Serial entrepreneur Bill Spruill has been named board chair for the Council for Entrepreneurial Development. He’s tasked with supporting the group’s mission of connecting entrepreneurs to resources to accelerate business growth.
Spruill grew Raleigh data firm Global Data Consortium from nothing into a $20 million company working in 70 countries. Earlier this year, it sold to London Stock Exchange Group, a deal that Spruill said made millionaires out of some team members.
Spruill wants more GDCs in the Triangle. And to do it, he’s turning to the Council for Entrepreneurial Development (CED), where he will lead the board through Sept. 30 of 2024.
Spruill has a long history at CED, which is based in Research Triangle Park. He was employee number five “way back when.” Later as and entrepreneur, he saw the group’s value firsthand. Following the GDC exit, he was “at a place where I could give back, both in terms of time and money.”
“It was a no brainer for me to want to engage and do this role with CED,” he said.
MORE: How Raleigh data firm pivoted its business model to become a $20M entity
Spruill has outlined a long list of priorities, but it starts with the founders.
“How do we help more founders in the tech community?” he said. His personal mission statement will be “to drive the inclusive growth of the Triangle tech ecosystem to a position of tech dominance over the next 10 years.”
It’s been his mission through repeated mentorship conversations over the years, he said.
“Why wouldn’t I want to engage and help drive forward a focus on founders and the growth of the founder teams in this region?” he said.
Entrepreneurs today face a slew of challenges, from financing to hiring top caliber talent. And macroeconomic concerns linked to a possible recession weigh heavily on the minds of some founders. Spruill said it doesn’t change the mission.
“A potential recession is definitely adversity, but it’s also opportunity,” Spruill said. “It’s a way to pressure test your business. It’s a way to better understand what your customer needs are going to be.”
And if you’re building the right business with the right product-market fit, there’s going to be an opportunity, he said.
“Some of the best companies out there have been grown out of a recession,” Spruill said.
The big challenge
Triangle Inno asked Spruill what an entrepreneur’s biggest challenge is.
“To some degree, I’m going to use the term learning,” he said. “Understanding the next set of challenges that face the founder or the founding team. How do you learn from that entrepreneur who is just ahead of you?”
That’s where CED should come in, as the ultimate connector. Spruill said his experience might not be relevant to a newly-minted entrepreneur, “but talking to a founder that is two years ahead of you in that journey or one year ahead of you… it actually creates more value.”
Spruill wants CED to facilitate those conversations.
“It’s how do we create more networks and communications in an aligned way with founders,” he said. “That’s the big challenge we’re facing. Everything else underneath that, whether you want to talk about funding, product market fit, culture, all those other things, it all comes from connecting, finding the right contacts who are just far enough ahead of you to be able to provide that relative near-term value.”
Talent is a huge issue for startups. Hybrid work means you are competing with global companies. But it also means you can access a global workforce.
“I think we have to stop being afraid of the problem, acknowledge that it’s an opportunity and not a problem, get out there and get it,” he said.
Spruill is still with GDC. But he is spending more and more time planning with CED and hiring staff for his new startup, 2NDF.org. The firm will be focused on a combination of traditional angel investment and philanthropic areas.
“The focus will be minority education and entrepreneurial development,” he said. “We’ll also be looking at how do we help with capital formation.” Locally, an area of focus as he builds its portfolio is deep tech, he said. Globally, he’s interested in data-driven businesses.
It’s early in the business plan, as the firm has yet to write its first check. But Spruill is excited.
Spruill is going on a month-long vacation, a long-planned trip to Europe. And then he’s hitting the ground running, both at CED and at his new venture. Its mission is also to drive the ecosystem – so it aligns, he said.
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