When it comes to investing in and fostering new entrepreneurs, Connetic Ventures takes a different approach to traditional investing. Rather than emphasizing a founder’s experience and personal network, Connetic takes a deep look at a founder’s potential. The company foregoes heavy reliance on connections and gut feelings in favor of an unbiased data-driven approach.
Connetic uses data science to identify traits that make a founder likely to succeed. Its AI, known as Wendal, uses deep industrial psychology to evaluate the potential of investments. To aid in this effort, the company has gathered data on 20,000 founders and their startup outcomes, making it the largest repository of founder behavioral data in the world.
By using this data-driven approach, the unconscious, and sometimes conscious, bias built into the traditional approach is avoided. Connetic’s Wendal uses an algorithm trained to eliminate bias. Doors are opened for anyone with internet access and a strong idea.
Wendal’s data comes from analysis of mostly early-stage startups in a wide variety of industries and geographies. Founders who have been selected through the application process, are 25 times more likely to receive investment once connected with a human.
How it works
Founders are invited to apply on the company’s website. The initial application takes about 20 minutes, and they will hear back within three business days. During that time, Wendal crunches the numbers comparing the information against thousands of data points gathered from successful ventures.
If a founder makes the first cut, they move to the “final diligence” stage to meet with a member of the investment team. Even at this stage, decisions come quickly. The company said it tries to get back to founders with a decision in 10 days or less.
After six years, the approach has yielded remarkable results, especially for entrepreneurs who have been under represented. With investments in 250 entrepreneurs, 33 % are minority founders, 31% are women and 8% identify as part of the LGBTQI+ community, according to statistics on the Connetic Ventures website.
Narratize: Telling the story
Connetic Ventures was one of the early funders of Narratize, an AI-powered platform that enables science, technology and engineering companies to bring their ideas to market faster and with greater impact. Started in 2021 by technical communications professional and entrepreneur Katie Taylor, the company focuses on facilitating communication between those with important research and innovations and those charged with the development and marketing of those innovations.
“So much science and so much tech sits on the shelf simply because it’s not well told — the scientist isn’t always the best storyteller. The researcher with all of this amazing knowledge, all this amazing expertise, they’re not often taught how to best communicate and convey that,” she said.
Taylor had worked on product development teams and saw first-hand the challenges of deciding which new discoveries to invest in, develop and bring to market. She said despite great ideas that could benefit many people, less than 10% of those ideas ever make it into development. This fact both fascinated and worried her, she said, so she decided to interview senior vice presidents in charge of research and development about why that is.
“They said it’s really hard for the scientist, for the engineer, to write really clear and impactful technical requirements that are needed to solve a real consumer pain point…It’s really hard for our intelligence teams to identify the right target opportunities for us to go after, and it’s really hard to cipher through all the massive amounts of data that go into making those decisions,” she explained.
Scientists and technicians may be excited about and know the value of their discoveries for the public, but may need help telling the story in a way that will resonate with investors and, ultimately, consumers. Marketers need to understand the innovations and the impact these could have on the public. They need to be able to ensure claims related to the innovation are accurate. The Narratize platform bridges that gap in communication and understanding.
The very first version of the platform was primarily a pitch generator, Taylor said. It would ask questions about an innovation or discovery and use the answers to create a 1,000-word pitch. One of the first clients was the United Nations, which offered the platform as a tool available to participants in a worldwide challenge project. The organization challenged 500 teams to find the best ideas to solve food insecurity issues. Four out of five teams who won the challenge did so with the help of Taylor’s platform. This set her on a journey to develop and deepen the platform’s capabilities.
Doors opened
Taylor had a product that addressed a clearly identified problem — and it had been proven useful on an international level — yet, when she decided in 2023 to seek investment to expand her company, she faced some unexpected obstacles. As a woman founder of a scientific and technology industry startup, she discovered funding was a challenge.
“One fun fact about Narratize is we are part of the 0.3% of AI companies founded by women that are venture backed…It made fundraising with venture capitalists extremely difficult for us. We were not the stereotype that any investor expected to see from the other end of that call,” Taylor said.
“We watched male founders doing similar work with similar tech stacks get funded in three months, where it took us 18 months. They were asked questions about opportunity while we were getting asked questions about risk.”
When she made her way to Connetic, however, things were different, she said.
“Wendal is an AI that just vets founders based on scorecards related to their competence. We scored crazy high on Wendal, and so we got their attention. We genuinely feel that the result of that enabled us to be on a more even playing field…And so I’m forever grateful that Connetic believed in us from the beginning, and that they had a more fair and equitable process for evaluating founders. I’m a big fan of it,” Taylor added.
By eliminating a well-worn industry bias, Connetic’s Wendal opened the door to a company that itself opens the doors to innovations and ideas that can impact the health, well being and productivity of people around the world.
To learn more, see the Narratize website.
Fireroad: Investing for good
Fireroad was created by and for entrepreneurs, described as “a partner on the road less traveled.” Led by a group of people who themselves have traveled the founder’s path, the team draws on their experience to help launch, invest in and grow companies.
Partner and CEO Tim Metzner said he wanted draw upon his experiences to provide the guidance and support he knows founders need.
“I thought, hey, I know this journey because I’ve been a venture-backed startup founder…We need more great investors in our region who understand that zero-to-one phase and what it’s like to be a founder, and who are willing to provide that early risk capital…who would roll up their sleeves and actually get involved from a mentoring, coaching, guidance, consulting perspective, not just a capital perspective. So that’s what led me down the journey of launching Fireroad Ventures.”
Fireroad consists of three areas of expertise, each supporting their mission in a different way. Fireroad Ventures invests in early-stage tech companies. Fireroad HoldCo looks to acquire and partner with existing small businesses whose primary asset is their skilled workforce, including those in the trades industries. The last piece is Trailblazers, designed to provide AI experience and financial expertise to small and mid-sized businesses.
Connetic has invested in and partnered with Fireroad. Even though both companies provide venture investment, they are collaborators rather than competitors.
Metzner explained, “More than a decade ago, I was starting a nonprofit accelerator in town called Ocean… Brad [Zapp] was starting Connetic at the same time…and so we had this really cool partnership where they were early backers, helping to be the actual capital investing in the startups that we were taking through the journey.”
Building community
The two companies continue to collaborate on projects and on building the community of support for founders.
“I think there’s a lot of good synergy there in terms of us providing deal flow for them, and them sharing deals with us,” Metzner said. “We can help start ups in ways Connetic can’t, and vice versa.”
Metzner sees Connetic and other venture investment firms as potential deal partners. Fireroad has co-invested with other companies, further strengthening the region’s entrepreneurial community.
Metzner said Fireroad’s mission is to cultivate entrepreneurship and help build companies that in turn contribute to the health and well being of the community.
“We believe entrepreneurs can be a force for good in our communities,” he said. “One of the things we focus heavily on is investing in founders and their well being, not just their businesses…We believe if a founder can stay healthy, mentally, physically, spiritually, relationally, emotionally, they have a better chance at having a successful outcome.”
He defines a successful outcome as providing meaningful work that allows people to “come alive” in their jobs. That feeling of pride and joy in one’s work carries over into personal lives and communities, he said.
For more, see the Fireroad website.
See the Connetic Ventures website to learn more and to apply through Wendal.
