Cary, North Carolina-based investment firm Cofounders Capital Management LLC made its first deal with a Florida company when it led a seven-figure investment into Orlando-based ViewStub LLC.
However, the deal with the events streaming software startup is not destined to be Cofounders Capital's last in the Sunshine State. Instead, the firm is making a push to look at deals across the Southeast and Florida, Cofounders Capital Partner Tim McLoughlin told Orlando Inno. "We want to spend more time in Florida."
Cofounders is an experienced investment firm. The company, founded in 2015, first deployed a $12 million fund. Cofounders followed with a $31 million fund that has invested in 14 companies since 2019. Cofounders is "at the tail end" of that second fund, McLoughlin said. Cofounders presents a potential investment opportunity for Central Florida startups, which may need to raise investment capital to expand their teams, develop their products, find customers and more.
Here's more from McLoughlin on why Cofounders Capital is interested in more Florida deals and how it can boost startups in metro Orlando:
ViewStub was your firm's first deal in Florida. Why did they catch your attention? Hybrid events already were coming, and Covid accelerated that. ViewStub wasn't a laggard trying to catch up. They were ahead of the curve... The passion and energy in team meetings showed we were getting involved with good people, passionate entrepreneurs and highly coachable entrepreneurs.
Why do you see an opportunity for more deals in Florida? We've worked with other investors down there. We think there’s a lot of talent coming out of the universities, and we think there’s a gap in the market Cofounders can help fill. Cofounders was originally a North Carolina firm. Now we're going to be a Southeast firm with a focus on North Carolina.
How can Cofounders help local companies? We have the ability to be a large seed fund. We can do deals at the earliest stages, but we can give them enough capital to execute on their plan. A lot of smaller seed funds don’t have the follow-on reserve capital to help companies get through the funding gap between a seed round and Series A. In Florida, we found a lot of firms are able to raise friends and family money or angel group capital, but being a lead investor for seed-stage companies with enough capital reserve is unique to Cofounders.
Will Cofounders raise an additional fund soon? Cofounders is planning on bringing on a family of funds and building a team to help early entrepreneurs who need value-added investors and significant capital to achieve their goals. We expect to be around the Southeast for a long time.
Contact
For more information, email tim@cofounderscapital.com or visit the firm's website.
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