Podcast Episode 42 | Why Venture Capital is Perfect for This Physician

With Dr. Marshall Kuremsky

About the Prosperous Doc® Podcast

The Prosperous Doc® podcast by Spaugh Dameron Tenny highlights real-life stories from doctors and dentist to encourage and inspire listeners through discussions of professional successes and failures in addition to personal stories and financial wellness advice.

Shane Tenny, CFP® is our podcast host and Partner at SDT. He has lectured numerous times for hospitals and physician groups and, most importantly, helped hundreds of clients develop strategies to navigate through turbulent times toward their financial goals.

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Marshall Kurems...: 00:00 My whole philosophy in the last five years has been finding ways to make sure that I was making money when I'm not working.

Intro: 00:09 From Spaugh Dameron Tenny, it's the Prosperous Doc Podcast. Real stories, real inspiration, real growth, a show for doctors who are ready to improve their overall wellness in every aspect of life. Now here's your host, Shane Tenny.

Shane Tenny: 00:27 Welcome back to this episode of the Prosperous Doc ® Podcast. I'm Shane Tenny, glad to have you with us today. Today we're talking venture capital. If you don't know what it means, don't worry. We'll define it in a minute, but one of the things we do know is that just because you're wearing a white coat, doesn't mean that your only passion is healthcare. We know that a lot of you have interests in finance, in business, in maybe even venture capital. Today, we're talking with Dr. Marshall Kuremsky. Dr. Kuremsky is an orthopedic surgeon by day and a venture capitalist by night, we like to say. He works near Raleigh,` North Carolina, board certified in hand surgery and sports medicine, and in some ways, most pertinent to today's conversation, several years ago, he began to scratch the itch of his growing interest in business and finance and ended up joining LOUD Capital, a venture capital firm in Ohio as an associate. So I'm excited to have the conversation today and hear about his story and his interest in pursuing interests outside of medicine. So, Marshall, thanks so much for being here.

Marshall Kurems...: 01:33 Shane, thanks for having me. This is my pleasure. I appreciate the offer and invitation. I'm excited.

Shane Tenny: 01:38 Yeah, absolutely. Well, I'll start with a softball. When did you know that you wanted to go into medicine, and when did you know that you wanted to go into something more than just medicine?

Marshall Kurems...: 01:50 This is a great question because somewhere around 12 or 13, I decided that I wanted to be an orthopedic sports medicine surgeon. It's really that simple. I had broken a ton of bones as a kid, combination of wild child, but probably somewhat klutzy and maybe 9 or 10 different broken bones, and I'll tell you that my local orthopedic surgeon, who is a friend of the family and my dad was a doc, my mom was a nurse. He just took great care of me, whether it was flipping up x-rays for me to look at and showing me what the problem was, to helping put on a cast each time, hey, I'm getting older now, so remember this is many, many years ago when the doctor was putting on a cast itself, to every time I went back to see him after the injury, I always felt better.

Marshall Kurems...: 02:34 He always looked like he was having fun. So that started a long time ago. Then the genuine interest in me from a business and a financial side probably started just only three or four years into my actual practice, where I simply started to realize that I craved as much information, knowledge, and experience about business and finance as I could. But then as I started to expand my network, socially and professionally outside of medicine, I was always really interested in what other people did. I wanted to know what their job was like and what that meant, the things that they did, the relationships that they had and I realized that there was more to my passion and my hunger than just that which I was doing, day to day.

Shane Tenny: 03:19 It strikes me just from talking with so many docs and dentists over the years, that there's certainly a high level of intellectual fortitude required to enter the profession, and then for many, there's like a restless intellectual curiosity. As much as we lament the 10 or 12 or 14 years of education and training, once you kind of get settled, after a couple of years there, it kind of becomes this appetite or this space to continue to learn or grow or things like that. Does that kind of resonate with a little bit of what you're describing?

Marshall Kurems...: 03:50 Yeah, 100%. So medicine, like a lot of disciplines, but for sure, it's no exception, but it's a lifetime of learning and becoming a lifetime student is what keeps one skill sharp and allows you to stay at the top of your game. Things changed so much, but it's also just patently clear that you can't practice medicine the way you did exclusively 15 to 20 years ago, because things will evolve and change. So you got to keep up. You got to remain hungry. When that wanes, probably some of your passion has waned as well. At some point in time though, the exams stop and in addition to just simply learning and reading for one's own gratification or to keep up, there might be other ways to fill the time because it's different without the constant rungs of the ladder to climb when you have exams, boards, certifications, and various steps that are required. I've been taking standardized exams, either to get into medical school or to gain all of my board certifications and then to maintain those certifications for 25 years now. A lot of exams.

