Dear Investors and Friends:
It’s a little early to start referring to us as Professors Poag and Cohen, but we did recently teach the first of a series of courses about venture capital and entrepreneurship to Princeton grad students and spoke to the Princeton Entrepreneurship Club (one of the largest clubs on campus). Partly because of how tight the academic market is now and partly because the entrepreneurial ecosystem at Princeton has grown so much in the past few years, many Princeton grad students are opting to start or join startups rather than pursue teaching positions. This is a boon for Fitz Gate since these grad students are among the brightest people in the world, have in many cases created unique intellectual property that cannot be duplicated (and that is protected by patents thanks to the Princeton Office of Tech Licensing), and Fitz Gate has early and unfettered access to these entrepreneurial graduate students (and their professors). Although the Fund is not focused exclusively on technology transfer, we have invested in two companies spun out of universities (Quantum Circuits and Optimal Dynamics) and likely will invest in a third tech transfer company soon.
In March, we invested in Newsguard Technologies (see description below) about which we are very excited, and we kept up a very busy travel schedule with multiple trips to NY, Princeton, Los Angeles and Silicon Valley to speak with potential investments and perform due diligence on a few startups with which we are further along. Also, in Los Angeles, Mark attended the Board and Advisory Board meeting of portfolio company Pledgeling (photos below) which is getting great traction and has very active support from its advisory board.
If you are keeping count, with Newsguard, Fitz Gate now has 9 portfolio companies, and we are in final diligence on 2 more potential investments. We intend to invest in several more startups from this fund, and we will start raising Fitz Gate Ventures II sometime this summer. More details to come soon!
Finally, Fitz Gate is once again sponsoring the Princeton Entrepreneurship Network’s annual alumni startup competition which will be held during reunions at Princeton on Friday June 1. If you would like to attend the competition (and say hello to Mark and Jim, who is judging), please register here: Attendee Registration. If you have a startup and would like to apply to compete, please register here: PEN Startup Competition Application.
As always, please feel free to contact us directly if you have any questions or have come across an interesting company with a Princetonian on board.
Jim Cohen and Mark Poag
