January 06, 2022

The Four Types of Investment

11 minutes

On this episode, Sabine VdL reviews the four types of investment and who is winning the corporate venturing game as well as looking to the future to evaluate and imagine what is coming our way.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

The four types of investment strategies: ‘Driving’ (strategic and tightly linked to operational capabilities), ‘Enabling’ (strategic and loosely liked to operational capabilities), ‘Emerging’ (tightly linked to metrics of financial importance), and ‘Passive’ (loosest connected to corporate capabilities and strategies).

Winners at corporate venturing during the ‘Startup Phase’ have been identified as having 3 core elements: A clear and defined vision that drives a clear charter and operating model; A strong and experienced team that combines both internal operational knowledge and external understanding of the Venture Capitalist’s drivers; Established expectations and milestones to measure and ensure performance.

Winners in corporate venturing during the ‘Expansion Phase’ are seen to have a slightly different set of core components: Agility in refining strategic investments or the portfolio focus; Tailored approaches to recruiting and retaining the Corporate Venturing team over time; Institutionalization of the Corporate Venturing operating platform.

Winners during the “Resiliency Phase” have found ways to industrialize and democratize their learnings. They have been identified as having the following common characteristics: The Corporate Venturing program plays a strategic role and continually influences parent growth; there are purpose-built, well-established, end-to-end investment platforms; and they have intelligent community management and communications capabilities.

BEST MOMENTS

'Consider Driving and Enabling investment paths at the earliest stage of formation, moving to Emergent investment. This means that Passive investment in the latter stages of the CVC model is probably the best option to drive long-term financial returns.’

‘CSAA Insurance Group, for instance, provides insurance products across a range of personal areas to AAA members as they built their own Corporate Venturing arm.’

‘Having an agile platform is crucial.’

‘Innovations are creating seismic scale changes to our business landscape across multiple big industries. These evolutions and changes are made possible through corporate venturing.’

ABOUT THE HOST

Sabine VanderLinden is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur and the CEO of Alchemy Crew Ventures. She leads venture-client labs that help Fortune 500 companies adopt and scale cutting-edge technologies from global tech ventures. A builder of accelerators, investor, and co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, Sabine is known for asking the uncomfortable questions—about AI governance, risk, and trust. On Scouting for Growth, she decodes how real growth happens—where capital, collaboration, and courage meet.

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