West Virginia SSBCI venture capital, the WVCAP Seed Capital Co-Investment Fund

Half the allocation is equity, and it is the largest of three programs

West Virginia operates three SSBCI financing programs: a collateral support program, a loan participation program, and one equity and venture capital program that invests directly. The West Virginia Jobs Investment Trust is the SSBCI implementing entity and administers all approved programs, and it has engaged the West Virginia High Technology Consortium Foundation, doing business as High Technology Foundation, to support administration of the direct equity program.

Treasury's portfolio table puts the WVCAP Collateral Support Fund at $6.3 million, the WVCAP Subordinated Debt Fund at $29.8 million, and the WVCAP Seed Capital Co-Investment Fund at $36.0 million, for a total of $72.1 million. The equity program is therefore just under half of the state's allocation and the single largest line in it.

The two lending programs sit beside it rather than feeding it. Collateral support provides up to 20 percent of a loan amount with a maximum of $500,000 of support on a $2.5 million loan, delivered as a certificate of deposit at the lending institution. The subordinated debt fund provides up to 50 percent of a borrower's capital requirement with a maximum loan of $2,000,000, which means a minimum financing package of $2 million.

The equity route co-invests, and every investment carries a match

The WVCAP Seed Capital Co-Investment Fund co-invests directly alongside venture capital funds, angel investors, or pre-qualified statewide or regional non-profit investment partners in small businesses raising equity capital investment rounds. The counterparty is named in the structure, which tells a company what the program is for: it participates in a round somebody else is assembling.

Each investment must be matched by private financing. That is stated at the level of the individual investment rather than as a program-wide aspiration, so a company approaching this route without private capital alongside it is asking the fund to do something the program does not do.

The eligibility test is about the company's relationship to the state and about the quality of the business. A company must be located in West Virginia, employ a workforce there, and offer products or services for the benefit of West Virginia. It must be well managed with outstanding long-term growth prospects from proprietary or sufficiently differentiated products or services.

What WVJIT publishes about its own terms, and how to read it

WVJIT's own pages describe how it invests without mentioning SSBCI. It states that its investments will generally be structured as convertible preferred equity or subordinated loans with warrants or options to buy stock, that they are sometimes subordinated to bank loans and mortgages, and that specific terms vary.

It also states a holding period. WVJIT describes its investments as short-term, ranging from three to five years, after which it expects to liquidate, generally through a sale or merger of the company or a repurchase of its securities by the portfolio company. A founder should read that as a stated exit expectation rather than as a preference.

Its published criteria are location, investment structure, industry, management, market, and products. WVJIT does not limit itself to specific industries and describes itself as flexible on structure. Because none of this is tied to SSBCI on WVJIT's own site, this page attributes it to WVJIT rather than presenting it as the SSBCI program's terms.

What is not published, and what to ask

Several things a company would reasonably expect to find are absent from both WVJIT's pages and Treasury's West Virginia entry, and they were looked for rather than assumed. There is no per-company investment range, no stage band, no employee ceiling, and no SEDI share stated for the equity route.

There is also no application window stated for the equity route. WVJIT publishes an investment application form and a contact address, which is an intake rather than a cycle.

• The current per-company investment range, and whether High Technology Foundation or WVJIT is the first conversation.
• What counts as qualifying private financing for the match, and whether the co-investor has to be one of the named categories.
• Whether the three-to-five-year horizon on WVJIT's site applies to SSBCI-funded investments on the same terms.
• How the location test is evidenced, given that it asks about workforce and benefit as well as location.