Growth equity raises
$3M - $50M+
Family office and strategic equity capital for revenue-generating companies scaling distribution, headcount, or category expansion. Typical close: 90-120 days.
Run your company. We'll run your capital raise.
Patient capital from family offices who understand long-term value, placed through a process built by Wall Street veterans.
Nassau Street Partners is an independent capital advisory firm. We connect growth-stage founders raising $3M-$50M+ with our network of 4,000+ family offices and institutional investors who back long-term operators, not short-term metrics.
90-120 day process · 9 global offices · $1B+ in transactions executed by our senior team
The team has executed transactions and held senior roles at
Robertson Stephens Chicago Corporation Representative experience. Includes roles held by our professionals prior to joining Nassau Street Partners.
Beyond the VC treadmill:
Why family office capital is built differently.
Most growth-stage founders get pushed toward the same two doors: traditional venture capital or institutional private equity. Both share an incentive structure built around fast exits and short-term performance.
Family offices operate on a different clock. They invest patient capital that compounds across decades, not fund cycles. They back operators with conviction, not consensus. And they evaluate companies on durability of value, not the next quarterly milestone.
We built Nassau Street Partners to give serious founders direct access to this network; without the distraction of running the raise themselves.
Methodology
Inside Our
Process
Step 01: Why family offices
Family office capital is not VC capital.
Most founders default to venture capital because it's the loudest part of the market. The reality is that VC and PE fit a narrow band of companies; the ones willing to trade long-term ownership and strategic control for fast money and a forced exit window.
Family offices are different. They manage private wealth across generations, which means their default holding period is measured in decades, not fund cycles. They are not under pressure to return capital to LPs on a five-to-seven year clock. They are not optimizing for the next markup. They invest in operators they believe in, often without forcing board control, dilutive ratchets, or aggressive growth-at-all-costs mandates.
For growth-stage founders building real businesses, this changes the math. Patient capital means:
- You set the operating cadence, not your investor's IRR model
- You retain meaningful ownership and strategic control
- You attract follow-on capital from a network that values consistency over hype
- Your exit timeline matches your value-creation timeline, not someone else's fund vintage
Patient capital means your exit timeline matches your value-creation timeline, not someone else's fund vintage.
Family offices are also fragmented and private. There is no Crunchbase for them, no public ranking, no inbound deal-flow process. Reaching them at scale requires direct relationships built over years; the kind of access most founders cannot generate alone, and most generalist bankers do not have.
Who we are: Nassau Street Partners maintains direct relationships with 4,000+ investors globally, with deep concentration in family offices, private credit, and specialized strategic investors across nine offices in North America, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia.
Step 02: The cost of running it yourself
The hidden tax on founder-led raises.
Founders who try to run their own raise pay a tax that does not show up on any balance sheet. It shows up in missed quarters, delayed product roadmaps, deals that go sideways because you took your eye off the business, and team morale that erodes while you spend six months in pitch meetings.
The math is unforgiving. A typical institutional raise takes four to six months of full attention. That is four to six months where your highest-leverage hours, the ones that compound into customer acquisition, hiring, and product velocity, are redirected into investor outreach, deck iteration, data-room management, diligence calls, term-sheet negotiation, and legal coordination.
Most founders we speak with describe the same pattern:
- Revenue growth slows during the raise
- Customer conversations get deferred
- Senior hires stall because the company is "in process"
- The team starts asking when leadership will be back in the room
The cost is not theoretical. It is the gap between what your company could have done in those four to six months and what it actually did.
Our model removes this tax. We run the institutional process; positioning, materials, outreach, diligence coordination, investor management, term-sheet review. You stay in the business doing the work that justifies the raise in the first place. You join the calls that matter. You make the final call on every investor we introduce. You do not run the engine.
Your time stays on the company. Ours goes on the raise.
Step 03: Our 90-day process
A structured 90-to-120 day path from kickoff to closing.
We run every engagement on a defined timeline. The structure is built to compress the institutional process without cutting corners on diligence quality or investor fit.
Weeks 1-3: Positioning and materials
We work directly with founders to translate the operating reality of the business into an institutional narrative; the kind that holds up under family office diligence. Deliverables include the confidential investment memo, financial model review, data-room construction, and the equity story document used in every investor meeting.
Weeks 3-6: Targeted investor outreach
We do not blast the deal. We map your business against our 4,000+ investor network and identify the 30-60 names most likely to engage on thesis fit, check size, and stage. We approve every name with you before outreach begins. We never reach out to anyone without your explicit green light.
