Rick Bolander | Crain's Detroit Business

Silicon ... Michigan? Founders of VC fund whose hearts are here hope to build bridge to the Valley By Tom Henderson


Michigan eLab founders (standing, from left) Rick Bolander, Doug Neal and Bob Stefanski gather with staff in incubator space that the venture capital firm uses in Ann Arbor.        

The business model for one of the state’s new venture capital firms can be summed up as simply as this: Silicon Valley meets Michigan. That refers to Michigan, the state, and the University of Michigan, the university with $1.3 billion in research spending a year and spinoff companies looking for...Read the rest of this entry...

Rick Bolander Discusses Gabriel Venture Partners’ Investment Focus

An experienced finance professional and venture capitalist, Rick Bolander currently works as a Managing Partner of Gabriel Venture Partners (GVP) in Redwood City, California. Founded in 1999 by Bolander and Phil Samper, GVP presently manages some $260 million in assets. The firm focuses its investment activity on early-stage startups, primarily those with passionate founders who offer new business models and next-generation technologies. Throughout all of its business activities, GVP makes use of a capital efficiency model, which focuses on small and early deals with a high potential for rapid growth and exits in the short term. In general, GVP seeks out those companies which will require less than $15 million in venture funding to reach an exit point or achieve cash flow positive status. Rather than seeking out long-term opportunities for billion-dollar valuations and very large initial public offerings (IPOs), GVP’s model allows for resiliency and diversification. To learn more about Gabriel Venture Partners, visit www.gabrielvp.com.