Seattle VC Profile: Elizabeth Scallon, Find Ventures

When I started Ascend in 2019, I realized even though I was o-l-d OLD, I had more in common with the folks in town who were earlier in their professional investing journeys than the venerable VC’s I’d pitched as a founder. I admire and respect the new wave of Seattle/Pacific Northwest venture capitalists, and thought it would be fun to profile some of our region’s up and coming VC talents in these pages. —KW

Elizabeth Scallon, Cofounder and Board Chair of Find Ventures, has been a catalyst for change and a friend to founders for years. From HP to Amazon to WeWork, she’s run incubators, seeded talent, and created hundreds of opportunities for startup to find their wings. Now, she’s created Find Ventures: a first-stage non-dilutive funder that envisions a world where all entrepreneurs have an equitable opportunity in building companies and a confident shot at solving our world’s greatest challenges.

What made you decide to be a professional investor?

A few things:

• I want to live in a better world tomorrow than I live in today.

• I love how imagination and wondering "what if" can lead to new business ideas, and through team building, customer discovery and product creation can turn into a thriving business (with a bunch of steps in between of course).

• I want to support entrepreneurship for everyone. I am tired of the perpetual funding bias for BIPOC, LGBTQIA, Women, Non-binary, disabled, immigrant, and other founders.

• I believe when people are business creators, they can increase economic wellbeing and quality of life not only for themselves, and family, but also for their community. And it's important to create businesses that have a sense of responsibility to their communities from the start.

What did you do before becoming an investor and how does that benefit your founders?

I have led many startup/new venture creation programs. Some of them are: CoMotion Labs at University of Washington, WeWork Labs for West Coast and Latin America, the inaugural Softbank Emerge Accelerator program, the inaugural Maritime Blue Innovation Accelerator, and now the inaugural Equity Innovation Accelerator.

I have worked at Amazon in their corporate venture arms, Alexa Fund and Smbhav Fund, as well as their innovation arm, Grand Challenge. My day job is currently the Lead of Incubation Enablement at HP.

I teach entrepreneurship at the UW Foster Business School, part of the undergraduate and MBA programs and Masters in Science of Entrepreneurship program.

How this helps founders is that I have deep networks, some insights, and lots of learning lessons to share.

What are your most successful investments so far?

For Find Ventures, we have just started to allocate funding and time will tell. Our portfolio is: Bio Fiber, Circled In, ClearBrief, Coltrain, GoldenSHERPA, Intentionalist, Lightsprite, NiftMint, Spritz, & WhyLabs.

I would love to shout out the following startups that have been part of my earlier programs/ones that I have supported in some small way (but may not have received funding directly from the program): GameJolt, Rebellyous Foods, CloudPaper, Pure Watercraft , Discovery Health , Koniku and so many more!

Why should founders want you on their cap table?

Find Ventures is a non-dilute investment. I won't be on your cap table, but you will have to sign a pledge to pay it forward if you make it big to seed the next generation of founders.

How many new pitches (actual calls/zooms) do you take per month?

It's summer, so for this month 8 (and some fall/winter months can easily go to 50+), and currently my calls revolve around if I can provide help/guidance/connections for the teams. This is not for an investment from Find Ventures, as Find Ventures is not actively seeking founders/startups right now.

How many new investments do you make per year?

We have just started this year, and our first portfolio is 10. Our goal is to raise enough capital each year to deploy to 10+ startups.

What's your sweet spot(s) in terms of check size, valuation, and vertical?

Up to $100K, early stage, and high tech. I personally love deep tech that has the convergence of multiple scientific disciplines.

What one portfolio company do you want to hype for us here?

ALL OF THEM!

Bio Fiber, Circled In, ClearBrief, Coltrain, GoldenSHERPA, Intentionalist, Lightsprite, NiftMint, Spritz, & WhyLabs. 

What do you think the next ten years looks like for Seattle/Pacific Northwest startups?

We have the best minds in the world here, I want to make sure that everyone has the opportunity to solve our biggest challenges and I think with Find Ventures and other great programs around our city, we will be leading the way to having Seattle break into the top 5 startup ecosystems in the world (currently we are number 9).

What song is currently getting the most run on your Spotify/Apple Music?

