Supporters Fund

Founder and CEO Jeffery Potvin leads investment decisions, supported by General Manager Laura Lirette and a committee of advisors that includes Asif Nasim and Silicon Valley co-founder Jeff Wallace. The firm's website lists these individuals as part of the core management and committee structure, suggesting a collaborative but founder-anchored decision process.

The firm operates a proprietary tri-layered sourcing model. Its sister company, Open People Network, cultivates a startup community that surfaces founders; Hardboot supplies fractional IT talent that builds relationships with technical teams; and Potvin's 'Impact Investing' podcast generates inbound from green-tech operators. This community-witnessed origination is central to the firm's stated identity.

No. The firm describes itself as a community-backed venture capital fund rather than a conventional blind-pool vehicle. Its investor base includes angels, business owners, corporate partners, and government entities. The firm publishes much of its portfolio openly, operating with a transparency posture closer to an angel network than to a closed-end institutional fund.

Supporters Fund targets early-stage startups, spanning pre-seed through growth-stage equity. Its portfolio includes companies at various maturity levels, from very early hardware ventures such as RYSE to more established consumer brands like Flow Water, indicating a flexible stage mandate within the private-company lifecycle.

The firm does not publish a formal exclusion list, but its public messaging and portfolio point away from extractive industries, fossil-fuel energy, and non-sustainable consumer goods. The entire portfolio is oriented around emissions reduction, waste elimination, circular economy, and regenerative natural systems, suggesting an affirmative climate-tech mandate rather than a negatively screened one.

All three are part of a single family of companies founded by Jeffery Potvin. Hardboot (est. 2007) provides IT resourcing and fractional technology talent; Open People Network operates a startup community platform; and Supporters Fund (est. 2016) is the venture capital arm. The three entities share leadership, ecosystem contacts, and a common mission to support technology-driven sustainability.

No. Supporters Fund has not publicly disclosed an AUM figure, nor have trade publications reported one. The firm does not announce fund closes or deployment totals, keeping its financial scale private. Any external estimate would be speculative.