A new venture capital firm has entered the Colorado tech scene to help startups that are at the very beginning of their journey.
Antler, a global venture capital firm already in more than 20 cities, will open its Boulder office on June 27 with the beginning of a six-week residency program. The program focuses on early-stage startups so early into the entrepreneurial journey that Antler calls the program a generator instead of an incubator or accelerator. At the end of the program, Antler will decide which of the 50 companies will receive a $150,000 investment and further mentorship.
Colorado startups raised $6.8 billion in venture funding last year — more than double the amount raised the previous year. VC funding in the Centennial State last year included 103 angel deals totaling $114 million, 85 pre-venture deals worth $27 million and 119 seed rounds tallying $252 million, according to an annual report by Access Ventures.
Although the local tech scene has boasted big funding rounds, Ryan Sommerville, an associate partner at Antler, said it is often difficult for early-stage tech founders to get enough momentum going to reach the venture capital world.
“I think for Colorado, specifically, we fill a really meaningful niche at the beginning of the entrepreneurial journey. There’s a decent amount of downstream funds, a decent amount of seed funds and a lot of Series A and beyond funds,” he said. “What we’re trying to accomplish is provide an on-ramp to get to that point, which many founders lack. And Colorado, to me, is a really ripe ecosystem to be able to insert ourselves into that point in the journey.”
Antler hired Sommerville in 2019 to launch its first U.S. office in New York City. He moved to Austin last year to open its second U.S. office, which launched its first six-week residency in March.
Eventually, Sommerville said he expects Antler to establish offices in the top 10 tech cities in the U.S., with the exception of San Francisco.
Antler has rented about 50 desks at the WeWork office at 2755 Canyon Blvd in Boulder. Sommerville said he has already filled half of the 50 seats in Antler’s initial Boulder cohort.
Sommerville said he is taking a bit of a regional approach with the Colorado office, accepting applicants from across the Mountain West region. He said he is looking for founders who have an impressive background and a problem they want to solve.
During his first seven weeks in Boulder, Sommerville said all of the founders, advisors and other venture capital partners he has talked to have been very supportive and have facilitated meetings with other local stakeholders.
“I think folks in Colorado, as well as myself, definitely have the mentality that a rising tide lifts all boats, and that what’s good for early-stage founders in Colorado is good for everyone who’s a participant,” he said.
During the six-week residency, Antler works with founders to validate their problem statement, build the initial technology and start building a team. At the end of the program, Antler decides which companies are worth investing in. Those companies will receive $150,000 post-money SAFE for 7 percent of their company.
“That’s kind of where the party starts,” Sommerville said. “That’s when we go heads-down with our portfolio support and infrastructure.”
Antler has the resources to help create go-to-market strategies, a tech roadmap and financial projections. Antler can also provide founders with talent, such as a CTO or a VP of engineering. As companies gain traction, Sommerville said he also helps them secure seed funding from downstream investors.
“One core pain point for founders at very early stages is accessing capital in an organized and streamlined way,” Sommerville said. “Our goal is to allow founders to outsource a lot of that workload to us, so that they’re not constantly having VC coffee chats and trying to get the word out. We can do a lot of that heavy lifting on our side as they approach the seed stage, so we can take them out to market with the best KPIs and the best story, introducing them to the best funds at the right time that can invest into our companies on the best terms.”
Once a company has raised a meaningful seed round, Sommerville said he takes a step back and is more passive. Antler does, however, have a large continuity fund that supports companies from a seed round through a Series C round.
Antler has invested in over 420 companies globally across 30 different industries. About 33 percent of these companies have at least one female co-founder.
One of the companies that has blossomed out of Antler’s New York City generator program is Marco Financial, which provides capital to small and medium-sized exporters in Latin America. Since meeting through Antler’s program, the company’s co-founders have hired more than 40 people at their Miami headquarters, raised $7 million in seed funding and $100 million in debt financing and developed a platform that essentially underwrites the risk incurred by U.S. buyers. This provides capital faster and on better terms to Latin American exporters.
