I recently wrote a brief post here about the fact the Bullpen has had several exists in less than a year. PE Hub picked up on this thread and asked to do an interview, which Duncan Davidson did a great job with.

The full article is here:

http://www.pehub.com/146524/with-impressive-returns-bullpen-capital-looks-to-raise-up-to-50-million/

An excerpt or two:

Officially launched late in 2010, Bullpen took shape after longtime friends Paul Martino, Richard Melmon, and Davidson decided there was an opening in the funding cycle for what they’ve dubbed “tweener” rounds, financings that follow seed rounds but precede bigger rounds that traditional VC firms like to do. Given their connections, they suspected they could get access to solid deals, too.

And

Bullpen seems to be in thick of things now. Davidson says the firm sees just 60 deals a quarter, but those deals come from roughly 55 “micro VC” entities that refer their already funded companies to the firm when the companies fall into one of a few buckets. For example, Bullpen likes “rational B” rounds — or a second round of financing that’s perhaps twice the size of a seed round and designed for companies that already have some product fit but that don’t want to be pressured by taking on too much in venture capital.

 

I also really liked that they managed to use a baseball on fire as the image for the article. I re-posted that here too!

Finally as a clarification: there was a question or two to my blog about the difference between Bullpen Fund Zero and Bullpen Fund I. Bullpen Fund Zero is a combined IRR record of mine, Duncan, and Rich’s angel investments from 2007 on. Bullpen Fund I is a fully formed instituational venture fund with traditional mechanics and carry.