Bluegrass Angels
Bluegrass Angels is a volunteer-led angel investor group in Lexington, Kentucky, founded in 2004 to fund and mentor high-tech Kentucky startups. It invests broadly across the Commonwealth, and as of 2026 just one company in its portfolio works on water: ElectraMet, a Lexington firm whose electrochemical filters pull metals out of industrial wastewater.
Compiled by Antoine Walter, (don't) Waste Water, from official filings and direct intelligence in Leviathan.
The take
Bluegrass Angels takes its name from the Bluegrass region of central Kentucky, and the geography is the whole point. Founded in Lexington in 2004, it is a volunteer-led club of Kentucky business leaders who pool their own money to find, fund, and mentor high-tech startups in their home state, then syndicate the larger rounds with angel groups across the country.
Bluegrass Angels writes some of the first cheques a Kentucky founder sees beyond friends and family. Across more than two decades it has put over $20 million into 50-plus Kentucky companies, aiming for five to seven new bets a year in whatever high-tech sector a local team is building, from health software to hardware. It is a generalist by design, not a thesis-driven sector fund.
Bluegrass Angels is not a water investor in any deliberate sense, and the data is blunt about it: across that whole portfolio, exactly one company touches water, backed across two funding rounds. That company is ElectraMet, a University of Kentucky spinout based a few streets away in Lexington, whose electrochemical cells use carbon electrodes to pull lead, copper, and other metals straight out of industrial wastewater, with no chemical sludge left behind.
Bluegrass Angels is best understood, for a newcomer to water, not as a water fund but as a local-first net that occasionally catches a water company. The next ElectraMet, if it comes, will likely arrive the same way this one did: not from a water thesis, but as a Kentucky deep-tech startup that happens to solve a water problem in the state's own backyard.
Water Commitment Score
Compiled from official filings, third-party records, and direct intelligence from investors and founders, in Leviathan · recomputed monthly · as of Jun 2026.
How they invest
Portfolio · 1 water companies
Invests alongside
Highlighted = profiled on (don't) Waste Water.
Frequently asked
- What does Bluegrass Angels invest in?
- Bluegrass Angels invests in high-tech Kentucky startups, usually at the first stage beyond friends-and-family money. Bluegrass Angels is a generalist group rather than a sector fund, spreading more than $20 million across 50-plus Kentucky companies since 2004 and aiming for five to seven new investments a year.
- Who runs Bluegrass Angels?
- Bluegrass Angels is led by its own investing members, not outside fund managers. As of 2026, Chris Young chairs the group and manages its BGA Venture Funds, with Jo Ellen Hayden serving as a fund manager and Brian Luftman on the venture-fund board. It is volunteer-led by Kentucky business leaders.
- Is Bluegrass Angels a water-focused fund?
- Bluegrass Angels is not a water-focused fund. Bluegrass Angels is a generalist Kentucky angel group whose water exposure is a single company: ElectraMet, a Lexington maker of electrochemical metal-removal systems for industrial water. (don't) Waste Water rates the group's overall water commitment One-Off, reflecting that lone deal in a broad portfolio.
- Where is Bluegrass Angels based?
- Bluegrass Angels is based in Lexington, Kentucky, in the heart of the state's Bluegrass region. Founded in 2004, Bluegrass Angels draws its members from across the Commonwealth of Kentucky and invests almost entirely in Kentucky-based startups, syndicating larger rounds with angel groups elsewhere in the United States.
- Is Bluegrass Angels the same as the BGA Venture Funds?
- Bluegrass Angels is the member angel group; the BGA Venture Funds (Funds III, IV, and V) are the pooled vehicles its members invest through. They share leadership: Chris Young is the angel group's chair and the funds' lead manager. The two work together but are distinct structures.