Shane Tenny: 05:03 Then that leaves you with a little bit of interest, I guess, in your case, it wasn't fitness or culinary school. It was this business and finance appetite that you had. Talk a little bit about just where you began to feel that interest and what led you into exploring the opportunity with LOUD.

Marshall Kurems...: 05:20 Part of it was merely engaging with friends who were able to be successful with what they were doing, regardless of career. Successful in life, right? Successful people and I started to really think about that. Hey, what am I looking for? What am I trying to do? I don't want to be Marshall the doctor or the orthopedic surgeon, right? I'm a person, I'm a guy, I'm a husband, I'm a father. Yes, I'm a doctor, but I'm also somebody that likes to learn. Somebody that likes to do. I'm somebody that likes to teach. I like to give and I realized that my purpose here is probably to have some sort of impact or some sort of change. So I just think that I wasn't meant to just do one thing and to fall into a routine or anything that might be somewhat stagnant. That is the interesting thing about the whole process of medicine.

Marshall Kurems...: 06:09 All of a sudden, you spend all this time getting the education, the training and the hands-on experience that you need and then boom. One day, it changes and you are the person. You might be part of a team, but you're the person that everybody is looking up to, after years and years and years of trying to get there. So after quite a bit of time of doing that, I think my focus started to realize, and we all change. I'm simply not the same person I was 5, 10 years ago, and 10 years ago, I couldn't have anticipated that. I had no idea what was coming or where my interests would lie. Then it kind of just organically happened that you spend this time talking to people and seeing what they're like, you find your role models, the people that you like, and that you aspire to want to emulate.

Marshall Kurems...: 06:54 You start to follow those patterns. The person that you're most like is the aggregate of the five people you spend the most time around kind of thing. So that 5 to 10 people that I spend time around has continued to evolve. So have my interests and a lot of that has centered on, can you make an impact? Can you do something different for yourself and for others, in another space, another opportunity, and that's kind of like the big picture idea of how I got there, along with some specifics too.

Shane Tenny: 07:22 Did you decide from your network and talking with friends and things like that, that the element of business that you'd like to explore further was venture capital, or did you end up connecting with the folks at LOUD Capital, where you're now an associate, we talked about that. Did you connect with them and realize, "Oh, that's the sort of business I want to be in?"

Marshall Kurems...: 07:41 So, it's the latter. Very clearly, it's the latter. Your smarts to kind of think about it like, "Hey, how did you end up there?" Well, I think when I'm able to share this story with others, when I'm able to talk about this, when people say, "Hey, tell us a little bit about your background," the one thing that I think is important is that there's a very human side to my story, that a lot of people can either appreciate or they can resonate with, and here it is. So our co-founder and CEO is another physician, Navin Goyal, and he is an anesthesiologist in Columbus, Ohio. He started a company which is doing very well and then he started a venture capital company with our other co-founder as well. Navin and I met many years ago as groomsmen in a wedding. So what's funny is that we were groomsmen in a wedding together and meeting for the first time.

Marshall Kurems...: 08:32 The core of that story is that the guy that brought us together was a guy that we both respect and love deeply, actually a general surgeon from training in Charlotte, and that's where I met him. This guy, we both think the world of and respected, and Navin knew him from childhood, like decades, and I met him, but I had a very, just powerful bond and connection with him during residency. So we were a couple of his, whatever, half a dozen or so groomsmen they had, however many, and so we met and then all the way through the wedding. Fast forward, several years later, and the same group of people, actually like three times that many, were meeting in Austin, Texas at his house for a 40th birthday party that he's putting on. We had a four-year-old and a two-year-old. We are two thirds of the way across the country. There was every reason not to go. It's been a while since I'd seen him, it would have been easy not to do it. I could not, I was never going to let that happen. My friend meant so much to me.

