Liberty Ventures is a community “Building the ecosystem of purpose-driven leaders committed to a free and prosperous future to build their businesses and so their impact.” I recently presented Coolwater Capital’s model to their members.
Libery Ventures asked me how we align with their values. I responded:
Two of our key values are innovation and diversity.
We think that innovation is the driver of productivity and economic growth. However, no one VC can be the expert on all possible innovation opportunities, even if that VC is narrowly focused on a given domain. The real experts are the founders with deep product-market fit, whom VCs back. In order to maximize the growth of the innovation economy, we need to back as many high-caliber VC funds as possible, in the widest possible array of industries- Fintech, EdTech, HealthTech, BioTech, DefenseTech, Supply Chain, EnergyTech, etc . Coolwater Capital backs over 256 VC funds across all areas of innovation, which have raised >$3b, reflecting our commitment to exploring new and diverse investment opportunities.
We strongly believe that teams which are more diverse (by philosophy, background, age, industry, etc.) generate greater success. We have no mandate to invest in diversity. But, that said…in our cohorts to date, 25% of GPs have 1 or more female Partners, and 42% have 1 or more Partner who is an underrepresented minority or person of color. Coolwater is backing diverse managers because we’re looking for the highest-potential emerging managers, and many happen to come from underrepresented groups. We’re achieving the DEI goal that Harvard and many others are trying to achieve, but we’re doing it without any quotas or filtering based on race, gender, etc.
You can see the video of my presentation here.
