# BYU Cougar Capital

> BYU Cougar Capital is a VC fund backing Software and Enterprise Software. See 41 investments, check sizes, portfolio and contact details. Updated Aug 2026.

- Type: VC Fund
- Location: Provo, United States
- Total investments: 41
- Last investment: Feb 2023
- Lead investor: 12%
- Last updated: Aug 2026
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/cougar-capital
- X (Twitter): http://twitter.com/cougarcapital
- Website: http://byucougarcapital.org

BYU Cougar Capital is a VC fund in Provo focused on Software and Enterprise Software. Cougar Capital is a student-run venture capital and private equity evergreen fund run by 2nd-year MBA students at the Marriott School at Brigham Young University.Cougar Capital partners with venture capital and private equity firms and becomes a member of the syndicate team conducting due diligence on potential investments. When appropriate,Cougar Capital will co-invest with the industry partners in the deal.Started in 2005, Cougar Capital has produced alumni currently working in private equity, venture capital, investment banking, and award-winning entrepreneurial startups. Forbes magazine recently designated Cougar Capital as one of the most innovative business classes in America.

## Contacts

5 contacts available for BYU Cougar Capital. Shizune tracks 3 team members at BYU Cougar Capital. Sign up free to unlock them: https://app.shizune.co/sign-up/investor-profiles/find-team-emails/cougar-capital?utm_source=investor_profile

## Investment focus

### Industry

| Industry | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Software | 18 | 44% |
| Enterprise Software | 9 | 22% |
| SaaS | 8 | 20% |
| Analytics | 7 | 17% |
| Information Technology | 6 | 15% |

79 industries tracked in total.

### Stage

| Stage | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Series A | 12 | 29% |
| Series B | 11 | 27% |
| Series D | 6 | 15% |
| Seed | 2 | 5% |
| Series C | 2 | 5% |

9 stages tracked in total.

### Country

| Country | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| United States | 32 | 78% |
| Canada | 1 | 2% |

## Team

| Name | Title | Investments | Profile |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Alex Herd | Director of Competitions | 0 | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/alex-herd |
| Jared Stone | Industry Advisor | 1 | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/jared-stone |
| Gary Williams | Founder & Advisor | 0 | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/gary-williams |