Marshall Kurems...: 09:30 We go and we're having fun and we're talking life and business and medicine and success, pathways and journeys and how we can become the best version of ourselves and our friend looks at me and says, "All the things you're asking me, I was in your shoes a couple of years ago. I think you should go talk to Navin again. I think you need to spend some time with him. Ask him about his venture capital company. Ask him what he does outside of medicine as an anesthesiologist." Wouldn't you know it, two and a half hours later, and this guy had my ear and we're talking about it and so, what I can't tell you is why that, but I can tell you that it was the person and soon as I realized the people, that was the inspiration.

Marshall Kurems...: 10:11 So it found me, if that makes sense. It found me, I didn't find it, and it was the circumstance. It was a trusted friend and now a partner. It was the purpose and the vision. It was the energy and it was the belief that we could do big things together as a team, that led me to get involved. That's really how that started. So it wasn't me selecting venture capital. It wasn't me selecting LOUD Capital. It was Navin and I mutually selecting each other, because we already had a background and he was a guy that I could trust. Sometimes, you can't break it down any further than that, because it's organic and it's real, and it's the narrative of the story. I'm super happy and proud of it because I'm not sure it works in a different scenario if it's not this.

Shane Tenny: 11:01 Yeah. I mean, the point you're making, which is, especially in business, it comes down to the people, as opposed to putting together a spreadsheet of business opportunities or venture capital firms and cold calling to find out which one might be a good fit for you, it's that relationship. Now let's take quick rabbit trail to define for anybody who's listening, what is venture capital? Can you define that and break it down for us?

Marshall Kurems...: 11:27 Yeah. What the heck is that, right? It's one of those things that if you're not super into it, then it may sound just kind of nebulous. Well, it's early stage investment in companies and people, entrepreneurs, startups. So terms that might be familiar or used are angel investors, venture capitalists, or private equity. They're all kind of on the continuum and spectrum of, some investor at some stage that is interested in the success of startup companies from either the infant stage, all the way to a very mature stage and angels would come before VCs or venture capitalists would come before private equity or PEs. All that means is the amount of risks on the left. There's a lot of risk and sometimes a lot of money that goes in, but a lot of money that theoretically can potentially come out and on the right it's a little bit more mature. It's a little bit more stable and so those relationships would be reversed and that's very generalized term.

Marshall Kurems...: 12:24 But the nice thing about venture capital is you get to, if done properly, in my opinion, and this is what we do, have a very hands-on approach, a very proactive and involved role in the support and development of the companies and people that you are choosing to support. So it is far more than raising and deploying capital. For us, it's helping to grow and shape these companies and provide them with the leadership, the resources and the network that they may not need. All you have to do is try to start a company, right? You don't need to succeed, but if you've tried it or been a part of it, whether as a solo or part of a bigger team, there's a lot. The idea seems like the hard part. That's not the hard part.

Marshall Kurems...: 13:09 The inspiration or the idea may seem like a struggle at first or may come naturally however, it's the implementation and the execution that is really the gem, particularly in 2020, 2021. Everybody's trying to do everything. Compound everything where there's a race to get your product or your widget or your app out as fast as possible. So being a part of that and helping people succeed, that's the thrill.

Shane Tenny: 13:34 What you're describing, I'm sure there's somebody listening, saying, "This sounds like Shark Tank," the TV show on ABC. Is that what you're doing? Do you get to sit in a big leather chair while people pitch you their ideas, and then you guys all look at each other and vote and say, "Yes."

Marshall Kurems...: 13:46 All right, I would be lying if I didn't own the fact that as recently as January of 2020, before the pandemic, I did do that in Charlotte, with some people who had me there as the featured guest on behalf of LOUD Capital and five or six companies pitched to me there and yeah, they wanted capital. They're startups and they want capital. So no, it's not like that most of the time, but there are times when it is like that. We did do a very cool joint venture project with the Chicago Bulls. That was a year long project and that actually wrapped up in March of 2020, right before everything truly came crashing down, at kind of sentinel events in the country, the last regular season game that the bulls played, we did. We had almost like a mini Shark Tank kind of thing, where for Chicago startup companies, they were able to pitch to us online through a video submission and then they were filtered out through four rounds of evaluation, competition and judging, many of which were in-person.

