A founder has spent decades earning customer trust. A product solves a real problem, but reaches too few people. A technology is peripheral to its corporate owner, yet could be central to a different business. These are useful places to look for opportunity.
The starting point is something that already matters to someone. Customers, repeat demand, specialist knowledge and a reputation earned over time give an idea substance. They also tell you what must survive any change.
Name the constraint.
‘Growth potential’ is easy to claim. A useful thesis is more specific. Is the business held back by positioning, an inconsistent sales process, founder dependence or a missing distribution partner? Would a better management team change its prospects? Is the product excellent but the business model wrong?
Imagine a specialist manufacturer with loyal customers and slow quotation turnaround. Better product data and a simpler quoting process might help win orders, free up technical staff and make growth easier to manage. That is a hypothesis worth testing. It also identifies what to measure before spending more.
Protect the reason customers care.
The less visible strengths often deserve the most care: employee knowledge, dependable service, craftsmanship and a founder’s instinct for quality. A new owner can destroy these surprisingly quickly while trying to improve the business.
Technology should make a good company easier to run. Management disciplines should make decisions clearer. Commercial improvements should help the right customers understand its value. Each change needs to strengthen the business customers already trust.
A good investment thesis should explain what to change, and what to leave alone.
Make the improvement achievable.
A credible opportunity needs someone capable of carrying the work. Who will lead the business? What can the team absorb? What will the improvement cost in money and management attention? A promising asset without a plausible operating plan is still an unfinished proposition.
This is why I am interested in established, profitable businesses entering a new chapter, as well as underdeveloped brands and technologies. Existing value can provide a strong starting point. The real work is to understand it well enough to add the next capability without losing the first.
That is the thinking behind Alemany Ventures: find what is valuable, identify what is missing and build from there.