Amy Weisman

The case for emerging managers: “What we don’t want to do is lock ourselves out of these high-performing, differentiated strategies for the simplicity of going with the big guys”, Taffi Ayodele director of the emerging manager strategy at the NYC Office of the Comptroller #investmentstrategies #investmentreturns #roi #assetallocation #emergingmanagers #riskreward #premium #performance

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Worth checking out for any companies at the right stage.

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🔍 Curious about the value of attending private equity conferences? Our new article breaks down 25 compelling reasons why executives should invest in their professional growth by attending these events. From networking with key industry players to acquiring strategic insights, the ROI is substantial. Read more here: https://buff.ly/3LZnxOV 💼 Learn more about Blackmore Partners: https://buff.ly/42iNmB3 📅 Have questions? Schedule a meeting with our Director Chris Melton here: https://buff.ly/46DZD46 #PrivateEquity #CareerGrowth #ExecutiveRoles #BlackmorePartners #PECareers

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🔍 Curious about the value of attending private equity conferences? Our new article breaks down 25 compelling reasons why executives should invest in their professional growth by attending these events. From networking with key industry players to acquiring strategic insights, the ROI is substantial. Read more here: https://buff.ly/3LZnxOV 💼 Learn more about Blackmore Partners: https://buff.ly/42iNmB3 📅 Have questions? Schedule a meeting with our Director Chris Melton here: https://buff.ly/46DZD46 #PrivateEquity #CareerGrowth #ExecutiveRoles #BlackmorePartners #PECareers

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In 2003, Mike Kirban was skating around NYC selling coconut water. 20 years later, that same product is set to hit $500 million in sales. 🥥 This is the Vita Coco story. The product is simple - some may even call it a commodity. But, branding, story telling and the right marketing allowed this Verlinvest portfolio company to win. This story will show that brands are built with patience, hustle and heart. In 2003, co-founders Michael Kirban and Ira Liran met 2 Brazilian women at a bar. Ira ended up falling in love with one of them and moved to Brazil🇧🇷 Later, during one of Mike’s visits, Ira convinced him to partner up to start selling coconut water in the US. Vita Coco was born! They scraped together $75,000 and bought two containers of coconut water; only to realize that they didn’t have FDA clearance to import them. But that didn’t stop them – They re-exported them to the Bahamas and flew there to sell through the product door-to-door. Mike was everywhere—skating through NYC in the morning, doing store demos in the afternoon and then bookkeeping at night. That’s the real founder hustle :) Meanwhile, Zico, a better-funded competitor, was emerging, setting the stage for the "coconut water wars." It’s around this time that Verlinvest realized we wanted to have a share of the coco-war, and ended up investing $2M. At the time, Vita Coco had not even hit $1M in sales yet. The momentum continued. In 2010, the brand raised a $5M celebrity from celebs like Madonna and Matthew McConaughey. Today, this is common - but at that time it was path breaking. Suddenly, they had the megaphone they needed to build massive brand awareness 🫡 Through the years, their distinct branding and marketing strategy allowed them to stand out on shelves across the world. In 2021, Vita Coco went public, raising $172M. Now, they’re on their way to clock $500M in sales :) From no business plan to building one of the biggest global beverage companies, the story of Michael and Ira building brand in a category like coconut water is one that’s always amazed me. In a lot of cases in consumer products, the product isn’t necessarily the moat. Success comes from brand and a relentless hustle - the willingness to roll with the punches. I’ve always said - the best way to start is to start. You will end up figuring out a lot on the way. I love the product. Have you tried Vita Coco? Do you think there is a case to build such a large coconut water brand in India? PS: Thinking of sharing more stories of our global Verlinvest portfolio like this. Thoughts? #business #entrepreneurship #founder

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There is a great piece on Forbes.com about Camber Creek portfolio company Maybern. It captures a lot of the promise Camber Creek sees in Maybern and the challenges the company is tackling. For example: • There are $15 trillion worth of investment in private funds doing intricate calculations in Excel. The market is enormous. • Errors can be costly and lead to lawsuits or even penalties from regulators. • Cutting through this complexity is not easy. One day, we’ll look back on archaic fund accounting processes and shake our heads at how far we've come. It’ll be because of Ross Mechanic, Aswhin Raghu, and their team. https://lnkd.in/e7P-RT-m

