Amy Bevilacqua is a Managing Partner of Green Street Impact Partners. With over 30 years of experience at the intersection of the education, media and technology sectors, she has an abiding passion for advancing innovation and scaling education companies that deliver on learner-centered missions. Amy believes in impact investing in the future of education.
Amy Bevilacqua is a Managing Partner of Green Street Impact Partners. With over 30 years of experience at the intersection of the education, media and technology sectors, she has an abiding passion for advancing innovation and scaling education companies that deliver on learner-centered missions. Amy believes in impact investing in the future of education.
Welcome to Ed Tech insiders where we speak with founders, operators, investors and thought leaders in the education technology industry, and report on cutting edge news in this fast evolving field from around the globe, from AI to xr to K 12 to l&d, you'll find everything you need here on edtech insiders. And if you like the podcast, please give us a rating and a review so others can find it more easily. I'm here at ASU GSV with Amy Bevilacqua. She is the managing director of Green Street Impact Partners, which is a private equity firm that is designed to accelerate the ed tech ecosystem. Welcome.
Amy Bevilacqua:Thanks, happy to be here.
Alexander Sarlin:So tell us a little bit about what Green Street impact partners is and how you work in edtech?
Amy Bevilacqua:Sure, so Green Street impact partners, is a growth equity firm, making impact investments in the future of education in the future of
Alexander Sarlin:work. So when you're at a conference like this, what does that mean, you've probably seen hundreds and hundreds of companies,
Amy Bevilacqua:we do and we come here like everybody else, because everyone we want to talk to is in the room. And that means companies who were already engaged with and advancing those relationships, that means new relationships with potential investments. And also, frankly, our relationships with other investors are really important to us. CO investing is an important paradigm in advancing innovation in education. And that's a big part of what gets accomplished for us when we come to this conference.
Alexander Sarlin:So for those who don't know a lot about the investing space, and I'm going to include myself in that category, tell us about what co investing looks like how do multiple investors decide to go in together, there's always a lead investor, I believe, and then others come together to really give people the capital they need to succeed. What does that look like?
Amy Bevilacqua:That's exactly right. And I can give you an example that we're living right now. So we're about to close on our first investment. And we are the lead investor, you're right, that's how it usually starts. And that lead investor tends to put structure to the deal, most important pricing the deal, and so coming up with an appropriate valuation. And then that lead investor really coordinates a variety of due diligence activities and corrals, other investors either up front or in the course of the process into participating in the round. And the role of the leader investor is important. And for companies that are seeking to bring capital into their businesses, they need to make careful choices there because we reach out to our network. And our network ends up populating the round. And ultimately, the board of these companies that we invest in, that's playing out right now for us, I'm in a really vivid way and in a way that I think the company that we're about to make an investment in is super happy with. And it's all about relationships, it's all about building authentic interactions with folks as we go through, frankly, what is usually a pretty painful process on all sides of the table, diligence processes. But I think if you can emerge out of that process, with the same level of conviction about the business with the same level of trust and respect between all partners, that's the perfect launching pad for a productive, long term relationship.
Alexander Sarlin:That's really interesting. So it's really a community sort of activity. There's a lead investor, there's multiple other investors filling around, there's the company itself, and everybody's trying to feel each other out through the due diligence process and understand how that everything's in place. And then it's sort of you all lunch together to really make it work.
Amy Bevilacqua:That's right. And it works when each investor is really upfront about what they're good at what they know and what they don't know. And you have to form this mosaic of knowledge. And you have to collaborate on financial models, for example, you have to figure out together what are the right questions to probe on with management teams and with their customers. And it's the old story about a collective effort yielding a better product. And it sounds like a cliche, but it's super important because we're investing in the dollars of our limited partners, our investors, and we have to do so with tremendous care.
Alexander Sarlin:One of the things that makes Green Street impact partners unique is that you're really really focusing on the EdTech space, you have people with deep expertise. There are a few other edX specific VC firms, but tell us about what it means to really understand and tech as an investor. It's definitely not like any other tech space.
