Idealab was perhaps the first (or at least one of the first) venture studios. They define themselves as an incubator (the term ‘venture studio’ didn’t exist when Idealab started in 1996.) They’ve created over 150 companies with 45+ IPOs and acquisitions. Till then, There are 720+ venture studios in the world. That’s many venture studios. And they come in all shapes and sizes. So, Venture studios, sometimes known as “startup studios,” are becoming increasingly widespread; many organizations, businesses, corporations, etc., claim to be venture studios. They need to realize how difficult it is to succeed in following the trend.

So, You might be asking, Is it just a Hype? Is it just a Fad?

A venture studio, in my opinion, is a company that creates and invests in new businesses.

• Building startups without providing funding puts you closer to a dev shop.
• To be an investor means investing in startups you do not build yourself.

Though they’re not venture studios, there’s nothing wrong with either. A hybrid of the two is a venture studio.

As the Founder of Bangladesh’s first Venture Studio, we had to ask ourselves many questions and navigate through many unknown variables. But the most fundamental questions were:

• Why do we want to launch a Venture Studio?
• What will be our thesis, structure & business model?
• How are we going to do it?

Here’s the summary of the questions we answered for Turtle Venture Studio:

Why?

“I believe Every decision in life, both personal and professional, should start with Why. So, the answer to why we started Turtle Venture Studio was simple: “The VC model is broken.” VC managers are more incentivized to raise large amounts of capital for large management fees, write large cheques to deploy funds quickly, and push portfolios for high growth to get premature exits. For that, they often adopt a “Spray-and-Pray” strategy without considering the sustainability & long-term goals of the fund and the portfolios. We think, for early-stage startups, the VC model doesn’t work because, at this stage, they need more network, support & expertise rather than a large cheque.

On the other hand, Accelerators or Incubators offer office spaces, networking mentorship, and other important tools but, without capital, are just “Training Centers” or “Free Office Spaces”, nothing else.

So, we opted for the hybrid model of “Venture Studio,” which combines the financial resources of a venture capital firm, the expertise and tools of accelerators and incubators, and the drive of startup founders.”

What?

“Turtle Venture Studio’s investment thesis is “Investing in solutions solving fundamental problems with a sustainable business model.” The keywords here are “Fundamental Problems” and “Sustainable Business Model.” Let’s break them down. What are the fundamental problems? Fundamental problems are associated with humankind’s fundamental needs, such as food, health, education, employment, etc. That’s why our focus sectors are Agriculture, Finance, Education, Health, E-commerce, and distribution.

But how should we solve them? With a Sustainable business model, not crazy growth. We believe founders should keep their focus on both growth & their bottom line to create impactful solutions. Our studio structure is based on the “Duel Entity Model” where “OpCo” is responsible for the strategy, operation & fund management of the studio, and the “HoldCo” is responsible for raising & injecting the funds. Our HoldCo is structured as a Permanent Capital Vehicle (PCV) with “No Carried Interest & Zero Capital Management Fee” to achieve long-term & sustainable investment goals & more transparency with the Limited partners.”

How?

“We offer an 8-month program with $125,000 in funding for each portfolio. How do we source the ideas? Both Internally & Externally. For external ideas, we target the Pre-revenue & pre-MVP stage startups. But we mostly focus on the founders with grit and positive attitudes towards mentorships & advice and playing as team players. For internal ideas, we validate the idea, product, customer & market with our studio team and then hire an “entrepreneur in Residence (EIR)” with equity with a vesting period & monthly salary.

After the selection process, the founders undergo a 6-month venture-building process where the studio team works as their virtual cofounders. This team includes business strategy, product development, marketing experts, and more. This is a resource-sharing model where all the portfolios share the team on a need basis. In this Venture-building process, we do:

• 20 weeks of intense incubation
• Supporting founders in product roadmap & MVP development
• Ensuring startups achieve product-market fit and minimum market traction.
• Assistance with investment readiness & participation in the demo day in Singapore

Here’s the program timeline of Turtle Venture Studio:

We keep the pro-rata rights to invest further into the best-performing portfolios in pre-series-A through our Continuity fund.”

It’s been an exciting journey, and we’re incredibly proud of our achievements. We’ve helped launch 7 successful startups, achieving the following:

• Portfolio companies have collectively raised US$750K+ to date.
• The cumulative value of Turtle Venture Studio’s portfolio is well over US$26M
• Over the last year, portfolio valuation has gone up by 6x.
• Startups grew their monthly revenue by 40% over the last 6 months.

We’re currently working on exciting projects and raising our second fund to invest in those projects, but this is just the beginning. We’re committed to continuing to support innovative entrepreneurs and help them turn their ideas into successful businesses.