Typically, VC, or Venture Capital, invests in Information Technology, Biotech or similarly high-risk, high reward ventures. A North Carolina VC company avoids those sectors and restricts investment in portfolio companies to those that meet three conditions; they must pledge to increase employment, they must locate in economically challenged areas, and they must be good stewards of the environment. In so doing, the VC company has been unapologetically capitalistic while at the same time improving the quality of life in the communities of the portfolio companies it invests in. The VC company also serves an ignored market; High ticket VC companies won't look at the smaller-sized business this one targets. This story takes a look at the courtship between the company and one of its portfolio businesses, a company that has a patent on new, environmentally sound irrigation system. The system resuts in a reduction of pesticides of up to 70% in some cases. And that translates into less cost for farmers, and environmentally, into far less runoff onto the ground and into the water table. This piece takes the listener from the boardroom to the farm and back. In one scene, a farmers says, "Were it not for (this system), we'd be out of the farming business." The owner of the patent has strong feelings about the disappearance of the family farm in America, which explains part of his motivation to seek a patent and VC investment. And for VC company, all this translates into news shareholders love; Profits!

Typically, VC, or Venture Capital, invests in Information Technology, Biotech or similarly high-risk, high reward ventures. A North Carolina VC company avoids those sectors and restricts investment in portfolio companies to those that meet three conditions; they must pledge to increase employment, they must locate in economically challenged areas, and they must be good stewards of the environment. In so doing, the VC company has been unapologetically capitalistic while at the same time improving the quality of life in the communities of the portfolio companies it invests in. The VC company also serves an ignored market; High ticket VC companies won't look at the smaller-sized business this one targets. This story takes a look at the courtship between the company and one of its portfolio businesses, a company that has a patent on new, environmentally sound irrigation system. The system resuts in a reduction of pesticides of up to 70% in some cases. And that translates into less cost for farmers, and environmentally, into far less runoff onto the ground and into the water table. This piece takes the listener from the boardroom to the farm and back. In one scene, a farmers says, "Were it not for (this system), we'd be out of the farming business." The owner of the patent has strong feelings about the disappearance of the family farm in America, which explains part of his motivation to seek a patent and VC investment. And for VC company, all this translates into news shareholders love; Profits!

Typically, VC, or Venture Capital, invests in Information Technology, Biotech or similarly high-risk, high reward ventures. A North Carolina VC company avoids those sectors and restricts investment in portfolio companies to those that meet three conditions; they must pledge to increase employment, they must locate in economically challenged areas, and they must be good stewards of the environment. In so doing, the VC company has been unapologetically capitalistic while at the same time improving the quality of life in the communities of the portfolio companies it invests in. The VC company also serves an ignored market; High ticket VC companies won't look at the smaller-sized business this one targets. This story takes a look at the courtship between the company and one of its portfolio businesses, a company that has a patent on new, environmentally sound irrigation system. The system resuts in a reduction of pesticides of up to 70% in some cases. And that translates into less cost for farmers, and environmentally, into far less runoff onto the ground and into the water table. This piece takes the listener from the boardroom to the farm and back. In one scene, a farmers says, "Were it not for (this system), we'd be out of the farming business." The owner of the patent has strong feelings about the disappearance of the family farm in America, which explains part of his motivation to seek a patent and VC investment. And for VC company, all this translates into news shareholders love; Profits!