We are very happy to announce the launch of Version One Ventures III with $45M USD ($57M CAD) in commitments. With Fund III, we’re doubling down on all that has worked in our previous funds – our strategy, geography, investment thesis and philosophy. It’s an exciting time to be launching a new fund as our focus on network effects and broad geography are driving opportunities in both existing and emerging markets.

About Fund III

• We invest in the early stages of company creation, leading or participating in pre-seed and seed-rounds with cheque sizes between $500K and $750K. This is where we believe we can have the biggest impact.
• We invest in companies and platforms that leverage network effects. This has been our core thesis in prior funds and led us to invest in marketplace, AI/ML and SaaS companies. But a thesis centered around network effects isn’t static – and isn’t limited to any particular sector, business model, or platform. Decentralized platforms offer new opportunities to create network effects in a wide open space without big incumbents like Google, Facebook, Amazon, and Apple. And we also look at companies that are creating the best product for a specific vertical – including bio/healthcare and other emerging tech. With Fund III, we’ll be concentrating wherever network effects are at play; this thesis gives us focus while enabling us to broaden our scope across existing and emerging opportunities.
• We invest across North America. From Fund I and now to Fund III, we have been able to serve as an important bridge between Silicon Valley and other tech ecosystems. With Angela’s promotion to General Partner, we now have investment partners located in both the U.S. and Canada, offering portfolio companies strong networks and resources on both sides of the border. Our particular focus is in San Francisco Bay Area, Toronto/Waterloo, Seattle, and NYC. We believe these emerging tech ecosystems are more relevant than ever, and want to empower entrepreneurs outside Silicon Valley with opportunities to grow successful businesses.
• Lastly, we will continue our goal to be the most value-add investor for our portfolio founders as they push to create category-leading companies. Having run our own companies, we try to pass on as much of our operations knowledge as possible.

Acknowledgements and gratitude

The start of a new fund is a good time to reflect on the six years since Version One launched; we want to thank the many, many people who have helped us along the way.

First, we are so grateful for the 40+ portfolio entrepreneurs who inspire us every day in their relentless push to use technology and innovation to solve very hard problems. Building companies is hard and we have the greatest respect for everyone we get to work with. It is a true honor to be a partner of yours!

Secondly, there are amazing people in the VC industry who have provided mentorship, challenged our thinking, and shared interesting opportunities with us over the years. As competitive as venture capital often seems, we are incredibly humbled by the amount of support and love we have gotten over the years from our community.

And last but not least, we thank our investors, the LPs. Many of you have been investors since the first fund and we are thankful for all the continued support and confidence. We are proud of the broad LP support we have received in this (and previous) funds, from large institutional LPs like Invesco, Harbourvest, Northleaf, and Kensington to entrepreneurs from Shopify, Slack, Hootsuite, Wattpad, and Salesforce.

We look forward to continuing to work with everyone, as well as teaming up with another group of great entrepreneurs on this incredible journey!