I had the pleasure of meeting Mac through Twitter then over Zoom last October. Over the holidays, I sat down with Mac Conwell to chat about his journey as an emerging manager, launching RareBreed VC, his investment philosophy, and his advice for those who want to follow in his footsteps.

McKeever “Mac” Conwell II is a software engineer by trade and was a former DOD contractor with “top-secret clearance doing a lot of cool stuff I can never talk about.” Mac spoke candidly about the highs and lows of his early career that ultimately led him to VC. He was…

Keys:

1. 95% of VC funds fail. In addition to your passion and commitment, bring operational experience to juggle investing, fundraising, and running your small business.
2. In the VC model, labor is a scarce resource. If you build a larger Fund II or III, consider the toll a higher volume of deals will take on your labor force.
3. Most VC funds are under-diversified. You’re going to learn as you invest and the world will evolve as well — give yourself enough flexibility to readjust, adapt, and take advantage of the opportunities that come your way.
4. When you’re in Fund I, you’re…

A Guide For Emerging Managers

Keys:

1. Tap into your 1st, 2nd, and 3rd degree network to cast a wide net when looking for potential investors to build support before your search becomes more targeted.
2. Set deadlines and create a sense of urgency to quickly build momentum and get LP commitments.
3. Communication is key when fundraising and managing your fund. Even if a lead goes cold, foster that relationship and stay in contact.

Once you’ve laid the groundwork for your first fund — building your network, identifying your secret sauce and motivation, developing your thesis, and modeling your fund — how do you move forward?

I…

Keys:

1. Investors can’t really correlate what success is with a company until it happens, but you can always help. That means going beyond the check as a consultant, an advisor, a mentor, a shoulder to cry on, or anything else a startup might need.
2. Track KPIs to share timely insights and signals with the team. This way you can connect before there’s an issue, get ahead of the problem, and have a hand in resolving it.
3. Share your passion for the product and make timely introductions to potential co-investors, customers, and employees.
4. Don’t miss out on a round. Understand cash…

Keys:

1. The KPIs to track and figures to hit when performance tracking can change based on stage and sector. It’s more important to understand how the metrics serve the specific goals of the startup and whether they indicate that the company has the growth, sales, and customers to reach the next level before the zero cash date.
2. For early stage investors, it’s important to learn how “revenue” is tracked when you don’t have any. For startups, pick three metrics to measure early & often to quantify value and product-market fit.
3. Be sure to understand their sales method. There is not…

For years, many VCs have used a mix of spreadsheets and email to manage their investments. Despite the fact that technology represents 78% of venture capital investments, VCs themselves are stuck in the dark ages. The future of investing involves greater deal flow and requires better real-time tools to help private market investors make better deal flow decisions.

Here are 5️⃣ must-have tools and features for private equity investors:

1. Source High-Quality Deal Flow

VCs need a tool to help bring high-quality deals into their deal flow funnel. Deal flow is usually not quantified and based solely on your network & friends.

This is great…

Venture capitalists see hundreds of deals every year — whether you’re an angel investor, emerging manager, or veteran managing partner. The question is, how do you manage all of this deal flow without losing track of the deal, investment economics, and post-investment milestones? Who sent it to you, and who you shared it with? Who has the deal and what are the economics?

Even further, you need to keep track of where all those companies are in your investment process. Through the diligence process, the huge mass of deals gets gradually whittled down to just a small percentage of companies…

Over the last few years, SaaS has become a very profitable investment for venture capital firms. In 2019, $136.5B was invested in SaaS companies in the US alone. More and more SaaS companies have entered the market, disrupting current practices and helping customers streamline their businesses and eliminate manual processes.

First, SaaS businesses provide predictable, recurring revenue, a draw for any VC firm. The SaaS model also allows startups to grow their customer base for the same costs, more or less. In this way, SaaS startups are incredibly capital efficient.