John Morisano agreed to meet with aspiring entrepreneur Mike Mason last October as a favor to Mason’s sister.
Ten minutes, tops, Morisano promised.
Well before that deadline, the co-founder of venture capital firm SLAAM knew he’d found his first investment. Mason’s idea for a new e-commerce tool geared toward helping small businesses with sales logistics and inventory management was as “brilliant” as the sister claimed.
“He demoed it as soon as I sat down,” Morisano said. “At the time, I’d seen 40 pitches in a span of a few weeks, and there were some we were interested in. But Mike’s was the only one where right away we could see how it would grow, scale, everything.”
SLAAM will officially announce its investment in Mason’s SV I start-up today. Mason relocated his one-man company from Kalamazoo, Mich., to Savannah earlier this month, setting up shop in a small office at ThincSavannah on Barnard Street.
Mason plans to launch a beta version of the product this summer and begin selling it in the third quarter.
“I think we knew right away that this was a good fit,” Mason said of his partnership with SLAAM. “When I demoed my prototype, they immediately saw the potential. The next thing I knew, we were talking funding. It was certainly not the typical way these things go.”
SLAAM is an atypical venture capital firm anyway. Morisano, a New Yorker, founded it last year after he and his wife bought a second home in Savannah’s historic district. He took on a partner in long-time friend Amy Factor, a retired venture capitalist who invested in pharmaceutical and telecommunication companies in the 1990s and the 2000s.
Morisano and Factor recognized Savannah possessed an innovative entrepreneurial community that had little access to seed capital. SLAAM’s focus is on start-ups, with investments between $10,000 and $100,000 in exchange for equity ranging from 5 to 25 percent.
SLAAM hosted a meet-and-greet last October that drew more than 100 local entrepreneurs.
SLAAM is “close” to finalizing deals with other start-ups, Morisano said. Unlike Mason’s SV I, those companies are “Savannah-centric,” he said.
Mason’s sister lives locally, and Mason was in town visiting her when he had his fateful meeting with Morisano.
“We are trying to do Savannah deals, but more importantly we are trying to grow a community in Savannah that will start to feed on itself,” Morisano said. “Bringing in a smart person who is going to be a part of that community is valuable.”
The head of the Savannah Economic Development Authority, Trip Tollison, called SV I’s relocation to Savannah “a very important step in continuing to coalesce Savannah’s creative and tech communities.
“SV I is going to need support and infrastructure, and I know Savannah has the talent to meet those needs,” Tollison added. “This is great news for Savannah.”