Amy Bevilacqua:Right. So a couple things that are a little bit different about Korea. and straight first, we have deep operating experience on our team. So when we came together, we asked ourselves, what would it take to make the best quality investment decisions. And there really are two answers for us. And one is having some battle scars, having scaled organizations and knowing what it takes understanding the interplay of the public or government sector, with the private sector and with the nonprofit sector, for example, and having an ability to see past whatever the panic moments of the current regulatory environment are, and have a long term perspective. So that's first, what it takes to your question about being an edtech investor. But something that we believe we bring that's distinct that deep operating experience. The other thing is you make good quality investment decisions in any industry, but in particular, in education, when you have diverse perspectives around the table, we're a firm that was formed with women and people of color at the top, and frankly, owning a majority of the firm's economics. And that is all by design. We know that that operating experience and diverse perspectives are going to propel us toward higher quality investment decisions.
Alexander Sarlin:That is really exciting that you're designed to have perspectives that do not mirror classic private equity, which tends to, I believe, be very male dominated. Tell us about what that looks like in practice. And I'd love to hear how that manifests at the conference. Well,
Amy Bevilacqua:my favorite part of this conference was a lunch that we hosted yesterday, we kicked off the first as far as we know, network of women investors in education. I've spent 30 years as an operator, I just made this transition into the investing side. And I looked around certain that this network existed, and I didn't find it. So I thought, well, we can create it. And so I partnered with Emily Foote at Osage ventures, and Amanda Nolan, who's based in Europe, and we crowdsource a list, I think it's the only list that exists of women, investors in education, all levels of the capital stack, from early stage venture investing, to growth equity, to later stage buyout, we have women who are early in their career, women who are later in their career, women who are operating inside of the US and outside of the US, we've built an inclusive community, we have a list of over 100 women, and over 70 showed up yesterday for this launch the launch of this network that will go on and we'll be having gatherings at major conferences over time and perhaps in London in the fall. But look, this is important because we talked earlier about the power of CO investing. And we're not going to move this market forward in the way that we need to, we're not going to stimulate the innovation that needs to come if we don't figure out how to marshal capital from a variety of sources, leverage what each of us knows well, and direct capital to the highest potential highest impact education companies.
Alexander Sarlin:That's very exciting vision for the future of this. And you mentioned that the most exciting thing you've seen at the conference is this amazing lunch, I would have loved to be there. But of course, that wouldn't have made any sense. But the other thing that we are asking everybody is this conference has so much focus on artificial intelligence and skills based hiring and, you know, just this sort of paradigm shift in education. I'm curious how you I'm sure you've talked to a lot of companies here and over your time as an investor and as an operator. What do you make of this? And where do you think this might be going?
Amy Bevilacqua:We approach this with great optimism, a lot of value is going to be unlocked and created. There certainly are opportunities around cost savings in content creation, for example. And those are exciting, but I think as we look forward, we can anticipate opportunities around new markets being created access to content being democratized. And look, if generative AI does nothing else, other than bringing about truly normalized and widely accessible, personalized one on one learning, that will be enough.
Alexander Sarlin:That's a really great perspective. I think, you know, people are all extrapolating out. And I definitely include myself in this of if this is happening now. What's going to be happening next and next and next. But just looking at that baseline that's already happening, the are ready kids in schools at homes, college students, k 12 students, instructors already having conversations with an intelligence that understands the entire internet and can put everything put things together in new ways and do new graphics and do new videos. Already we are in a new world already. And who knows where it'll go from there. But I hope that investors can really help corral that power to increase the equity, increase the access, increase the learning outcomes and the quality of education.
Amy Bevilacqua:I think that's our job. We are impact investors. But as I like to say, anyone who invests in education is by default, an impact investor, because you cannot scale in education unless you have a demonstrable track record of positive learner and worker outcomes. That's our job, just to make sure that that happens. That's
Alexander Sarlin:a really exciting note. to end on. I'd love to hear more about what Green Street is doing when you're public with your first investment. I want to cover it on tech insiders definitely give us a call. Thanks so much for being here. It's really great to have you Amy bevilaqua, Managing Director of Green Street impact partner.
Amy Bevilacqua:Thanks so much.
Alexander Sarlin:Thanks for listening to this episode of edtech insiders. If you like the podcast, remember to rate it and share it with others in the EdTech community. For those who want even more edtech insider subscribe to the free ed tech insiders newsletter on substack.