This week M25, a venture capital concern focused on investing in the Midwest of the United States, announced a new fund worth $31.8 million. As the firm noted in a release that The Exchange reviewed, its new fund is about three times the size of its preceding investment vehicle.
I caught up with M25 partner Mike Asem to chat about the round. Asem joined M25 in 2016 after partner Victor Gutwein spearheaded the effort with a small $1 million fund. Asem and Gutwein have led the firm since its first material, if technically second fund.
Asem said that his team had targeted a $25 million to $30 million fund three, meaning that they came in a bit higher than anticipated in fundraising terms. That’s not a surprise in today’s venture capital market, given the pace at which capital is both invested into VC funds and startups.
The investor told The Exchange that M25 has been investing out of its third fund for some time, including CASHDROP, a startup that I’ve heard good things about regarding its growth rate. (More here on the CASHDROP round that M25 put capital into.)
All that’s fine, but what makes M25 an interesting bet is that the firm only invests in Midwest-headquartered startups. Often when I chat to a fund that has a unique geographical focus, it’s merely that, a focus. As opposed to M25’s more hard-and-fast rule. Now with more capital and plans to take part in 12-15 deals per year, the group can double down on its thesis.
Per Asem, M25 has done about a third of its deals in Chicago, where it’s based, but has put capital into startups in 24 cities thus far. TechCrunch covered one of those companies, Metafy, earlier this week when it closed more than $5 million in new capital.
Why does M25 think that the Midwest is the place to deploy capital and generate outsize returns? Asem listed a number of perspectives that underpin his team’s thesis: The Midwest’s economic might, the network that his partner and him developed in the area before founding M25, and the fact that valuations can prove to be more attractive in the region at the stage that his firm invests. They are sufficiently different, he said, that his firm can generate material returns even with exits at around the $100 million mark, a lower threshold than most VCs with larger capital vehicles might find palatable.
M25 is not alone in its bets on alternative regions. The Exchange also chatted with Somak Chattopadhyay of Armory Square Ventures on Friday, a firm that is based in upstate New York and invests in B2B software companies in what we might call post-manufacturing cities. One of its investments has gone public, and the group’s latest fund is a multiple of the size of its first. Armory now has around $60 million in AUM.
All that’s to say that the venture capital boom is not merely helping firms like a16z raise another billion here, or another billion there. But the generally hot market for startups and private capital is helping even smaller firms raise more capital to take on less traditional spaces. It’s heartening.
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