Boyd Street Ventures: Under the Radar. Above the Crowd.
Bringing OU innovation to the world is the goal of Boyd Street Ventures, a one-of-a-kind venture capital firm based in Norman whose mission is to provide funding and guidance for promising startups within the OU ecosystem.
The firm has created the first fund that allows alumni to support OU by investing in affiliated early-stage businesses created within OU or founded by OU alums.
The story of the Boyd Street Ventures starts with founder and managing partner, James Spann, who graduated from OU in 1982. He spent the next six years serving in the Marines, attaining the rank of Captain before joining the corporate world.
During his 30 years working at the C-Suite level in fields related to healthcare, Spann also served the university through several committees and alumni activities. During his visits to campus, he saw how many startups were being developed within the OU ecosystem. Spann was also aware of several supportive organizations on campus including the Office of Innovation and Corporate Partnerships, the Ronnie K. Irani Center for the Creation of Economic Wealth and the Tom Love Innovation Hub. In visiting with the leaders of these groups, however, he realized there was a problem: Too many startups had great ideas and supporting research, but were unable to raise the funding necessary to launch their innovations.
Spann and I-CCEW Executive Director Jeff Moore decided the solution was to start a private venture capital firm that would exist primarily to support startups within the OU ecosystem – and to benefit numerous OU constituencies like students, faculty and staff in the process. Spann serves as the Founder and Managing Partner, while Moore is the Co-Founder and Strategic Advisor while continuing to run I-CCEW.
BSV partners with startups in growing industries that also happen to be also areas in which OU excels from the research side: aerospace and defense, weather technology, energy technology, life sciences/biotech and fintech. BSV brings a combination of resources including a board of strategic advisors that provides guidance in any area needed from improving efficiency, outsourcing manufacturing or putting together a salesforce to finding the best way to position a brand in the marketplace. BSV works in concert with the three campus organizations mentioned above to help startups eliminate risk, shorten their time to market and ultimately see profit success.
For investors, including non-OU alums, BSV partners identifies under-the-radar startups from the OU ecosystem that don’t get the attention of similarly promising startups from East and West Coast universities and hence are less likely to be overbid and overpriced. Additionally, since BSV and the other three campus organizations can help decrease risk, the odds increase that these companies are successful and earn good returns.
According to Spann, “We particularly look for alumni who have an interest in investing with us to grow OU-community startups, as well as alumni with early-stage companies that might be seeking investment and strategic or operational help.”
