Fellowship Spotlight: Z2Sixty Ventures

The catchphrase zero-to-sixty refers to acceleration and high performance in the fast-paced world of car racing. Hernando Bunuan, founder and partner of Z2Sixty Ventures, is bringing that mindset to his new venture fund. He’s using his deep experience, unique skills, extended network, and capital to help founders and startups accelerate their businesses. 

Z2Sixty Ventures backs bold founders building tech-driven solutions to create a smarter, more sustainable, and more impactful society. Bunuan is focused on early-stage founders in four markets that can generate outsized returns: ClimateTech/Smart Cities, FinTech, Digital Health/Aging Society, and EdTech. 

An Experience-Informed Approach

With over 20 years of experience advising and investing across the technology landscape in the U.S. and Europe and a strong network of experts, Bunuan’s work and portfolio have a solid base of support. As a former senior technology banker with experience in major M&A and IPO exits, he originated, executed, and advised on over 35 landmark deals worth over $45 billion.

His background working as an investment banker informs his VC approach. “I saw what the opportunity was for exits over the last 10 years and did analysis based on those exit outcomes,” he shares. “That’s how I focused my own initial ownership in these startups and where I thought I would be able to return the fund based on the potential exit.”

Bunuan is building an initial $20M fund and investing up to $500K checks in pre-seed through Series A. By establishing two parallel $10M funds, he’s creating opportunities for more accredited individual investors to participate with smaller checks in addition to the traditional, institutional investors. “My focus was specifically on trying to make sure I’m intentional about letting certain types of investors enter the fund,” Bunuan says. This means that while Z2Sixty Ventures is funding businesses that make a better world, they’re also building a more diverse and inclusive LP base.

Early-Stage Focus

Given Bunuan’s background, people often wonder why he focuses on the early stage. Throughout his career, he saw the importance of having a “barbell approach,” monitoring trends both with early-stage startups and mature leaders. “You need to know what’s going on in the public, late-stage side, but all those people were also wondering what’s new and up-and-coming on the early-stage side.” With this perspective, he’s committed to keeping this barbell mindset as he evaluates potential founders to back.

Having worked in intrapreneurial teams and also mentoring founders at top-notch accelerators, Bunuan has an understanding of the entrepreneurial mindset that complements his analytical approach. “Although I was part of established organizations,” he says, “I always found it exciting to be working in brand new teams. We essentially applied best practices to launching new business lines or entering new geographies.”

Sharpening a Complex Lens

A diversity of experience has the tendency to expand the way a person thinks and sees the world, and Bunuan represents this pattern matching approach. His lived experience is one explanation for the more complex lens he applies to his work. “I grew up in the Philippines, went to an international school,” Bunuan says, “and then spent 14 years in various U.S. cities for college, business school, and work before spending 11 years in Europe, and most recently returning to the States.” 

With exposure to these different environments and cultures, Bunuan saw how advantageous it can be to embrace diverse mindsets, while also understanding, he says, “that inequalities do exist, and there are ceilings for people as they move up in their career.” He came to believe that there’s also a lot of opportunity in backing the people who encounter these ceilings, hence his focus with Z2Sixty Ventures.

“I really wanted to focus on backing founders and teams who come from diverse backgrounds,” Bunuan shares. He also wanted to focus on environmental, social, and governance factors. “I’m not an ESG fund, per se, but I do apply an ESG lens in looking at the types of opportunities and founders that I have.” Additionally, Bunuan is committed to funding companies that are truly prioritizing diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). 

He believes that teams that are diverse in gender, ethnicity, age, geographic/national culture and veteran status are better able to serve the very broad customer base in his targeted markets. One way Bunuan evaluates the authenticity of a company’s DEI is by looking at the senior management team. “Does someone on the senior management team come from a diverse, minority, or underrepresented background? Do they also have a significant stake in the business?” He emphasizes the true and far-reaching benefit of bringing different people together, saying, “The best high-performing team is one that is always open to diverse opinions.”

VC Include: Living Up to Its Name

When asked about his participation in the VCI fellowship, Bunuan replies, “There’s one word I would use to describe the experience, and it is in the name: include.” He’s grateful for the inclusive environment the fellowship provided to him and his peers. “As an emerging manager and someone who comes from a minority background,” he reflects, “being in a similar group of people going through that experience, who also have the same desire, the same skill set, has been very rewarding and reassuring and definitely created more of a sense of community.” He points to the often challenging and lonely nature of being an emerging manager who falls into these categories, and underscores how helpful it’s been to have the newfound community established through the fellowship. 

In addition to the power of community, Bunuan gained game-changing practical knowledge from the instruction and the connections made by way of the fellowship. “Knowing what we can do to overcome the challenges we face,” he shares, “was very helpful as reassurance that we’re not in this alone and we do have others within VCI and the overall community that are looking to help us succeed.” 

We’re honored to continue supporting Z2Sixty Ventures to succeed in its mission to help companies accelerate the creation of a more sustainable, inclusive, and impactful society.