Cognitive ^g Capital Group, LLC was founded in 2018 by Eston Woodard to provide outsourced fundraising and corporate advisory services for select investment managers and operating companies seeking institutional capital. Cognitive ^g assists established, emerging and niche private issuers, as well as non-US entities seeking access to a fully compliant distribution framework.

The firm helps early, growth, and lower-middle market operating companies with obtaining debt financing, raising equity, recapitalizing assets, seeking secondary liquidity, LBO’s, M&A, MBO’s or corporate business development and strategy. We particularly focus on enterprise software, TMT, professional sports, tech-enabled services, transportation, infrastructure, real estate and energy.

Cognitive ^g’s capital formation service executes targeted yet comprehensive sales and marketing programs that represent our clients in a differentiated and compelling manner. We work dynamically with internal business development teams, or as an outsourced syndicated distribution network to help managers gain access to leading VC’s, pension funds, RIA’s, family offices, endowments, HNWI’s, BDC’s and sovereign wealth funds.

The firm takes its name from the Charles Spearman’s theories of General Intelligence.

• • Psychometrically, g as a construct refers to overall mental capacity behind a person’s performance on any number of cognitive tasks.
• • Statistically, g is a way to account for variance. ¹

English Mathematician, Henry T. Piaggio summarized Spearman’s theory is a (1) A mathematical theorem, that when all the tetrad differences such as (rabrcd-racrbd) formed from N variables a, b, c, d, . . . vanish, each variable may be considered as the sum of two parts (or ‘factors’) which are numerical multiples of a general factor g (the same for every variable) and of a specific factor s (different in each case). These N + 1 factors are all uncorrelated with each other. (2) The attribution principally to mere error of sampling of the non-vanishing of the small tetrad differences formed from dissimilar mental measurements. (3) The interpretation of g as general mental energy, and of each s as a specific ability.

In the hedge fund space, managers endeavor to deploy creative strategies that consistently generate alpha yet remain less correlated with broader market returns. Multi-variate factor models help each manager express their respective thesis. However, investors are tasked with translating these somewhat esoteric models into repeatable processes that adhere with their investment committee guidelines. Our firm distills complexity enabling allocators to more readily comprehend your methodology, a reflection of g.

Raising institutional capital is a daunting exercise for many fund managers and private issuers. Today, there are numerous competitors, gatekeepers, consultants, and social distancing concerns which have made it exponentially more challenging to develop relationships with professional allocators. While larger funds counter this with well-established brands, superior technology, and large development teams, smaller managers may lack these resources. Our mission at Cognitive ^g is to level the playing field by providing niche and emerging managers with the access to allocators that only experienced executive-level leadership can arrange.

Top-decile performance alone is not enough for a manager to successfully grow their franchise. Marketing and sales campaigns must effectively differentiate firms, convey selection and risk management processes, and explain investment return drivers. Further, these campaigns must be led by an experienced network of professionals who can translate the noise. Cognitive ^g’s approach incorporates all these elements to effectively engage institutional investors.

Eston Woodard is the Founder and Managing Partner of Cognitive ^g Capital Group LLC, a Stonehaven LLC Affiliate Partner (www.stonehaven-llc.com). Stonehaven, led by David Frank, CFA, is a NYC based global private capital markets FinTech platform that has placed over $7 Billion across hedge funds, private equity, private credit, secondaries, and M&A. The network comprises over 50 independent Affiliate placement agents and investment bankers who have relationships with the top 2500+ institutional allocators.

Mr. Woodard focuses his efforts on institutional capital raising, private credit, and secondaries for investment managers with niche and non-correlated strategies, particularly real assets. He is responsible for manager selection, due-diligence, market syndication, investor research and placement activities.

Prior to launching Cognitive ^g, Mr. Woodard was a Managing Director at Riverside Management Group/BCW Securities, a Westport, CT based family office and merchant bank, where he was responsible for deal sourcing, alternative investment manager research, and institutional capital formation. Mr. Woodard spearheaded engagements for venture capital, direct technology, and real estate private equity managers. During his tenure at RMG, Mr. Woodard either advised or participated in $250 MM of successful financings across many verticals including: maritime, natural resources, blockchain, real estate and alternative energy.

Eston began his sales career in software and enterprise cloud computing. He held progressively senior roles at XEROX, Oracle, and IBM.

Mr. Woodard earned an AB in English from The College of William & Mary in 2002, a Master of Arts in Religion with a Concentration in Social Ethics from Yale University in 2004, and an MBA in Banking with Merit from The University of London in 2011. He holds FINRA Series 7, 62, 63, 31 and 65 securities licenses and is a Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst (CAIA) designee. Additionally, Eston is a Professional Member of the CFA Society New York.