering.

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