## Investments

| Company | Description | Amount | Stage | Date | Website |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| GrainChain | GrainChain creates an exchange platform with blockchain-based solutions for prompt payment and accountability.Since the dawn of agriculture, human beings have continually sought higher efficiency and security in the production and trading of food. The modern age has seen the economics of agriculture and soft commodities repeatedly transformed bysudden technical innovations, a pattern which will continue to repeat itself. In the 1850’s advancements in refrigeration and food preservation dramatically lowered food prices and increased availability. In the 1940’s innovation came in the form of gasoline tractors replacing horse drawn plows. Today, blockchain technology is poised to play a major part in the agricultural revolution of our time. GrainChain’s patent pending solution utilizes blockchain technology to address numerous issues present within the soft commodities markets, such as fraud at all stages, large and small-scale corruption, payment delays, access to futures commodities market, and a cycle of debt that is difficult to escape. GrainChain changes this. GrainChain utilizes the well-known properties of blockchains to address the systemic problems present in soft commodities markets, an industry in which the GrainChain team already has first hand experience in building software solutions. The GrainChain system greatly increases transparency and accountability within the agriculture business by eliminating disparate and wasteful paper trails, greatly eliminating the opportunity for fraud and dramatically reducing time and costs. It ensures the prompt and secure execution of contracts between farmers and buyers, by both automatically facilitating payment to the farmer and making available the corresponding financial instrument for trading on commodities markets while verifying it is backed by only real assets in the system. This shortens a process that can currently take weeks down to a nearly instantaneous one. GrainChain benefits farmers, buyers, brokers, storage facilities, banks, suppliers of agricultural goods, governments, and ultimately every food consumer on earth; everyone that benefits from a more honest and efficient agricultural industGrainChain was first introduced in 2013 by an inventor and entrepreneur Luis Macias. | $29M | Venture - Series Unknown | Feb 16, 2023 |  |
| Neurala | Neurala is the company behind The Neurala Brain—deep learning neural network software that makes smart products like cameras, robots, drones, toys and self-driving cars more autonomous and useful.Unlike traditional AI companies, which designed for super computers connected to the Internet, our first project was for NASA to be used for autonomousplanetary exploration. Super computers were not available. Battery life was limited. Fast internet access was impossible. Our deep learning neural networks had to be lightweight and perform in real-time without ground intervention.With our constraints, we modeled the Neurala Brain on animal brains because animal brains are highly efficient “computers” that do more in less space and with less power consumption than the computers we use today. The brain also knows how to use eyes (cameras) and ears (microphones). This approach worked and we are now bringing The Neurala Brain to market. Our smart, fast, anywhere brain works on systems from single board computers to large servers. | $12M | Venture - Series Unknown | Jun 24, 2021 |  |
| Dragos | Dragos is an industrial cybersecurity company on a mission to safeguard civilization by protecting the world’s critical infrastructure. Dragos codifies the knowledge of our cybersecurity experts into an integrated software platform that provides customers critical visibility into ICS and OT networks so that threats are identified and can beaddressed before they become significant events. Our solutions protect organizations across a range of industries, including power and water utilities, energy, and manufacturing, and are optimized for emerging applications like the Industrial Internet of Things (IIOT). Dragos is privately held and headquartered in the Washington, DC area with a regional presence around the world, including Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Europe, and the Middle East. | $10M | Series A | Aug 14, 2017 |  |
| Visier | Visier People is a people analytics and workforce planning solution, provides you with answers to hundreds of pre-built, best practice questions about your workforce, across HR and business topics.Designed by people data and HR experts to include the answers you need to strategically manage a complex workforce, Visier People supports you and yourpeople analytics and planning needs, from start to finish. With an unmatched all-inclusive subscription model, Visier People gives you access to a Customer Success team that doesn’t stop with onboarding your data, but is focused on continuously delivering you with new business value, so that your returns grow and grow. | $45M | Series D | Mar 15, 2017 |  |
| Canopy | Canopy is the all-in-one practice management platform top-rated on G2 in both Tax Practice Management and Accounting Practice Management.It's built for U.S. CPA, tax, bookkeeping, advisory, and multi-service accounting firms of all sizes. Canopy consolidates CRM, workflow, document management, month-end close automation, time and billing,client portal, and AI into one platform with one login — replacing the disconnected stack of point solutions most firms cobble together over time.Where most practice management tools are strong in one area and shallow in others, Canopy is purpose-built to serve as a firm's entire operating system. Client relationships, engagements, deadlines, documents, communication, and payments all live in one place, giving every person in the firm a single source of truth from onboarding through billing.With good, better, best pricing, firms can start with what they need today and add capabilities as they grow — without switching platforms, retraining staff, or migrating client data to a new system. | $20M | Series B | Mar 13, 2017 |  |
| Chatbooks | Each year, we collectively take 3 trillion photos on our phone—and most of those memories get lost in a digital abyss, never to see the light of day. Chatbooks is on a mission to make creating a photo book as easy as taking a picture. The $8 photo books, which automatically pull photos from your Instagram, Facebook, and Camera Roll via 5-StariPhone and Android apps, are designed to tell the ongoing story of your life with zero effort: Over 100,000 users are actively subscribed to get new Chatbooks with every 60 photos they take, and will buy over 1 million books by the end of 2015. Today, our experiences and memories are more valuable than ever—and Chatbooks helps you hold on to what matters. | $11.5M | Series B | Feb 07, 2017 |  |
| Neurala | Neurala is the company behind The Neurala Brain—deep learning neural network software that makes smart products like cameras, robots, drones, toys and self-driving cars more autonomous and useful.Unlike traditional AI companies, which designed for super computers connected to the Internet, our first project was for NASA to be used for autonomousplanetary exploration. Super computers were not available. Battery life was limited. Fast internet access was impossible. Our deep learning neural networks had to be lightweight and perform in real-time without ground intervention.With our constraints, we modeled the Neurala Brain on animal brains because animal brains are highly efficient “computers” that do more in less space and with less power consumption than the computers we use today. The brain also knows how to use eyes (cameras) and ears (microphones). This approach worked and we are now bringing The Neurala Brain to market. Our smart, fast, anywhere brain works on systems from single board computers to large servers. | $14M | Series A | Jan 17, 2017 |  |
| True Fit | True Fit is a footwear and apparel discovery platform. Its Genome is mapped from the world’s largest collection of attribute-rich fit and style data for footwear and apparel. Genome helps retailers and brands unlock digital growth in the $1 trillion footwear and apparel industry. It powers the Confidence Engine, allowing retailers to provide highlypersonalized fit ratings and size recommendations to shoppers, resulting in dramatic increases in net revenue.True Fit is also helping to unlock digital growth with its Discovery Engine, which allows retailers to curate highly personalized collections for each consumer, and its True Insight platform provides retailers and brands unparalleled insights to optimize marketing, merchandising, and product development.True Fit is led by an experienced team of executives and leaders from the fashion, retail, big data, and e-commerce, and is backed by top investors. | $25M | Series B | Jul 13, 2016 |  |
| Grow | Grow is a business intelligence dashboard software for small and medium businesses that makes it easy to track the right metrics, make good decisions, and lead with confidence.Quickly set up dashboards in minutes, not months; connect data sources like QuickBooks, Salesforce and Zendesk—along with your own databases and spreadsheets—withoutwaiting for IT. Grow helps you grow your business faster by allowing everyone to see the score. Employees engage when they know the score and what they can do to win. Leaders who know inspire confidence, respect, admiration, and loyalty so they can lead their teams to success.Founded in 2014, the company is headquartered in Orem, Utah, United States. | $9M | Series A | Jul 13, 2016 |  |
| ObservePoint | For organizations to be truly data-driven, they must answer two vital questions: 1) What is this data telling me about our customers? and 2) Can I trust my data?Since its creation, ObservePoint has empowered insights-driven companies to trust their data and create better experiences for their customers with analytics testing and data governance.Our automated Technology Governance solution enables companies to scan their digital properties for data collection errors—ensuring they are collecting accurate data to guide their decisions.Now with Privacy Compliance and Campaign Performance, ObservePoint helps organizations comply with regulations to protect customer data as well as standardize campaign tracking to capture complete, actionable insights.Together, ObservePoint’s Data Governance solutions bring insights, automation, and compliance to the chaos of customer experience data. For more information visit www.observepoint.com. Follow ObservePoint on Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Facebook. | $7M | Series B | Mar 29, 2016 |  |

