Yale graduate and former Goldman Sachs partner Mike Ryan is transforming investment decision making with Bullet Point Network (BPN), a SaaS company that he co-founded and has developed from the ground up.
BPN uses its unique interactive platform to offer analysis services to Private Equity and Venture Capital Funds, enabling investors and executives to make more informed decisions.
Ryan, a veteran of Wall Street with almost two decades at Goldman Sachs, started his career as an analyst and later served as Co-head of the Global Equity Business. After leaving Goldman Sachs, he started a family office and subsequently managed $6B of direct investments and $12B in allocations to outside managers for Harvard University’s endowment.
The analytical software that now underpins BPN was initially licensed to Harvard and was later developed into an interactive SaaS platform. The platform builds Strategic Scenario Models, facilitating investment in decision making.
BPN is based on Ryan’s belief in considering a range of outcomes and assigning odds to different potential results. This novel approach aimed to address the gap between intuition and data, providing a platform that integrates critical insights about management teams, market opportunities, product differentiation, and competitive dynamics into quantified scenarios for future cash flow and valuation. BPN focuses on translating these insights into models that help mitigate cognitive bias and ensure sound investment decisions.
“In the midst of market uncertainties and volatile valuations, we’re proud to have forged a path of success,” Ryan told TechBullion. “We’ve created a tool that bridges the gap between intuition and data that enables investors to make informed decisions amid uncertainty. We’re thrilled to see how our clients harness our platform to navigate these turbulent waters, and look forward to continuing to provide a solution that brings clarity and confidence to their investment decisions.”
Despite the inherent challenges of building a new business, Ryan along with co-founder Peter Moore and a team of analysts and developers, have managed to design a platform that aids investors in balancing intuition with data, fostering debate, and capturing a broad range of evidence before settling on key assumptions.
BPN’s core product, the Strategic Scenario Model, provides a comprehensive set of cases for future cash flow and valuation based on the fundamental aspects of businesses. This SaaS platform facilitates debate on key assumptions and maps evidence directly against each assumption. It also integrates with other platforms such as Tableau and Slack, ensuring a seamless experience for its users.
Since its launch, the technology has continually evolved to enhance user experience. While the core analytical engine remains largely unchanged, BPN has made significant strides in improving the user interface and increasing the flexibility of analyzing businesses in different sectors.
A testament to the platform’s success is its implementation across different investment firms such as Patriot Financial, Alpha Partners, and Branded Hospitality Ventures. These firms have incorporated BPN’s platform in their investment process, leveraging the tool to build conviction around investments by translating their unique insights into quantified scenarios (and the probability?) for cash flow and exit valuation.
As for the company’s future, Ryan told TechBullion, “Our primary goal is to help investors and CEOs make better decisions. We know that if we deliver a platform that enables them to harness the vast knowledge and intuition that they have accumulated, translate it into actionable decision making analytics, and improve their investment returns over time, our own success will follow.”
BPN plans to expand its focus beyond professional private equity and venture capital funds, working with SPACs, family offices, independent sponsors, and larger companies for long term capital allocation decisions.
With a clear vision and a unique approach to investment decision making, Bullet Point Network is poised to redefine the way investors and executives perceive and navigate the complexities of the financial markets.
