York IE partners with JP Morgan to bring startups to life

A new partnership with banking giant JP Morgan will give York IE, a Manchester-based advisory and investment firm, more fuel to revive tech start-ups.

According to Adam Coughlin, co-founder, chief marketing officer and managing partner at York IE, the partnership is significant on several levels.

“We really want to be a one-stop shop that tech companies can go to for help, and that’s why working with JP Morgan is interesting because there will be things that we do really well. But it’s also very important for us to have an ecosystem of partners that we can recommend that do complementary things that are not part of our core competencies,” Coughlin said.

According to Coughlin, the partnership also demonstrates the willingness of J.P. Morgan, known more for its traditional investments, to get involved in the growing technology industry.

“It’s also a great opportunity for both of us because we have a great network and reputation in the startup community. Overall, they have a great reputation and working with us is a win-win,” Coughlin said. “The team we work with in the Boston office really aligns with our ethos of doing everything we can to help these companies succeed.”

An example of how collaboration works can be found at Winrate. Using Slack (a cloud messaging application that helps teams collaborate and communicate in real time), Winrate enables sellers and buyers to collaborate and share information. Winrate is headed by Steve Travaglini.

As part of the partnership, York IE provides Winrate with hands-on technology support in the areas of product strategy and development, messaging and website development, and corporate finance and strategy. JP Morgan provides Winrate with treasury services, payment and settlement solutions, as well as access to bankers’ knowledge and technology.

Celebrating its fifth anniversary, York IE was founded by people who worked at Dyn, the former Internet performance management company in Manchester that was purchased and absorbed by Oracle.

Coughlin spent more than seven years at Dyn and then at Oracle, working in corporate communications, including public relations, analyst relations, investor relations, speakers’ bureau and internal communications.

He explained that York IE has two parts: an advisory services side and an investment side. According to Coughlin, the company in which York IE invests will use its advisory services, but the use of advisory services is not dependent on the investment.

So far in its five years of operation, York IE has invested about $50 million in 71 investments in 54 companies, Coughlin said. “We have made a lot of investments in some companies,” he noted. “We talk to about 10,000 companies a year to make 10 investments.”

Startup investments have been made across the U.S., Canada and Europe, but their natural tendency is toward New Hampshire, Coughlin said.

An example of York IE’s investment is Terrantic, a data operations platform for the food supply chain. The investment in the Seattle-based company announced in August enables it to continue helping food processing companies minimize food waste and increase efficiency by optimizing supply chain operations and ensuring their products reach their destination at the best quality, according to the company.

“We have a fantastic investment team that has a very thorough investment process that they execute with due diligence,” Coughlin said. Co-founders Kyle York, CEO, and Joe Raczka, chief investment officer, worked together at Dyn.

“Both Kyle York and Joe Raczka have made multiple angel investments and we have already built a very strong ecosystem of relationships that has led to the creation of our invested companies,” Coughlin said. “Now, after five years of doing really good, thoughtful work on both the investment and advisory sides, the network continues to grow.”

A sign of York IE’s growth is Inc.’s February ranking. 5000, Inc.’s annual list of the 5,000 fastest-growing private companies in the United States.

Warehouse. With three-year revenue growth of 493%, York IE was ranked 1,031st.

York IE is looking for potential capital by investing in a startup. “You invest capital in equity, and that equity becomes valuable as the company succeeds,” Coughlin said. “That’s why we have always been very entrepreneurial, because what is a success for the founder and the company he builds also becomes a success for us as an investor.”

The technology industry remains as dynamic as ever, Coughlin said, and perhaps even more so during and after the COVID pandemic, which has forced greater reliance on software and technologies to help people navigate new work environments.

“As people started working remotely, the need for these kinds of tools and communication and all these things became even more important,” Coughlin said.

“America is the greatest country in the world for innovation and entrepreneurs willing to take risks,” Coughlin added.

“And this is not an easy thing. How can you support them and I think we try to do that.”