My daughter owns the music - it is anything from the Bluey soundtrack.

Favorite shoes?

Skye - they work great around town, hiking, in the rain, traveling, etc.

Favorite cooking ingredient?

Broccoli.

Anything else to say?

Two things: 1) We are always looking for donors that share our mission at Find Ventures! If inspired, donate today.

2) Thank you Kirby! Your commitment to Seattle and our founders is awe inspiring. Big love to you & your community!

Seattle VC Profile: Sara Lindquist, FUSE

When I started Ascend in 2019, I realized even though I was o-l-d OLD, I had more in common with the folks in town who were earlier in their professional investing journeys than the venerable VC’s I’d pitched as a founder. I admire and respect the new wave of Seattle/Pacific Northwest venture capitalists, and thought it would be fun to profile some of our region’s up and coming VC talents in these pages. —KW

Sara Lindquist of FUSE has already had careers as a DI college athlete and a published Nashville musician. Now, she’s one of the most compelling and energetic investors in Seattle, and we were lucky to catch up with her for this debut profile.

What made you decide to be a professional investor?

I have always been intrigued by the investment frontier and seeing “what’s next.” I was fortunate to intern at Ignition Partners (FUSE’s alma mater) in college, which was my first direct exposure to Tech and early-stage investing. I had deep respect for the team and excitement about the breadth of markets/products/verticals to learn about. The experience immediately sparked my interest. At my core, I love intellectual rigor and people, so it’s a great matchup.

My work with FUSE has granted me the opportunity to meet brilliant individuals each day who are seeking to change the way we live, work, and engage with the world. It is fun, inspiring, and the opportunity to steward capital towards these individuals is important. It is an invigorating responsibility to be trusted by our investors to find and sponsor the best people and the best ideas that will win in the long run.

What did you do before becoming an investor and how does that benefit your founders?

I worked with the Industry Analyst Relations team at Smartsheet. We focused on building / defining a market category and then establishing the company's product position within that category. As such, we were always trying to determine (1) the market scale and viability, (2) why customers needed the product, and (3) how to talk about the product in a way that people would best understand. It’s storytelling… and storytelling = influence. I try to contribute that experience to our portfolio companies as they work to hone their market position and tell their story.

Why should founders want you on their cap table?

The FUSE community. FUSE has always been intensely focused on building a community that offers founders access to thoughtful guidance, top talent, customers to help them scale…and more. This comes via the support of our entire team, and the 150+ PNW leaders, executives, and investors we are fortunate to call our LPs. Our team is a group of smart, high integrity, “roll up your sleeves” people who will work relentlessly to help portfolio companies succeed. Feel free to check out our website or reach out to any of us directly to learn more!

How many new pitches (actual calls/zooms) do you take per month?

We take about 150/month on average.  

How many new investments do you make per year?

About 10.

What's your sweet spot(s) in terms of check size, valuation, and vertical?

Our focus is Pre-seed through Series A and check sizes range between $500K-$12M. Our core area of focus is B2B software, but we also will invest in B2C and other digital businesses as well.

What one portfolio company do you want to hype for us here?

How about two? :) I’ll first give a shout out to Zuper. They are changing the game in field service management and Co-founder/ CEO Anand Subbaraj is a terrific leader, and a great product-mind. He truly lives out a customer-obsessed mentality.

Also want to mention Xemelgo. Founders Rich Rogers and Akhila Tadinada are building a team and product that is completely transforming manufacturing and factory operations. Industry 4.0 here we come! 

What do you think the next ten years looks like for Seattle/Pacific Northwest startups?

The PNW looks strong! The next generation of founders/leaders get to stand on firm “bedrock” – this business community now represents an abundance of top talent, investors, mentors, coaches, etc. that have evolved from the region’s numerous startup and corporate success stories.

What song is currently getting the most run on your Spotify/Apple Music?

Oh man, who to choose… have been listening to a lot of Moon Taxi, Chris Stapleton and Emily King lately. And then of course anything by the one and only Grace Potter.

Favorite shoes?

They certainly aren’t the best-looking shoes in the closet, but I’ve got to say my Hokas. Those babies are CLOUDS to walk/run on.

Favorite cooking ingredient?

