You’re probably getting it by now. A unique element of 7x is our two interdependent games. Game 1 is for the Startups, game 2 is for the vVC’s.
Start-ups can however utilize all of the powerful tools on 7x, without playing the game.
Before we move on to game play, seriously, congratulations! It’s hard work making progress toward attaining your goals. You’re taking a really significant step in that direction.
The game competition is similar to professional sports in that there is a pre-season, regular season and playoffs. This is not a one-time pitch event – it’s a whole new way to launch a business. You may be engaged for an entire season that will play out over a 20-week period so be prepared for an endurance race. Each game lasts approximately 7 days. After each game, all scores are reset to 0 and a new game begins.
When you signed up, you were placed on a team based on your state of residence. Everyone starts in the development league of a team. The development league is designed to help you succeed at any level. You’re welcome to build your business and thrive in this environment – the development league is perfect for that. If your aspirations are to make it to the big leagues, this is the place to start. Whatever your goals, you can grow your business here.
Just like professional sports, you can’t just walk into the front office and sign up to compete in the big leagues. You have to prove yourself in the development leagues first. It’s the same on 7x, but instead of looking at athletic ability, team management is looking for founders that have business potential.
Management is looking for startups that are gaining traction. There are three scoring elements your team management uses to track and evaluate your performance while on the 7x platform. The results of these elements are encapsulated in the ranking block on your dashboard. To successfully compete in this game, you need to focus your efforts at excelling in these three areas. These are the ranking elements that are the used in the development leagues, and throughout the entire season.
First, vVC Ranking In other words The voting of Virtual Venture Capitalists® (vVC) – When a vVC places you on a game roster you earn points. The number of points you receive is based on the position they place you in.
First – 7 points
Second – 6 points
Third – 5 points
Fourth – 4 points
Fifth – 3 points
Sixth – 2 points
Seventh – 1 point
Points are tallied and you are ranked based on your point totals. The more points you earn – the higher your ranking. To do well in this element of the game you will need to convince as many vVC’s as possible to include you in their rosters – with a high ranking. Only vVC games with an entry fee will contribute to your vVC score.
Bonus Tip: The more vVC’s you recruit, the better chance you have to accumulate more points and they are more likely to place you in a high position on their roster.
Second, Revenue Rankings
There are 3 ways you can generate revenue on 7x, two are ready to go, one is ramping up.
Your revenue score starts with the sales you generate on the 7x platform – Having a product or service that people will pay for is a powerful indicator of a successful company. All revenue generated from sales in the 7x Marketplace is included in the revenue score rankings. Only 7x Marketplace sales contribute to your score because 7x can only track sales that take place through the 7x marketplace.
Since you are also generating revenue from vVC entry fees, we include those earnings in your revenue score as well. 32% of all vVC entry fees are paid directly to the startups on their respective rosters. The payouts are weighted based on the position the startups are ranked on the vVC’s roster. To be clear, the first position will receive 21.3 % of the 32 percent allocated to the Startups weekly competition. Every time someone puts you on their roster – you get paid!
First position on vVC roster pays out – 21.3%
Second – 19%
Third – 16.7%
Fourth – 14.3%
Fifth – 12%
Sixth – 9.7%
Seventh – 7%
FYI the bulk of the entry fees is paid to the vVCs who can make up to a 7x return on their game play. A portion is also applied to seasonal purses for both vVC and Startups.
- Investment Capital Raised – This is the one that is ramping up, so it is not currently live on the platform, but will be coming soon. The 7x platform will link startups to an investment portal that allows them to build a Regulation Crowd Funding offering, known as REG CF. REG CF provides a means for startup to raise up to 5 million dollars from the crowd, this includes both accredited and non-accredited investors. This money goes directly into your company in exchange for equity. The nature of the game we’ve created digs deep into startup operations, which goes beyond what is allowed by SEC’s general solicitation regulations. Therefore, in order to raise capital through REG CF it has to be through a registered SEC third party funding portal. Later in the season startups will be provided a link that will help them set this up. We anticipate investment dollars raised through REG CF will be included in your revenue score, but we’ll have to establish a legal precedent first because nobody else has ever done anything like this. Be patient – we’re working on it.
To do well in these elements of the game you will need to convince as many vVC’s as possible to include you in their rosters with a high ranking, sell as much product or services as possible (including presales) through the 7x Marketplace, and when available, raise capital using the third-party investment portal.
Third, Competition ranking – The competition element has two modes – the preseason mode and the regular season/post season modes. In order to earn points in preseason mode you must:
- Preseason Super (for video) Make your team’s top 20 during the pre-season. Team management will be actively evaluating and monitoring the startups in the team’s development league. Management will post the team’s top 20 at the conclusion of each pre-season game – generally weekly. The only way to get competition points is to make your team’s top 20. Points earned are inverse to your ranking, for example if you are ranked first you receive 20 points, second 19 points on down the line to 20th you would receive 1 point.
- (Regular season super) In the regular season the only way to get competition points is to fill one of the seven positions available on your team’s starting line-up. Your team’s management will call you up to fill one of seven starting positions. We call this the Big Leagues, this is where you compete in head to head competition against other startups.
