Post Banking Crisis – The Current State of Tech Banking and Lending (Seattle Tech Week)

The past 12-18 months have seen a dramatic contraction to the venture market impacting not only company valuations and access to equity capital, but also over the last few months triggering the failure of several financial institutions focused on serving tech companies and entrepreneurs. Join our panel of experts discussing the current state of banking and lending for tech companies. What does the landscape look like today? How should entrepreneurs think about banking? What are lenders looking for from tech companies today?

​Moderator: Joe Wallin, Carney Badley Spellman

​Panelists:

• ​Minh Le, Managing Director, Stifel Bank
• ​Jody Page, Investments Director, Lighter Capital
• ​Noah Shipman, Partner, Vistara Growth
• ​Mario De Luca, Managing Director, MUFG

​Bios:

​Joe Wallin – Joe is an attorney at Carney Badley Spellman. He focuses his practice on early stage and growth companies. He represents companies from inception to exit, and assists companies with among other things, formation, equity compensation, angel and venture financings, mergers and acquisitions, and other significant business transactions. He also represents investors in and acquirers of businesses and founders and executives.

​Joe is a member of the Angel Capital Association’s Public Policy Advisory Council. He has been active in advocating for laws to make it less difficult for companies to raise capital. Joe wrote the first draft of Washington’s equity crowdfunding law and was an early advocate for state crowdfunding laws, and later testified in favor of the bill that ultimately became law in Washington State. He also assisted in amendments to the bill that ultimately became law.

​Joe recently co-authored a new book “Angel Investing, Start to Finish.”

​Minh Le – Minh is Managing Director at Stifel Bank based out of Seattle where he launched their Venture Banking practice in March of 2023 covering the Pacific Northwest. He serves as a banking partner for technology, life science and clean technology companies of all stages.

​Minh is deeply involved with the Washington entrepreneurial and venture capital communities and has advised countless companies on raising capital and debt financing.

​Minh has extensive commercial banking experience dating back to the start of his career in 2000. Prior to joining Stifel Bank, he was Market Manager at Silicon Valley Bank where he spent nearly 15 years running their Tech Banking practice in Washington and Western Canada. Before SVB, he helped launch Square 1 Bank’s Venture Banking practice in the Pacific Northwest.

​Jody Page – Jody has more than 20 years of experience in the financial industry and is the most senior member of the Investment Team at Lighter Capital. Over the past seven years, he executed 150+ tranches of debt capital into over 80 growing startups — those businesses went on to raise an estimated $300M+ in venture capital and private equity; several others were eventually acquired. Before Lighter Capital, Jody spent over four years at PitchBook Data, ahead of its Morningstar acquisition, and from 2001-2009 he held operating and management roles in consumer financial services.Jody is a devoted advocate of youth sports and education. After earning his degree in Business Finance from Washington State University College of Business (which he attended on a track and field scholarship), Jody served on his alma mater’s board, the board of Seattle Girls’ School, and dedicated over a dozen years to coaching.

​Noah Shipman – Noah has 10+ years of experience in technology corporate finance, M&A, and strategic planning, having worked as an advisor as well as in-house for both public and private companies.

​Prior to joining Vistara Growth, Noah was Principal at Garibaldi Capital Advisors, a technology-exclusive boutique investment bank. While at Garibaldi, he successfully executed growth capital and secondary financings, as well as buy and sell side M&A mandates for a variety of technology and technology enabled service companies.

​He was previously in a corporate development role at Viterra, where he helped lead an active acquisition-focused growth strategy. During his tenure, the company financed and deployed approximately $2.5 billion in transactions across multiple continents.

​He began his career as an investment banker with Genuity Capital Markets’ Diversified Industries group, where he supported private equity related mandates for clients in technology, media and service sectors.

​Mario De Luca – Mario is Managing Director at MUFG, where he has run the Growth and Middle Market Tech Banking team for the NW & Utah Region since joining in April 2023.  Mario supports public and late-stage private companies, providing deep expertise in debt financing, capital markets, global treasury and payments, foreign exchange, and asset management.

​Prior to joining MUFG, Mario ran SVB’s Corporate Banking team for the NW & Utah, supporting SVB’s late-stage clients both public and private.  Prior to that, Mario spent 11+ years at JPMorgan and USBank in commercial and corporate banking.