We have new Operating Partners!
Above any other consideration, a Venture Capital firm like Kibo Ventures must deliver returns to our investors. We strongly believe that a big part of the returns depends on picking the right horses…but we are also big believers that adequate portfolio management and founder support creates value. If rightly done, it also creates the most powerful marketing and recommendation machine ever for us: the founders we backed in the past.
While all investors would agree on the huge impact that the right picking has on returns, some would disagree on the fact that getting involved with portfolio companies really creates value. At Kibo Ventures, we are strong believers on creating value through active involvement.
There are many areas where we think we can add value (see chart below): strategy, team building, mentoring, looking for relevant capital, commercial contacts and a longer or shorter list depending on the company needs. Some of them are fairly obvious and depend on the specific VC experience, attitude, charisma and time availability.
Technology is a less obvious area and tech decissions are difficult to makecan have a huge impact on the likelihood of the company success. My opinion is that only a few investors really understand the knots and bolts of technology, including myself :-),….we have been in technology environments for decades, but can not write a line of code.
And more increasingly, founders are facing many tech challenges when they scale their businesses that requiere specific, well thought and customized answers
- Linking strategy and product: What should be built to achieve strategy and business plan?
- Solid product building methodologies: What prioritization tools and processes? How to reduce “product debt” and “we do too much stuff”?
- Business Intelligence stack and KPI´s to run the company
- Product and tech team management: What is the right skill set of the team? Where can I find team members?
- How to link product with engineering and infrastructure to have boomproof growth?
- ….and many more
Taking a wrong technical decision can be painful and expensive, increasing cost and reducing the company’s ability to grow.
In Kibo Ventures we are facing these issues as our companies scale and we feel that we needed additional horse power and expertise to support our companies. We had already identified Teo and Pedro, even before they started Vernon, their current company. We have worked together in many Technical Due diligences for our investments, and in many discussions on the challenges ahead for each one with founders.
We love working with them! And there is a great match between what they can offer to our portfolio companies and their needs. Their positive personalities, great reputation, rounded expertise and hands-on experience (“tiros pegados”) with many start-ups can only help us improve how we do things and work with portfolio companies.
We really think Pedro and Teo can help our portfolio companies overcome the scaling challenges with one clear focus: Make things happen!. For these reasons we are very happy to announce today that they are joining Kibo Ventures as Operating Partners.
They will spend more time in our Zurbano office, while still mingling with entrepreneurs at the Google Campus to help us identify new talents and companies.
Welcome to the Kibo Ventures family!
Note: For more on Venture Capital involvement read this post by my friend David Teten, Managing Partner at HOF Capital and founder of HBS Angels of New York.
