Chris Carter of Ponte Vedra Beach is an angel investor and advocate for entrepreneurship and innovation, having served in a variety of mentorship, advisory, consulting and venture development roles in support of entrepreneurs and their visions. He has been actively involved in the entrepreneurial ecosystem in Northeast Florida, serving on, and moderating, several panels at innovation conferences and events, as well as judging entrepreneur pitch competitions in the region. He has proactively developed relationships with innovation communities and universities throughout Florida, local and regional government officials, and state organizations like the Florida Venture Forum and Launch Florida, a consortium of entrepreneur organizations and accelerators throughout the state formed to promote entrepreneurship and innovation in Florida.
Most recently Chris served as President of One Spark Ventures (OSV), the Florida Social Purpose Corporation formed to identify and develop ventures with talented teams and scalable ideas that participate in One Spark sponsored programs. Chris has worked with the One Spark’s Board to restructure and rebrand the organization away from its broad focus and crowdfunding roots to a focus on high caliber teams with scalable business ideas in targeted market segments that could, potentially, create new businesses and jobs in the region and provide a source of deal flow to the local investment community. Chris has worked closely to mentor and advise several portfolio teams on strategy, operational, business planning and funding issues, several of whom have now raised equity rounds and are scaling to launch, or that have launched, commercially.
Prior to this Chris was principal of a boutique consulting firm that provided venture development, strategic business advisory, and interim management services to corporations and VC-backed enterprises. He previously led strategic venture and business development initiatives for divisions of Fortune 500 companies, including Panasonic, CBS, and the former Bell Atlantic Corporation.
Chris earned his MBA in finance at the Sellinger School of Business and Management, Loyola University and a bachelor’s degree in economics and business administration at McDaniel College.