Venture Profile: Mellon Ventures Focuses Lots of Cash and Attention on Internet, Telecommunications

Editor’s note: Local Tech Wire features a venture capital or investment firm each business day. Matthew Burns, Worth Civils and Daniel Pearson compiled the series. With more than $1.3 billion under management, Mellon Ventures ranks among the nation’s largest venture capital firms.

The private equity arm of Mellon Financial, the firm has offices in Atlanta, New York and Los Angeles in addition to Mellon’s headquarters in Pittsburgh. It uses the parent company’s contacts and industry expertise to structure and invest in a variety of sectors, including enterprise software, optical networking and telecommunications, and gain access to financial and other support for its portfolio companies.

Mellon is open to working with companies at a variety of stages, from early-stage funding to later-stage growth capital and buyouts, typically investing between $5 million and $25 million in each company. The firm looks for companies with entrepreneurial leadership, an achievable business plan and an attractive market.

Among Mellon’s investments in the Southeast since it opened its Atlanta office four years ago are: iXL, SpectraSite, Knology, LIPSinc, Novient, SecureWorks, Digital Pipe, Wave 7 Optics and MediaOcean.

Here’s the skinny:

Firm: Mellon Ventures, Inc.

Mailing address: 3060 Peachtree Road, Suite 780 Atlanta, GA 30305

Phone number: (404)264-9180

Web site: www.mellonventures.com

Management Team:

Burton Goldstein
John Richardson]
John Adams
Max Chee

Focus of firm: Internet and telecommunications companies

Money under management: $1.3 billion

No. of current investments: 113

Companies funded over the last five years:

Airnet Communications
Eftia OSS Solutions, Inc.
Eureka Broadband
Icon CMT Corp.
Kestrel Solutions, Inc.
Knology, Inc.
Network Telephone Corp.
Ondax, Inc.
OptiGlobe Communications, Inc.
Paradigm Wireless Systems, Inc.
Spectrasite
Trendium, Inc.
VeloCom, Inc.
Yafo, Inc.
ECredit.com
Financeware.com, Inc.
GiftCertificates.com
Invesmart, Inc.
Investor Force
MPower, Inc.
Multex.com
Princeton eCom
RunMoney Corp.
Summit Global Partners, Inc.
Broadrange Storage, Inc.
Digital Impact
Digital Pipe, Inc.
Entevo Corp.
InfoLibria, Inc.
InfoSAGE, Inc.
Interne Capital Group
IPNet Solutions, Inc.
LexarMedia
LIPSinc.
LiveWire Utility LLC
Logilent Learning Systems, Inc.
Lycos Corp.
Making Technology Work, Inc.
NetScaler
Novient, Inc.
Ockham Technologies, Inc.
OmniCluster Technologies, Inc.
PrintCafe, Inc.
Prolatus, Inc.
RichFX, Ltd.
SecureWorkds, Inc.
Simtrex Corp.
Storactive, Inc.
THINQ Learning Solutions, Inc.
Xelus, Inc.
AimNet Solutions, Inc.
Axalon Internet Group, LLC
Computer Jobs.com
Cooking.com
Digital Planet, Inc.
Essential.com
Exult, Inc.
FFWD, Inc.
FullTilt Solutions, Inc.
HireRight, Inc.
Ifleet, Inc.
IP.com
ipCapital Group, Inc.
LifeMinders.com
MAILnet Services, Inc.
Media Ocean, Inc.
Plan4Demand Solutions, Inc.
Quantapoint, Inc.
Red Siren Technologies, Inc.
Redleaf, LLC
SafeRent, Inc.
Scient, Inc.
StarCite.com
Stonebridge Technologies, Inc.
Utiliman Systems, Inc.
Wine Access Inc.
A.H. Harris & Sons, Inc.
AAG Holdings, Inc.
Advance USA, LLC
Berkeley Industries, LLC
Carrizo Oil & Gas
Cascade Cookie
Corporate Staffing Resources
Emglo Products, L.P.
Eurodesign Holdings, Inc.
Five Star Food Service
Gradall Industries, Inc.
Leeann Chin, Inc.
Minnetonka Brands, Inc.
National Divrsified Sales
Pacific Precision Metals
Paramount Cards, Inc.
Pecora Corporation
Security Services of America
Steel Dynamics Holdings, Inc.
Tekni-Plex, Inc.
W/S Packaging, Inc.
Western Indsutries, Inc.
Wilmar Industries

How many new deals do you expect to fund in 2002: Undetermined

In what size range: $3 million to $25 million

Sweet Spot (types of deals, stage of the company): Startups, first, second and late stage, buyout or acquisition

Most important attributes for companies seeking funding: Must have a CEO with proven entrepreneurial leadership, an achievable business plan in an attractive category or market, and defensible balance sheet assumptions.

What differentiates you: Mellon Ventures’ primary limited partner is Mellon Financial Corporation, a global financial services company with $2.8 trillion in assets under management, administration or custody. This relationship provides Mellon Ventures with a significant source of global Fortune 1000 contacts and industry expertise that enables us to structure and invest in a wide variety of companies and also access financial and other support for our portfolio companies.

Monday’s profile: Linx.

Previous profiles can be founded by searching Venture Watch category. Profiles by date:

Feb. 11: Academy Venture Funds
Feb. 12: Atlantic Group
Feb. 13: Aurora Fund
Feb. 14: Capital Investment Partners
Feb. 15: Carolina Financial Group
Feb. 18: Carousel Capital
Feb. 19: Catalysta Partners
Feb. 20: Charlotte Angel
Feb. 21: Draper Atlantic
Feb. 22: Eno River
Feb. 25: Halifax Group
Feb. 26: Intersouth Partners
Feb. 27: Kitty Hawk Capital
Feb. 28: NC Enterprise Corp.