Impact’21 | Eric Ball of Impact Ventures

Transcript of Eric Ball of Impact Ventures interview by Alan Olsen, Host of the American Dreams Show at Impact’21:

Alan Olsen: I’m here today with Eric Ball of Impact Venture Capital. Eric, welcome.

Eric Ball: Thanks, Alan, great to be here. And great to have you here as well.

Alan Olsen: So Eric, we’re in this phenomenal conference center up in Sacramento, the convention center at this. At the I guess we we took a year or two off with COVID. But tell us how Impact is doing today?

Eric Ball: Well, thanks. Yes, this is our annual event that hasn’t happened in two years. But it’s, it’s really, it’s really a great event, we have a chance to highlight the progress of several of the companies that we told people about two years ago, and introduce people to several other companies that are more recent investments for Impact Venture. We also talked a little bit this morning about our portfolio pre-COVID, and post-COVID. In particular, the fact that some of our companies struggled under COVID, some did better under COVID, with were remote work, lifestyle, and our portfolio valuation barely moved at all. So the rank ordering of our companies changed a little bit. But But overall, you know, we’re still at about on our fund one 3x valuation to cost ratio. And we now have eight companies, our initial companies and fund two, two of which we just added in the last week. And we’re, we’re really excited about the momentum that we have both in the maturing fund one, and in the relatively newer fund, two,

Alan Olsen: You know, a lot of people want to get involved with venture, but they often wait too long. And then when they see the return of the ventures, it’s, it’s too late. So right now, the second fund is open for new investors, you’re up to eight companies.

Eric Ball: We’re up to eight companies, we had nearly close of $16 million, that let us fund the initial eight companies. And we are accepting investors through at least the end of this quarter, and those new investors will get the same access to the same portfolio with the same progress that our existing investors have. So yes, there, there is still a chance for people to join us, we’re gonna do a larger fund close this this quarter. And, and we think that this is an amazing environment for venture. You know, if you look over the long run, early stage venture has higher returns than any other asset class, we think that a lot of people are struggling to figure out where to put, allocate their capital. Now, equity markets are arguably, if not overheated, highly heated, and volatile. Fixed Income has zero return. Real Estate has already gone up a lot. And we have a lot of data that suggests that the best time historically to invest in venture has always been about a year after a crisis. And that was true in 2001. That was true in 2008. And we believe that’s true now. And we believe that if those patterns repeat, this will be one of the best vintage years for venture your performance that people may have seen. So I say I can’t tell you what the optimum percentage of your capital to put into venture is. But it’s certainly not zero. And whenever you thought that percentage should be two years ago, I would argue it should be higher today.

Alan Olsen: So as as always, new investors should go do their own due diligence coming in, but how would they go ahead and contact you. For more information about Impact Venture two fund?

Eric Ball:  Well, you can contact us, we have our emails on our website, impactvc.com. We’re happy to talk to people who may want to participate as investors. Also we’re thrilled to get referrals to entrepreneurs that we should look at. We’re currently vetting over 2000 entrepreneurs a year, over the last year or two, we we fund perhaps 10 of those 2000. So, you know, only only a few survive our due diligence process. But we’re thrilled to talk to people, whether they want to be investors in the fund, whether they want to bring us potential deals to invest in or whether they would like us to share with them some of the deals that they can invest in as co-investors as well.

Alan Olsen: Eric, thanks for being with us today.

Eric Ball: Thank you, Alan. Great to be here.

Alan Olsen: Thanks.

To receive our free newsletter, contact us here.

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel for more interviews and updates.

This transcript was generated by software and may not accurately reflect exactly what was said.

Alan Olsen, is the Host of the American Dreams Show and the Managing Partner of GROCO.com.  GROCO is a premier family office and tax advisory firm located in the San Francisco Bay area serving clients all over the world.

Alan L. Olsen, CPA, Wikipedia Bio

GROCO.com is a proud sponsor of The American Dreams Show.

The American Dreams show was the brainchild of Alan Olsen, CPA, MBA. It was originally created to fill a specific need; often inexperienced entrepreneurs lacked basic information about raising capital and how to successfully start a business.

Alan sincerely wanted to respond to the many requests from aspiring entrepreneurs asking for the information and introductions they needed. But he had to find a way to help in which his venture capital clients and friends would not mind.

The American Dreams show became the solution, first as a radio show and now with YouTube videos as well. Always respectful of interview guest’s time, he’s able to give access to individuals information and inspiration previously inaccessible to the first-time entrepreneurs who need it most.

They can listen to venture capitalists and successful business people explain first-hand, how they got to where they are, how to start a company, how to overcome challenges, how they see the future evolving, opportunities, work-life balance and so much more.

MyPaths.com (Also sponsored by GROCO) provides free access to content and world-class entrepreneurs, influencers and thought leaders’ personal success stories. To help you find your path in life to true, sustainable success & happiness.  I’s mission statement:

In an increasingly complex and difficult world, we hope to help you find your personal path in life and build a strong foundation by learning how others found success and happiness. True and sustainable success and happiness are different for each one of us but possible, often despite significant challenges.

Our mission at MyPaths.com is to provide resources and firsthand accounts of how others found their paths in life, so you can do the same.