The Central Intelligence Agency’s venture capital arm needs a new chief. In-Q-Tel’s CEO Amit Yoran said Monday he has resigned from the firm, after four months in the firm’s lead role.

Mr. Yoran said he resigned to spend more time with his wife and three children, adding that when he took the job, he hadn’t expected to do quite so much traveling. He’ll remain aboard in a consulting role while In-Q-Tel engages in another nationwide search for his successor.

An interim CEO is expected to be announced in coming days. This will be the second such search in the past year. In January, Mr. Yoran was tapped to succeed from Gilman Louie, who had been running In-Q-Tel since 1999.

What is it about In-Q-Tel that makes it so tough to keep top managers? In an interview with RedHerring.com, Mr. Yoran said the role was demanding, but did not place any blame on the firm. He did acknowledge that his former employer functions differently than a typical VC: Its investors are government agencies, and has its own attendant bureaucracy.

Having said that, he added that “it was not substantially harder to do deals here than elsewhere.”

“We’re not just looking for strong IRR, but rather working for the noble cause of national security,” he said, referring to the fact that In-Q-Tel invests in companies whose technologies show promise for helping the spy community at the CIA and other intelligence agencies, as well as assisting with other national security functions.

”Unlike other investors, we have a strategic mission and focus, so if we have a potential investment that doesn’t fit the strategy, that would be a deal we'd probably pass on,” he said.

He did allow that the travel associated with deal-making on In-Q-Tel's behalf was substantially more than the 25 percent to 30 percent travel he had expected upon taking the job. He noted that he had logged about 100,000 air-miles this year alone, to do deals in several states.

Mr. Yoran, a former captain in the US Air Force, came to In-Q-Tel after serving as director of the National Cyber Security Division at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security since September 2003 (see New Chief at CIA’s VC Arm).

Before President George W. Bush appointed him to that post, he had co-founded and managed Riptech, a venture-backed network security firm that Symantec acquired in 2002. After the acquisition, Mr. Yoran worked for Symantec as vice president of worldwide managed security services.

Early in his career at the Department of Defense, he was also director of the vulnerability assessment and assistance program for the U.S. Department of Defense Computer Emergency Response Team (DoD/CERT).

Mr. Yoran said he had no immediate plans other than to spend more time with his family. Whether he might consider another venture capital pursuit, or an operational role at another company, he said he remained undecided.

“In-Q-Tel has benefited from Amit’s vision and leadership during his tenure as CEO,” Lee A. Ault III, chairman of In-Q-Tel’s board of trustees, said in a statement.

Growing Budget

Under Mr. Yoran’s leadership, In-Q-Tel’s budget has grown to more than $50 million, and the group has completed a number of investments.

Last month, In-Q-Tel announced an investment in Initiate Systems, a Chicago-based company that has developed software for identifying individuals and entities from different types of information sources. Two other venture firms, Sigma Partners and Apex Partners, also participated in the financing.

In January, In-Q-Tel signed an agreement to invest in Nextreme Thermal Solutions to develop new thermal management and power-generation products.

Last month, Google acquired one of the companies in which In-Q-Tel invested, @Last Software, which develops 3D design software.

The CIA established In-Q-Tel in 1999 and so far it has worked with about 90 companies and helped bring more than 120 technologies to market.

One candidate could be Mark Frantz, managing general partner of In-Q-Tel. Mr. Yoran brought him on board last month. Mr. Frantz had worked at Carlyle Venture Partners since January 2001, focusing on the technology, media, and telecommunications sectors.