Durham’s Bull City Venture Partners, a venture capital firm that typically makes two to four investments a year, has made two investments in just the last three weeks.
The names of the two companies have not yet been publicly revealed, but Bull City co-founder Jason Caplain shared some notable updates about his firm during the Virginia Venture Partners Virtual Coffee event Friday, which brought together a group of successful venture capitalists to talk about investment strategies.
Bull City Venture Partners is on its fourth fund, valued at $53 million, which it has been using to invest in early-stage software companies. Caplain shared what his firm looks for in a potential investment. First and foremost, it puts 80 percent of the weight on the founder.
“We’re a little unusual that way,” Caplain said. “We look for people that we think have the ability to scale all the way through. We’re not big on investing in a company and replacing that founder.”
Caplain said his firm is usually drawn to founders with a great pitch and a “magnetic personality.”
“This may sound a little silly,” Caplain said. “But we look for people that we get the feeling we’d want to quit our jobs and go work there.”
The companies at the “top of the stack” for Bull City Venture Partners are ones that get referrals from other entrepreneurs.
“We’ve never in the last two decades invested in a company that’s coming in cold.”
The firm reviews a couple thousand companies each year, but only invests in a handful. Of course, that means there will be some misses, Caplain said, citing Peloton (Nasdaq: PTON) as a company that Bull City skipped over.
Caplain spoke about what North Carolina entrepreneurs should focus on when trying to attract investors. His first line of advice was to not solely focus on regional investors.
“For the first time, I’m seeing more investors on the West Coast and in other regions investing where they’re not usually going,” Caplain said.
Bull City's investments are typically in companies that see $20,000 to $200,000 a month in revenue and are scaling.
