Originate Growth Fund #1 is not making any new investments.
Menu
As entrepreneurs, we have been in your shoes, so the Originate team supports our portfolio companies well beyond our financial resources. We share our experiences and perspectives from our own lessons learned, and from our unique skill sets. Also help you steer through the challenges that are often inevitable: tough personnel issues, hiring the right people, creative fund-raising, and sharing the little wins that are oh-so important. We can be a sounding board or be all-ears when needed, too. Our most important order of business–make sure the CEO has the right plan and resources to bring the vision to life.
Eric has a long history as both a line marketer and growth strategist, held accountable for taking the strategic recommendations into specific execution. This think and roll up your sleeves combination was pioneered at the firm he founded – ENVISION. They developed a ‘Brand Development System’ that typically stretched across a multi-year period. This ensured that strategies were effective and truly created incremental growth.
For all inquiries, please contact Shannon Morin at shannon.morin@originateventures.com
Copyright © 2023 Originate Ventures. All rights reserved. Originate Ventures is a licensee of Originate.
Eric has a long history as both a line marketer and growth strategist, held accountable for taking the strategic recommendations into specific execution. This think and roll up your sleeves combination was pioneered at the firm he founded – ENVISION. They developed a ‘Brand Development System’ that typically stretched across a multi-year period. This ensured that strategies were effective and truly created incremental growth.
ENVISION was only 1 of 2 companies ever acquired by McKinsey & Company. At McKinsey, Eric was a senior partner, serving as a leader in the North American Branding Practice. His responsibilities included introduction of the ENVISION intellectual capital globally. The ENVISION approach and methods were the basis for Power Brands, written by McKinsey Director Hajo Riesenbeck and Jesko Perrey. Eric led numerous Brand engagements, focused on integrating ENVISION’s innovative growth strategies and insightful quantitative methods with McKinsey’s traditional supply side strengths. Clients included John Deere, Wrigley, Midas, Visa, The Weather Channel, and Allstate.
In addition, Eric assisted David Thomson, a McKinsey alumni, in an exhaustive examination of high growth companies. The intent was to understand why certain companies had sustained, rapid growth. As a result of David’s exploration, Eric became a significant contributor for the compelling book, ‘Blueprint to a Billion – 7 Essentials to Achieve Exponential Growth.’ His perspective centers around creating powerful value propositions and defining the tangible and intangible benefits your brand should strive to own. Blueprint was the #4 best selling CEO book in 2007.
Eric began his professional career at Procter & Gamble, where he held a variety of Brand, Sales and Product Development positions on brands including Duncan Hines, Pringles Cisco and Jif. He later joined Beecham Cosmetics as Director of Marketing, responsible for Vitabath, Vita Europa, Yardley of London and new product launches like the fragrance Aspen. Prior to McKinsey’s acquisition of ENVISION, Eric spent most of the 90’s consulting in consumer categories. He was one of the original partners at The Cambridge Group and in 1994 left to found ENVISION.
Eric holds a liberal arts degree from The University of Michigan, where he was also the President of the Michigan Student Assembly (MSA), the all campus student government. He resides in the Chicago area, is married with 3 children, and is an entrepreneur at heart.
Glen is a Managing Partner of Originate Ventures (based in Bethlehem, PA), an early stage-oriented venture capital firm that is primarily focused on investing in emerging companies located in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. He has been a Partner with Mid-Atlantic Venture Funds since its founding in 1985 and combined MAVF’s fifth fund to help establish Originate Ventures. Glen began his venture capital career when he joined Key Venture Capital Corporation upon completing his MBA and opened its Boston office in 1984.
