Talk with Aptera’s pre IPO Investment Banker, US Capital

Musical Opening OD to AB Tera the most efficient vehicle on the planet [Music] [Music] [Music] have terra cruising wingless flly I love of Terror It Feels So Right Glides down the highway from the Introduction Sun drill of the all-wheel drive app Tera on a twisting curving Mountain Road and the rush of adrenaline with sub4 second acceleration time and the pleasure of charging your car from the Sun and on some models the confidence of up to 1,000 miles of range but we don't have an aptera yet and some specifications have changed to get aptera to Market quicker despite that there are some things I would like to share with you today first though a little bit about me I'm a trained electrical engineer so I understand how EVS work I'm an EV owner with over 150,000 miles of experience so I get range and charging I have an NBA in finance and I have been mentored by an investment banker in my day job I read and analyze financial statements every day so what attracts me to the aptera the awesome styling yes the sub4 second 0 to 60 acceleration time on the all Drive version yes is it the solar charging yes though I live in the Rainy Northwest or is it apter's amazing efficiency for me it's all about efficiency because with efficiency all those other things are possible and for these Reasons I'm an investor in EPA an ambassador and a reservation holder well with the preliminaries done Interview Start today's video will be a special one we have as a guest Frank villery managing director and partner at us Capital Global Partners US capital is the investment banking firm behind aptera $60 million offering an offering that I described in my last video as a mesine so are we ready for the interview let's get right to it welcome Frank I looked at your professional profile and see that you have some experience with JP Morgan and stel these are both firms that I know people in though through Public Finance to set the table in our conversation I know Investment Banking is highly regulated and with oversight by the Securities Exchange mission in the thra so there are likely some things that we can't talk about today with our viewers but with that said Frank welcome maybe you could tell the viewers a little bit about yourself thank you Rich it's my pleasure to be with you today um my background is that uh my career has been in finance and I have worked predominantly for H bracket Investment Banking firms uh mainly in banking uh and Investment Banking uh so I've been with our firm for roughly about eight years and um really have uh focused on a wide variety of different Industries and verticals I am based in San Francisco so a lot of the deals that I have been involved with are focus on technology and Healthcare and uh we see that uh technology is playing a very important part in the development of evolution in Autos um so we're seeing quite a bit of interest in the Auto industry right now you tell our audience what an investment banker does sure an investment Banker's job is to raise capital for companies this can be in the form of equity or debt and invest Banker also might be mandated to find a buyer for a company uh either a public or private company I think that's called mergers and Acquisitions is that right that's right yes so raising raising funds and then mergers and Acquisitions that's correct and can you explain to our viewers what a bulge bracket firm is what does that mean sure there's different tiers of investment things so I think most notably the names that uh are affiliated with what is deemed to be bulge bracket might be JP Morgan Goldman Sachs Morgan Stanley um and then there are more of the boutique and smaller and more maybe specialized oriented investment banks that might include companies such as uh William Blair Rothchild uh and many others interesting um what kind of vetting does an investment banking firm do before they take on want a client to raise capital for them sure so I think that one of the larg considerations is that the deal needs to be bankable and what I mean by that is um we are asked every day uh to take on clients and uh really we want to ensure that when we take on a mandate that we do think that there are either investors or lenders uh that would be a good fit for any particular client or mandate so we do have a requirement uh that uh really is aligned with how much money the company has raised uh what stage the company is at um and what details really make it attractive for investors or lenders to consider the opportunity to participate in an offering by any of our clients that's very encouraging uh and I say that in as much as um presumably aptera Motors has gone through that vetting process and the uh whatever committee if there is a committee Bob their heads up and down and says this looks like a a very doable transaction yeah that's right I think that the level of interest that um aptera has received including the amount of capital labor ra um the impressive pre-orders that they've received all make this a very uh um high-profile engagement I think so um I think that the market reaction and interest in this company even before we've gone out to raise capital for the company was something that was appealing for us yeah I understand they've raised over100 million a lot of it from the crowd I and is my understanding it's the largest crowdfunding um raise of all time um and it's you know I think it's like $1.4 billion dollars of pre-order uh sales or pre-orders that are in the books and that's fairly compelling at least it is to me on investment banking what kind of credentials or background is useful for someone who's interested in getting in to Investment Banking well I think typically a bachelor's degree is um really the kind of foundation but oftentimes an MBA or CFA designation is not uncommon uh sometimes both quite a few investment bankers particularly in the more technical uh oriented industri such as Healthcare may have phds as well wow and I think the CFA is a chartered financial analyst and actually studied for that yes that's right it's U rather difficult T designation to secure that uh takes three tests uh you take uh one test per year so you need to pass all three uh not necessarily in succession u a lot of folks uh in fact I know only a handful of uh individuals who have passed it one two and three in suc session usually uh you know you might find somebody who doesn't pass two and then uh may take four or five years to get the designation so it's uh pretty rigorous examination my favorite I I I look at Bloomberg all the time because in my my day job I help manage interest rates for the organization I work with and my favorite Bloomberg reporter Tom key R Bai is both an engineer and a CFA and it's always I just relish listening to Tom King um what kind of entities or individuals would want to invest in a growing company that might be IPO so what's typical in the evolution of a uh Capital raise for a company is that early on in a company's life cycle there's usually a seed or friends and family round in other words