Oklahoma City, Oklahoma – Cortado Ventures, a pioneering venture capital firm based in Oklahoma City, is rapidly emerging as a significant force in shaping the future of American innovation. Co-founded by General Partner Mike Moradi, the firm is strategically investing in seed-stage frontier technology companies across the U.S. Midcontinent, challenging traditional perceptions of where groundbreaking innovation can originate. This initiative, highlighted in the National Venture Capital Association’s (NVCA) "Meet a VC" series, underscores a broader movement to decentralize venture capital and unlock untapped entrepreneurial potential beyond established coastal hubs.
Cortado’s investment thesis is firmly rooted in the belief that the most impactful founders – those poised to transform critical industries – are often individuals who have spent years immersed within those very sectors. By bridging their deep experiential knowledge with crucial capital, access to customers, and an expansive network of support, Cortado Ventures is actively expanding the geographical footprint where American innovation can thrive. This approach not only seeks to generate compelling financial returns but also aims to cultivate robust, localized innovation ecosystems.
The Entrepreneur’s Crucible: Mike Moradi’s Path to Venture Capital
Mike Moradi’s journey into venture capital is not one of abstract financial theory but of firsthand entrepreneurial grit and resilience. Before co-founding Cortado Ventures, Moradi was a six-time founder himself, navigating the often-treacherous landscape of company building across technically complex industries, including biopharmaceuticals and nanotechnology. His entrepreneurial odyssey began unconventionally, with a pivotal decision to depart dental school to launch his first company. That initial venture, Moradi candidly recounts, ultimately failed.
However, this setback did not diminish his ambition; rather, it forged a profound understanding of perseverance. The experience instilled in him the critical lesson of pushing through obstacles, resisting discouragement from rejection, and maintaining an unwavering commitment to the chosen path. “The lesson was to keep pushing past every obstacle, to not be discouraged by hearing the word ‘no,’ and to stay the course,” Moradi reflects, a sentiment that now underpins Cortado’s philosophy in supporting its portfolio companies.
Subsequent ventures proved more successful. His second company achieved rapid growth and was eventually acquired by a Fortune 100 corporation, a significant early validation of his entrepreneurial acumen. Later, a San Francisco Bay Area venture also culminated in an acquisition, but not before confronting near-failure despite securing an $18 million Series B financing round. This particular experience delivered another crucial insight: while capital can indeed accelerate a company’s trajectory, speed is only advantageous when the business is moving in the correct direction and is genuinely prepared to scale. “A high valuation and a full bank account will happily let you scale the wrong thing,” Moradi cautions, emphasizing the perils of unchecked growth without foundational validation.
These profound experiences, marked by both exhilarating successes and humbling failures, have profoundly shaped Moradi’s current mission: to infuse the Midcontinent with the dynamic entrepreneurial spark typically associated with Silicon Valley. He dedicates considerable thought to the strategic sequencing and timing of capital deployment, recognizing that financing should serve to validate assumptions, mitigate risk, and help founders achieve concrete, meaningful milestones. Crucially, it should not enable a business to expand beyond what its foundational evidence has proven. This nuanced perspective advocates for pairing entrepreneurial optimism with rigorous evidence, disciplined execution, and a clear understanding of the immediate next steps required for a company’s development.
In 2020, Moradi, alongside a team comprising seasoned founders, CEOs, and operators, launched Cortado Ventures. Their collective aim was to establish the kind of venture firm they themselves wished had existed during their own entrepreneurial endeavors: one that deeply understood the multifaceted decisions founders confront and could offer substantial value far beyond the initial capital injection.
The Midcontinent Advantage: A Strategic Imperative
Cortado Ventures’ distinctive investment strategy hinges on the unique competitive advantages offered by the U.S. Midcontinent. This vast geographical expanse is home to many of the nation’s critical industries, sectors currently facing immense pressure to innovate and evolve. Energy, aerospace and defense, healthcare, advanced manufacturing, mobility, and logistics are all deeply embedded within complex physical environments, characterized by established supply chains and demanding customer relationships. True transformation in these sectors, Cortado posits, necessitates more than just a compelling software application; it demands a profound, intrinsic understanding of the industry’s intricate workings.
Consequently, Cortado actively seeks out experienced technical founders who possess this invaluable domain expertise. These individuals may have dedicated years working within a hospital, a factory, a laboratory, an energy corporation, an aerospace program, or a logistics network before identifying a persistent problem and conceiving an innovative solution. Their intimate experience grants them unparalleled credibility with potential customers, invaluable insight into implementation challenges, and a depth of knowledge that would be exceedingly difficult for outsiders to cultivate.
