Mike Moradi, co-founder and General Partner of Cortado Ventures, is at the forefront of a movement to decentralize American innovation, steering an Oklahoma City-based firm that is redefining venture capital in the U.S. Midcontinent. Featured in the National Venture Capital Association’s (NVCA) "Meet a VC" series, Moradi and Cortado Ventures are spotlighted for their strategic investments in seed-stage frontier technology companies, underpinned by a deep conviction in the transformative power of founders intimately familiar with critical industries. Their thesis posits that the most impactful innovators are often those who have spent years immersed in the sectors they seek to disrupt, such as energy, aerospace, healthcare, and manufacturing. By strategically coupling their invaluable experience with capital, customer access, and a robust support network, Cortado Ventures is actively cultivating new innovation hubs and expanding the geographical footprint of American entrepreneurial success.
A Founder’s Journey Forges a VC’s Vision
Moradi’s journey into venture capital is deeply rooted in his firsthand experiences as an entrepreneur. A serial founder with six companies to his name across technically complex fields like biopharmaceuticals and nanotechnology, Moradi understands the arduous path of company building, replete with both exhilarating successes and humbling setbacks. His entrepreneurial odyssey began unconventionally, leaving dental school to launch his first venture—a venture that, notably, failed. This initial defeat, far from dampening his ambition, became a foundational lesson in resilience. "The lesson was to keep pushing past every obstacle, to not be discouraged by hearing the word ‘no,’ and to stay the course," Moradi recounts, highlighting the tenacious spirit essential for any founder.
His subsequent ventures painted a more nuanced picture of success. One company rapidly scaled and was acquired by a Fortune 100 entity, a testament to effective execution. Another, a San Francisco Bay Area startup, narrowly averted collapse after securing an $18 million Series B financing round before ultimately being acquired. This experience instilled another critical lesson: capital, while vital, is a double-edged sword. It can accelerate growth, but speed without strategic direction can be detrimental. "A high valuation and a full bank account will happily let you scale the wrong thing," Moradi observes, emphasizing the need for disciplined growth and validated assumptions. This hard-won wisdom forms the bedrock of Cortado’s investment philosophy, prioritizing evidence and strategic milestones over unchecked acceleration.
Cortado Ventures: Built by Founders, for Founders
In 2020, Moradi co-founded Cortado Ventures alongside a team of seasoned entrepreneurs, CEOs, and operators, driven by a shared vision to create the kind of supportive venture firm they wished had existed during their own startup journeys. This collective experience ensures Cortado understands the multifaceted challenges founders face, enabling the firm to contribute far beyond mere financial investment. Their approach integrates entrepreneurial optimism with rigorous discipline, ensuring that financing helps founders test assumptions, mitigate risk, and achieve meaningful milestones, rather than encouraging premature or unproven growth. This "founder-first" ethos differentiates Cortado in an increasingly competitive venture landscape, particularly in regions historically underserved by traditional capital sources.
The Midcontinent Advantage: Proximity to Hard Problems
Cortado Ventures’ strategic focus on the U.S. Midcontinent is not merely a geographic preference but a core competitive advantage. This region is a crucible of industries facing immense pressure to innovate and evolve, including energy, aerospace and defense, healthcare, manufacturing, mobility, and logistics. These sectors operate within intricate physical environments, established supply chains, and demanding regulatory frameworks, necessitating solutions that go beyond superficial software applications. True transformation requires a profound understanding of industry mechanics.
Cortado actively seeks out technical founders who possess this intimate knowledge—individuals who have spent years within hospitals, factories, laboratories, energy companies, or logistics networks, identifying persistent problems and conceiving novel solutions. Their deep-seated experience provides unparalleled credibility with customers, invaluable insights into implementation complexities, and a knowledge base difficult to cultivate from an outsider’s perspective. The geographical proximity to these critical industries fosters synergistic relationships between startups and potential customers, facilitating pilot programs, feedback loops, and market validation.
Beyond industry access, the Midcontinent offers a compelling economic proposition. The region boasts a technically skilled workforce, often trained at strong local research institutions, and benefits from complementary public funding initiatives. Crucially, the lower cost of company building—from office space to talent acquisition—provides a significant runway advantage for startups compared to traditional tech hubs. This confluence of factors creates an environment where differentiated companies can emerge and thrive, challenging the long-held notion that innovation is solely concentrated on the coasts. While Silicon Valley, New York, and Boston have historically dominated venture capital funding, recent data from PitchBook and NVCA shows a growing decentralization of VC activity, with emerging markets like the Midcontinent capturing an increasing share, albeit still smaller, of early-stage investments. Cortado’s strategy is thus not about charity, but a conviction that "talent is not concentrated anywhere in particular. Capital and networks have just been slower to distribute than talent has," leading to potentially outsized returns.