Marshall Kurems...: 14:47 Ultimately got whittled down to five finalists who were evaluated at the center court of the United Center in Chicago, in front of a panel of five judges and a winner was selected and then presented, to their surprise, during the Bulls' game with one of those big, fancy, large checks that's like as big as we are. So yeah, that was kind of it. But most of it is people reaching out, wanting to talk, wanting to share about their company. They have a raise going on so they're seeking capital, they're seeking money. Then we are recruiting money from investors who are investing with and trusting in us, as we do the due diligence to source and vet and find these companies that we believe in, and then we pool them together in a fund and we invest in these companies in exchange for equity.

Marshall Kurems...: 15:37 That's ultimately what happened. There's different ways to do it. There are nuances that every company might do, but I think the general flavor would be something of multiple companies in a fund or a certain pool of money is raised, and then these companies are supported as they try to head towards some sort of an exit, either public or being acquired by a bigger company.

Shane Tenny: 15:56 So I want to ask you in a minute, when we get right back from this break, on what it takes to get involved in something like this. So I'll take you there in just a minute.

Shane Tenny: 16:10 Do you have a financial junk drawer? Even before I describe it, you probably know what I'm talking about. Just like that proverbial drawer in your kitchen or laundry room. You know, the one filled with pens and pencils, screws, and duct tape, matches, chopsticks, maybe even an old sock. The drawer filled with things that you didn't know where else they belong. Well many of us, as we go through life, accumulate a sort of financial junk drawer, filled with an insurance policy we bought from a college roommate after graduation, an old 401K that we never moved from an early job or bank accounts that we opened to get a car loan or mortgage, even though we don't bank with that institution.

Shane Tenny: 16:53 The more products, accounts, and policies you have, the harder it is to create a centralized vision and progress towards the goals that you have. Whether you're working with a professional financial planner or trying to tackle these things by yourself, the more organized you can be, the more effective you'll be at making the changes and monitoring the results towards the goals that you have. If you need help in this regard, click on the show notes below and download our free guide, Five Steps to Organize your Finances. I can't say it's a fun way to spend a weekend, but you'll be amazed at the progress you can make if you'll just start cleaning out your financial junk drawer.

Shane Tenny: 17:40 All right, so Marshall, we were talking before the break, just about, I guess, your trajectory from medicine into the world of venture capital and the relationship that you formed, that allowed you to be part of the firm LOUD Capital. You were describing, kind of the Shark Tank-esque type of thing, even if it occurs virtually, as you all evaluate business ideas and business visions and determine what is a prudent investment, for you and for your investors. My question is for a colleague listening today who thinks, "That sounds really interesting, I would love to be involved in something like that," what's required. Is it enough to have a unique knowledge base that you bring to the group? Do you need to have your own money that you're planning to invest? Do you need to have connections to be able to raise money? How do you get involved? What do you have to do?

Marshall Kurems...: 18:30 That's a great question. So what do folks need to do? Well, there are different angles. One of the ways that people can get involved is simply to become an investor, what we call limited partner. That's actually how I started and got involved like that. So you don't simply walk in and join a company like that. Certainly not at this level, but there was a need and a role that the company needed to fill. I was able to fill that need, but I started as an investor, a limited partner and invested in their first venture capital fund and then I wouldn't go away. I wanted to learn more. I wanted to know more. I wanted to help. I offered to help. I was donating my time and what I was doing was acquiring experience. I sat in on calls. I read the documents, I got involved. I'm a self-starter and doer and this is how it worked. This is several years ago now, when things were much smaller.

Marshall Kurems...: 19:21 So part of that was also, to be fair, circumstance and timing and things like that, and a prior relationship. So yeah, it takes something. It takes network or knowing somebody, it takes reaching out on social media. It takes some capital to get involved. In my particular case, what ended up happening was it was a great match for both sides. What I was able to provide to the company was useful and what they're able to really give to me, in return, was something that led to a fulfillment that I didn't realize was missing. So that's why it's been a real good relationship, all the way from associate now to full partner and a member of the team that sees everything from the highest level of documents and the due diligence, knows about the ins and outs of the money and the plans for the company.