Bomba Sauce from Trader Joes. Perfect little kick for everything – pasta, pizza sauce, you name it. It’s fire.

Ascend Founder Profile: Matt Meyers - Yesler

This is a series of real talk blog posts meant to let founders share a bit about themselves and their companies without the marketing jargon and “killing it” puffery of most tech startup profiles.

What does your company do, for who, in plain English please!

Yesler is a marketplace plus tools for sellers and buyers of bulk lumber (truck and railcar quantities).

What's a typical day like for you, from wakeup ‘til bed?

Up by 5 (lumber trades early) working from home watching the GYM (Go Yesler Marketplace, our internal slack channel to monitor marketplace activity), prepping for customer calls or creating new GTM ideas to share with the team. In office by 8 or 9, customer meetings/demos, internal meetings, zoom, whiteboarding. Late afternoon ideation with other team members as the day slows down around 3 or 4. Water taxi home. Run. Cook dinner for the family or drive a kid to soccer training. Work from the car or home on the couch cleaning up from the day's email or uncompleted tasks. Wordle and NYT Spelling B with my 12 year old around 9pm. Asleep by 10. Repeat.

What keeps you up at night?

Whenever I sense: 1) Lack of urgency/intensity 2) Lack of creativity or grit at roadblocks 3) When the team is asking what to do, instead of doing and telling me what they have done. Why? These indicate that the culture has crept toward command and control, instead of empowered, entrepreneurial, supported.

What brings you joy?

Signs of magic in little wins. Failure full of lessons. Working with smart people. Family.

What is one word you hate to hear?

Phrase: "I know you don't want to hear this..." Yes, I do. Whatever it is.

What is one word you love to hear?

Why?

What was your biggest failure in the past year?

Too slow to figure out that customers would let us do the work for them.

What was your greatest accomplishment in the past year?

Grit

Who or what inspires you most?

Creativity of any kind - art, music, invention

What's your best tool for managing stress?

Running

What's getting the most burn on your playlist right now?

I’m all in on podcasts

Favorite shoes?

Altra Running

Favorite cooking ingredient?

Tamari

Ascend Founder Profile: Dave Siegfried - LOANtuitive

This is a series of real talk blog posts meant to let founders share a bit about themselves and their companies without the marketing jargon and “killing it” puffery of most tech startup profiles.

What does your company do, for who, in plain English please!

LOANtuitive empowers commercial mortgage brokers to match loan requests to lenders better than anyone else.

What's a typical day like for you, from wakeup ‘til bed?

The typical day I strive for includes waking up by 5:30 am, two cups of coffee while sending emails / working on more creative tasks. By 7:00am I bike ride for 10 to 20 min to get the blood pumping and clear my head. By 8:00 am I’m usually in my first meeting. Later in the day I try to step away from the computer for an hour to go to the gym. I try to break from working by 6:00 pm so that I can spend time with my husband before working a few more hours. My last task for the day is preparing the coffee machine for the next morning before reading in bed.

What keeps you up at night?

It varies, though it is usually something I’m excited for or anxious about. Generally a problem I’m trying to work through.

What brings you joy?

Family, Friends, Team. I’m fortunate that my personal Venn diagram would intersect with each.

What is one word you hate to hear?

COVID

What is one word you love to hear?

Uncle

What was your biggest failure in the past year?

Finding balance between the I time spent working and time I spent with family and friends.

What was your greatest accomplishment in the past year?

Assembling our current team at LOANtuitive.

Who or what inspires you most?

The people I’ve been fortunate enough to surround myself with.

What's your best tool for managing stress?

I find consistent exercise is the best lead indicator for whether I will feel stressed or calm.

What's getting the most burn on your playlist right now?

The archived streaming set from KEXP’s Friday Night with Michele Myers

Favorite shoes?

Whichever pair is closest to the door I’m leaving from.

Favorite cooking ingredient?

I use DoorDash too often. When I don’t its a dash for garlic salt in what ever dish it is I’ve MacGyver’d from our refrigerator.

Ascend Founder Profile: Aaron Ambuske - HEST

This is a series of real talk blog posts meant to let founders share a bit about themselves and their companies without the marketing jargon and “killing it” puffery of most tech startup profiles.

