Mandate 05 · Raise
Capital raise
Growth, structured minority, and debt raises in the band where there is no clearing price, only a list.
The position
Capital for a company in this band does not behave like a market. Each provider has a mandate with hard edges — cheque size, sector, structure, control, geography, whether their own fund is in its investment period — and a company that fails one of them is not priced worse. It is not priced at all.
The provider's answer arrives in a form that resembles a valuation disagreement, which is how founders come to believe they have been marked down when they have been screened out.
How it runs
Structure is settled first. A business that cannot be funded as growth equity at the price the board wants is frequently fundable as a structured minority, a unitranche with a small equity strip, a divisional sale, or a partial secondary that resets the register before the primary is raised. Each has a different set of providers and the sets barely overlap.
The list is then defined against that structure and worked in order, opening with a party that has done the shape before. Volume works against a raise in this band, so nothing is sent to a party who could never have transacted.
What it holds
A short process with providers who can price the risk, and a term sheet that reflects the structure rather than whichever fund had the loosest mandate that quarter.
One company per sector at a time. We do not take two raises that would meet the same providers.