Sam Blond is leaving Founders Fund, as well as the profession of venture capitalist, just 18 months after he joined the storied Silicon Valley firm.
For now just immense gratitude to FF and all the incredible people and… — Sam Blond (@samdblond) March 4, 2024Before joining the VC firm, Blond was best known as the former Chief Revenue Officer at Brex.
Brex is not a Founders Fund portfolio company, although Founders Fund is an investor in one of Brex’s biggest competitors: Ramp.
We hope to have the opportunity to work with him again,” Founders Fund spokesperson Erin Gleason tells TechCrunch.
But this is the second splashy departure of a Founders Fund partner over the past couple of months.
TechCrunch has learned that the program, known as the “Startup Qatar Investment Program,” is backed by a Qatar Development Bank (QDB)-managed $100 million fund.
Like most venture ecosystems, several of these requirements are mandated by limited partners, primarily sovereign wealth funds, in the Gulf upon these venture capital firms.
Just last week, Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund unveiled a $1 billion venture capital fund of funds dedicated to international and regional venture capital funds.
For Qatar, launching its fund of funds and startup program signifies a crucial step toward developing its tech ecosystem to rival its neighbors, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
Last year, the MENA region experienced a 23% decline in venture capital activity compared to the global average of 42%.
Inspired Capital is celebrating its fifth birthday with the closing of its Inspired Capital Fund III with $330M in capital commitments.
The New York-based early-stage venture firm was founded in 2019 by entrepreneurs Alexa von Tobel and Penny Pritzker.
They went on to raise $200 million for a debut fund and then $281 million for its second fund in 2021.
“Venture capital, when properly deployed is actually the most powerful economic engine that the world has ever seen.
As part of the new fund, Inspired Capital wrote a manifesto that highlights how the venture capital firm thinks, what it believes in and what it is looking for.
Black Tech Nation Ventures launched in 2021 to address the funding gap for Black founders amid a wave of venture diversity initiatives after the murder of George Floyd in 2020.
Three years later, amongst growing backlash against DEI and diversity-focused investments, the firm’s mission may be more important now than when it started.
The firm found initial fundraising success in 2021, and held a first close on $25 million that year, he explained.
“We have seen funding to diverse founders and Black-led venture funds decline rapidly.
The firm will also collaborate with Black Tech Nation, the nonprofit that is run by BTNV general partner Kelauni Jasmyn that created a digital network of Black tech professionals, when it can.
Crypto fund Asymmetric Financial is creating its Bitcoin DeFi Venture Fund I to focus on investing in the blockchain’s nascent space with a target raise of $21 million.
The fund will be spearheaded by general partner Dan Held, former director of growth at Kraken and long-time Bitcoiner.
Many Bitcoin-focused VCs ignore DeFi because it’s speculative, and broader crypto VCs see it as a “dead boomer rock,” he added.
Much of this activity has centered on the Ethereum blockchain, but Held believes Bitcoin’s blockchain has tons of future potential as an ecosystem.
“It will be a Bitcoin DeFi renaissance.”“Bitcoin is worth more than every other crypto asset combined,” Held added.
But a new venture capital firm, funded by some heavyweight legacy construction companies, is out to change that.
Zacua Ventures has launched its inaugural $56 million fund targeting early-stage construction technology startups, backed by 19 of the construction sector’s biggest corporations.
Vivin Hegde, Mauricio Tessi Weiss and Juan Nieto started San Francisco-based Zacua in 2022.
Hegde was previously with construction tool maker Hilti Corp, while Tessi Weiss and Nieto were at Cemex Ventures.
Since the launch of its fund, Zacua Ventures has invested in over a dozen startups across the construction technology ecosystem.
Dubai-based early-stage venture capital firm COTU Ventures is announcing that it has raised $54 million for its inaugural fund to support startups in the Middle East from pre-seed to seed stages.
Founder and general partner Amir Farha revealed in an interview with TechCrunch that COTU Ventures is inclined slightly towards fintech and B2B software.
Noteworthy investments by COTU Ventures include Huspy, a UAE mortgage platform backed by Peak XV and Founders Fund, and Egyptian fintech startup MoneyHash.
While at Beco Capital, Farha and his partner returned the first fund following Uber’s acquisition of Careem.
By fostering such open dialogue, COTU Ventures aims to establish trust and strong connections with founders, enabling informed investment decisions.
The Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) is launching a $1 billion venture capital (VC) fund of funds for international and regional venture capital funds, the sovereign wealth fund announced on Monday.
Similar to typical fund-of-funds structures, QIA’s initiative will invest indirectly through other VC funds but also make targeted co-investments with participating funds.
These funds, aiming to reduce reliance on oil, have increasingly poured money into tech startups in the region, hoping to nurture a thriving venture capital industry.
However, unlike Jada, the PIF’s $1 billion fund of funds and Saudi Venture Capital (SVC), which targets both venture capital and private equity funds, QIA’s fund of funds focuses solely on venture capital funds, marking the first of its kind in the region.
Historically, these wealth funds have backed foreign startups primarily in the U.S. and Asia, with limited ties to the Gulf region.
Golden Ventures, a Canada-based venture capital firm, closed on over $100 million in capital commitments for its fifth fund targeting high-potential, seed-stage founders working across technologies, including AI, climate, blockchain and quantum.
“This is a continuation of our core thesis and created to be super founder-aligned,” Golden told TechCrunch.
The firm makes both core investments and those that lean more on the angel side.
Over 13 years, Golden Ventures has backed over 100 companies at the seed stage.
Golden Ventures V is backed by a group of existing institutional limited partners, including BDC Capital, ECMC Group, Foundry, HarbourVest Partners, Kensington Capital Partners, Northleaf Capital Partners, RBC, Teralys Capital, University of Chicago and Vintage Investment Partners, and new institutional partner Deloitte Ventures.
Food tech investment may have declined along with overall venture capital, but Bluestein Ventures is not letting that slow it down.
The Chicago-based early-stage venture capital firm closed on $45 million in capital commitments for its Fund III.
Andrew Bluestein, co-managing partner of Bluestein Ventures, founded the firm in 2014 and brought on Ashley Hartman, also co-managing partner, eight years ago.
They join other venture capital firms, like Kost Capital, Supply Change Capital and Joyful Ventures, that have recently raised new funds to invest in food tech.
“When we started Bluestein Ventures, people would ask us why we were investing in food,” Bluestein told TechCrunch.