We never reach out to anyone without your explicit green light.
Weeks 6-10: Investor meetings and diligence
We coordinate first meetings, manage Q&A flow, prepare you for diligence calls, and quarterback the data-room. You attend the conversations that matter most. We absorb everything else.
Weeks 10-14: Term sheets, negotiation, closing
We negotiate term sheets in parallel where possible to create optionality. We coordinate legal, regulatory, and closing logistics through our internal team and external counsel. We work toward closing with your strongest aligned partner.
Average time from engagement to close: 90 to 120 days for growth-stage equity raises in the $3M-$50M+ range. Complex structures (convertibles, bridges, debt+equity stacks) typically run 100-150 days.
Step 04: The truth about our fees
Why we charge an upfront fee, and what it covers.
The most common question we get on first calls is about our fee structure. We answer it directly here, on the page, so you do not have to ask it on the call.
We charge two fees:
- An upfront work fee in the range of $45,000 to $100,000 depending on raise size and complexity
- A success fee of 6% on equity raised and 4% on debt raised, paid only on capital we directly introduce
Why the upfront fee exists. Running a real institutional process costs real money. The fee covers senior partner time on positioning and materials, data-room construction, analyst support, legal coordination, and the diligence work required before we put a deal in front of a single investor in our network. Firms that skip the upfront fee tend to skip the work; they spray decks to a list and hope something sticks. That is not what we do, and it is not what closes deals with family offices.
Why the fee is mutual. The upfront fee also functions as a commitment mechanism in both directions. It signals to the investor network that the deal has been fully vetted by a senior team that put their own time on the line. It protects us from spending hundreds of hours on a founder who is testing the market without intent to close. And it aligns the engagement around a real outcome, not a maybe.
We only earn a success fee on the capital we directly introduce.
What we do if you raise on your own. We operate non-exclusively on the success fee. If you bring in capital from your own network during the engagement, you owe us nothing on it. We only earn a success fee on the capital we directly introduce.
What we do if the raise does not close. The upfront fee is non-refundable; it pays for work already delivered. We are direct about this on every first call. We do not pretend the worst-case scenario does not exist, and we do not engage with founders we do not believe we can close for.
Step 05: Who we work with
Is your company a fit for our process?
We are selective about the engagements we take. Our process is built for a specific profile, and it does not fit every business. Before booking a call, here is who tends to be the strongest fit:
Raise size: $3M to $50M+ is our core operating range. We also handle smaller pre-seed raises ($700K-$3M) selectively.
Stage: Growth-stage with traction. Most of our closed deals are companies with $500K-$10M in revenue, clear unit economics, and a real path to scale. We also work with pre-revenue MedTech, deep tech, and regulated-market companies where the team and category are exceptional.
Capital type: Founders who want patient, strategic capital from family offices and specialized investors; not founders looking for the highest-velocity, highest-pressure VC term sheet.
Founder profile: Operators who plan to run the company for the next five-plus years. Founders looking for a fast flip are usually a poor fit for the family office network and will be better served elsewhere.
Operators who plan to run the company for the next five-plus years.
If you fit this profile, the next step is a 30-minute conversation with one of our partners to discuss your business, the capital you need, and whether our process is the right one for you.
Why founders choose us
Our Flagship Differentiators
01
4,000+ direct investor relationships
A global network of family offices, institutional investors, private credit funds, and strategic capital across nine offices in four regions. We have spent years building these relationships. You get access in 90 days.
02
Senior bankers on every deal
You work directly with partners and managing directors with 25-to-40 year careers at firms like Robertson Stephens, Intel Capital, Deutsche Bank, and RBC Capital Markets. No junior analysts running your raise.
03
Global capital across four continents
Nine offices spanning North America, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. When the right check for your business sits with a family office in Singapore, Stockholm, or Dubai, we already have the relationship. Most boutique firms can't reach beyond one region. We close deals across all of them.
Capabilities
Where We Place Capital
Debt, bridges, and convertibles
$1M - $25M
Convertible notes, SAFEs, venture debt, and bridge structures for companies optimizing capital structure ahead of a priced round, acquisition, or strategic milestone.
M&A and sell-side advisory
$10M - $150M+
Sell-side and buy-side advisory for founder-led companies executing strategic exits, divestitures, or roll-up acquisitions. Run by partners with prior sell-side leadership at top boutique investment banks.
Founder voices
What Founders Say About Working With Us
“You're the first person I've talked to that actually knows our space. Every other banker we met treated us like a checkbox. Nassau Street understood the business in the first call.”
