TRAC Challenges Traditional Venture Funding with Innovative ‘Moneyball’ Approach to Business Investment
Venture firm accelerates the development of funding selection technology using government R&D tax credits and partnership with Boast
About TRAC®
Creating a successful venture capital (VC) firm is not easy. There’s a sea of available capital and there are more venture firms than ever. But the VC industry’s collective track record is not great. Many firms still have a high failure rate when investing in companies, and many of the investment decisions are still made based on relationships and emotion.
TRAC started in 2020 to change that approach. Inspired by the fundamentals of data and the possibilities offered by a more quantitative-driven view to venture funding, the company set out to be different from inception. “We don’t pick winners, we focus instead on using data to help eliminate opportunities that won’t show a likelihood of success,” said Joseph Aaron, founder, and managing partner at TRAC. “Similar to how the Oakland A’s baseball team and Billy Beane used data to find overlooked potential in baseball players—the famous Moneyball story—we are using data to find performers with strong fundamentals that have a higher likelihood of success. The data tells a powerful story that strips traditional elements away from the typical venture funding process.”
Using their proprietary technology, TRAC can eliminate 97 percent of startups that normally may be attractive for other VCs. This helps them focus on just those companies that fit their model. Their technology uses key performance indicators like website unique visitor growth, current investor pedigree and success, business funding‘rounds of progression’ or follow-on rounds of funding, and other indicators.
“We desire to eliminate the luck that prevails in VC funding,” said Aaron. “Typically, eight to nine out of ten investments fail, but one of them makes a big splash of success and even becomes highly valued as a ‘unicorn.’ That’s a terrible?batting average. The future of VC funding will be more strategic and led much more by data. Of the few that make it past our data benchmarks, we can further classify their chances based just on their operators’ past and their?current investors. Do they have demonstrated success in that industry, have they been an operator themselves, are they an expert forecaster?
TRAC has been innovating to bring their needed decisioning data to life. They are a software company, executing like a VC firm. Their expert engineers and data scientists build models, code, technology, and processes to speed up the data flow needed for TRAC and its clients.
“We are using data to find performers with strong fundamentals that have a higher likelihood of success. The data tells a powerful story that strips traditional elements away from the typical venture funding process.”
Pisano Insights utilizes the Canadian Government’s Scientific Research and Experimental Design (SR&ED) tax credit program to help fund their innovation. “SR&ED helps?us develop our deep learning and analytics capabilities at an accelerated pace,” said Vellani. “When you are launching a company, you are 100 percent focused on innovation. SR&ED tax credits help extend the innovation runway and give us room to breathe.”
Pisano Insights partnered with SR&ED tax credit automation provider Boast to claim all their eligible R&D tax credits and get their funds as quickly as possible. Boast worked with Pisano to provide larger claims, faster, and with less risk.
“We have loved working with Boast. They made our SR&ED process easy, and they bring more than just tax credits to the relationship,” said Vellani. “They are committed to helping clients learn more about R&D, as well as making introductions and connections. Some of our biggest investors were introduced through the Boast community. Boast has opened a lot of doors for our company.”
Pisano Insights utilizes the Canadian Government’s Scientific Research and Experimental Design (SR&ED) tax credit program to help fund their innovation. “SR&ED helps?us develop our deep learning and analytics capabilities at an accelerated pace,” said Vellani. “When you are launching a company, you are 100 percent focused on innovation. SR&ED tax credits help extend the innovation runway and give us room to breathe.”
Pisano Insights partnered with SR&ED tax credit automation provider Boast to claim all their eligible R&D tax credits and get their funds as quickly as possible. Boast worked with Pisano to provide larger claims, faster, and with less risk.
“We have loved working with Boast. They made our SR&ED process easy, and they bring more than just tax credits to the relationship,” said Vellani. “They are committed to helping clients learn more about R&D, as well as making introductions and connections. Some of our biggest investors were introduced through the Boast community. Boast has opened a lot of doors for our company.”
“Time savings is the big reason we’re fans of Boast. It’s worth it to not disrupt my broader dev. team. Even if PWC or another big player were to offer us a lower rate, we’d stick with Boast.”
Jason Smith, CEO, Klue
“Boast was 100x better than any other firm we have used. They made the process seamless from end-to-end. A truly exceptional partner.”
Kumar Erramilli, CTO, Acto
TRAC Innovates Faster with R&D Tax Credits and Boast
