Welcome back to The Sunstone Way, and hello 2024!
We have an extra day this year. What are you going to do with it?
I hope you don’t wait until Feb. 29 to get a little more out of 2024. Today is the first day of the rest of your life, and it’s time to make the most of it.
What does success look like to you? Is it building a strong business? Is it providing for your family? Is it building enough wealth to have the leisure time to spend with your loved ones?
Personally, I’m going after all three. And I’ll add one for good measure – helping you succeed too.
What’s Trending For 2024?
After perusing several lifestyle and fashion magazines, I’ve discovered what’s going to be hot in 2024. The “in” color is peach fuzz. Silver jewelry is in, gold is out (that’s a Beyonce thing, you know). Micro fringe and mod micro-minis (don’t ask me) lead the fashion forecasts. Proactive personal health is a thing, egged on by smart watches and other wearable tracking devices. I like that one – I’m a bit of a fitness freak.
Fitness gurus say that a focus on mental health will be an even bigger thing in 2024. Moreover, the operative word will be “happiness.”
How do you make yourself happy? It’s been shown that one good way to do that is to help others – it makes you feel good about yourself. It matters. Check out “It’s A Wonderful Life” if you don’t believe it.
Here To Help
Sunstone Management is dedicated to enriching lives and enriching communities. Certainly our role as a diversified private capital firm points to increasing monetary coffers. But The Sunstone Way defines enrichment in a much broader way – a way that speaks to the whole person and the whole community.
I’m talking about helping people fulfill their own American Dream, whatever that may be. There’s something supremely satisfying in building a business you can call your own, and Sunstone is here to help do that. We help by encouraging university entrepreneurial programs, by supporting accelerators, by providing access to needed capital.
I’m a firm believer in that cliché “give a man a fish and feed him for a day, teach a man to fish and feed him for a lifetime.” We work hard to provide people with opportunities to fulfill their dreams and enrich their lives, and the tools necessary to succeed in that endeavor.
We also help by providing connections to expertise, venues for interaction and more. Building a business — heck, living a life — is something meant to be shared. That’s enriching.
In The Community
I’m a community guy, and we’re a community company. That community can be Irvine, New York City, Long Beach … it’s any community we’re a part of. You’ve heard me say before that our secret sauce is partnering with governments, and we’re busy doing that all over – from the East Coast to the West Coast. We try to enrich communities through economic development, job creation and participation.
Yes, Sunstone Management’s presence enriches communities because we offer a positive approach to business and job creation – we help.
That’s why we are the primary capital connectors for both the Long Beach Accelerator and Lair East Labs in New York City. That’s why we work to inform founders about available government money – small business loans, capital matching grants and more – and help them apply for that money.
Win Win – and Win
Picture this. University students get valuable practical experience creating an economic development plan for a real municipality – and the chance to win cash. City officials get fresh eyes on the potential for bringing new businesses and more jobs to their towns.
It’s called the Sunstone Economic Development Challenge @ USC Price, and this is the second year Sunstone has sponsored it. A strong example of Sunstone facilitating opportunity in the community, I’m particularly pleased with this program. I graduated from USC, and this is a chance to give back through our company. That’s pretty cool.
Have you seen our new profile series, The Next Step? It’s all about student entrepreneurs who have won pitch contests where Sunstone is a sponsor, and who are using that prize money to take the next step with their businesses. We’re watching, supporting, and rooting for their success. We’ll be there when they are ready to take The Next Step.
That’s win, win, win. And it’s fun.
It’s also The Sunstone Way. 2024 will be a very good year. Come join us.
And as always, be a Sunstone.
John Keisler
CEO & Managing Partner
Sunstone Management, Inc.
Tell your friends and colleagues about The Sunstone Way and the insights it provides. To receive a copy each week, sign up at the link.
Have a comment about this topic, or want to suggest topics for future blogs? Click here.
###
Note: This blog post is for information purposes only and is not intended as an offer to sell securities or the solicitation of an offer to buy securities. Such offers are made solely pursuant to formal offering and subscription documentation in an investment fund (“Fund”).
More About Sunstone Management
Sunstone Management is a diversified private capital sponsor firm headquartered in Southern California that invests in diverse early-stage technology entrepreneurs who seek to build great companies. We believe in the aspirational power of the American economy to attract and inspire investors and entrepreneurs from throughout the world. We deliver new and exciting opportunities for economic growth through the creation of innovative public-private partnerships, and our unique experience across government, education, and private sectors. Identified by Financial Times as one of America’s Fastest Growing Companies three years in a row. In the second quarter of 2023, PitchBook ranked Sunstone the seventh most active early-stage venture capital firm in the country, and 18th overall.
© Sunstone Management Inc., 2023