Speaking
Tomasz Felpel is a three-time founder (Value Alpha, Sonnerie VC, and Pond), an angel and healthcare investor, and a former Fortune 500 dealmaker. He speaks on building a company from zero, finding product-market fit, angel investing, private-markets valuation, and healthcare venture, for founders, investors, universities, and finance audiences.
Why audiences book me
I do not speak about building from theory. I have started three companies, priced billions in M&A inside a Fortune 500, and now write angel checks of my own. Every talk comes from the work: what actually happened, what I got wrong, and what I would do again.
Topics
What the first eighteen months actually look like, across three very different companies. Choosing the problem, the brutal early trade-offs, and how to build infrastructure before anyone is asking for it.
Best for: founders, accelerators, university entrepreneurship programs
How to tell real pull from polite interest, the signals that matter before revenue, and why most teams declare fit a year too early. Honest stories from getting it right and getting it wrong.
Best for: early-stage founders, product teams, pre-seed and seed cohorts
How I read a deal as an operator, why I underwrite the operation and not the slide, and how to start writing angel checks without a fund or a network. What the data room does not say.
Best for: new angels, founder-investors, syndicates, investing clubs
Why fair-value infrastructure matters, how the three valuation methods each mislead, and what breaks when funds and acquirers price on precedent and gut alone.
Best for: investors, finance students, fintech and AI audiences
Why healthcare startups die on operations, not market size; diligence in regulated markets; and where understanding the science, not just the deck, becomes the real edge.
Best for: healthcare founders, VC clubs, life-science accelerators
Coming to American finance from Krakow with no rolodex, and why that became an analytical edge. Rigor over rapport, and reading institutions as systems instead of clubs.
Best for: universities, entrepreneurship orgs, founder and immigrant communities
Formats: Keynote · fireside · panel · workshop · founder AMA · guest lecture
Guest lectures from $1,500 USD (scope and travel dependent). Keynotes, expert panels, and custom founder workshops, enquire. Paid advisory sessions $500 via calendar.
Signature talks
"I started three companies. Here is what actually changes." A founder talk on going from idea to company three times over: the patterns that repeat, the advice that turned out wrong, and why building valuation infrastructure is nothing like building a product people already ask for.
"Product-market fit is a feeling you can measure." A working session on the signals that precede real traction, how to run cheap experiments that tell the truth, and why confident founders keep mistaking momentum for fit.
"What I look for as an angel." How an operator reads an early-stage deal, the questions that separate a real business from a good story, and how to start investing without a fund, a brand, or a network.
Every talk is tailored to the room. Tell me the audience and the outcome you want, and I will build the session around it.
FAQ
Tomasz Felpel speaks on building a company from zero, finding product-market fit, angel and early-stage investing, private-markets valuation, and healthcare venture from an operator lens. He also speaks on building without inherited networks. Audiences include founders, investors, universities, accelerators, and finance audiences.
Yes. He is a three-time founder: Value Alpha (AI private-markets valuation), Sonnerie VC (early-stage healthcare venture), and Pond (structured-networking software). He is also an angel investor and spent years in Fortune 500 corporate development and M&A, including a transaction valued at around 26 billion dollars.
Yes. Founder-focused sessions cover building a company from zero, finding product-market fit, fundraising, and how to start angel investing. Formats include keynotes, founder workshops, and AMAs tailored to the cohort.
Send a speaking enquiry by email to info@tomaszfelpel.com, or book a call. Formats include keynote, fireside, panel, workshop, founder AMA, and guest lecture.
Guest lectures start from $1,500 USD, scope and travel dependent. Keynotes, expert panels, and custom founder workshops are quoted on enquiry. Paid advisory sessions are $500 via the calendar.
Founders and early-stage teams, angel investors and syndicates, universities and accelerators, and finance and healthcare audiences. Every talk is tailored to the room and the outcome the organizer wants.