Looking Back: 2023 Year in Review
News
By Joe Powers, Managing Director, Maine Venture Fund
It’s hard to believe 2023 is already coming to a close. The MVF team was fortunate to be able to continue our success in accelerating high growth companies in Maine this year. We’re taking this opportunity to debut a new MVF video that we believe conveys the special type of work that we do, and the great people we get to do it with:
https://youtu.be/2PEu71u3apo
This was a challenging year for venture-backed Maine companies, both from a macroeconomic perspective with rising interest rates and compressing valuations, and also on a local level with the loss of a friend and longtime Maine startup community member John Pavan and the horrible events of October 25th in Lewiston. We all have one precious life on this planet, and this year reminded us of both the possibility and fragility of each day.
Despite challenges, Maine companies were ever-resilient and still growth-oriented. As a result, 2023 was MVF’s most impactful yet in our 25-year history. We deployed a total of $17.1M into Maine-based companies in the calendar year of 2023, up roughly 6X over the prior year. Comparatively, we’ve invested more in the last 18 months than the previous 13 years combined. This was all enabled by US Treasury stimulus funds, which were allocated to MVF through FAME’s Grow Maine program. And for every dollar invested by Maine Venture Fund, we helped catalyze roughly $5 in additional co-investment from others both within the state and beyond, for a total of over $90M invested alongside MVF in 2023.
As a result of this significant capital deployment, we were excited to welcome fourteen new innovative, Maine-based portfolio companies - nine pre-revenue companies via the Roux Institute at Northeastern University’s Future of Healthcare Founder Residency program and five other direct investments:
Orange Bike Brewing (gluten free beer)
SoulBeing (alternative medicine as an employee benefit)
Katahdin Salmon (farm-raised salmon)
KitNA Brewing (non-alcoholic beer)
TimberHP (wood-based insulation products)
Our portfolio is currently our largest-ever, at 45 companies across all industries, 71% of which are located in economically distressed areas. Of all investment over the past 5 years, 33% has gone to companies led by female CEOs and 41% has been invested into companies that are innovating within Maine’s “heritage industries” of farming, fishing and forestry, which is aligned with several of the state’s economic development goals, including the Governor’s Economic Development Strategy.
The Maine Venture Fund team behind this activity consists of our three full-time team members (yours truly included), five contractors (Chris Pizey, Claire DeSelle, John Pavan, Harbor House Partners, Fisher Green Creative) and 11 highly accomplished volunteer Board members.
This year we were fortunate that our Board Chair, Dr. Brien Walton, enlisted for a third year at the helm while Peter DelGreco served his second year in the Vice Chair seat. Claire Deselle and Theresa Hodge both moved on from the Board after fulfilling their full term board duties and then some. We will certainly miss their insight and presence, but we’re fortunate that the two newly appointed members in their stead, Susan Ahern, VP of Innovation at Maine Health, and Julie Viola, SVP at Gorham Savings Bank, joined us.
My colleague Nina Scheepers has truly hit her stride in her second full year with MVF. She sits on 12 different boards in the MVF Observer role with a new focus on the aforementioned heritage companies that are innovating within the farming, fishing and forestry industries. Nina successfully executed MVF’s second annual Maine Startup Challenge business plan competition for all ages in October, which drew more than double the number of applicants from the year before. Nina also joined me as a Leadership Maine alumna in 2023, having graduated from the fantastic nine-month course offered by Maine Development Foundation this spring. She did all of this while also managing MVF’s marketing and intern programs, all alongside her core duties as a professional investor.
Nina and I are both lucky to have an unsung hero, Terri Wark, our Office Operations Manager, holding down the fort behind the scenes with all Fund record keeping, accounting and reporting responsibilities. Terri has kept MVF running smoothly and in compliance with our statute since the early days of the Fund nearly 25 years ago.
MVF hosted two MBA interns for the summer from Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business, Kelly Timmes and Pierce Gibson, who in turn embedded with portfolio companies Bookclubs and Tanbark, respectively, to help define go-to-market strategies and regulatory approaches, among other tasks. We’re grateful for their work in supporting the Fund and our portfolio!
In November, we held our annual End of Year Portfolio Recognition Event at the Harraseeket Inn in Freeport, where we called out several portfolio companies for their extraordinary effort and performance throughout the year. A highlight to the session was keynote speaker and WEX CEO Melissa Smith, who shared WEX’s story from its humble beginnings in 1983 to IPO in 2005 and now the global context in which the company finds itself as a multibillion dollar company still operating out of Portland.
Following Melissa’s keynote, the following companies earned awards:
Grit Award: Mousam Valley Mushrooms
Acceleration Award: KinoTek
John F Burns Integrity Award: Blue Trace. This last award is given each year to recognize John’s legacy of integrity and service in building MVF from the ground up as the founding Managing Director. Congratulations again to this year’s winners!
In closing, we’re thankful for the opportunity to work alongside so many dynamic people (both the doers and supporters) in our mission of investing in Maine businesses with the highest potential for growth and impact. I’m grateful to share this journey with my team, proud of our results and humbled by the teams we’re fortunate to support.
Happy Holidays from all of us at Maine Venture Fund!
About Maine Venture Fund
Maine Venture Fund invests in Maine businesses that have the highest potential for growth and impact. For more information, visit maineventurefund.com.
Inquiries:
Terri Wark
Maine Venture Fund
(207) 305-0006
terri@maineventurefund.com