You will be assigned a position to compete in, the positions are:
- Pitch
- Branding
- Social Media and Marketing
- Sales & Operations
- Team
- Impact
- Leadership
When you get called up, your team management will explain the nuances of each of the positions.
Bonus Tip: Team management will be looking for specialists in each of the seven positions. If you can make yourself uber qualified in any one of these positions it may help you get called up.
(regular season super) During the first Season, You are competing “zoom to zoom” with another Start-up from a different team that is assigned the same roster position. You have a total of 2.5 minutes to make your entire presentation, including preproduced material; however, that time is likely be interrupted by judges to ask questions, and you may elect to temporarily stop your time to send it over to your opponent, so you can understand your opponent’s pitch. The advantage in doing this is to allow you to critique their weaknesses and to defend your strengths on your opponent’s rebuttal.
While the judges are asking you questions, the clock is stopped.
Your performance is scored by the 3 judges on a scale of 1- 10 (10 is represented by the roman numeral X hence the perfect score for a team is 7 x’s – one for each position). Each judge must declare a winner of each round. The judges scores are tallied to determine the winner of the round. If the tallied score results in a tie, the winner is the Startup that was scored the winner by 2 judges.
Don’t be discouraged if you aren’t called up immediately. During the regular season every Startup in the development league is eligible to be called-up to fill a team’s roster position, at any time.
(Play off super) At the culmination of the Regular season, four teams are eliminated from the competition. In preparation for the playoffs, 7x has put in place an event called, Free Agent Signing Day. On the eighth week of competition, the 4 teams that have qualified for the play-offs can protect five startups on their team. Every other Startup in the entire league becomes a free agent, including the development league, and the startups that were just eliminated from the four non-playoff teams. 20 startups from the playoff teams are locked in, but every other startup on the platform is now available to be called up to a different team.
One week prior to this event, the four playoff teams announce four startups that they’re interested in having on their respective teams, for a total of 16 startups. The day of this event these 16 startups are paired up to compete head to head in the traditional 2.5 minute format playing the pitch position. At the conclusion of the competition each team announces the startups they would like to sign to their team. If more than one team selects the same startup, Team management tries to win them over but the startup has to make the final choice of which team to join. This process repeats itself until each team fills their 7 team roster.
The structure of playoff games is the same as the regular season with one modification. Throughout the course of the play-offs, each game features one position with all startups in the playoffs playing the same position, i.e. pitch for all the startups. The play-offs are single elimination, so with every round of competition you could be eliminated. 28 startups qualify for the play-offs. There are 7 elimination rounds in the play-offs.
Here is the elimination schedule:
Week 1 – 28 Startups
Week 2 – 24
Week 3 – 20
Week 4 – 16
Week 5 – 14
Week 6 – 12
Week 7 – 10
Startups are eliminated based on the lowest scoring point totals.
During the regular season teams are looking for specialists, but in the playoffs well rounded startups have the advantage.
In the final playoff round we begin with 10 startups. By the end of that round 7 are declared champions. The champion startups can come from any or all of the four teams, and share in the startups seasonal purse. The purse is distributed to the 7 winners accordingly, based on their final points:
- 1st place – 18%
- 2nd place – 17%
- 3rd place – 15%
- 4th place – 14%
- 5th place – 13%
- 6th place – 12%
- 7th place – 11%
The Scoring – which determines your ranking, is weighted differently during the preseason than the regular season and playoffs.
For the preseason, the weight goes toward rewarding startups gaining the attention of vVC’s Therefore:
- The voting of Virtual Venture Capitalists® is 50% of your total score
- Revenue Generated is 40%
- Making your teams top 20 – 10%
The weighting for the regular season and the playoffs puts more emphasis on the competitive arena.
- The voting of Virtual Venture Capitalists® 35%
- Revenue Generated 25%
- Big League Competition 40%
Making it to the playoffs is a huge accomplishment along with a tremendous amount of exposure. The process has put you and your company on a great path to success. 7x and our team owners have worked hard to contribute to your success, and for their efforts startups that make it to the playoffs will be required to assign a small amount of equity to their respective team and 7x for each round they remain in the playoffs.
Assignment of Equity to 7x – Startups featured in the playoffs agree to undergo a 3rd party valuation, prior to the playoffs. Based on this valuation Startups agree to assign their respective teams, and 7x Corp a .7% interest for each round they are featured in the play-offs. If you make it to the final round of the playoffs, the total amount of equity assigned could be 4.9% for your team, and 4.9% for 7x Corp, the total equity assigned never exceeds 9.8% of your company’s equity. The assignment of Team Equity for Startups that transition to a different Team during the playoffs will be split evenly with their home team and their playoff team.
Keep in mind that 7x is committed to providing far more value to startups and receiving far less equity from startups than startups could negotiate by partnering with traditional VC’s/Sharks. Also keep in mind that by having a stake in your company, 7x and team management are highly motivated to help you grow your business and increase your valuation.
The best relationships are symbiotic between all participants. 7x only works if vVC’s, Startups, team management and 7x corporation are all helping each other. 7x, and all Team licensees only succeed when you succeed.