Danny Donado spent years working for a hedge fund bemoaning the lack of a good document and research management tool that he could use to organize and share the copious notes he was making on potential deals, so finally he built one.
Donado launched Bipsync so other hedge funders wouldn’t have to. The former Miura Global employee initially used Evernote, Dropbox, and Salesforce to manage his workflow, but found that his cobbled together system had too many holes. “At the end of the day, it wasn’t purpose built,” says Donado.
Bipsync differs in that it operates on a single platform, he says. The company is now pitching its wares to Donado’s former colleagues in the hedge fund business, but intends to expand its reach to a broader base of investment managers.
Helping Donado go to market are a clutch of well-known angel and institutional investors who have funneled $1.5 million into the company’s coffers. Some of the disclosed backers include Russell Siegelman, a partner emeritus from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, David Eisner, and Steadfast Venture Capital.
The company is now in an open beta for individuals to access its product for buyside investment teams.
“The IT security and compliance requirements are beyond anything consumer-focused software hosted on the public cloud can provide. At the same time, traditional financial software is notoriously complex and clunky,” said Donado in a statement. “Amazingly, this means that a personal investor using a patchwork of easy-to-use productivity software like Evernote and Dropbox is better equipped than a professional investment analyst. That ends today.”
Bipsync has already partnered with five sizable hedge funds – collectively managing over $20 billion in assets – to gather feedback for its initial enterprise beta. Fund tier subscriptions start at $3,000 per month for 5 seats while, big enterprise accounts pay $10,000 a month for 20 seats. Investors can get a reduced rate now with $2,000 per month for the fund tier, and $7,500 for the enterprise tier. That deal will last til the end of January 2015.
Photo via Flickr user Perpetual Tourist