Patricof Co has spent nearly a decade pooling athlete capital for investment opportunities, and now it’s taking that endeavor a step further.
On Tuesday, the advisory practice and investment firm L Catterton announced the formation of a strategic partnership. The initiative, called Champion Athlete Managing Partner, or “Champ” for short, aims to create outsized growth for consumer brands using Patricof Co’s deep bench of athlete partners, who also will participate as investors in any deals. It will raise $500 million, and sports stars have already committed more than 10% of that figure, according to The Financial Times.
Athletes who have partnered with Champ are the NBA’s Tyrese Haliburton, Cade Cunningham and Cooper Flagg; the WNBA’s Azzi Fudd, Cameron Brink and Sophie Cunningham; the NFL’s Dak Prescott, Ja’Marr Chase and Joe Burrow; and MLB’s Mike Trout, Tarik Skubal and Bobby Witt Jr. Also involved are Kevin Durant’s 35 Ventures and former college gymnast and influencer Livvy Dunne.
The partnership is the latest entry in a long-running relationship between Patricof Co and L Catterton; the two have co-invested in brands such as Cholula Hot Sauce, Kodiak Cakes and Real Truck. The LVMH-backed L Catterton has roughly $40 billion in assets under management spread across private equity, credit and real estate strategies. The Connecticut-based firm, which was founded in 1989, writes checks ranging between $5 million and $5 billion, and it has made over 300 investments in consumer brands thus far.
Patricof Co was founded in 2018 by its namesake, Mark Patricof. The son of legendary venture capitalist Alan Patricof, he started his career and co-founded incubator KPE in 1996, which was sold to Omnicom six years later. He launched another initiative, media and entertainment advisory firm Mesa, and sold that to Houlihan Lokey in 2015, where he later worked as a managing director.
Patricof created relationships with sports stars, including Durant, via his role in Most Valuable Partner, a TV show where entrepreneurs pitch investment opportunities to sports icons. From there, he launched Patricof Co in September 2018 with $200 million in co-investment capital from JP Morgan Private Equity Group, with former Seattle Seahawks defensive lineman Cliff Avril as his first client. In addition to past investments in companies like Bombas, Daily Harvest and SpaceX, Patricof has bought into farm land and launched a platform for athletes to invest in precious metals, according to Sports Business Journal.
(This story has been updated in the second and fourth paragraphs with additional information about the fund and about L Catterton.)