LA Venture: Operate's Carey Ransom, from Hardware Store to Venture Capital

On this week's episode of the L.A. Venture Podcast, hear from Carey Ransom, the founder and president of Operate, an Orange Country-based venture studio.

Ransom is well known for his commitment to Orange County businesses and community — "a vibrant community," he says, where he works with startups in pre-seed and seed-stage startups.

Ransom began his career working for his family business, a hardware store in small town Indiana. He credits working with his father and grandfather for sparking his successes and business acumen.

Community was a huge focus of his family's business.

"What I have needed to learn about business, about people — whether that's employees or customers, partners, and even community, I feel like I learned growing up in that business," he said.

After attending business school, Ransom led a startup from inception to exit. This launched his career as an advisor and investor, where he is able to "collaborate on the company-building process."

His latest venture — Operate — is centered around innovation.

"We know they [founders] need a lot more than capital," he said. "And if we can find ones that we can love and we can support in a multifaceted way— that's really what Operate is all about."

Carey Ransom is the founder and president of Operate.

"Where we as a society in many respects have lost our way is by trying to boil things down to a single number, as opposed to accepting that the world is way more complex and complicated than that." — Carey Ransom

dot.LA Engagement Intern Colleen Tufts contributed to this post.

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