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Great analysis of recent #vc trends. Thank you Kaela Roeder and Technical.ly for including my thoughts in the piece. My "expanded" two cents below for anyone curious... It is easy to get excited by what is happening in venture capital these days given the advent of AI. However, for early-stage startups, the numbers tell a more nuanced story. Early-stage deal volume in Q4-2023 was down 66% from the peak (Q4-2021) and a quarter of the deals were down rounds. In 2024, volumes stayed fairly flat relative to 2023 levels (signalizing a normalization to pre-pandemic VC activity) and 32% of deals were down rounds in Q1 (a worsening since year end). Early-stage valuations have spiked back up this year – a pleasant boon for some founders. But, this inflation is largely driven by the excitement around AI and strong demand for capital-efficient, high-growth companies. Many startups have tried to become “dot AI” businesses overnight; however, such tactics are not the “silver bullet” to fundraising challenges and growth. With limited time and capital, funds are on the hunt for companies with bulletproof fundamentals or those with exponential growth potential. If you don’t check one of these two boxes, the VC world looks fundamentally different for you. Locally, there are some positive tailwinds. The D.C. area has outpaced other metro areas in adding AI jobs due in large part to the defense industry and an increasing number of tech companies opening-up federal outposts. Over the long-term, this will be very positive for D.C. startup growth and talent.

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Have a story to tell... Use Narratize AI Co-Authoring platform to tell your stories in an impactful manner. Katie Trauth Taylor, PhD and the entire team is committed to helping you in becoming amazing storytellers. Check out their impressive work at https://lnkd.in/gnNYHSSX Start telling your stories with Narratize AI as your co-author. #generativeai #storytelling #innovation #aicoauthoring #innovators #researchers #impactstories #startups #problemsolvers #AI #AIStartup

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Great NYT article about the US private secondary market highlighting an early mover I co-founded, Forge, and another I invested in and advised that's bringing things to the next level, Destiny (D/XYZ). A couple of my heroes and colleagues, Sohail Prasad and Kelly Rodriques, are quoted extensively. Written by Erin Griffith, a veteran journalist who has followed private markets for nearly two decades, the good insights outweigh a few things that beg for clarification. The public comments, by contrast, are mostly misunderstanding and misinformation. If you've ever worked for a long time at … well, anything… and then you read a news article about it, you probably know the feeling. Private markets are not "shadowy and often enigmatic." It's not that mysterious or complicated, people. It's just a fresh approach to an old business. * rant about Stripe * The article amplifies and conflates misleading claims by Stripe disparaging forward contracts as possibly worthless with others questioning secondary stock solicitations as likely scams. Stripe is twisting stock ownership legalities as if it doesn't want its employees to benefit from shares it's been awarding them for the last 14 years, not unless and until Stripe says they can. We used to run into that at Forge, companies granting equity awards then pulling them back with hidden strings, threats, and bluster to keep control over when, where, whether, and how employees could raise cash from the stock they fully earned as compensation for their loyalty and hard work. Say an employee wants to buy a home or car, pay for medical bills or their children's education. Or leave to start their own company. Sorry, those shares management paid you in lieu of cash, they didn't really mean it. The pinnacle was Airbnb's hired gun CFO calling us "bottom feeders" for facilitating employee stock sales without his permission. As if Airbnb wasn't doing the exact same thing, in their case illegally, monetizing tenants and their apartments. Happily awareness has grown. The Airbnb guy was soon out, and the general understanding came to acknowledge that once an employee earns their stock fair and square it's theirs. Market participants see this as a matter of fairness, but more to the point as a benefit to everyone involved including the company that issued the stock. So most companies encourage a secondary market. Rather than tensions rising, the long term trend is a growing acceptance of stock sales initiated by employees and early investors. Forge, for its part, has found it more effective to work with the companies and honor their wishes rather than butting heads with them as we sometimes did in the early days. I guess Stripe didn't get that memo. Or the people who post comments to New York Times articles.

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To create and sustain high performance, #privateequity sponsors must prioritize building a distinctive #CEO that drives #transformation, #growth, #value and #culture https://ow.ly/rsnx50QqEc5

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I’m a strong believer in the idea that leading is largely about building empathy. The job isn’t just helping others understand the mission - it’s helping them complete the mission and building alignment through personal context. To take it a step further, you can’t be empathetic if you aren’t curious. Curiosity drives us to ask deeper questions - those questions build empathy and, then, we become more aligned.