10 of 41 investments shown.

## Co-investors
- [Pelion Venture Partners](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/pelion-venture-partners) — VC Fund, 14 deals together
- [AllegisCyber](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/allegis-capital) — VC Fund, 5 deals together
- [Kickstart](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/kickstart-seed-fund) — VC Fund, 5 deals together
- [Peterson Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/peterson-ventures) — VC Fund, 5 deals together
- [Signal Peak Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/signal-peak-ventures) — VC Fund, 5 deals together
- [EPIC Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/epic-ventures) — VC Fund, 3 deals together

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- [Alumni Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/alumni-ventures-group) — VC Fund
- [General Catalyst](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/general-catalyst-partners) — VC Fund

## FAQ

### What does BYU Cougar Capital invest in?

BYU Cougar Capital invests primarily in Software, Enterprise Software and SaaS startups, most often at Series A and Series B stage. Most of the 41 investments tracked by Shizune back companies in United States. The Investment Focus section breaks down every industry, stage and country in the portfolio.

### How do I contact BYU Cougar Capital?

Public channels for BYU Cougar Capital include LinkedIn, X (Twitter) and the website linked on this profile. For a verified work email and phone number, create a free Shizune account — contact data is searched across 20+ sources and validated before delivery, so your outreach lands in the right inbox.

### Who are the partners at BYU Cougar Capital?

The team at BYU Cougar Capital includes Alex Herd (Director of Competitions), Jared Stone (Industry Advisor) and Gary Williams (Founder & Advisor). The Team section lists each member with their title, investment count and links.

### Is Shizune's investor data accurate?

Yes — every stat on this profile is calculated from confirmed public funding rounds monitored across hundreds of sources since 2020. This profile was last refreshed in Aug 2026 and is updated monthly. Spotted something off? Use the “Suggest an edit” link near the top of the page.

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