“Doing this on my own would have been wildly distracting. I run the company. They run the raise. That's the trade, and it's the right one for where we are.”
“We had turnaway business and that hurt bad. We didn't want to lose those clients. Nassau Street got us to the right investors fast and we didn't have to choose between the raise and the customers.”
“Our story doesn't fit the local AI-and-hard-tech crowd. The family foundation world is where we belong, and Nassau Street is the first firm I've talked to that actually has the relationships there.”
“I've talked to a lot of bankers. Most of them want to take a fee and disappear. The Nassau Street team stayed on every call, knew every term, and pushed back on investors when they tried to lowball us.”
Leadership
Our Senior Team
Gary Shields
Chairman & Managing Partner
40-year career in investment banking. Former Head of Healthcare Investment Banking at Chicago Corporation. Senior research analyst and banker at Robertson Stephens, one of the "Four Horsemen". Co-founder of Flemming, Lessard & Shields. Healthcare and life sciences board director.
Juan Moreno
Managing Partner
Wall Street experience at Royal Bank of Canada and Deutsche Bank. Prior asset management with high-net-worth and family office capital at Farad Investment Management, Luxembourg. Buy-side and sell-side dealmaking across multiple verticals.
Ron Reich
Partner
20+ years at Intel Capital, where he managed more than half a billion dollars in acquisitions, venture investments, and joint ventures. Former Booz Allen strategy consultant. Investor in cloud, AI, and real estate via TableRock Capital ($1B+ AUM).
Sam Collins
Managing Director
25+ years in private markets, wealth management, and cross-border capital formation. Former CEO of Creation Wealth Capital. Senior leadership at Echelon Wealth Partners, CIBC Investments, and Merrill Lynch Canada. Co-founder and CEO of CGR Ventures.
Nassau Street Partners operates from nine offices across North America, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia: New York, San Diego, Chicago, Panama, London, Stockholm, Cairo, Dubai, and Singapore.
Our commitment
Our Mutual Commitment Pledge
We do not guarantee outcomes. No legitimate capital advisory firm can. Here is what we do guarantee:
- We never contact a single investor without your written approval. You see and approve every name before outreach.
- You see every term sheet and make every final call. We negotiate. You decide.
- We are direct about risk. Every raise has friction. We tell you the friction in your deal on the first call, not in month four.
- Senior bankers, every engagement. A managing director or partner is on every call. No junior analyst is ever your primary point of contact.
Frequently asked
Frequently Asked Questions
Two reasons: one protects you, one protects the quality of every investor introduction we make.
It protects you: The upfront fee covers the institutional-grade work we do before a single investor sees your deal. That includes positioning, materials, data-room construction, legal coordination, and senior partner time across the first phase of the engagement. That work makes your company permanently more fundable and allows the rest of the engagement to focus purely on closing capital.
It protects the quality of investor introductions: Family offices are private, relationship-driven investors. Our family-office network takes our calls because they know every opportunity has been fully vetted by Nassau Street Partners. We only bring them deals we believe in. The upfront commitment ensures we can be selective about who sees your deal, which is exactly what you want when your company's reputation is at stake.
The founders we work with consistently tell us the same thing: the fee is not a cost. It is the reason the entire process works. It means both sides are committed from day one. Book a call to discuss pricing for your specific raise.
Family offices are private institutions and most do not permit public disclosure of their investments. This means we cannot publish a deal tombstone wall in the way a public-markets banker can. On the discovery call, we share representative transaction examples by industry, raise size, and structure. After engagement, we can arrange one-on-one reference calls with past clients who have agreed to speak to prospective clients.
Discretion is built into how we operate. We sign mutual NDAs at the start of every engagement, and we never disclose your company name or deal details to any investor without your written approval. Before any outreach begins, we build a target investor list and review it with you. You see every name. You approve every introduction. When outreach begins, investors first receive only a high-level paragraph. We pre-vet their interest before going further. If there is genuine alignment, we execute an NDA with that investor and share detailed information, always with your sign-off.
Our core operating range is $3M-$50M+ raises for growth-stage companies with revenue traction or a clear path to it. We selectively take smaller pre-seed raises ($700K-$3M) in deep tech, MedTech, and regulated markets where the team and category are exceptional. The best way to know whether we're a fit is a 30-minute discovery call .
Talk to a partner about your raise.
A 30-minute discovery call with one of our partners. We will discuss your business, the capital you need, and whether our process fits where you are. No pitch. No pressure. If we are not the right firm, we will tell you on the call.
90-120 day process · 9 global offices · Senior bankers on every deal