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A Trade You Don't Make Inspired by the NBA Finals and from a WSJ story... There is an interesting lesson for companies to have a long-term view with some of your key people (while also having a discerning eye for talent). Summary: - There was a lot of pressure a few years ago to trade away Boston Celtics players Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown - critics called them overrated due to playoff failures - Turns out, the decision *not* to trade them has proven pivotal - they are central to the Boston Celtics' success in the NBA Finals - The retention of Tatum & Brown underscores the value of stability and growth within a team, countering pressures and criticisms with patience and long-term commitment to process and progress - Their performance in the Finals highlights the advantages of maintaining core players and evolve them, overcoming past past failures and solidifying their roles as integral components of a championship-contending team --- Source: WSJ - https://lnkd.in/eMUk4WQE --- #business #ceo #cro #pe #privateequity #talent #teams

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An Entrepreneurial Board of Directors A Value Maximization Model For Public Companies #corporategovernance #governance #boardsofdirectors #shareholdervalue #performance #capitalism #institutionalinvestors

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The lack of exits from both private equity and venture capital funds over the last few years continues to have a significant impact on the behavior of large investors. Per the attached article from Institutional Investor, single family offices have moved more capital into fixed income and liquid equites (ie. the stock market). With yields on fixed income securities now higher, the move into that asset class is easy to understand. I would expect a larger allocation to fixed income to endure, as interest rates are likely to remain at or near their current level for the foreseeable future. However, I suspect that the move into liquid stocks is driven more by the need for near-term liquidity, rather than any structural change in asset allocation philosophy. The truth is that family offices need both access to growth companies AND liquidity. If exits in the private markets begin to uptick again, I would expect family offices to once again deploy capital to PE and VC. Private equity and venture capital continue to be the most effective method to access the return profile of growth-stage companies. That is not going to change. However, the liquidity side of the equation needs to return to normalcy. #privateequity #venturecapital #innovation #entrepreneurship #founders #startups #investing Endeavor Colorado Zeb King Tegan Stanbach Kathryn Dickson https://lnkd.in/g4rqxzhQ

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The Resurgence and Reality of SPACs: What Investors Need to Know Special Purpose Acquisition Companies (SPACs) have faced ups and downs in recent years, but there’s a renewed interest brewing. This article dives into why SPACs are attracting both companies and investors again, their potential advantages, and the pitfalls to watch out for. I have placed a link to the article below https://lnkd.in/gvHhGrwG

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Boards of Directors – How Relevant To The Business Is The Board? In 2014, activist investor Starboard Value successfully replaced all 12 directors on the board of Darden Restaurants. The following shows the Darden incumbent board at the time of Starboard's proxy fight, Starboard’s value creation plan initiatives, the Starboard director nominees and the before and after performance (revenue, EBITDA, EBITDA margin and stock price). Note especially the direct relevance of each Starboard nominee to the industry or some aspect of the value creation plan. How often do you see this level of relevance on public company boards?

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💰 Women-Led VC Funds: Navigating 2024 Fundraising Landscape 💰 According to Venture Capital Journal, despite a strong start, women-led VC funds are feeling the impact of the industry-wide fundraising slowdown. As of November 30, 2024, women-led VC funds have raised $2.54 billion, which represents a 25% decrease from 2023's total of $3.43 billion. In comparison, global venture fundraising is down 13% YoY. While the numbers reflect challenges, there's still potential for growth: • Several funds typically file updates in December • These late submissions could help narrow the gap Let's continue supporting diversity in VC and monitor these trends as we approach year-end. #VentureCapital #WomenInVC #FundingTrends2024 La Creme de la STEM ™ - female founders support system Noshin Ahmed Lori Rodriguez Emilie Vallauri Craig Zapatka

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Can't wait to reconnect with the brilliant Amanda Herson and join the discussion with Maciek Gnutek and Iain Martin at Slush about our fund models and what they mean for Founders ❄ 🚀

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Thanks, Axial, for your findings. I'd rank the Management Team high in the business description. As investors, we are buying their core competencies, track record, market position, and strategic fit. #privateequity #buyout #independentsponsor #growthequity #food #beverage #CPG #healthwellness

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