J.P. Morgan, the commercial and investment banking business of JPMorgan Chase, is further positioning itself as a player in the innovation economy, looking to fill a white space left by institutions that failed during the 2023 U.S. banking crisis.

Earlier this month, the firm released the first two ads in a series designed to increase its awareness among venture capital-backed early-stage business founders. The spots highlight customers Gridware and Gamma, a software company that identifies disruptions in electrical grids and an AI platform that creates presentations and slide decks, respectively. Each ad spotlights the clients’ founders and why they banked with J.P. Morgan.

Both spots are running on digital and social platforms accompanied by digital out-of-home placements in San Francisco. J.P. Morgan will roll out creative showcasing various clients into 2025.

The marketing push is the second phase of the Limitless Growth campaign J.P. Morgan launched in October 2023, which aimed to promote the firm’s stability as a banking partner at every step of an innovative business’ growth trajectory.

The Alt League provided creative services while Revery handled production and Dentsu partnered on media.

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Servicing Silicon Valley startups

J.P. Morgan’s services include creating networking opportunities with investors for clients and discussing how their businesses fit into personal wealth management. The firm can also leverage its fortress balance sheets, which are financial statements that protect a company's assets and money by having more equity than debt.

“Following the market disruption and regional banking crisis, that was very attractive to many companies after they went through this traumatizing experience,” said Tanya Clark Marston, managing director and head of innovation economy marketing at J.P. Morgan.

Besides increasing awareness among founders, the campaign aims to affirm that J.P. Morgan works with companies of all sizes and dissuade early-stage founders from the notion that it only works with companies as giant as itself. It highlighted Gridware and Gamma to demonstrate that it can provide focused expertise to niche businesses.

“We want to make sure that they were in different sectors but also showcased the technology-based nature of things,” Marston said. “These are different types of companies than a small business startup that might be a more traditional revenue-generating company off the bat.”

J.P. Morgan also wanted to highlight California-based companies as part of its awareness-building efforts in the Bay Area, she added.

“There’s such a huge ecosystem and concentration of founders and funders here,” she said.

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Leading the innovation economy

J.P. Morgan identified a dearth of banks catering to early-stage innovative and technological businesses following the collapses of Silicon Valley Bank, First Republic Bank and Silvergate Bank last year due to liquidity shortfalls and rapid deposit withdrawals. All three catered to tech companies and high-value individuals holding large deposits and marked three of the largest bank failures in U.S. history.

To prevent further destabilization, the federal government and regulators protected deposits at these banks and initiated takeovers. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation in May 2023 sold First Republic’s assets to J.P. Morgan for $10.6 billion. Some politicians criticized the move, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who said it showed how “deregulation has made the too big to fail problem even worse.”

J.P. Morgan began accelerating its innovation economy business, which it formalized in 2016, soon after the purchase, Marston said. Since then, it’s hired hundreds of bankers and set up dedicated teams for software, applied tech and climate tech clients as well as early-stage startups.

It’s currently opening new branches in the Bay Area to cater to the high-value clients previously served by First Republic. After initially struggling to provide those customers the luxury service they were accustomed to, J.P. Morgan in July converted old branches into financial centers where it studied its newfound clientele and reported findings back to its broader network. This fall, it opened its first of many Bay Area branches to put those lessons into action for techy, high-value clients.

Many of those clients are investors and founders in the innovation economy, Marston said. With a physical presence in 19 countries, J.P. Morgan is banking on its size and scale to beat digital-first competitors serving innovative startups.

“Where we feel we can bring so much more to the table is our global capabilities,” Marston said. “As a company scales and needs to go global, we can help with that.”