Sadly, NZ has lost Ray's Wing Power

Sadly, Ray Thomson has passed away recently. He was instrumental in kickstarting my angel investor career. He had a charming but very effective way of helping fledgling angel investors grow their wings. He would simply stand behind them at the deep end and push them in to fly, swim or drown. In startup speak 'drown' would be 'fast fail'.  Worked for me and from joining Ice Angels in 2010 I rapidly advanced to become chairman of their screening committee and a member of their advisory board under Ray's chairmanship.

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• With respect to gardening tools we were always in total agreement and would always call a spade a spade.
• Ray was the first recipient of Ice Angels' William H. Payne Active Angel Award in 2010 and I followed in his footsteps the following year.
• From 2012 to 2014  Ray was also chairman of the Angel Association New Zealand. Under his stewardship the number of angel investors in formal angel networks increased by over 150 to 500  and over 100 Kiwi startups received seed investment.
• In 2014 Ray was awarded the prestigious Arc Angel Award at the 2014 Angel Summit.
• Ray was a very IP and returns oriented investor, whilst I focus more on founders and collective investment process.
• Ray was concerned that  the monopolised dealflow at Ice Angels would be threatened when I set up Flying Kiwi Angels ☞ in 2014 ​with a bunch of others in order to avoid the conflict of interest that results from a commission based angel model.
• Thankfully, we caught up in June this year for a coffee and chat, one might call it a reconciliatory chat. He reckoned that he had still 10 or more years of active angel investing left in him. Sadly, he did not. 

His investment style may have been divisive but with his enthusiasm and drive he was an example for many angel investors, myself included. 

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