A stealthy Chapel Hill investor with SpaceX in its portfolio is raising $30 million and looking for deals in "deep tech."
A securities filing disclosed this month by Champion Hill Ventures shows CH Ventures II L.P. is looking to raise the sum to fund future venture-capital investments.
In an interview, the firm's founder, Chapel Hill's Josh Manchester, said the goal is to fund eyebrow-raising technologies. Manchester initially started the firm as a side project to house some of his personal investments in 2014. But in 2017, he took it full time.
“I thought there was a need in the market for more very early-stage investors … and I also just wanted to work for myself,” he said.
Today, the company has about $10 million in assets under management — a number expected to increase with the second fund.
According to PitchBook, the firm has made 18 investments and has seen two exits so far.
The portfolio, according to its website, includes firms such as Elon Musk-founded aerospace company SpaceX. Other names on the list include San Francisco-based Flexport and U.K.-based LabGenius.
Manchester said the firm has a bias toward deep tech when it comes to investing.
“We like things that have a defense component to the business side,” he said. “We also do things we call ‘curve balls,’ which just don’t look like anything else, but have the potential to be large companies.”
While the portfolio contains companies in the Southeast, there are no local startups in the mix. But that could change.
Manchester said that while the stars have not quite aligned, the firm is open to opportunities to fuel Triangle innovation. A typical Champion Hill investment is between $250,000 and $500,000 in a pre-seed company bent on industry disruption, he said.
Champion Hill closed on its first fund last year, the $4.2 million CH Venture I fund, earmarked for disruptive technologies.
Manchester is a former venture partner at San Francisco-based Foundation Capital. Prior to Champion Hill, the marine veteran also worked as a senior investment associate at Chapel Hill’s TrueBridge Capital Partners.
