---
title: 'Starting a conversation about early stage investment in the Portland startup community'
date: '2016-09-07T23:28:05-07:00'
type: post
word_count: 263
char_count: 1538
tokens: 342
categories:
  - '#featured'
  - Oregon
  - Portland
  - Startups
tags:
  - Community
  - conversation
  - 'early stage'
  - Portland
  - 'randy fernando'
  - Startup
  - vault
---

# Starting a conversation about early stage investment in the Portland startup community

[As Randy Fernando of Vault closed, “Let’s start a conversation.”](https://medium.com/@randyfernando/oh-portland-74bfbcf68541#.3qgo1vkqm "Oh Portland") No doubt, this is going to be a topic of conversation for weeks to come. From my vantage, it’s not an isolated story. And Randy’s post serves as an eloquent recounting of a personal experience—one that reflects numerous other fundraising stories circulating around Portland for early stage startups—and a plea for all of us to work to change it.

> There are some great companies that have failed due to the toxic culture that cloaks the Rose City. And there are also some companies that I know of right now in Portland that would be doing so much better if they relocated, which is extremely sad.

> Portland founders — if you have experienced things similar to what I have mentioned above, you are not alone. The silver lining is that through this tedious process I have actually come across people who are genuinely looking to help driven folks like us. If you have a great idea and a great team, you may just have to push yourself out of your comfort zone in order to find them. This post was written to simply shine light on a problem that I know can be fixed. Let’s start a conversation.

For more, read [“Oh Portland…” on Medium](https://medium.com/@randyfernando/oh-portland-74bfbcf68541#.3qgo1vkqm "Oh Portland"). For more on Randy’s company, visit [Vault](http://getvault.com/ "Vault").