Altered Capital Research
Investment Thesis
Altered Capital is an Auckland, New Zealand-based venture capital and private equity investor founded by a team with prior experience at international venture and growth-equity firms. The firm's stated mission is to "unlock potential" for founders, employees, and investors, and it reasons from first principles, breaking an investment thesis into its fundamental components before building conviction from an axiomatic basis. Altered backs "strong leaders and teams" first and ideas second, favoring driven, domain-expert operators over pure ideation. It requires evidence of product-market fit, proven unit economics, and commercial traction before funding: "the proof is in the prerequisites," and the firm does not fund pre-revenue, concept-stage companies. Altered runs three fund strategies: a New Zealand-biased Venture Capital program, an International Co-Investment program sourcing high-growth opportunities through global relationships, and a New Zealand-biased Private Equity program.
Stage Focus
Altered Capital invests from Seed through growth and late-stage rounds, with a clear bias toward companies that already have proven product-market fit rather than concept-stage startups. External directories describe its focus as spanning Seed, Series A, Series B, and Series C. Its 2026 Venture Fund II (NZ$100M) is explicitly positioned to boost Series A and B funding for New Zealand technology scaleups, backing companies with product-market fit across technology, healthcare, and financial sectors.
Check Size
No explicit check-size range is published on the firm's own site. Given fund sizes involved (NZ$100M Venture Fund II, reported $250M FUM / $1B FUA) and its growth focus, checks likely range from the high hundreds of thousands into eight figures for larger co-investments, but a specific range could not be independently confirmed.
Lead Tendency
Altered Capital states it takes both majority and minority stakes across a broad range of transaction sizes: "We lead funding rounds, and we follow... focused on alignment and empowerment, not on titles and control."
Recent Activity
Altered Capital has been active through 2026. In February 2026 it closed and began deploying a new NZ$100M Venture Fund II, anchored by a NZ$25M commitment from the Crown-owned NZGCP Elevate Venture Fund, earmarked to boost Series A/B funding for NZ tech scaleups. Around the same time (announced ~February 3, 2026), Pie Funds became the first KiwiSaver provider to invest in Altered Capital, allocating up to ~4% of its Pie KiwiSaver Aggressive Fund (roughly $80M) to the manager. In May 2026, portfolio company Abe's Bagels was acquired by George Weston Foods (a subsidiary of Associated British Foods), delivering an exit for Altered's Private Equity Fund I. Nicholas Fogarty rejoined Altered's private equity team after four years in the private equity team at Soul Patts in Sydney, sourcing and executing transactions and serving on portfolio company boards. The firm describes itself as having $350M+ in committed capital, $180M+ deployed, 20+ investments made, and 5+ funds raised across its history, with roughly 24 active/exited positions visible on its public portfolio grid.
Portfolio Highlights
Named portfolio companies with public case studies include: Crimson Education (global college-admissions and online education platform founded by Jamie Beaton, headquartered in Auckland, one of NZ's best-known tech scaleups), Emerge (formerly SquareOne, a Kiwi digital banking alternative for consumers and SMEs), Abe's Bagels (Australasian bagel brand producing 100,000+ units, exited to George Weston Foods in 2026), Oritain (forensic origin-verification for global supply chains, serving major apparel and food brands), Starboard Maritime Intelligence (Wellington-based AI-powered maritime domain awareness software for defence, fisheries, and security customers), and MacroActive (an Auckland-based ownership and coaching-software platform for fitness and nutrition creators, invested October 2023 following an 18-month relationship). The portfolio page also displays Addepar (US wealth-management data platform) as an international co-investment, alongside roughly two dozen further active positions across New Zealand, the US, UK/EU, and Australia that are not individually named on the public site.
Team
- Craig Mawdsley, Founding Partner
- Marcus Traill, Founding Partner
- McGregor Fea, Managing Partner
- Finn Templeton, Partner
- Laura Manson, Partner
- Mark Ashley, CFO (previously led Crimson Education's finance function, scaling it from roughly 40 to 700 employees)
- Heath Milne, Investment Manager
- Joshua Commons, Investment Analyst
- Sam Rapson, Investment team
- Stuart Inglis, Investment team
- Nicholas Fogarty, Private Equity team (rejoined in 2026 after four years at Soul Patts in Sydney)
Decision Process
Altered Capital describes itself as a small, entrepreneurial team that "moves fast" once it identifies alignment, consistent with a partnership-style decision process rather than a large investment committee.
Founder Preferences
The firm backs "driven doers and accomplished technicians with domain expertise," explicitly prioritizing people over ideas. It favors founders solving genuine problems in unique ways, whether via disruptive new products, new market categories, differentiated consolidation plays, or "old-economy" businesses ready for transition, provided they can show data-driven proof of product, sales, and unit economics.
Geographic Focus
Altered Capital's Venture Capital and Private Equity funds carry an explicit New Zealand bias, while its International Co-Investment fund sources high-growth opportunities globally. Confirmed portfolio geographies include New Zealand, Australia, the United States, and the UK/EU. The firm is headquartered at 54 Mackelvie Street, Grey Lynn, Auckland.