Amplio Ventures

Amplio Ventures

Firm Headquarters: Atlanta, GA

Date Founded: 2019

Investments to Date: Under 10

amplioventures.com

This Page was Updated October 2020

Investment Approach

Amplio Ventures leverages the power of early stage Venture Capital to accelerate the stability of refugees through funding technology powered solutions.

Refugees are both undervalued and overlooked by venture capital investors. By investing with a refugee lens and leveraging this undervaluation, Amplio Ventures, backs enterprises that are founded by refugees, leverage the refugee workforce and/or have use cases within the global refugee community as a market segment.

This takes the practical form of investing in 3 investment verticals:

  • Refugee Entrepreneurs 

  • Companies leveraging a refugee workforce

  • Companies whose product or service has a strong application within the refugee community

Focused Geographic Regions of Investment: 

  • Is all of your activity in the US?

    Georgia, Texas, NC, Michigan, Virginia, New York, Mass, California.

  • What countries outside of the US are you active in?

    Middle East, North and East Africa, Southeast Asia, Central and South America.

Focused Industries of Investment:

  • Banking and Finance

  • Data, Software and Technology

  • Manufacturing

Previous or Active Portfolio Companies:

    1. Joust Labs (acquired by Zenbusiness)

    2. Blusion Laundry

    3. Needslist

Investment Example:

Companies within the REVF portfolio will experience an initial engagement with our team to both determine their alignment on “dignity of work” impact for the refugee workforce and their growth potential as a company. As we enter due diligence we listen closely to needs and challenges and ways we can serve these companies with our Christ centered portfolio support program including mental health counseling, mentorship. 

Companies within the portfolio are in their pre-seed and seed stages. Investments raised are expected to create an 18-month run-way for the company.   During this time the company is expected to continue the development of their products and refinement of their market fit. Our team will sit on the board and will be facilitating introductions to potential future funders. Our team will also engage in intentional supporting services.

Capital Raise Strategy

  • Total Assets Under Management: $7.5M

  • Total Number of Investors: 10

  • Average Investment: $500K

  • Minimum Amount: $250K

  • % of Capital from Top 3 Investors: 25%-50%

  • Financial Reporting Frequency to Investors: Quarterly

  • Setup to accept charitable capital through the National Christian Foundation or other listing platforms? Yes.

Leadership Team

  • Cumulative Leadership Experience in Accredited Investing: 10-20 years

Apporv Karmaker| Managing Director

Before joining Amplio Ventures, Apoorv Karmakar was a Senior Director at Village Capital, an early-stage venture capital firm in Washington, DC. At Village Capital, Apoorv was instrumental in helping the firm find, train, and invest in startups at the forefront of impact innovation in financial health, sustainability, and the future of work across the globe. As a leader of the firm’s investment and operational strategy, Apoorv helped Village Capital develop sector and geographic specific investment theses by identifying existing critical issues in each sector, evaluating existing solutions, and assessing the investment and exit momentum within each individual market. Apoorv’s cross-disciplinary skillsets were critical in helping Village Capital identify and invest in the most passionate and innovative entrepreneurs that typically sit in venture capital investor blind spots.

Thomas Sperry | Chief Investment advisor

As CIA, Tom will advise in the investment process and be a leading voice in the final decision-making process. Tom is a successful entrepreneur-turned-investor who co-founded and is currently the Managing Partner at Rogue Venture Partners, a top-performing fund in the United States, where he has launched three separate funds. His track record speaks for itself, with returning 3x realized returns to investors through 2 funds, from 13 exits. He has been involved in launching multiple accelerators focused on refugee entrepreneurship including in the Gaza Strip.

Chris Chancey | founder and Partner

Chris and his wife Sarah are entrepreneurs based in Atlanta, Georgia. In 2014, they launched Amplio Recruiting to serve as a staffing agency helping refugees resettled in the Atlanta metro area find meaningful employment. They have founded several businesses and have extensive start-up experience, fundraising, vision casting and scaling. Chris began dreaming of moving from just a focus on job placement to also implementing job creation strategies in 2016 along with Chase Carroll and soon after, Amplio Ventures was born. Chris engages potential LPs and casts vision for the impact of refugee lens investing. ​

Chase carroll | Founder and operating director

Chase Carroll, CPA, and his family live in Kigali, Rwanda. With a background in public accounting and management consulting, he specializes in building efficient business models, advising businesses in both developed and frontier markets via data-driven recommendations. His detailed models and intense market research guide executives to maximize their growth potential. Chase is an angel investor who is developing a portfolio of high growth impact start-ups in North America and East Africa.

Dalton t. Sirmans | Founder and partner

Dalton T. Sirmans is a co-founder of MainStreet Technologies, Inc. (MST), developer of loan portfolio risk management software for banks and credit unions, and real estate document management software for government agencies. As president and CEO, he oversaw the firm’s evolution from a startup in 1999 to serving hundreds of financial institutions in all 50 U.S. states and in Asia, and 80 state government agencies across the Southeastern U.S. As Dalton grew the company’s customer base he also kept it on firm financial footing, enhancing the firm’s value and resulting in a bid from and sale to a financial services industry consolidator in 2018.

Spiritual Integration and Impact:

Faith Driven Investing can span a wide range from high yield to concessionary returns that have a higher level of spiritual integration. Having clear expectations of this philosophy is key for the movement. Each investment is unique and you might want to select multiples but if you had to choose one quadrant that best fits your groups spiritual integration and financial performance targets … What would it be?

The main reason why we decided to launch a venture capital firm is because we felt the top right quadrant was obtainable. We believe by building the right team and approaching due diligence in a dogmatic fashion we can see above market financial returns on investments.

Describe the Spiritual Integration Activities of the Fund:

We believe we can see high spiritual return in the following activities alluded to briefly in this context:

  1. Investing in solutions that increase “dignity of work” for refugees around the globe.

  2. We provide a Christ centered portfolio support program including mental health counseling, mentorship.

  3. We partner with organizations working on the ground who are Spiritually aligned in the services they provide to refugees.

  4. Through strong secular partnerships such as the UN, we have access to UPGs from closed countries and have been given full authority to engage with and support them. 

  5. We have a global venture analyst program active among UPGs.

Is Impact and Spiritual Integration Tracked?

  • Not yet, laying the foundation now for deploying capital and tracking these metrics

Are you partnered with any other organizations?

  • Yes, our partners on the ground providing services for refugees are Spiritually aligned.

A lot of Investing Conversations look at Social Impact related to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Is there one of these that most resonates with your organization?

  • 13 of the 17 SDGs fit within our thesis. #8 and #9 are most relevant as we focus on decent work and industry innovations

WHY The FAITH DRIVEN INVESTOR?

  • Why are you compelled to be certified and a part of the Faith Driven Investor Group?

    The wisdom, experience, accountability and financial resources from the FDI community is incredibly valuable to us. Additionally, we desire to provide opportunities for FDIs to steward their resources for kingdom impact within the refugee and immigrant community. 

  • Does the leadership align with the Unifying Principles on Faith Driven Investor and agree to the Code of Conduct? Absolutely.

  • Who nominated you to be listed on the FDI site? Kenny Ewell

AFFILIATIONS- Are you a part of any third party groups, affiliations that you would like to list here?

  • Lion’s Den, Toniic Impact Network, Tent Partnership for Refugees, B Corp Certified

Learn More

  • Key Contact Name: Chris Chancey & Chase Caroll

  • Email: chris@amplioventures.com / chase@amplioventures.com