The last time we heard from Raleigh-based venture studio 24 And Up, CEO Eric Boduch had just spun out its first startup, Revcast—which was given a healthy head start with a $3M pre-seed round led by Palo Alto-based CRV in 2023.
Now, the studio has launched three companies since its 2022 founding, with a fourth in the works and plans to create two more every year. GrepBeat caught up with Boduch recently to talk about the changes he’s seen within the studio, along with some updates to come in the New Year.
Boduch initially launched the studio upon his departure from Raleigh unicorn Pendo. He’d spent eight years helping the software company grow its literal fixture on the Raleigh skyline alongside fellow co-founders Todd Olson, Erik Troan and Rahul Jain.
As stated on the 24 and Up website, the studio was built with the purpose of improving the speed and outcomes of startups by combining investment and hands-on entrepreneurial support in a way that traditional venture capital does not.
They act and collaborate as a co-founder with startups, providing personalized engagement to help turn ideas into successful companies. With Boduch’s extensive entrepreneurial background, comprised of over two decades of experience creating and scaling software companies—and with the help of seasoned expert advisors—24 and Up is also dedicated to accelerating the growth of impactful AI native software.
“It’s hard to get really hands-on and help make a change when you’re just an advisor,” Boduch said. “What motivates me [and why I wanted to create 24 and Up] is being able to personally get involved, and I find to do that at best is working [one on one] with the CEO to get that company from zero to one.”
24 and Up’s Launches
The studio’s aforementioned first spinout, Revcast (which was originally headed up by Boduch but is now led by CEO Dustin Amrhein), has been in the GrepBeat universe for a while; it was the subject of a June 2023 feature as well as a 2023 Startups to Watch Honoree. Revcast just launched its general availability product in Q3 of 2024 and is currently raising a $2M half-committed SAFE round.
24 and Up’s second company provides an AI management platform that is designed to help organizations create, train, deploy and manage AI agents’ effectiveness. San Francisco-based Wayfound is a relatively new company, having raised a $3M seed round in the spring of 2024 and signed its first customer this year.
But, despite being younger, Boduch said Wayfound is already receiving significant traction and is becoming acknowledged as a leader in the generative AI space, specifically around communications between agents, observability and oversight.
Troupe is the third company to spin out of 24 and Up. This startup’s AI model works as a team of product experts, analyzing all external communications to ensure that everyone and everything always says the right thing to the right people at the right time.
Companies can instantly identify what is and what is not working, and what to do about it—increasing pipeline velocity and win rates. Troupe closed a $400k Friends & Family in the summer of 2024 and is currently raising a venture round. They plan to have their GA launched for Q1 of 2025.
With three (almost four) companies in the works and more to come in the years ahead, Boduch has learned a lot about creating and managing a venture studio—especially concerning the value they can add around fundraising.
“Because of my experiences of my network with investors, along with my experience outside of Pendo helping other companies raise funds, we may have undervalued the amount of help we could be to our studio companies and fundraising,” Boduch said.
“So that’s an area we’ve helped a lot, especially since the market’s a little tough right now for fundraising, which is even probably worse than when Pendo first raised money in 2013/14…And [that’s why 24 and Up] needs to deliver like or better than a co-founder. For us, we really focus on how we can help companies get from that idea on that path to product-market fit as quickly as possible and help companies acquire those first paying customers.”
Boduch told GrepBeat that 24 and Up is launching a rolling studio fund in 2025, which will provide opportunities to invest idea-stage capital directly to current and future studio companies. Along with this effort to expand their internal and external support to these companies, Boduch also said that 24 and Up is launching a podcast, which will feature executive founders sharing the stories of how they scaled their companies.
Stay tuned.
