Lisette Titre-Montgomery: "We will keep knocking on doors and pitching until we find the right person"

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Finding VC support for your studio is complex, and it gets thornier when trying to find a partner that aligns with your views and culture. The difficulty gets further compounded when your studio's founders don't belong to demographic groups that investment firms have commonly supported.

That's what Cornerstone Interactive Studios co-founder and CEO Lisette Titre-Montgomery says as she and her team search for funding.

Titre-Montgomery explains that since launching her studio, she's been learning the ropes of being in a new executive role.

"I've always had my foot in the production side for most of my career. This is my first foray into being a CEO and learning what that means"

"I've always had my foot in the production side for most of my career. This is my first foray into being a CEO and learning what that means. Dipping my toe into what it means to lead a company as a CEO, and it's been overwhelmingly positive," she says.

The CEO explains that support among her peers and colleagues has been encouraging since taking her company public.

However when it comes to finding venture capital partners, Titre-Montgomery says, "The problem is that those people are money people. There's this insular group that I have to figure out how to connect with and pierce."

Along with her co-founders, Raymond Graham and Marcus Montgomery, she explains they have something valuable: decades of experience in interactive entertainment and the games industry.

And even though they receive the same questions from VC firms as other studios, Titre-Montgomery says, "What we get are the actual hurdles of validation.

"No one thinks when we walk in the room that we have 60 years of experience [collectively] because they don't see that every day."

The executive notes that her co-founders are facing these hurdles as an all-Black professional-founded studio. Her experiences also mirror a recent Polygon report revealing how few little women-led firms receive investments.

The CEO says, "They always have to dig into who we are to move past their low expectations. That's just, quite frankly, bias and racism, and there's nothing I can do about it. But that also proves you're not the right partner.

"When we put out the same [energy] as the right partner, that means people understand who we are and what we are about. They're just not out here trying to make a PR campaign with a diversity kick."

She continues, "We don't want those people because we've seen how those deals have played out now that the money is no longer free. Many of those projects have been shut down. We want to own a good business, and it shouldn't matter who we are or what color we are."

"No one thinks when we walk in the room that we have 60 years of experience [collectively] because they don't see that every day"

Titre-Montgomery says that she and her co-founders are quite aware of the current economy and shrinking investment pool. However, that hasn't deterred their efforts, and it makes finding the right VC partner easier.

"Really strong game studios take years to develop, and we want those people," she explains.

"Do I want millions of dollars? Of course, but not with the wrong strings [attached] and not if they will dictate my creative vision. This is how it's always been in my heart. That said, it’s not anything new, and until it becomes [venture capital firms'] problem, they won't change."

The CEO says the goal is to create a studio, games, and culture that will appeal to a more diverse consumer base.

"We know that there's a huge untapped market, particularly for women, Black, and Brown people who have bounced off toxic communities and are looking for somewhere to feel welcomed. And inherently, who we are will attract a certain market and a certain consumer," Titre-Montgomery explains.

"I think if you build it, they will come. I'm pretty confident that once people realize we are different, they'll be fine."

But to reach this point of creating a new studio and having a decades-long career, she explains that survival certainly played an important part as she navigated her experiences at studios.

"There have been times when I struggled with my own survival. I have done that by being really blessed to have people close to me and focusing on what matters," she explains.

"One of those areas is just making good-ass games that speak for themselves, that's how I've always focused. I've also been hyper-focused on creating a pipeline to create change."

Regarding building a more inclusive games industry, she highlights her active work with Gameheads. The organization helps low-income youth and youth of color get hired into the industry. However, she adds, they are "getting hired into the same toxic systems as they had before."

While her career now involves running a studio and encountering unique challenges, Titre-Montgomery says she wouldn't have it any other way.

"I'm more terrified of going back to the way things are like when you experience abuse at a studio. Nowhere is safe except for the places that you build for yourself"

"I'm more terrified of going back to the way things are like when you experience abuse at a studio. Nowhere is safe except for the places that you build for yourself and that's what I'm focused on," she explains.

"I'm more excited about what that feels like day-to-day to look out and have a team that I built that is building great products that doesn't have to deal with the bullshit and just focus on doing good work, but that's my job."

When asked about the games industry's work on diversity, Titre-Montgomery is somewhat skeptical. The CEO notes the statistics for Black game professionals she's witnessed over the years.

"The numbers have gone down since I first started. It was 4% Black, and now it's 1%. So the industry grew. There's technically more of us, but mathematically it's not more," she says.

(Tallies have differed, but GDC's 2024 State of the Games Industry report surveyed 3,000 game developers and placed Black, African, and Caribbean professionals at 3%.)

Titre-Montgomery adds that while some firms now have visible Black executive leaders, their staff still isn't necessarily racially diverse.

"This is why I've started being extremely honest about what's going on. Because I've seen companies do their Black History Month tweet and act like everything's fine. They have a lot of work to do. And these layoffs over the last year and a half have [disproportionately] primarily hit Black and brown developers," she says.

Still, these matters remain important to Titre-Montgomery and her team, so they'll continue the search for the right partners.

"So we will keep knocking on doors and pitching until we find the right person"

"So we will keep knocking on doors and pitching until we find the right person. I'd rather take good money than bad money," she says.

"We've already figured out the hard part. I have a talented team. The stupid part is the money. I know what we're making, who we are, and who my staff would be," she says.

Thus far, she explains that the journey for Cornerstone Studios is only beginning.

"We've been in stealth mode for the last two years building our ideas, soft pitching with friends. So we've hardened what we want, and we know who we are. So [its] the rubber meets the road over the next year or so. We've met with maybe one VC so far that noticed us, but we weren't ready to pitch because we didn't think their program was right for us."

"I'm just waiting for the right person. I like to see these relationships as marriages."

She continues, "I need to trust you [because] you're going to know all of my business, and I'm going to know all of your business. We're going to be intertwined until we exit or until we no longer need your money."

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