What does your company do, for who, in plain English please!

HEST develops and delivers high-performance and portable sleeping solutions for camping and travel. HEST revels in the idea of enabling more people to get outdoors and enjoy all that it has to offer, especially after a good night's sleep.

What's a typical day like for you, from wakeup ‘til bed?

Wake at 6 AM, Check email and Oura sleep score, run with the dog (or bike), take youngest son to school, work at HEST warehouse until 6 PM, dinner at home, walk dog with wife, try to get through all emails and go to bed.

What keeps you up at night?

I try to have a good sleep routine, but sometimes my mind gets going with HEST product ideas and responsibilities which wake me up in the night.

What brings you joy?

Designing products to help people find joy in the outdoors.

What is one word you hate to hear?

Impossible

What is one word you love to hear?

Iterate

What was your biggest failure in the past year?

Hmmm. Seems like I fail everyday in something, but fortunately, there have not been any big ones the past year.

What was your greatest accomplishment in the past year?

Developing, commercializing and launching new products to drive over 50% of our sales YTD.

Who or what inspires you most?

Other founders. I’ve been fortunate to meet some amazing founders since creating HEST, and I’m so impressed and inspired by people building companies from scratch.

What's your best tool for managing stress?

Riding my bike

What's getting the most burn on your playlist right now?

Sleeping on the Blacktop by Colter Wall or Mountains, Alone by Carly King

Favorite shoes?

K2 Ski Boots (Designed original collection)

Favorite cooking ingredient?

Traeger Blackened Saskatchewan Rub

Ascend Founder Profile: Scott Case - Recurrent

This is a series of real talk blog posts meant to let founders share a bit about themselves and their companies without the marketing jargon and “killing it” puffery of most tech startup profiles.

What does your company do, for who, in plain English please!

Recurrent helps electric vehicle owners and shoppers understand batteries when they buy and sell EVs.

What's a typical day like for you, from wakeup ‘til bed?

6:45 - 7:45 -- The breakfast/dog/school drop-off scramble

8:00 - 4:00 -- A potpourri of Zoom meetings from home and trying not to sit at the computer for too long at once. Sometimes I try to see other humans outside of my family and the Zoom screen for dog walks or lunch or runs. I'm getting better at making time to eat in the middle of the day.

4:00 - 8:00 -- My favorite thing about work-remote is having the flexibility to be home and present for the afternoon to hang out with my 11-year old. The tyranny of the 9-5 work day + commute meant that I didn't get to spend that time with family pre-pandemic.

8:00 - 9:30 -- Finish work if needed, doing lower-priority stuff like filling out this questionnaire :)

What keeps you up at night?

Staying up too late at my computer doing things like filling out questionnaires :)

What brings you joy?

Running, gardening and board games with friends. Social interactions outside work are so much more important now!

What is one word you hate to hear?

Mayonnaise

What is one word you love to hear?

Done

What was your biggest failure in the past year?

I got a little lost on the #2 job a startup CEO has -- making sure the rest of the team has really clear alignment on strategic direction -- while I was focused on the #1 job a startup CEO has (see next question). That meant some extra wasted time where everyone wasn't working with intent on the highest priorities for the company.

What was your greatest accomplishment in the past year?

Got our $4.5M raise done in April, in a choppy venture market. #1 job of a startup CEO = don't run out of money. Check.

Who or what inspires you most?

The students and graduates of Ada Developers Academy, overcoming so many barriers to get there and then thrive as software engineers in the tech industry.

What's your best tool for managing stress?

A great "To Do" list (I love Any.do), and plenty of cardio exercise.

What's getting the most burn on your playlist right now?

Cold Heart - PNAU Remix from Elton John and Dua Lipa.

Favorite shoes?

Brightly colored adidas sambas - my favorite pair is kelly green with bright orange stripes.

Favorite cooking ingredient?

Sourdough culture for weekly bread bakes and crackers (yum).

Ascend Portfolio Founder Dinner - March 2022

Incredible to celebrate 3 years of Ascend with some of our awesome founders. We’re blessed to work with the best!

