Today we are thrilled to announce the close of our second fund to help founders build the future of financial services in the U.S. We couldn’t be more excited and humbled to continue to invest in and build the fintech ecosystem alongside some of the industry's leading institutional investors and in partnership with a group of visionary founders.
Since launching in early 2018, we’ve strove to position ourselves as the first stop a founder makes in their entrepreneurial journey. The barriers to entry in fintech are high, and launching a new company is incredibly complex. Our goal is to speed up that process by proactively bringing partners from across the financial services industry to engage with our founders while providing deep operational support and early capital. We’ve seen that this approach consistently allows our founders to move faster, make better informed decisions and, over time, build category defining businesses.
Since launching, we’ve invested in 50 firms, had one company go public, seen eight acquisitions – nearly all of which were accretive to our investors – and seen several billion dollars of enterprise value created by our portfolio companies. Within our portfolio, a stunning 94% of our companies have raised follow on capital, or have been acquired.
We’re particularly honored to partner with some of the industry’s leading institutional LPs on this journey, including pension funds, insurance companies, some of the world’s most successful software companies, banks spanning the spectrum from century old community banks to global powerhouses and dozens of the leading investors, founders and operators in fintech. We were thrilled to see that investors representing 97% of the capital in Fund I re-upped into Fund II, often doubling or tripling their commitments.
Our team also continues to grow while staying grounded in providing market-leading operational expertise within fintech. The addition of Cameron Peake to our partnership earlier this year has dramatically strengthened our sophistication in understanding the complexities surrounding small business and enterprise fintech. Meanwhile Kate Johnson’s addition as the Director of our Program Operations has allowed us to further strengthen our founder-centric programming. We expect to continue to build out our operational team over the coming year as well so stay tuned for new opportunities to join us!
The recent downturn in public fintech valuations and choppy fundraising conditions in the private markets certainly creates challenges for all of us in this industry. However, for those founders (and investors) who are disciplined in how they deploy capital, who focus on the customer experience and in building strong internal cultures, the opportunities available abound.
The reality is that there are still so many areas of financial services where technology has the potential to meaningfully improve our economy and the living standards for tens of millions. For those founders who have the courage, ambition and vision to seize the opportunity and jump in, we’re here to help, invest and partner with you. Please reach out!
The FVS team
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