Marshall Kurems...: 20:07 It can be done. There won't be a cookbook recipe for it, but reach out, when one is interested, you reach out and try to establish some connections. A lot of people have reached out to me over the last couple of years because I make my email, my cell phone pretty available to people and they just want to have a chat. They heard a podcast, or they read something and they say, "You seem like the average physician. You seem like somebody that I can relate to," and that's exactly the goal, to be blunt. I really love telling the story because I feel like there's nothing terribly extraordinary about me and what I'm telling here is something that a whole bunch people can relate to.

Marshall Kurems...: 20:48 They can say, "I worked my tail off forever to be a physician. It's what I wanted to do. I still like it, or I still love it. Some things are different or have changed. Maybe I'm different and maybe I don't know what I want to do. Maybe I know exactly what I want to do. Maybe I need more. Maybe I need more money. I need more financial sense and wellbeing so I'm going to seek it, and you did that." And that's exactly what happened and so I enjoy trying to help people navigate that process. Everybody's got a little bit different kind of angle, but sometimes it just helps to kind of hear that anybody can do this, from any background, whether you grew up wanting to be a businessman or businesswoman, or whether you started out always wanting to be a surgeon and somehow find your way pivoting to doing some other really cool, unique stuff, because you like it and you're pretty decent at it.

Shane Tenny: 21:36 Now, you started as a limited partner and so the opportunity to invest in projects is something that's often prevalent for physicians. Are there any prerequisites that you can share that you would say, "Look investing in VC or investing in some sort of private placement type thing can be great, but don't miss some of the basics. You definitely want to have this, this and this kind of ticked off your list before you go trying to put capital here."

Marshall Kurems...: 22:01 Absolutely and I appreciate you asking this, but as a financial planner and advisor, let me just tell you some things, because again, here's what ends up happening. A lot of doctors, not just doctors, but a large part of my network, at least on the investment and financial side, ends up being other physicians. The reality is, is that a lot of physicians trust physicians and it's a great thing because it stems all the way back to the Hippocratic oath. But the creed that we live by in the business world, as a physician founded venture capital firm, and where a third of the partners are physicians, is we have to do right by you.

Marshall Kurems...: 22:40 The goal is looking for win-win scenarios, not how fast can you make some money and at what expense can you do it? We will not do that. LOUD Capital will not do that. So a lot of times when you hear us speak, many people feel that it's authentic and it's from the heart and it just feels real and that's because we are speaking from that, so we try to do business the same way we would practice medicine and we hope that that comes across that way. So with that as a background, a lot of folks will come and they'll say, "Hey, what should we do?" And so without providing financial advice to them or anything like that, I'll say, "Here are a couple of things. One, when you're doing that, obviously it goes without saying, but needs to be said, you need to be an accredited investor for some of these things. Then two, get your loans down. I mean, get rid of the things with the interest rates that are above a certain percent."

Marshall Kurems...: 23:27 I mean, everybody's going to be different. I have my number that I had to clear those credit cards, your high interest stuff. I came through an era where student loan rates were very different, much lower, than they are in more recent times. So while I had a large balance, the rates were favorable and they could lock in on something. There's a tendency to get involved the doctor house or to have some lifestyle creep and that can be really dangerous. So there's so many different philosophies and strategies, and ultimately you have to decide what you're going to do. Are you going to spend, because that's how you prioritize things or are you going to save? And for me, it's not just saving, it's investing. You need to have your money working for you and growing so that ultimately, as doctors, most of what we do, we make money when we are at work. You trade time for work.

Marshall Kurems...: 24:12 My whole philosophy in the last five years has been finding ways to make sure that I was making money when I'm not working, if that makes sense. So there's a whole class of assets in the alternative investment space, real estate, metals, gold, art, there's venture capital and private equity type stuff, assets of that nature that are different from stock market based stuff, for example. So most of the time there's no correlation with the market and so it's a way to diversify and a lot of times we have chats with people about this as they tell me, and there are some times when people are pretty young, very little debt, a lot of cash on hands and they're just saying, "I really don't know what to do. I've got tons of money tied up in the market. I have everything paid off. We have our 529s are funded. We've done our IRAs and our 401Ks and our backdoor ROTHs and all this kind of stuff."