Seattle VC Profile: Andy Liu, Unlock Ventures

When I started Ascend in 2019, I realized even though I was o-l-d OLD, I had more in common with the folks in town who were earlier in their professional investing journeys than the venerable VC’s I’d pitched as a founder. I admire and respect the new wave of Seattle/Pacific Northwest venture capitalists, and thought it would be fun to profile some of our region’s up and coming VC talents in these pages. —KW

Andy Liu of Unlock Ventures is a founder’s founder. His track record raising venture, exiting his two startups, and angel investing prolifically, combined with a poker master’s love of the game, makes Andy unique in the Seattle ecosystem.

What made you decide to be a professional investor?

I get fired up helping entrepreneurs achieve their goals and dreams.

What did you do before becoming an investor and how does that benefit your founders?

I started and exited two venture-backed companies and can empathize with the entrepreneurial journey. Learned a ton of good and hard lessons along the way.

What are your most successful investments so far?

We are still early but many of our companies are performing well including Possible Finance, Dolly, Fight Camp, and Outer to name a few.

Why should founders want you on their cap table?

We hustle hard for our founders assisting on the board, taking late night calls, introducing new anchor customers, new hires, helping with financing strategy, amongst other things. While we don't operate the company, we understand how difficult it is to build a company from the ground up and we want to be as helpful as the founder would like us to be. In addition, we host learning events, summits, and build strong networks for our entrepreneurs to thrive. They become a part of our community.

How many new pitches (actual calls/zooms) do you take per month?

I average about 25-30 per month.

How many new investments do you make per year?

We average about 8 investments per year.

What's your sweet spot(s) in terms of check size, valuation, and vertical?

We invest in pre-seed and seed stage. Our average check size is between $750K-$1.5M for the initial check and target ownership in the range of 10-25% although there isn't a hard and fast rule. We are pretty broad in verticals - it is all tech and we won't do biotech or medtech. We like companies that have a strong, sustainable competitive advantage around data.

What one portfolio company do you want to hype for us here?

Keep an eye out on Concreit. Great team and product, gaining real traction.

What do you think the next ten years looks like for Seattle/Pacific Northwest startups?

Not much to say here except that we're VERY bullish.

What song is currently getting the most run on your Spotify/Apple Music?

Waka Waka

Favorite shoes?

NB Running Shoes

Favorite cooking ingredient?

Sesame Oil

Anything else to say?

Go get a great bowl of ramen!

Growing Ascend - Welcome Jen!

Running a venture capital fund requires a lot more than just meeting entrepreneurs and making investments. As one of my favorite LPs is quick to remind me, "any a**hole can write a check."

The real work happens behind the scenes. Thousands of pitches need to be screened. CRM needs to be updated. Portfolio companies need support; from recruiting to service provider sourcing, from investor discovery to sales lead sourcing. Networks and relationships need to be nurtured. LPs need to be engaged. Advisors need to be connected in to founders. The fund itself as a set of entities needs to be administered, budgets and expenses managed, compliance and security minded. Its service providers need oversight. The website needs to stay fresh. Blog posts need creating. Community engagement and events require planning. Meetings need to be coordinated.

If you've ever worked with me, you know very few of the items on the list above are in my "sweet spot." But as they're integral to the success of our funds and founders, they need proper attention and investment. Just like a solo startup founder who has discovered product/market fit, I need to start building a world class team to support our growth at Ascend.

That's why I am so stoked to share that we've made Jen Haller our first hire at Ascend. Yes, it's truly "we" now!

Jen is an absolute dynamo. Her title will be Chief of Staff but in reality she'll do a bit of everything. She's been a classic utility infielder at a few of Seattle's most successful startups of the 2010s (Urbanspoon, Axon); she was part of the Paul Allen/Vulcan family via Stratolaunch; and most recently she helped Ascend portfolio standout Attunely scale through their Series A.

Jen is an awesome human. Aside from her selfless and well documented courage as the first recipient of Moderna's trial COVID vaccine, she's a foster parent for special needs dogs and has a long history of civic involvement from volunteering for social justice causes to political organizing. She is also a supermom to two teens, and in her spare time, enjoys trying to relax.

If you haven't met her yet, I cannot wait for you to meet Jen. She's just the person we need to help Ascend begin its next phase of growth!

