Our company is known for patient capital and for helping entrepreneurs realize their aspirations. We strive to bring more to the investment than just money, such as human, intellectual and social capital. We also want to receive more than just a financial return on the investment, including learning new insights into consumers and communities.
Investment Portfolio
Investment History
Two entrepreneurs and brothers-in-law, Alfred B. Miller and Elmer Crockett, founded the South Bend (Indiana) Tribune in 1872. The two had worked for another newspaper and believed the growing community could support a third newspaper.
The company launched WGAZ radio (now WSBT-AM) in 1922 – just 18 months after the first station in the United States. WSBT Television began broadcasting in 1952 and is the oldest continuously operating UHF television station in the United States. In 2016, one of our broadband companies, Antietam Broadband, announced plans to build a one-gigabit fiber network in Hagerstown, Maryland – the first privately funded gigabit city in the state – to spur economic development.
We have innovated and partnered with entrepreneurs in all of our industries for decades.
Investment Guidelines
- The company should be in a relatively early stage, but should be generating revenues or well on the path toward validation (i.e. growing customer base).
- A prospective company’s solution should have the ability to achieve scale of some sort (e.g. customers, data, and/or users).
- The firm we are investing in should have a talented management team and/or intellectual property.
- The company needs to provide a product or service that solves a problem for customers. We need to be able to easily understand what the company is trying to do.
- We like well-defined, defensible niche businesses.
- We like recurring revenue.
- SCI would prefer not to lead the round and let other investors set the valuation and terms.
Where We Focus
We are also looking at new industries to enter, such as marketing, education, and human resources services. If we can add more value to your organization than just financial capital, let’s talk.
How to Reach Us
Latest Investment News
Burlington, Schurz Communications Announce Investment in Tech Economy
Burlington Telecom will invest $3 million in the local tech economy over the next 10 years to boost startups and nonprofits in Burlington. The telecom's general manager, Mike Loucy, made the announcement Tuesday at the kickoff for the fourth annual Innovation Week, a...
Online Tech is now Otava!
If you’ve been following our recent #RebootOT campaign, you probably guessed that we’ve had something big in the works. This morning, we announced that Online Tech has changed its name to Otava – and, we have a comprehensive, shiny new brand to go with it! Becoming...
Student startup to make video content more accessible wins Schurz competition
WEST LAFYAETTE, Ind. – Global Sign, a student startup that created a platform to make video content more accessible to those with limited or no hearing through sign language, won the eighth annual Schurz Communications Innovation Challenge. Fourteen teams of both...