Permanent capital is money with no return date. A permanent-capital owner buys a company to hold and operate it indefinitely, rather than to sell it inside a fund's ten-year life. There is no exit deadline, because there is no fund.
Curious is a long-term holding company that buys and grows software companies with empathy. This page explains the structure we use, where the money comes from, how it pays for itself, and what it means for a founder deciding who to sell to.
The phrase gets used loosely, including by funds that have a clock and would rather you didn't notice it. Here is the test we'd apply to any buyer who claims it, including us.
The vehicle holding the company has no wind-up date and no obligation to return capital by a given year. If there's a fund with a vintage year, there's a clock.
Ask a buyer: when does the vehicle that owns my company have to return capital?
The owner makes money by running the business well, from profit, not by selling it to the next owner at a higher multiple. That single difference changes every decision after close.
Ask a buyer: how does this investment pay you if you never sell it?
Money already on the balance sheet rather than capital to be called or borrowed. It's why we can say sixty days and mean it, and why there's no financing risk in our letters.
Ask a buyer: is the purchase price already funded today?
The unglamorous mechanics, because they're what actually determine how a company gets treated after close.
Linear growth over exponential. Sustainable over unsustainable. Calm over urgent.
Backed by operator LPs with cash on our balance sheet, so there's no financing risk. People who have run software companies chose a long hold on purpose, which is a different investor conversation from a ten-year fund.
Returns come out of company profit over many years. That makes pricing discipline matter at the front end and makes cost-cutting theatre pointless at the back end.
We don't need debt service to work, so the product roadmap isn't negotiated against a covenant. This is the quietest and most important difference for the team.
Five majority-owned companies: Convox, Buildfire, Avenue, Polymer, UserVoice. We still operate all of them. That's the whole track record, and it's checkable.
Every buyer behaves the way their capital tells them to. Pick what matters most to you and we'll point at the structure that fits, even when it isn't ours.
Certainty comes from where the money sits. Cash already on a balance sheet closes; a fund still calling capital, or a marketplace buyer arranging a loan, does not always. Permanent capital and any all-cash buyer win this one, and you should ask to see proof of funds either way.
Permanent capital is money invested with no return date, so the owner can hold and operate a company indefinitely instead of selling it to satisfy a fund's timeline.
Curious is a long-term holding company that buys and grows software companies with empathy.
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