Marshall Kurems...: 25:03 And I'm thinking. "Yep, yep, yep, yep. Definitely. Good for you. You are ahead of the game because I was a knucklehead and I didn't do it right. I didn't listen to certain people that might be interviewing me right now, all the time and I wish I'd known then what I know now, but it's never too late." So finding successful strategies to help you grow your money is an important way to get rid of the stressor of thinking that your job as a physician is tied completely to your ability to manage all your finances and to provide for your family. It's a bad feeling to have that and a ton of physicians have that. I really enjoy helping them realize that if you put in the time and the money, then in due time, with proper investing strategy, you can get to a point where it is not all, go to work as physician, to make money as a physician, to pay bills.

Shane Tenny: 25:58 You make the right decisions or the smart decisions, you're able to move through your career from the stage where it's you having to go to work, to the stage where it's your money going to work, to generate the money that you need. I think your point is well taken. I was definitely shamelessly asking you a little bit of a leading question there, but there can totally be the space in a plan for a lot of docs to add VC or to add alternative type things or real estate or commercial property, and it is often so helpful or preferable to take care of the foundation, the blocking and tackling first, whether it's a student loans, emergency fund, cash, basic debt management.

Shane Tenny: 26:44 If you get that inverted, then you can easily get into a pickle if you get a capital call or loan issues or underwriting issues or things like that.

Marshall Kurems...: 26:52 Or a pandemic comes.

Shane Tenny: 26:54 Or a pandemic comes. Yeah, exactly. How do you balance the time? You're a full-time practicing orthopedic surgeon and you're a partner in a VC firm and you've got a family. Do they ever get to see you? Or how do you juggle all this?

Marshall Kurems...: 27:08 So quality over quantity is one motto, sleep less and that sounds silly and usually makes people laugh. It's just, some of the most influential people in my life and they're not at all in medicine and they're are people that I've only met in the last five years, you hear some things like no excuses, talk less and do more, kind of thing. If you are aiming for something, if you want to become the best version of yourself, it will not be easy. There will be sacrifice. I think that's one of the biggest mindset changes that I've had is to go do and talk and dream less. It's amazing what that has done. I'm not there yet, but it feels different and the actions, they are different now, too. There's more purpose and more intent as opposed to just, I'm going to be in this position. No, I need to go get in that position, all right, and it's going to take time and I'm going to fall down, and when I fall down, I'm getting up because I've got a no quit clause.

Marshall Kurems...: 28:05 So you have to think about it in that regard. The other thing is, I've had to make decisions. What's important to me? I am still as big a sports fan as I typically run into, the stats and the enjoyment of the games and participating in things as an individual, but really just pro and college sports, I love it. Well, when all of this stuff happened last year, with coronavirus and events were canceled or seasons were shortened and truncated, or they were interrupted and then resumed, I gave up a lot of stuff that was a habit for me. Now I don't binge watch hours of Netflix or things like that on the weekend kind of deal, but I'm a heavy football consumer. I'm a heavy hockey consumer. I love basketball and you start getting into it and you realize like, you know what, that's a lot of stuff. So what ended up happening was I chose what's important to me and right now, trying to do as well as I can in my jobs, for the people that are depending upon me and for my family, that's my priority.

Marshall Kurems...: 29:04 I will make time for my health too, but make time for everything else. It has to fall in line because you cannot do it all.

Shane Tenny: 29:12 So Marshall, as LOUD Capital looks at different investment opportunities, are you all kind of focused on a particular type of business venture or idea, or do you primarily look for investment opportunities within healthcare or medical devices or things like that, since so many of you are physicians or are you kind of open to any type of industry?

Marshall Kurems...: 29:31 Yeah, we're open. So we're industry non-specific or industry agnostic. We cover about 11 or 12 different sectors, everything from healthcare and software to blockchain, to energy and transportation, we cover a lot of different ground. What we're interested in are people and stories and somebody who has a vision to make the world a better place. That really is it. I mean, our motto, our slogan is, "Venture for people," and those words were chosen very carefully because it's all people. We want everybody to have access to capital, particularly underrepresented or traditionally excluded groups and it's everybody. That's super important to us and I'll be on record as saying, we'll take slightly less profit or financially in the end, however it is to shake out in the future. It's way more important that we do the right thing and that we back people who are making the world a better place and doing good business in the right way than it is about the absolute bottom line.