Beyond the human capital, the Midcontinent itself serves as a strategic asset. The region offers unparalleled proximity to these critical industries and their potential customers. It boasts a technically skilled workforce, often overlooked but highly capable, alongside robust research institutions. Furthermore, the availability of complementary public funding initiatives and significantly lower company-building costs compared to coastal tech hubs create a fertile ground for startups to establish and scale efficiently. This combination of factors, as noted by organizations like the U.S. Economic Development Administration and various regional economic reports, positions the Midcontinent as an increasingly attractive destination for venture investment, particularly in sectors requiring physical infrastructure and specialized expertise.
Cortado’s diverse portfolio vividly reflects the breadth of innovation emanating from this environment. Its companies are leveraging cutting-edge technologies across a spectrum of applications, from space communications and industrial safety to critical infrastructure cybersecurity, advanced manufacturing processes, healthcare solutions, energy transition technologies, and mobility innovations. The firm’s strategy is not predicated on the notion that Midcontinent founders deserve investment merely due to historical undercapitalization. Instead, it is built upon the firm conviction that direct proximity to "hard problems" — the complex, real-world challenges embedded in these foundational industries — inherently produces differentiated companies capable of generating strong financial returns.
“Talent is not concentrated anywhere in particular. Capital and networks have just been slower to distribute than talent has,” Moradi asserts, articulating a core tenet of the firm’s philosophy. For Moradi, expanding the geographic reach of venture capital is not simply about discovering more founders; it is about uncovering novel sources of insight and innovation that traditional, geographically concentrated networks may have historically overlooked. This aligns with a broader national trend, often termed the "Rise of the Rest," advocating for increased investment in overlooked geographies to foster a more resilient and distributed innovation economy.
Beyond Capital: The Imperative of Ecosystem Building
When Cortado Ventures first launched, Mike Moradi initially believed that the primary constraint hindering the growth of a nascent venture ecosystem in the Midcontinent was a simple shortage of capital. The firm quickly demonstrated that promising companies could indeed be identified and successfully funded within the region. However, as Cortado expanded its operations and deepened its engagement with the local entrepreneurial community, Moradi’s understanding of what founders truly needed became significantly more expansive.
“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,” Moradi candidly states. This critical realization underscores a fundamental truth in ecosystem development: while financial investment is foundational, it alone cannot sustain a thriving entrepreneurial environment. Founders also require access to experienced operators who can help them circumvent preventable mistakes, customers willing to adopt and validate unproven technologies, investors prepared to provide patient support between critical milestones, and a robust community where essential relationships can organically form and flourish. “Money can accelerate a company,” Moradi emphasizes, “It cannot stand in for experience.”
This profound understanding has profoundly shaped Cortado’s expansive role within the broader Midcontinent ecosystem. The firm actively works to bridge connections among founders, funders, academic institutions, large corporations, policymakers, and technical experts, consciously choosing not to reserve these invaluable relationships exclusively for its own portfolio companies. This inclusive approach creates a positive feedback loop, strengthening the entire regional innovation landscape.
A prime example of this commitment is Cortado’s annual Midcontinent Venture Capital Summit, an event that convenes investors, limited partners (LPs), founders, and ecosystem leaders from across the nation. Such gatherings are vital for fostering collaboration, sharing best practices, and attracting external capital and expertise to the region. Additionally, Cortado actively collaborates with regional entrepreneurship organizations and plays a significant role in The Verge, an Oklahoma City-based incubator and accelerator. The Verge provides critical company-building resources, targeted programming, and crucial capital connections, nurturing nascent startups from concept to scale.
Each of these interactions, whether through a summit, a program, or a direct introduction, can be a catalyst for a founder to secure a pivotal customer, gain an essential advisor, recruit a key employee, find a strategic collaborator, or attract a follow-on investor. Collectively, these relationships construct the foundational infrastructure that enables a greater number of companies to both launch and successfully scale. For Moradi, this is where the true, enduring impact of venture capital begins to extend far beyond the confines of a single investment. A stronger, more interconnected ecosystem provides more entrepreneurs with a viable pathway to company formation, simultaneously creating a greater abundance of opportunities for capital, talent, and innovation to intersect and flourish.
