Early Stage Partners was formed in 2001 with the belief that Northeast Ohio, Ohio, and the Midwest could and would create and attract a significant number of early stage technology companies that would be attractive venture capital investment opportunities. This belief was partly predicated on trends in economics and technology. In the economic sphere, extensive study was enabling knowledge about entrepreneurship to be dispersed beyond its traditional centers to communities that had missed the last wave of economic growth and didn’t want to miss the next one. Northeast Ohio was one such community.
At the same time, technology was enabling people to work from wherever they wanted—and increasingly people wanted to be near friends and family, in regions with a lower cost of living and a high quality of life. Northeast Ohio is one such region.
The Early Stage Partners team also had enough experience to believe that Northeast Ohio had plenty of entrepreneurs and good ideas, as well as technologies being created at leading research institutions. Retaining those people and opportunities within the region was a challenge. A significant source of professionally-managed institutional venture capital was a missing link in a burgeoning, region-wide surge of entrepreneurship.
With that in mind, we joined together to raise Early Stage Partners I: Jamie
Ireland, a native Clevelander, experienced private equity investor, and community leader; Jim
Petras, also a native Clevelander and experienced private equity investor; and Jonathan
Murray, a consultant and executive with technology company operating experience, supported by native Clevelander and Manco veteran Charlie
MacMillan as CFO, and native Clevelander Connie
Weber as Office Manager.
We began raising capital in 2001 in the depths of a venture capital industry depression. In spite of being a first-time fund investing in technology in the Midwest in the midst of that depression, we raised $44 million.
Since that time, Northeast Ohio has embarked on a broad transformation, which includes increased technology transfer and company formation from regional research institutions, the formation of accelerators BioEnterprise and JumpStart, the attraction of overseas entrepreneurs and companies, and increasing attention from venture capital providers outside the region. We are well-positioned to ride these trends. Read on to see what we have done with Fund I.
Contact Us:
1801 East Ninth Street, Suite 1700
Cleveland, OH 44114
(216) 781-4600
(216) 781-0158 Fax
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