C2 Ventures doesn’t spend money on crypto, Net 3 or client firms, and it stays away from Silicon Valley startups. As an alternative, the New York Metropolis-based enterprise agency focuses on disruption in legacy industries. For instance, considered one of its portfolio firms is a robotics startup that cleans industrial loos.
The agency introduced right now it has closed its second-early stage fund totaling $20 million, and a separate $2.5 million Tributary Fund that may make investments in earlier, pre-seed stage old-economy SaaS and robotics productiveness instruments.
Fund 2’s LPs embrace over 125 traders, together with the State of Connecticut by Connecticut Ventures.
This brings C2V’s complete belongings below administration to greater than $30 million. The agency has greater than 30 portfolio firms, three of which have exited, together with Kambr, an airline income administration SaaS supplier that was acquired by Amadeus.
C2V’s normal companions are Chris Cunningham and Matt Olivo. Describing C2V’s funding philosophy, Cunningham mentioned “primary, we’re not an anti-San Francisco agency, however we don’t spend money on the Bay Space. We don’t make investments there as a result of it’s usually over saturated. Worth factors are insane.”
As an alternative, C2V focuses on flyover states and has made investments in cities like Cleveland, Chicago and Charlotte.
Cunningham additionally mentioned the agency “runs as quick as potential” away from crypto, NFTs, Net 3 and client firms towards what the “soiled, uninteresting and harmful.”
“These are outdated financial system, legacy industries which might be ripe for disruption,” mentioned Cunningham. “They’ve had stagnant productiveness. Examples are advert tech, prop tech, insurance coverage tech and the underlying knowledge for the industrial trucking industries.
Another examples of C2V’s portfolio firms features a robotics startup for building and software program firms for automobile washes, laundromats and dry cleansing.
“We love these verticals as a result of they’re sitting on billions of {dollars} of TAM and tons of of tens of millions of income. They’re arguably recession-proof, however they’re not that glamorous, in order that they recover from appeared,” Cunningham mentioned.
To date, this method is understanding for the agency. C2V’s Fund 1, which closed on the finish of 2019, has a present IRR of greater than 50% and two exits. In lower than two years, 15 out of its 19 portfolio firms have both excited or raised main follow-on funding.
A few of Fund 2’s LPs embrace quarterback Baker Mayfield and his brother Matt and NFL Community reporter, together with founders and tech executives like Brian Adams, Jennifer Prince, Shiven Ramji, Sean Cohen, David Kidder, Ari Paparo, Haroon Mokhtarzada and Mike Murphy, who’re all an “operators bench” that helps with technical due diligence after which helps startups after they be a part of C2V’s portfolio.
Cunningham mentioned 30% of Fund 2’s LPs are personal people and household workplaces, however 70% have expertise working a tech firm.
In a ready assertion, Matt McCooe, chief govt officer of Connecticut Ventures mentioned, “C2V squarely suits our technique of figuring out the most effective rising managers in Connecticut dedicated to supporting and rising our state’s startup ecosystem.
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