Investment Discipline: Conviction Without False Certainty
Investing in early-stage companies inherently involves navigating significant uncertainty, a reality Moradi embraces. “Incomplete data is my job description,” he quips, encapsulating the essence of venture capital. Rather than attempting to eliminate uncertainty entirely, Moradi employs a disciplined approach: he meticulously distinguishes between assumptions that can be immediately tested and those that will only be resolved over time. He identifies the critical conditions that must hold true, rigorously considers how those conditions could be disproven, and carefully evaluates the cost associated with achieving the next meaningful milestone.
Moradi’s strongest convictions typically center on the founding team’s capabilities, the clarity and urgency of the customer problem being addressed, and the company’s demonstrable rate of progress. He maintains a more cautious stance when it comes to predicting the precise timing of an emerging market’s maturation or the exact path a company may ultimately take towards an exit.
This discipline becomes particularly crucial during rapidly moving financing rounds. The allure of a compelling founder and the competitive pressure of an active process can create immense pressure to reach a decision before the central investment assumptions have been thoroughly vetted. “A hard deadline is exactly when people stop asking uncomfortable questions,” Moradi warns, highlighting the risk of overlooking critical red flags under time constraints. When necessary, Cortado is prepared to deliberately slow down the process, bringing in independent scientific or technical experts for deeper evaluation. This additional diligence may either strengthen the firm’s conviction or, equally importantly, reveal compelling reasons to step away from an investment. Moradi notes that Cortado’s most robust founder relationships have often originated from this initial scrutiny, as it sharpens strategic thinking and identifies risks early, when there is still ample time to address them effectively. However, slowing the decision-making process does not equate to delaying the response; efficiency remains paramount once a commitment is made.
Moradi applies the same rigorous discipline to company valuations. “A sensible entry price is a form of protection for the founder, employees, and investors alike,” he states. While an aggressive valuation might initially feel like an immediate victory for a startup, if the company’s subsequent progress fails to meet the elevated expectations tied to that valuation, the consequences can be far-reaching. These repercussions can adversely affect founder ownership, dilute employee equity, constrain future fundraising options, and ultimately impair the company’s agility and ability to adapt to unforeseen challenges. This balancing act is crucial, as VCs can also inadvertently stifle a company’s potential with overly stringent terms. “The right number buys you options for years. In boom times, people forget that financial crises happen,” Moradi observes, underscoring the importance of long-term strategic thinking over short-term perceived wins. For Cortado, this discipline is not indicative of a lack of belief in a founder’s ambition; rather, it is a strategic mechanism designed to grant an ambitious company the vital flexibility and time it requires to achieve sustainable success.
The Art of Founder Support: Speed, Specificity, and Strategic Non-Intervention
The Cortado Ventures team brings a wealth of operational experience to the table, having personally built, scaled, and successfully exited companies across many of the industries in which the firm now invests. This deep operating background profoundly shapes how Cortado supports its founders, particularly when strategic plans inevitably shift or difficult decisions must be made.
Moradi succinctly describes the essence of meaningful support in two words: “Speed and specificity.” He advocates for responsiveness measured in hours rather than days, and for investors to arrive at the table with tangible work already completed, rather than merely offering generic advice. “Better yet, pick up the phone,” he adds, emphasizing direct, personal engagement. This hands-on approach might involve rebuilding a complex financial model, facilitating a crucial customer introduction, assisting in the recruitment of a senior executive, or taking responsibility for navigating a challenging board conversation. It also encompasses the difficult but necessary task of delivering uncomfortable truths when a company’s runway is diminishing or its core strategy urgently requires a pivot.
Moradi vividly recalls being the founder in such high-stakes meetings. “What helped was someone who lowered the temperature, told the truth to me and the board, and followed up after the meeting,” he reflects. This empathetic understanding drives Cortado’s commitment to transparent, actionable guidance.
As Cortado and the surrounding Midcontinent ecosystem have matured, the firm’s founder support mechanisms have become increasingly sophisticated. Portfolio companies now have access to a rich network comprising operating executives, industry specialists, expert advisors, prospective customers, experienced coaches, follow-on investors, and a community of other founders within the firm’s extensive network. The needs of founders in the region have also evolved. While capital scarcity once made Cortado’s initial investment and its ability to attract additional investors particularly valuable, today, founders increasingly require customer access, senior talent acquisition support, specialized technical expertise, and candid, honest guidance from experienced mentors.
