Our Approach
Behind every investment we make is one discipline: we will not choose between doing well and doing good. This page sets out how risk, return and impact each shape a decision at Sustainable Impact, and how the three come together into a single view of a good investment.
Risk
We do not avoid risk; we spread it across the whole venture spectrum rather than concentrate it at any single point. Our earliest positions, at seed and Series A, carry the most risk and the most upside, and are where our capital and operating work create the most value. Later-stage and fund investments are steadier: across the market, close to two thirds of early-stage financings return less than the capital invested, against under a third at later stages. By backing companies at every stage from seed to pre-IPO, and funds alongside direct deals, we balance those high-risk, high-reward early bets with more resilient later positions, so the portfolio never rests on any single company or any single moment in its life. Our single-family structure lets us calibrate our exposure stage by stage and stay invested on our own timeline.
Source and method. The chart shows the historical probability that a single venture financing returns less than the capital invested in it, that is, below one times cost, split between early-stage rounds (seed and Series A) and later-stage rounds (growth and pre-IPO). The figures are drawn from aggregate United States venture capital outcomes over roughly the past decade and are rounded: historically, close to 65% of early-stage financings have returned less than invested capital, against under 30% at later stages. The data describes the market as a whole, not any single manager or strategy, and a loss here means only that a financing returned below its cost, not that a business necessarily failed. It is shown to illustrate how loss rates fall as companies mature, and is provided for information and context only. It is not a forecast or projection, not investment advice, and does not represent the past or expected performance of Sustainable Impact, any fund or vehicle it manages, or any investment. Past outcomes are not a guide to, and are no guarantee of, future results.
Sources: Correlation Ventures; Industry Ventures, The Venture Capital Risk and Return Matrix.
Return
Impact does not mean concessionary returns. We underwrite to institutional performance and treat purpose and profit as complements, not a trade-off. By focusing on a small number of high-conviction positions rather than spreading thin, we give each the capital and the attention it needs to reach its full value.
Return is built across a company's life: value created early at seed and Series A, scale captured on the road to a pre-IPO round, and, where we take control, disciplined operating work. Across all of it we stay deliberate about the exit, whether a strategic sale, private equity or the public markets.
Target IRR1
25%
Target vehicle multiple2
10x
- Target net internal rate of return over the life of the vehicle; an objective only, not a forecast or guarantee of returns.
- Target gross multiple of invested capital (MOIC) over the life of the vehicle; an illustrative objective, not a projection.
Impact
We invest in people before we invest in markets. Our conviction is simple: a founder with the right idea, given the right means, will find a way to make it work. So before the model or the numbers, we study the person. We look for one particular kind: someone with a deep, first-hand understanding of the problems the world faces today, and the integrity to build a company worth trusting.
We are not looking for a better business for one city or one country. To earn our capital an idea has to be scalable enough to reach as many people on earth as it can, and it has to serve what matters most. Our focus starts with the foundations of a decent life. In the language of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, that means clean water, an end to hunger, good health, quality education, affordable clean energy and action on the climate, the handful of goals that, between them, decide whether a life can be lived with dignity.
Every company we back must advance at least one of them, do no significant harm to the others, and meet the safeguards set out in the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises and the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. Impact, for us, is never a label added once the deal is done. It is the reason the deal exists at all.
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