the uh executive team uh might have colleagues uh who may know them by reputation uh family that uh obviously has taken an interest in the Endeavor by their family member and may just uh start that initial pool of investment just to get the company up and running um after that phase then uh and depending on the Milestones depending on the companies industry or vertical um you might get into maybe a series a round which uh typically is comprised of maybe a venture capital firm uh or an angel investor someone who U is familiar with the space Maybe has had an exit and has taken an interest in a particular technology or project um or platform that the company is involved in following that stage there might be a series B round where uh Venture Capital comes into the picture uh and they are interested in um sometimes making a Strategic investment where um it aligns with their Diversified portfolio private companies or maybe it's a particular expertise that the general partners of said Venture firm have and find an interest in the company and uh those uh funds B basically are um really vary it can be very specific to an industry sometimes uh it can be a larger Venture fund that has a number of different industries that they invest in so uh to answer your question it can be funds it can be high net worth individuals um or sometimes a sovereign wealth fund sometimes it might be uh a country that actually puts money through one of their investment arms into a particular techn ology if they believe that it will somehow often times benefit uh their country maybe the infrastructure that they're building out we find that often times in clean tech companies Great observation um thank you um it made me think about um uh so Lucid Motors I think Lucid Motors uh receive some funding from this I think the Saudi um um wealth fund Sovereign wealth fund and it also made me think of uh your your firm I believe has an office in ALU Dhabi or um yes we have an office in Dubai CEO spends quite a bit of time there um certainly between Dubai and London um so we see Dubai as a growing region where there is an active interest in um as I indicated earlier in building out their infrastructure so we have a number of clients who are looking at things such as uh water filtration hydrogen um there is um a move um curiously away from um traditional oil and um hydrogen is a particular interest uh in these regions so we see that as a growing trend and um it's noteworthy that uh yes to your point Lucen has received investment from one of these entities and I think you'll continue to see that kind of partnership between government and private uh companies depending on the industry in vertical yeah um it made me think of a video I saw recently and it was about AB Tera and what was interesting in terms of the um petroleum companies if you will the carbon fiber body that EPA is manufactured from has a lot of petroleum into that mix that carbon fiber mix so you're actually sequestering fossil carbon into the body which I would think would be very desirable for um firms interested or firms in the um oil industry industry in complex yeah there is one of the aspects that is interesting is that um the manufacturing process for ATA is such that they really don't require paint um in modular orientation um this is uh curiously one of the most U expensive uh components of manufacturing and Auto is actually the pain um it's highly regulated and the fact that the company can actually manufacture and build their cars without the use of U the traditional manner that cars are painted is one of the things that reduces the costs of the company as well as uh enables it to um really get to Market in a manner that most other oil makers may have a hurdle from an EPA regulatory standpoint I'm I'm watching the clock I know we have limited time today and again thank you Frank um thinking about us Capital um are there any companies that you can think of that have gone on that you've raised um invest quote Investment Banking funds for that have gone on to an initial public offering on one of the yes and that's always the hope when we uh take on an engagement I mean our interests really are aligned in ensuring that our clients are successful having said this our Focus really is on private companies and uh in most cases we hope that it is the maybe last round that a company might require either for growth or working capital um so our focus is really on uh that last private round before company goes public it and just to hit that question again has US capital raised funds for companies that have gone public the answer is yes okay thank um just going to share a brief story with you um yesterday I was watching a Ferrari video it just popped up on my YouTube channel I guess I have an interest in cars and one of my takeaways it was a beautiful 1930s Ferrari with an alunan body with a V6 engine and this 80-year-old woman had purchased this car many years ago and cherishes it and what she said struck me she said this car is a moving piece of art and in some ways I think of aptera in that way as well it is beautiful distinctive vehicle that perhaps someday could be looked at as iconic as the Volkswagen Beetle but yet under that beauty is high technology instead of the V16 in this Ferrari there's an Efficient Electric Motor instead of the aluman body in this Ferrari there's Advanced carbon fiber in the appar um and and it just struck me um watching that video it was a beautiful Ferrari I wish I remember the model number 1930 with the V16 lunman body um and then it just Bing this is the optera is is just like that advanced technology beautiful it it's a moving piece of art um yeah yes indeed um we're thrilled that uh this year uh we're going to be um showcasing one of the Appo vehicles at this year's Concord delance in cble Beach uh it won't be there uh Sunday when the judging for best and show takes place it'll be there on Saturday where a lot of Industry insiders and participants uh normally go there um but to your point yes some of these vehicles of the past really are deemed to be rolling art and we certainly think that as well of the design of the upo vehicle yeah really struck me advanced technology and good um well again I'm I'm looking at the clock um I know there have been many things that perhaps we could not talk about today in recognizing uh the regulated industry that invest Bankers work in once the app Tera Motors offering is closed Frank would you be willing to come back and have another conversation with our viewers certainly it would be my Closing Remarks pleasure I want to thank you today Frank from us capital for sharing some time with our viewers and I wish you a fabulous day and for everybody charge on Musical Closing [Music] wingless flag I love a terror It Feels So Right the future is now protect Mother Earth keep her healthy for what it's worth what's your pleasure Luna or Soul let's save the planet we're on a road Glides down the highway taking power from the sun no more can't you see we're [Music] done EPA don't to F EP Tera you know there it's round [Music]