TNInvestco: State ECD updates on process

By Milt Capps UPDATED 25 March 2011 4:20 p.m.


TNInvestco: State ECD updates on process | economic development, Mark Drury, TNInvestco, early stage, venture capital, private equity, state government

Mark Drury

Update: State ECD released the promised data late on Friday, March 25, posting it here.- The story as originally published follows, below. Ed.

The Tennessee TNInvestco program's first annual report is likely to be released next week, said Mark Drury, deputy commissioner for Economic and Community Development.

Gov. Bill Haslam and others have previously said they would decided whether to support future funding for additional TNInvestco rounds based on performance, although most agree the first annual report is an unlikely gauge of the program's longer-term value, particularly given that some funds have been in operation less than a year.

Drury responded this morning to a VNC query, "The deadline for all TNInvestcos to submit their information for the compilation of the annual report to the Governor, the General Assembly and the constitutional officers is close of business today. It will take some period of time for the various reports to be reviewed and assembled into a single document and the statute calls for the annual report to be posted online as soon as practically possible. I don't have a 'date certain' for that, but my guess it is likely to be early-to-middle of next week."

Referring to recent media coverage of the TNInvestco program, Drury provided VNC what he said was his earlier response to a media query regarding "concerns relative to TNInvestcos investing in companies that have been around for as much as a decade or longer and why such investments would be approved."

That response was, according to Drury: "The investments would be approved because they meet the statutory description of a 'qualified business' as defined in TCA 4-28-102. ECD's purpose in reviewing the investments is to determine if they comply with the statute only. The statute defines 'seed or early stage investment' as 'an investment in a company that has a product or service in testing or pilot production that may or may not be commercially available. The company may or may not be generating revenues and may have been in business less than three (3) years at the time of the investment.'" VNC