Venture Finance
See guidelines for early stage venture funding here.
We mainly work with a set of partners offering early-, middle and late-stage capital for infrastructure projects, but also have ties to boutique venture funds, private and institutional lenders, and family office impact investors — focused on diverse markets, sizes and development stages, but always with strong teams, technology innovations, and substantial growth opportunities.
We can also assist with structuring syndications, corporate M&A, succession planning, refinance of existing assets, tools for collaboration, education and change management. more
What’s the difference between venture or corporate capital and project finance? Project finance is a method of raising medium- to long-term debt (a loan) based on cash flow generated by the project, while venture finance uses the balance sheet of the company and/or its sponsors. Projects typically do not have technology risk; most risks are controlled or mitigated. Venture funding is more often used for new technology commercialization, also called “risk capital”. ( view full article )
How We Work
In three basic steps (“In 3” — get it?), collaborating with client companies to:
- Prepare — Identify, assess and describe venture’s current status, funding history, and funding options.
- Present investment proposal or pre-apply for venture finance per investor’s preferred format.
- Partner — assist with investor due diligence, obtain commitment letter or expression of interest, execute agreement(s).
We use a “blended” approach combining automation (qualification and matching) with bespoke advisory services, recognizing the uniqueness of your project, team and goals.
Our specialization is project and business funding, including equity and debt, across a broad spectrum of “impact” sectors.
We can bundle early-stage development costs (get past the idea/inception stage, which is mostly “sweat” equity, before raising outside capital) with subsequent project or venture capital. Initial funding must always come from the founders, as most of it is labor anyway (sometimes travel or testing is involved to test fundamental feasibility), then an “extended founder’s round” (family and friends, but not yet angel investors) is widely used for further venture development. Project finance is different, though if you have access to seed-stage funding from family, friends or others in your network with a vested interest, all of this helps create “skin in the game” — your own at-stake-ness, also known as commitment.
If your area of focus is not yet commercially proven, or at such a strong disadvantage in the marketplace that share of dollars on the for-profit side go to other, more attractive proposals, consider whether you might qualify for grant funding. This is not our expertise, but there are grant research and writing resources that can assist with preparing the grant program description and making initial inquiries. We earlier had close working relationships with several sources of Technical Assistance grants, feasibility study grants, and startup project assistance grants, but those contacts have moved on. Mainly you can look for government-assistance or seek TA grants from regional development banks or other “multilateral” finance institutions.
Further Resources:
- in3finance.com/process
- In3 Group capital sourcing services
- Advisory services to access funding