Betting on himself took Newark, NJ, native Vaughn Crowe from initially wanting to be more involved in finance as a career to being a managing partner of a VC firm.
During his time working at philanthropist Ray Chambers’ family office, Wesray Social Investments, Crowe was a founding limited partner in Newark Venture Partners (NVP) — founded by Audible’s Don Katz — on behalf of the family office. At AFROTECH™ Executive Newark, Crowe recalled investing in NVP as he had a desire to be an entrepreneur.
“When the opportunity presented itself to go and run a fund and run a firm that I had backed as an investor, it was a natural transition for me doing what I was doing inside of a single-family office to becoming a fiduciary of a number of different investors and having responsibility for catalyzing next-generation software businesses and backing extraordinary founders,” Crowe shared in an interview with AFROTECH™.
NVP focuses on health tech, industrial, and fintech with plans to build “a leading tech ecosystem in Newark,” according to a press release. Among its portfolio are companies such as Joseph Kitonga’s Vitable Health, Sam Caucci’s 1Huddle, and Wole Coaxum’s MoCaFi. During the interview with AFROTECH™, Crowe explains how the founders in NVP’s portfolio are all aligned.
“The overlapping mission that our founders have is that their goal is to build game-changing companies that will change the world — software that will eat the world. We embody that as a firm, that as we continue to invest in companies we want to make sure that there is a shared commonality. Not just with us, but as we think about our portfolio, are we placing enough bets on founders who have a vision to build really big businesses? That’s the core of what we are about, and that’s what we want to do as investors.”
According to Crowe, NVP has amassed over $200 million in assets under management. In addition, NVP is raising its third fund including investors that have been riding with the firm from the start.
During AFROTECH™ Executive Newark, Crowe detailed that NVP took a unique approach through leveraging Newark and New Jersey’s resources. Additionally, he credits the business community in Newark and supportive anchoring institutions that helped build the firm from the ground up. Now, he says he is confident in NVP continuing to expand its reach, especially being that Newark has a close proximity to New York City, NY — one of the leading innovation hubs.
“We think that the proximity to one of the most vibrant ecosystems will only benefit Newark for us to continue to have local impact with a global footprint,” Crowe said.
He added, “We don’t want to be completely landlocked and have our opportunities geofenced. So what have we done to be a frictionless partner in the community? We’ve included the Boys and Girls Clubs of Newark as one of our carried interest partners in NVP’s Fund II. We’ve included an organization called Braven as a member of our GP in Fund III. That’s another example of a global mindset investing in the best founders in North America, but still maintaining our commitment to do well and do good in our home city of Newark, NJ.”