Capital: Necessary, But Not Sufficient
Moradi’s initial assessment of the nascent venture ecosystem in the Midcontinent identified a shortage of capital as the primary constraint. Cortado Ventures played a crucial role in demonstrating that promising companies could indeed be identified and funded within the region. However, as the firm matured and the ecosystem began to grow, Moradi’s understanding of founders’ needs evolved. "Five years ago, I would have said the limiting reagent in a young ecosystem was capital. Capital turned out to be necessary, and also nowhere close to sufficient," he reflects.
This realization underscored that financial investment, while essential, is merely one component of a comprehensive support system. Founders require experienced operators who can guide them around common pitfalls, early-adopter customers willing to embrace unproven technologies, and a community of investors prepared to sustain a company through various developmental milestones. Critically, they need a vibrant community where crucial relationships can organically form and flourish. "Money can accelerate a company," Moradi states, "It cannot stand in for experience." This perspective resonates deeply with founders in emerging ecosystems who often lament the lack of holistic support networks compared to established tech hubs. The absence of seasoned mentors, warm introductions to corporate partners, and a dense network of serial entrepreneurs can prove to be as significant a barrier as a lack of funding.
This expansive view has profoundly shaped Cortado Ventures’ role within the broader Midcontinent ecosystem. The firm actively works to bridge connections among founders, funders, universities, corporations, policymakers, and technical experts, consciously extending these relationships beyond its proprietary portfolio. Initiatives like Cortado’s annual Midcontinent Venture Capital Summit convene investors, limited partners, founders, and ecosystem leaders from across the nation, fostering collaboration and knowledge exchange. Furthermore, Cortado collaborates with regional entrepreneurship organizations and The Verge, an Oklahoma City-based incubator and accelerator that provides critical company-building resources, programming, and capital connections. Each of these interactions serves as a vital artery, enabling founders to discover customers, advisors, employees, collaborators, or investors. Collectively, these efforts construct the essential infrastructure that empowers more companies to launch, scale, and thrive, ultimately creating a more robust and resilient regional economy. The implications are profound: a stronger ecosystem not only offers more entrepreneurs a viable path to company formation but also generates increased opportunities for capital, talent, and innovation to converge.
Conviction Without False Certainty: The Discipline of Early-Stage Investing
Early-stage venture investing inherently operates in an environment of incomplete information, a reality Moradi candidly acknowledges. "Incomplete data is my job description," he quips, encapsulating the challenge of making high-stakes decisions with imperfect foresight. Rather than attempting to eliminate uncertainty, Moradi employs a disciplined approach: he meticulously separates assumptions that can be immediately tested from those that will only resolve over time. This involves identifying critical conditions, rigorously evaluating how they could be disproven, and assessing the cost of achieving the next significant milestone.
Moradi’s strongest convictions typically center on the founding team’s capabilities, the clarity of the customer problem being addressed, and the company’s demonstrated rate of progress. He remains more circumspect about predicting the precise timing of an emerging market or the exact trajectory a company might take toward an eventual exit. This discipline is particularly crucial when a financing round is moving rapidly. The allure of a compelling founder and the pressure of a competitive process can tempt investors to make hasty decisions before core investment assumptions have been thoroughly vetted. "A hard deadline is exactly when people stop asking uncomfortable questions," Moradi warns, highlighting the danger of foregoing critical due diligence in the pursuit of speed.
When necessary, Cortado will deliberately slow down the process, engaging independent scientific or technical experts for deeper evaluation. This additional diligence can either fortify the firm’s conviction or reveal crucial reasons to reconsider the investment. Paradoxically, some of Cortado’s most robust founder relationships have begun with this very scrutiny, as it sharpens strategic thinking and identifies potential risks while there is still ample time for mitigation. However, slowing the decision-making process does not equate to a sluggish response; once a decision is made, the firm acts with agility.
Moradi applies similar discipline to valuation. While an aggressive valuation might feel like an immediate triumph for founders, he argues that "A sensible entry price is a form of protection for the founder, employees, and investors alike." If a company’s progress fails to meet the lofty expectations tied to an inflated valuation, the repercussions can be severe, impacting founder ownership, employee equity, future fundraising prospects, and the company’s adaptive capacity. This perspective acknowledges that an overly aggressive valuation can stifle a company’s flexibility, a crucial asset during periods of market volatility. "The right number buys you options for years. In boom times, people forget that financial crises happen," Moradi reminds, underscoring the long-term strategic benefits of prudent financial structuring. For Cortado, this discipline is not a lack of faith in a founder’s ambition but a deliberate strategy to provide ambitious companies with the necessary flexibility and time to achieve enduring success.
Showing Up With Work Already Done: A New Standard for Investor Support
Cortado Ventures’ team, having built, scaled, and successfully exited companies across many of the industries in which they invest, brings an unparalleled level of operating experience to their portfolio. This practical know-how profoundly shapes how the firm supports founders when plans inevitably shift or difficult decisions arise. Moradi distills meaningful investor support into two powerful words: "Speed and specificity." He advocates for rapid responses, stating, "Answer in hours rather than days and show up with work already done instead of advice. Better yet, pick up the phone."