Marshall Kurems...: 30:34 That's not lip service because I think, when you look at the companies we've invested in and who their founders are, whether it's by race, whether it's by gender, whether it's by background, whether it's by area of the country, we actively seek that. That's where many of the best ideas are so any industry, any sector, as opposed to just a healthcare fund or anything like that. What that allows us to do is diversify the fund itself, but also it's allowed us to speak to a ton of different people who have very, very good ideas, good business plans, tons of passion and motivation, and they're going to get it done.

Shane Tenny: 31:09 So Marshall, thinking about some of the projects you guys have funded in the past, what's one of the more interesting types of things that you guys have gotten behind?

Marshall Kurems...: 31:18 Yeah, that's a great question. I mean, they certainly won't all be winners because there's some risk involved in this and that's the unknown. You're investing in people and companies for the long-term, as they go from little specks and you're trying to get them to become ready to fly out on their own and be really successful.

Marshall Kurems...: 31:34 Well, one of the coolest things that we've gotten involved with is an energy company that uses hydrogen, which breaks down to water and that process is able to power their vehicles from automobiles to potentially airplanes. So something like that is revolutionary in that there's no electric, it's not an electric vehicle. There's no battery. There are no fossil fuels or diesel or anything like that. The by-product is water so the longer you driver to go with it, the lighter it gets because more and more water gets put out. So from an emission standpoint, from a public safety and health, from an environmental standpoint, as well as just from a practical application, that kind of stuff is disruptive to an industry and it's really cool to see that company, which is part tech, part energy, part transportation, and really an amalgam of all that, thrive.

Marshall Kurems...: 32:28 Another company that we are invested in is on the health care side, which is trying to bring access and improve access to care through mobile initiatives. For example, trying to provide mobile anesthesia to pediatric dentist practices or provide mobile care to more rural industry, more rural areas and bringing physicians or providers through a large truck that would have medical equipment supplies and diagnostic capabilities, to these communities that are underserved, where maybe transportation would be difficult. We like to get involved in great people who have a vision to try and change the world and make it a world that would be better for everybody that's involved in it.

Shane Tenny: 33:13 Marshall, is there a favorite story or a scenario of investment that LOUD's been able to do that you're particularly proud of?

Marshall Kurems...: 33:20 Yeah. That's a great question. I'll tell you that I'm an advisor for an opportunity that I am incredibly happy to be a part of. It's called our Pride Fund and the Pride Fund supports members of the LGBTQ community. The only prerequisites to being a portfolio company in the fund are that its founders need to be a member of the LGBTQ community or its product, its service, its invention, needs to service that community. It's great because the LGBTQ community has been underserved and underrepresented in the business world for what seems like ever, and not only are there challenges in that regard from access to capital and opportunity, but then there's this underlying current of an inability to be oneself, to be open and free and honest and I sat in on a call last week with somebody who was pitching LOUD Capital for money, and they're trying to do something crazy, crazy, incredible with, let's just say with one of the major insurance companies that would benefit senior citizens.

Marshall Kurems...: 34:30 In the end, this entrepreneur was emotional at having the opportunity to be able to discuss his background, on a personal level, with us because of the intent behind us, which is specifically, we want to make sure that the companies that are going to be great and make the world a better place, who have gay founders or service the gay community, that they get what they need, and somebody needs to look out for them because they haven't. They are very empowered to know that there's somebody that is looking for them because the LGBTQ community feels like nobody ever looks for them. It's called the Pride Fund and I'm proud of it. I don't know how else to say that, without being repetitive, but I'm proud to be a part of that and to help because, not only the company is doing awesome things that are going to benefit everybody, that's the really cool thing, but there aren't that many other organizations that are trying to do something this specific, to service part of our community that really could benefit from it.

Shane Tenny: 35:34 Marshall, thanks so much for your time this afternoon and for sharing your story, your passion, the opportunity that exists when you're willing to think big and chase the side gigs.

Marshall Kurems...: 35:43 Shane, thank you for having me as your guest. I appreciate you and your firm very much and this was truly my pleasure to be able to talk about venture capital and my story and LOUD Capital with our audience. Thank you.

Outro: 35:59 This episode of the Prosperous Doc Podcast is over, but you're not alone on your journey. Spaugh Dameron Tenny has been helping physicians and dentists prosper through financial planning for over 60 years. To connect with us, visit SDTplanning.com today and take your financial wellness to new levels. Join us on the next episode of the Prosperous Doc Podcast.