Crucially, the firm’s role is not to usurp control from the entrepreneur. Moradi believes that sometimes, the most valuable contribution an investor can make is recognizing precisely when not to intervene. “Other times,” Moradi acknowledges, “being helpful means staying out of the way.” This nuanced approach respects the founder’s vision and autonomy while providing a safety net of expertise and support.
Building What Outlasts a Fund: A Legacy Beyond Returns
Mike Moradi firmly believes that a venture firm’s responsibility extends far beyond the immediate performance of its own portfolio. “We must build things that outlast a single fund,” he declares, articulating a vision for enduring impact. For Cortado, this translates into a steadfast commitment to strengthening the connective tissue among founders, funders, universities, corporations, and policymakers across the Midcontinent. It also means actively fostering the formation and growth of more investment firms within the region itself.
“This is not a zero-sum game,” Moradi asserts. “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 provides founders with a broader array of potential capital sources and expertise. It also creates more opportunities for investors to collaborate and participate in promising companies. Over time, this collective effort can establish a more durable and efficient pathway between regional innovation and national capital markets, ensuring a continuous flow of resources and opportunities.
Moradi emphasizes that this commitment to ecosystem building does not supersede a firm’s fundamental responsibility to its limited partners. Having served as a trustee and audit committee member for a state retirement system, Moradi possesses a deep understanding of fiduciary duties. This experience has reinforced the paramount importance of being direct and transparent about investment risk, duration, and potential losses. “Ecosystem building matters, and it does not excuse any of us from being disciplined fiduciaries first,” he states, ensuring that social impact aligns with robust financial stewardship.
Moradi also recognizes the NVCA as an indispensable component of the connective infrastructure supporting venture firms and founders nationwide. Issues such as capital formation policies, research commercialization, immigration policies affecting talent, government procurement processes, tax treatment of investments, and securities regulations are not abstract concepts. They directly influence whether an emerging manager can successfully raise a fund, whether a startup can attract essential talent, and whether a new technology can ultimately reach the customers and institutions that desperately need it. “NVCA helps each of us make policy concrete and stay on top of the issues that matter in D.C. and beyond,” Moradi affirms. Furthermore, Cortado’s active participation in the NVCA provides a vital platform to inject a Midcontinent perspective into national dialogues concerning innovation, capital formation, and the evolving future of the venture industry.
Expanding the Map of American Innovation: A National Imperative
Mike Moradi hopes that the story of Cortado Ventures can illuminate the true breadth and diversity of American venture capital. While the industry’s largest, most prominent firms often capture the lion’s share of media attention, the vast majority of venture capital activity, he argues, is carried out by smaller, specialized investors. These firms write early-stage checks into niche markets, be they industrial, geographic, demographic, or otherwise focused. “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,” Moradi explains, demystifying the industry.
These specialized firms play an absolutely essential role in identifying founders before their markets become obvious, skillfully connecting specialized knowledge with necessary capital, and providing crucial support to help companies navigate the incredibly difficult period between a promising initial idea and the establishment of a sustainable, scalable business. “The hardest work happens after the money moves,” Moradi notes, highlighting the continuous effort required post-investment.
New technological advancements are making this work even more consequential. The rapid evolution of artificial intelligence, automation, advanced manufacturing techniques, energy innovation, biotechnology, and space technology is dramatically reducing the cost and barriers to attempting ambitious ideas. Consequently, small, agile teams can now pursue opportunities that once demanded the vast resources of large corporations or extensive national programs. Many of these groundbreaking teams, Moradi predicts, will naturally emerge in regions intimately connected to the complex problems they are striving to solve.
This decentralization of innovation is the broader, profound impact of expanding venture capital across America. When investors consciously look beyond familiar networks and actively seek out founders where critical industries operate, they facilitate the transformation of more ideas into viable companies, enable more cutting-edge technologies to reach the market, and empower more communities to actively participate in and benefit from the country’s innovation economy. For Mike Moradi, the unwavering optimism for the future lies squarely with the founders who dare to attempt what others deem impossible. “Never forget that we’re here for them. When we do this right, everyone, including humanity, wins,” he concludes, encapsulating the ultimate aspiration of Cortado Ventures.
Cortado Ventures stands as a testament to the power of regional focus and founder-centric investment, demonstrating that the future of American innovation is not confined to a few coastal enclaves but is blossoming across the nation’s heartland. The NVCA proudly includes Cortado Ventures in its membership, recognizing its vital contribution to a more diversified and robust national innovation landscape. To learn more about Cortado Ventures and its mission, visit cortado.ventures.