This commitment to active, hands-on support translates into tangible actions: rebuilding a financial model, making a critical customer introduction, assisting in the recruitment of a senior executive, or taking responsibility for navigating challenging board conversations. It also encompasses the difficult but necessary task of delivering uncomfortable truths when a company’s runway is shortening or its strategic direction requires a fundamental pivot. Moradi, drawing from his own entrepreneurial past, remembers the invaluable impact of an investor who could "lower the temperature, told the truth to me and the board, and followed up after the meeting."
As Cortado Ventures and the surrounding ecosystem have matured, the firm’s founder support mechanisms have become increasingly sophisticated. Portfolio companies can now tap into a rich network of operating executives, industry specialists, advisors, prospective customers, coaches, investors, and other founders within the firm’s extensive sphere of influence. Concurrently, the evolving needs of founders in the region reflect the ecosystem’s growth. While capital and the ability to attract additional investors were initially paramount, founders increasingly seek customer access, senior talent, specialized technical expertise, and candid, experienced guidance. It is crucial, however, that the firm’s role does not usurp the entrepreneur’s control. Sometimes, the most valuable contribution an investor can make is discerning when not to intervene. "Other times," Moradi notes, "being helpful means staying out of the way."
Building What Outlasts a Fund: Ecosystem Development as a Core Mandate
Moradi firmly believes that a venture firm’s responsibility extends beyond the confines of its own portfolio. "We must build things that outlast a single fund," he asserts, framing ecosystem development not as an ancillary activity but as a core mandate. For Cortado, this means actively strengthening the connective tissue among founders, funders, universities, corporations, and policymakers. It also entails fostering the growth and formation of more investment firms within the region, rather than viewing them as competitors. "This is not a zero-sum game," Moradi emphasizes. "We want to enable a dozen other firms in our geography, and bring in outside funds for later rounds. We need to create scalable structures where everyone can win."
A larger, more interconnected investment community offers founders a greater diversity of capital sources and expertise. It simultaneously creates more opportunities for investors to collaborate and participate in promising companies, ultimately establishing a more durable pathway between regional innovation and national capital markets. This expansive vision for ecosystem building, however, does not diminish a firm’s primary fiduciary duty to its limited partners. Moradi’s experience as a trustee and audit committee member for a state retirement system reinforced the paramount importance of transparency regarding investment risk, duration, and potential losses. "Ecosystem building matters, and it does not excuse any of us from being disciplined fiduciaries first," he affirms.
Moradi also recognizes the NVCA’s crucial role in constructing the connective infrastructure that supports venture firms and founders nationwide. Policy issues such as capital formation, research commercialization, immigration, government procurement, tax treatment, and securities regulations are not abstract concepts; they directly influence an emerging manager’s ability to raise a fund, a startup’s capacity to attract talent, and a new technology’s journey to market. "NVCA helps each of us make policy concrete and stay on top of the issues that matter in D.C. and beyond," Moradi states. Furthermore, Cortado’s active participation in NVCA provides a vital platform to inject a Midcontinent perspective into national dialogues concerning innovation, capital formation, and the future trajectory of the venture industry.
Expanding the Map of American Innovation
Moradi hopes Cortado Ventures’ narrative will broaden the perception of American venture capital, moving beyond the often-caricatured image of large, coastal firms. "Most of VC looks nothing like the caricature. The bulk of the industry is small firms writing early checks into some niche, be it industrial, geographic, demographic, or otherwise. And a VC firm is also a startup until fund 3 or 4," he explains. These smaller, specialized firms play an indispensable role in identifying founders before their markets are obvious, bridging specialized knowledge with capital, and guiding companies through the challenging chasm between a promising idea and a sustainable business. "The hardest work happens after the money moves," Moradi asserts, highlighting the intensive, hands-on support required for early-stage success.
The accelerating pace of technological advancement, particularly in areas like artificial intelligence, automation, advanced manufacturing, energy innovation, biology, and space technology, is dramatically lowering the cost of pursuing ambitious ideas. This paradigm shift empowers small teams to tackle opportunities that once demanded the vast resources of large corporations or national programs. Many of these innovative teams are emerging in locations intrinsically linked to the problems they are striving to solve, precisely the kind of environment the Midcontinent offers.
This is the profound, broader impact of decentralizing venture capital across America. When investors consciously look beyond familiar networks and engage with founders in regions where critical industries operate, they facilitate the transformation of more ideas into viable companies, enable more technologies to reach the market, and empower more communities to actively participate in the nation’s innovation economy. For Mike Moradi, the enduring optimism lies with the founders themselves—those intrepid individuals attempting what others deem impossible. "Never forget that we’re here for them. When we do this right, everyone, including humanity, wins." This conviction drives Cortado Ventures’ mission, making it a pivotal player in the evolving landscape of American venture capital and a beacon for regional innovation.
