Purpose Ventures

Website

https://purpose-economy.org/en/ventures

Location

Germany, remote

Founded

2017

Get in touch

ventures@purpose.ag

Investment Focus

Start-Ups

Investment Phase

Series A

Ticket Size

100 - 500k

Status

Currently investing

FOCUS ON

👉

Mission-oriented circular and/or regenerative business models serving B2B & B2C clients across various sectors

👉

Europe, with a focus on Western and Central Europe

INVESTMENT THESIS & MISSION

At Purpose Ventures, we strive for a fundamental shift in the economy by promoting changes in ownership and governance principles, with a focus on the G in ESG. We partner with companies that share our passion for this mission. Our investments are targeted towards European steward-owned companies and founders committed to transforming their startups into steward-ownership models. We look for founders who prioritize purpose over profits, and businesses where stakeholder-relationships and steward-ownership provide a competitive edge. As a leading advocate for the steward-ownership movement, Purpose Ventures supports these companies in their transformation journey, providing responsive, non-extractive capital that separates money and power.

Conventional VC is often at odds with the ambitions of purpose-driven entrepreneurs and their founding values and missions. These founders are interested in more than growth for growth’s sake. They want to build lasting, impactful businesses and preserve their mission in the future. Our goal is to enable founders to align their values and mission with their ownership and financing structures and mobilize more capital towards steward-owned companies.

We invest in people who feel passionately about steward-ownership – about what it means for their company, team, purpose, and the world. Our founders want to help build a more social, sustainable economy and understand their businesses as part of the solution. In our investments, we look for strong teams and experienced entrepreneurs. We work closely with our portfolio companies, so we look for honest, authentic relationships.

THE ROLE OF STEWARD-OWNERSHIP IN OUR INVESTMENT WORK

Purpose Ventures supports companies that are either already steward-owned, or legally committed to transform to steward-ownership within or after the next financing round. We invest on a variety of steward-ownership capable terms. We work closely with the founder teams to develop terms that support the business and meet our needs as investors. We work to find the best solution for a given company and while we have our “toolkit” of terms and structures, we are excited to explore new solutions.

We do not take voting stock in companies. All of our investments direct towards a “structured exit”. Most have a predetermined fixed return rate or multiple. We do not have a set return expectation or hurdle rate on our investments. Common financing instruments we use include revenue/royalty share, redeemable preferred non-voting equity or subordinated debt.