Seattle VC Profile: Ben Nahir, Elevate VC

When I started Ascend in 2019, I realized even though I was o-l-d OLD, I had more in common with the folks in town who were earlier in their professional investing journeys than the venerable VC’s I’d pitched as a founder. I admire and respect the new wave of Seattle/Pacific Northwest venture capitalists, and thought it would be fun to profile some of our region’s up and coming VC talents in these pages. —KW

What made you decide to be a professional investor?

Right place, right time. I left my career in academic research in 2014 to begin an MBA at Portland State University. I started working with TiE Oregon, an angel group in Portland, OR, in 2016 as I was wrapping up my degree. I knew about the startup and angel community abstractly but didn't have a good sense of what it was really like. 5.5 years later, I found I absolutely love working with entrepreneurs and helping them navigate the challenges of starting companies.

What did you do before becoming an investor and how does that benefit your founders?

I spent 12 years as a research neurophysiologist. While that by itself may not be helpful, my education and training as a scientist taught me how to identify problems quickly, ask targeted, probing questions, and come up with potential solutions and ways to test them. More than having the right answer, I have found helping entrepreneurs come up with solutions through asking the right questions is incredibly valuable. I'm sure my in-depth knowledge of the rat brain will come in handy one day, though.

What are your most successful investments so far?

Despite being a relatively young fund, having been founded in 2016, we have realized 4 exits to date. One of our first investments, RFPIO, exited within 2 years. Brandlive provided us another (partial) exit this year and we are very excited to see this company continue to grow. The majority of our portfolio is still active and we have several companies positioning for new fundraising or potential exits this year. TrovaTrip, our last investment from Fund 1, just closed a Seed round led by PSL. We participated in that round out of Fund 2 and are very impressed with their growth trajectory.

Why should founders want you on their cap table?

Our General Partners are all seasoned entrepreneurs (including 2 IPOs) and have weathered the ups and downs of the last 20+ years. We believe very strongly in mentor capital and engage with our portfolio companies in whatever way makes the most sense to help them succeed.

How many new pitches (actual calls/zooms) do you take per month?

Too many? Just pitches for new companies is ~25-30 per month.

How many new investments do you make per year?

We hit the ground running with Fund 2. Since October 2020, we've made 10 new investments and 7 follow-ons from Fund 1. We are targeting 5-6/year but are not terribly strict on that if we see good opportunities. Though at this point, we are only going to make a few more investments to round out the portfolio.

What's your sweet spot(s) in terms of check size, valuation, and vertical?

Check size: $250k - $1M, depending on a lot of factors

Valuation: $5-15M, though we are participating in some much larger rounds too. We are still feeling this out as we mature from a pre-seed to a seed stage fund.

Vertical: technology (software) generally and healthcare in particular. We are pretty industry agnostic and are more interested in compelling problems and business models. Given the breadth of our team and partners, we believe we can add value across industries by helping entrepreneurs with the fundamentals of managing and growing their companies.

What one portfolio company do you want to hype for us here?

Fund 2: Time Study. Kishau Rogers is an amazing founder and created a simple, elegant solution for time management within hospitals. She is a no-nonsense leader who gets things done but is incredibly supportive and empathetic with her team.

Gap Fund: biomotum. Ray and Zach are developing a lower extremity, soft-robotic exoskeleton to help kids with Cerebral Palsy learn to walk.

What do you think the next ten years looks like for Seattle/Pacific Northwest startups?

We closed more than 17 investments entirely virtually in the last year and a half. I expect this trend will open up access to capital across the country. But, with investors gaining visibility into so many more markets, the competition for those investment dollars will increase even more. We may see increased maturity and development as a requirement for earlier seed and pre-seed rounds.

What song is currently getting the most run on your Spotify/Apple Music?

I've been listening to Anihmed's Deep House playlists on YouTube. Good beat that helps me focus, especially on diligence work. My 3-year-old son is really into mariachi music right now. So that provides a great contrast.

Favorite shoes?

I just replaced my Lems after about 5 years - with another pair of Lems. For formal occasions, I love my Primal Professionals. I'm all about minimalist shoes.

Favorite cooking ingredient?

Bacon. Garlic. Onion. But really, bacon.