Texas Venture Fund

TARGET AUDIENCE

The target audience is Texas startup entrepreneurs from mostly outside the more common innovation hubs such as Austin & Dallas. There are incredible and very much needed founders with inventions in R&D and with new technology and business model approaches-- but most Texas cities do not have an environment conducive to startup company building such as a mentorship group, educational programming, networking events, financial support, or really much of any support at all to allow a new idea to properly take shape.

Additionally, both our startup and startup investor industry is taking a major hit. Many businesses are folding, and even investors have run out of money to support these innovative founders. While there's federal financial support, we need active community leaders in inside and outside of major cities to co-create an environment conducive to startup company building.

PROJECT DESCRIPTION + WHAT PROBLEM DOES THIS SOLVE

This initiative will fundraise and and deploy a $1M Texas Venture Fund for startups in Texas via support from the state's many Chambers of Commerce, Economic Development Corporations, City Offices, and corporate sponsorships. Startups that solve problems in ESG issues (Environment, Social, and Governance) and/or establish Texas as an emerging innovation economy, would be accepted into our $1M fund and program. Depending on how much the Chambers, EDCs, City Offices and corporate sponsorships contribute, we would allocate a certain amount of startups from their region/network to join the fund/accelerator. It might be important to add some sort of diversity/under-represented component or allocation to this to ensure adequate support to an under-estimated group in innovation.

Hyperlocal and statewide opportunity: With all the new growth of something like half a million people moving to Texas per year, our state has done really well via revenues from property and sales tax. Cities big and small have become more prosperous, so now is the time for a spark, direction, a dedicated network, and know how that startups can tap into. Startups are also a riskier bet than your average small business, but very high reward, and the type of economic development success stories we like to see in the state. This not only solves a problem with startup entrepreneurship, but also invites Chambers, EDCs, Cities, etc, to think about their role in this special type of economic development. This would encourage new jobs, and types of jobs that we should encourage to thrive here in Texas. A program like this would not only pump up the cities, but would also help their startups tap into a larger network of support across the state via our nonprofit, Texas Venture Alliance. Importantly, Chambers, EDCs, and City Offices on their own cannot provide or are well equipped to sustain such an effort.

IDEAL OUTCOMES

The ideal outcome would be that founders in Texas who work to help innovation in ESG/infrastructure get financially supported, can tap into mentorship programs, networking events, and an accelerator with great programming. We need to inject the Texas startup ecosystem with immediate support and I know efforts like this can help start to set the stage for a prosperous future + market the state as an active supporter of innovation, which will attract even more startups and success stories.

This also establishes city communities across Texas to think and act together. We currently think of ourselves in terms of just cities and there is some level of pride in that—but via one collective voice and action, we'd be a real powerhouse.

WHY TEXAS VENTURE ALLIANCE

We are very uniquely situated with our leadership team’s experience to start and complete a project of this nature. We have the passion, network, work ethic, technical prowess, influence, reach, respect, execution level, and importantly the vision to pull off a new fund & support of this nature.

CS Freeland was the first and only full time cofounder and Executive Director of a venture capital association in Austin/really the entire state with the Austin Venture Association– but still in the new Texas capacity with the Texas Venture Alliance she remains the only individual with this experience, but now with a bigger and statewide impact. Last year in Austin I supported a board of 13 leaders, and now across Texas I'm leading a founding team of 20+ leaders in 10+ cities.

Marisa Vickers serves as the Director of Global Brand Growth for Builders + Backers, an early-stage accelerator and venture firm that globally invests from Pre-Seed to Series C. The Builders + Backers Idea Accelerator program and philanthropic Pebble Fund provide a modern and equitable onramp to entrepreneurship, enabling anyone, no matter their background, experience, education or expertise, to bring their ideas to life. 

This work is important for chambers, economic councils, and other venture firms in Texas because growing young companies locally is a critical component of a successful economic development strategy and the core to success is to focus on the idea.

Prior to Builders and Backers, she has supported diverse founders and females in STEM throughout Texas and the international community by working at MassChallenge, Girls Who Code, Chick Tech, and the Greater Austin Asian Chamber of Commerce. Marisa knows the startup and venture community very well and has an impressive Rolodex which has been utilized to partner with organizations that consist of nearly half the Texas Venture Crawl.

Raymond Kaminksi is a master fundraiser and understands fundraising from the startup side inside and outside of Texas. His previous startup broke a record for Texas’ largest seed fund for a company a few years ago. He also worked at NASA and saw many government grants as well as having approved / declined many. His strengths also compliment the rest of the team by knowing legal and operational implications. His knowledge of fund dynamics & deal structure will prove imperative.

PROGRESS

Tactically speaking and to share actual progress of this idea is that CS has already started to partner with Austin & Dallas Chambers because of their exemplary work with startups and investors, but she would like to take that model and scale outreach and partnerships to 10+ cities across the state. Traveling with CS, has been a number of investors, accelerator operators, business leaders, world class engineers, and other top professionals visiting those 10+ cities all across our big state of Texas to meet with other leaders in venture capital, Chambers, EDCs, incubators, etc so that we can all get to know each other and to “build beyond city limits”. We have personally gotten to see the many startup coworking spaces, listened to startup and investor concerns, and helped spot opportunities.

Because we have done that work, we have started to validate the idea that a $1M Texas Venture Fund of this nature would not only benefit existing Chamber, EDCs, Cities Offices’ members/residents, but be a great way to work together across the state to build and co-create this ecosystem of support for startups.

Examples of Note: City of Midland already has a $500k fund to invest in small businesses. They might be an outlier as Midland is in a wealthy region + does not have a startup community there. Round Rock Chamber of Commerce has a $250k fund to invest in aerospace companies. But none of their startups are connected to a larger state network, nor do they get programming, are part of a prestigious brand, etc.

NEXT STEPS

1) Float the idea to Chamber Exec friends: Drew (Texas Chamber of Commerce Executives / Conference), Glenn (TAB/Texas Chamber), Tony (Frisco Chamber), Zhelun (Austin Chamber / Opportunity Austin, their EDC), Nathan (Brownsville Community Improvement Corporation, an EDC), Brandon (New Braunfels Chamber of Commerce)

2) Raymond work out fund dynamics/pricing model at least on lite (how much the accelerator would cost based on Builders + Backers), work into the participation a TVA membership, Raymond and/or Drew (?) cut

3) Agree / approve on a legitimately feasible timeline