NVC: Engineered to meet the moment

Venture capitalists are well-known for driving companies to find a strong product-market fit, yet, as an industry, we often struggle to find our own. At NewView Capital (NVC), we’ve sought to change that. From day one, we’ve been focused on finding a unique product-market fit for our firm—one that offers tangible value to entrepreneurs, our limited partners, and our peers in the venture ecosystem.

As an industry, venture capital is experiencing exponential rates of growth and a new, accelerated pace of investment. Additionally, early-stage firms are raising more funds to expand their ability to invest in companies at later stages. Many of our peers and their respective investments have achieved tremendous success from this bold size and pace. However, this approach to venture can come at the cost of long-term company building and maintaining deep, sustainable partnerships with management teams. NVC has been carefully engineered to fill this gap.  

Our heritage

From the beginning, we’ve functioned more like a startup than a traditional investment firm—seeking opportunities to rethink the method, pace, and culture of venture capital. In 2018, we raised our inaugural $1.35B fund to pioneer a new path forward. $1B was dedicated to an innovative portfolio acquisition strategy, seeding our fund with a curated collection of 31 growth-stage companies from NEA, and the remainder was dedicated to direct and follow-on investments. Through this acquisition, these companies had the freedom to stay private longer and receive more financial and operational resources to continue their growth trajectories. We also increased DPI and partner bandwidth for our friends at NEA. 

While many described this as a ‘secondary’ transaction, this does not fully encompass the unique value of NVC’s approach. As investors, we are acutely aware of our responsibility to build enduring companies, so our firm was carefully engineered for long-term growth, regardless of the nature of the investment. Every company within our portfolio—whether acquired through direct investment or portfolio acquisition—benefits from operational expertise from our operating partners and seasoned advisor network. This fully integrated approach results in a high-touch, collaborative, and supportive environment for entrepreneurs.

Our future

Today, we are thrilled to announce that we have raised an additional $544M to advance our efforts. While our core philosophy remains the same, we’ve now officially bifurcated our approach between two distinct funds—NVC Fund II, which will be dedicated to new, direct investments, and NVC SOF I, to progress our portfolio acquisition strategy. In both funds, we seek to be long-term partners to entrepreneurs and our peers by empowering true, elite, sustainable company building and remaining nimble to the continued evolution of the investment landscape.

Our strategic pillars, which were established at our founding, remain central to our vision:

Focus

At its core, our firm is engineered to focus on investing in and helping build enduring, high-growth companies that define industries and deliver best-in-class returns. It is a “back to basics” approach, where thoughtful company building is the key to creating market-defining companies.

To this end, we invest at a measured pace which allows us to build deep relationships with our portfolio companies and be dedicated long-term partners. This is written into our values, our strategy, and how we grow and scale as a firm. We serve growth-minded entrepreneurs that are dedicated to building enduring companies, and we are uniquely suited to guide growth-stage companies on the road to IPO or acquisition.

While our investments are varied, we recognize and continue to develop our deep domain expertise in fintech, software as a service (SaaS), consumer internet, and AI, allowing us to comprehensively understand and support our portfolio.

Flexible capital

Driven by a proven investment team, we invest in high-growth technology companies through both direct investments and curated portfolio acquisitions. This flexible financial support allows us to work in rhythm with the needs of our various partners. 

As direct investors, we invest on a primary, secondary, or hybrid basis, can lead or follow, and don’t have minimum ownership requirements. The majority of our direct investments are dedicated to venture growth- stage companies. We also invest in and serve a select number of early-stage companies in areas where we hold deep domain expertise.

In tandem, our firm continues to advance the unique portfolio acquisition strategy that distinguished our founding. Through these highly curated portfolio acquisitions, we enable venture capital firms to more actively manage their portfolios by locking in returns, freeing up reserves, providing incremental partner bandwidth, and improving DPI. This is all in service of a healthier and more sustainable venture ecosystem.

Operational excellence

No matter how we build our portfolio—through direct investing or portfolio acquisition—our firm is committed to building enduring companies. Our operating partner and advisor model is paramount to this. Our in-house operating partners have deep, proven experience to guide go-to-market strategy, product development, fundraising, recruiting, and liquidity and M&A strategies. We work in close partnership with the CEOs and their teams of our portfolio companies to understand and help to build towards their vision. Our bench of formally engaged expert advisors and mentors also support this effort. Ultimately, through this model, we help companies achieve sustainable growth and market leadership.

True partnership

Genuine partnership is foundational to our philosophy and practice as a firm. We believe that our success is inextricably tied to that of our community of entrepreneurs, fellow VC investors, and limited partners. As such, we’re committed to building a venture ecosystem of trust, collaboration, and mutual respect.

We do this by being a firm built on and defined by our values:

Do the Right Thing

We strive to have integrity in our actions and our work, doing what’s right for our firm, our portfolio entrepreneurs and companies, our partners, the tech ecosystem, and community.

Focus on Returns

We stay true to our identity by focusing on returns, not AUM. We do this by committing to the health of our portfolio and maintaining deep and authentic relationships within our industry.

Ownership and Accountability

We are accountable for the quality of our work, and are mindful of how it influences the growth and success of the firm, our portfolio, VC partners, and investors. 

High-Performance

We set a high bar for positive performance, attitude, and resourcefulness.

Mutual Trust and Respect

We gain confidence internally and in our community through commitment, candid communication, dedication, loyalty, and hard work. We seek partnerships that offer the same in return.

We’re proud of the firm that we’ve built over the past three years. Today, with more than $2.2 billion in total assets under management, we are grateful to those who have partnered with us on this journey—the limited partners, entrepreneurs, and VC peers who have trusted in our firm’s vision for the venture ecosystem. Together, we look forward to more years of growth and the possibilities unlocked by our two new funds.