We incubate new ideas in our AI Venture Studio that solve portfolio company problems. When they work, we spin out the solution into a new startup you can invest in.
When we solve a problem for a business with our EIR services, we often discover other businesses have the same problem. To capitalize on a successful customer-problem-solution, we productize the technology we developed for one company and turn it into a software, AI or SaaS startup. Market validation is achieved by making the portcos our first customers and then expanding into other customers outside the portfolio.
This creates a dual benefit for clients: we improve EBITDA in the portcos while creating an equity investment opportunity for the sponsor.
Full stack solution — Discovery, Focus, Build, Implement, Generate returns.
Every AI company the studio creates was born inside your portfolio, solving a problem your own companies proved they'd pay for.
Our approach is superior to hiring an AI consultant. Instead of paying consulting fees as an expense, our clients invest in our startup as a capital investment to solve the portco's problem while simultaneously creating an equity investment opportunity in the new startup.
| Hiring an AI consultant | Our AI Venture Studio | |
|---|---|---|
| What you pay | Consulting fees | A capital investment in the startup |
| How it's booked | An expense | An equity investment |
| What the portco gets | A recommendation | A solved problem and bigger EBITDA |
| The return | About 2× on consulting fees | The potential for a 10× to 20× return on invested capital more leverage for the same funds |
This approach creates a dual impact for the sponsor that is typically higher than hiring consultants.
This is one of the key differences between hiring entrepreneurs like us and consultants. Consultants work for fees. Entrepreneurs create equity value by building profitable businesses that scale.
The choice is yours. You can pay $1 million in consulting fees. Or you can invest $1 million in a valuable AI startup that solves a real problem for one of your portcos, improves portfolio equity value and creates an incremental equity return in a successful AI technology startup.
Every problem we solve inside one of your portcos teaches us something. The studio takes that insight, a solution already proven inside your own portfolio, and puts it into a new startup. Your portcos keep the EBITDA gains. Your firm gets the chance to own equity in the company we create. That's the dual benefit.
| The firm provides | The firm receives |
|---|---|
| Introductions to portfolio CEOs | EBITDA improvement in the portcos that engage measured per build |
| Access to the real problems inside your portcos | A new AI startup built on that insight with your portcos as its first customers |
| A capital investment in the startup, on terms agreed up front | Equity in a company built to grow beyond your portfolio with the potential for a 10× to 20× return on invested capital |
| First right to invest in each startup the studio creates | Proprietary deal flow in companies whose product-market fit was proven inside your own portfolio before you invested |
| An AI entrepreneur-in-residence for the portfolio without hiring one |
I've built new lines of business inside five Fortune 500 companies, including a B2B business at Amazon taken from a blank PRFAQ through funding approval. My first venture studio built five profitable companies in a row on about $5K of invested capital, a 1,460× cash-over-cash return. I've founded eight companies, seven profitable, three exits. And since February I've shipped eight production software products with AI, alone.
A studio partner who has done the discovery, the build, and the spinout personally, repeatedly, is what makes the model work at this size.
A consultant bills fees, which you book as an expense, and leaves a recommendation. We build the solution in production inside your portco. When other businesses have the same problem, we turn it into a startup your firm can invest in. Consultants work for fees. Entrepreneurs create dual equity value.
Equity in a new software, AI or SaaS startup built on a solution that's already working inside one of your portcos.
Consulting fees return about 2× at best. A startup built on a proven customer-problem-solution has the potential for a 10× to 20× return on invested capital. To mitigate market acceptance risk, we sell the solution to a portfolio company to validate the AI product works and delivers a strong ROI. If the portco doesn't buy it, then we go back to the drawing board until we get traction.
It's the same related-party structure corporate venture builders have used for years, and it's disclosed up front. The real test is simple: companies outside your portfolio have to want the product too. If they don't, it doesn't become a startup.
Then that company owns it outright and keeps the EBITDA improvement. Not every build becomes a startup, and that's still a good outcome.
Decided per build, in writing, before the build starts. Company-specific solutions: the portco, outright. Portfolio-common solutions on the spinout track: the studio, with a permanent license to every portco that helped prove it.
One introduction per CEO and a quarterly readout. We work with the portcos to refine the solution, implement it and realize the EBITDA improvement.
Twenty minutes to walk through one or two portfolio challenges and how I can help.