Investments that Glen has led include International Quantum Epitaxy (LSE: IQE plc), the world’s leading merchant manufacturer of compound semiconductor wafers, Innovative Solutions & Support, Inc. (NASDAQ: ISSC), a leading provider of flat panel avionics to commercial aircraft, Access Health (NASDAQ: ACCS, acquired by McKesson), a leading provider of health information solutions, Ravisent Technologies (NASDAQ: RSVT), a leader in digital video solutions, AnyTime Access (acquired by Digital Insight), a provider of on-line loan origination and processing solutions, UltraCision (acquired by Johnson & Johnson), developer of the Harmonic Scalpel system, MicroE Systems (acquired by GSI), manufacturer of the most advance position management solutions and CareGain (acquired by Fiserv), a provider of consumer-directed health plan solutions.
Glen was the Chairman of the Greater Philadelphia Venture Group (now IMPACT) in 1996-1997, where he conceived and organized the GPVG Venture Institute and has been on the Investment Advisory Committee for the Ben Franklin Technology Center, Southeast Pennsylvania for over 20 years. In addition to his Originate Ventures Board positions, Glen is Vice-Chairman of Innovative Solutions and Support, Inc. (NASDAQ: ISSC) and a member of the Board of Alum-a-Lift, Inc., a family-owned manufacturing business servicing over 200 of the Fortune 500. Glen is also a Board member of St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children in Philadelphia.
Glen holds a BSBA, cum laude, from Boston University and an MBA from Babson College.
Prior to Originate Ventures, Mike was a co-founder and former CEO of OraSure Technologies (NASDAQ: OSUR), where he helped build the company from a start-up to more than $50 million in annual sales and a market cap of over $500 million over a 17-year period. Among other things, OraSure is best known for developing, manufacturing and selling the 1st rapid oral fluid HIV test in the world.
Over that time, Mike raised more than $100 million from angel investors, venture capitalists, public offerings, and from commercial banks. Mike was recognized as Ernst and Young Central and Eastern Pa Biotech Entrepreneur of the Year in 2005 and the Company was named seven consecutive years to the Fastest 50 growth companies in the Greater Philadelphia region.
Mike is the Chairman of Lehigh Valley Industrial Park, Inc. (www.LVIP.org) a local non-profit land development company. Mike joined the Board in 2001 and became Treasurer in 2004 and Chairman in 2016. LVIP recently acquired a large former Bethlehem Steel brownfield site and expects to invest $100 million in the redevelopment of the site into prime industrial, retail, and commercial space. The lofty targets include the new creation or retention of 10,000 jobs and $1 billion of new capital investments in the region.
Mike served as a Board member and former Treasurer for the Community Action Committee of the Lehigh Valley (www.CACLV.org) from 2009 to 2019. The CACLV’s mission is to improve the quality of life in the Lehigh Valley by building a community in which all people have access to economic opportunity, the ability to pursue that opportunity, and a voice in the decisions that affect their lives. Mike helped fund expansion of its food bank operation to deliver up to 20 million pounds of food annually to a seven-county region.
Mike served as a Managing Partner of The Brand Experience (www.TheBrandExperience.com) from 2011 to 2018. The Company was a private marketing agency located in Cincinnati, Ohio, focused on building compelling, multi-dimensional experiences for corporate visitor centers, tradeshows and events and was sold in 2018 to HyperQuake (www.HyperQuake.com). Mike provided the seed capital to help the founders spin the division out of a corporate conglomerate into a stand-alone agency with revenues in 2018 in excess of $10 million.
Mike served as a Board member and Audit Chair at KNBT Bancorp (NASDAQ: KNBT). During Mike’s tenure, the bank grew from $800 million in assets to be one of the largest community banks in northeastern Pennsylvania, with more than $3 billion in assets.
Mike also served on the Healthcare Advisory Board of Safeguard Scientifics (NYSE: SFE), a publicly traded venture capital firm located in Philadelphia.
Mike graduated from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute with a BS in Mechanical Engineering in 1980 and he received an MBA in Finance from Miami University of Ohio in 1983. He is active in the community promoting economic development and entrepreneurship.
Mike has one son and two German shepherd dogs. In his spare time, he enjoys golfing, biking, hiking, philanthropic activities, red wines and Asheville, NC. He is active in the local community supporting a wide range of economic development and entrepreneurial ventures.