From Founder to Funder: New Seed Stage VC Launches

Published November 10, 2009 @ 01:01PM PT

The pressure on venture capital firms for big exits is tremendous. Union Squares Venture principle Fred Wilson wrote about "The Venture Capital Math Problem," in the end hoping for a return to a scenario that involves smaller funds and more focus. This week, the Founder Collective is launching, putting this entrpereneur-centric perspective into practice.

Founded by active entrepreneurs, the Founder Collective is a $40 million fund based out of NYC and Cambridge, MA that will invest in seed stage ventures. To use their words, "a person or two and an idea is our favorite stage."

From their website, it seems like they want to create a fund that focuses heavily on mentorship and advising and that works to align the incentives of funders with founders. Indeed, most of the people contributing money to the fund are active founders themselves, like Hunch CEO Chris Dixon.

On his blog, Dixon writes that the group things of themselves as "peer-to-peer" venture capital, and sees its ethos in groups like Y Combinator. Among the five characteristics they list about themselves, they include "trying to be respectful," which is pretty unusual, and gives me a good vibe for the group.

Interestingly, they are going to focus on ideas coming out of the East Coast, which they see as poised for a startup renaissance. As a founder who anticipates one day being a funder, I'll definitely be watching this group to see how they shake this game up.

Photo: Founder Collective co-founder Chris Dixon.

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Comments (1)

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Posted by bob korngold on 11/15/2009 @ 08:37AM PT
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Author

Nathaniel is the founder of Assetmap, a San Francisco-based startup that builds web tools to help people better visualize and leverage their social capital. Before that, he was the founding director of the Northwestern University Center for Global Engagement.