Criteria
We publish what we look for.
Build, Buy and Back each have their own filters, and one geography filter applies to all three. We publish them because it saves everyone time, and because a company willing to write down what it will not do is easier to check.
Build: with you
Companies where a well-built system moves the P&L.
| Dimension | In scope | Out of scope |
|---|---|---|
| Size | Real revenue and real operating problems. Big enough that changing a system matters. | Ideas with no product and no revenue yet. |
| Situation | Profitable, or clearly on the way there. One specific problem in how the work gets done. | A failing business, a rescue, or work driven by a lawsuit. |
| Owner | A senior person willing to sit in the room and change how the work is done, not just the software. | Handed to a project team. Bought to satisfy a target set elsewhere. |
| Economics | A number worth the trouble on both sides. Willingness to write it down at the start. | “We’ll work out what it was worth once it’s live.” |
| Data | Records we can actually build on, or willingness to clean them up first. | Numbers the finance team would not put its name to. |
| Working style | Comfortable having us in the daily detail for months, not weeks. | Work that ends with a report and a departure. |
| Geography | United States operations, or a business in Kenya. | Anywhere we cannot reach on a predictable schedule. |
Buy: own and operate
The shape of a business we would still be running in ten years.
| Dimension | In scope | Out of scope |
|---|---|---|
| Size | Small and mid-sized operating businesses. Durable, cash-generating, understandable. | Startups. Businesses not yet producing cash. |
| Economics | Revenue that repeats. Real margin. Profit that turns into cash we can trace. | Deals that pay off only on the resale price, with no plan to run the business better. |
| Ownership | Founder-owned, family-owned, or held by a few people. Someone who can decide, willing to talk to us directly. | Auctions, and sales run to a long list of bidders at once. |
| Situation | A next chapter that needs hands-on work: an owner stepping back, systems to rebuild, or growth to manage. | A business running out of cash, or one that needs rescuing. |
| Structure | The whole company, or a large minority stake with a real say in how it is run. | A small stake with no say. |
| Horizon | No interest in selling in five years. Interested in what the business is in ten. | Any deal that requires us to agree now to sell by a set date. |
| Geography | United States, or Kenya. A second market in the region only once we can name the three people we would call there before any money is committed. | Markets where the only people we know came with the deal. |
Back: founders and operators
Founders we would trust to build one of the things we build.
| Dimension | In scope | Out of scope |
|---|---|---|
| Stage | Past the idea, before the growth. A product in the market, or one that will be within twelve months. | A deck and no product. No team yet. First money in. |
| People | Operators we already know, or one step away from someone we know. People with a habit of getting things built and into use. | Introductions from strangers, with nobody in common. |
| Field | AI put to work inside a real business, or businesses whose economics AI clearly changes. Work we can be useful in during a bad quarter. | Fields where we could not give an honest opinion. |
| Check | Small, patient, our own money. Room to put in more if the results earn it. | Leading a round. Amounts only a fund would write. |
| Role | Passenger seat, on call, quiet. If we take a board seat, we do the work that comes with it. | Paid advisor or paid mentor arrangements. |
| Geography | Operators in the United States, or in Kenya. | Markets we could not be useful in from where we sit. |
Declined, consistently
Six things we say no to without exception.
- Auctions and bidding contests. When the price is set by bidding, the work we do after the deal is not what decides the outcome.
- Advice only. Recommendations where we do not have to live with the result. We are not built for that.
- Finding money for other people. We do not raise, place, or arrange money for anyone, and we do not make introductions for a fee.
- Work that needs a license we do not hold. Trading securities, acting as a broker, and giving regulated investment advice sit outside what this company does.
- Selling software for a commission. We do not buy software on behalf of companies we work with, and we take no referral fees.
- Donor money, grants, and funding on below-market terms. We do not put our money into businesses funded that way. Everything we own is held to the same commercial standard, and money offered on easier terms than the market would give changes what a business is answerable to.
A useful first note
Four short paragraphs is enough.
For brokers and bankers, and for owners writing to us directly.
- What the business does and who pays for it.
- Roughly how much revenue, and whether it is profitable.
- Who owns it and who decides.
- The one constraint, or the one number, that made you think of us.
| Reply time | Within one week, including when the answer is no |
|---|---|
| Materials to start | None. No summary document, no confidentiality agreement, no folder of files |
| Confidentiality | Assumed |
| Markets | United States today; Kenya being built next |
| Intermediary fees | None paid |
| Build engagements | Roughly one to two a year |
| Acquisitions | Zero to one a year |
| Backs | A few a year |