Originally published at Tech.mn.
With our newest $55 million Fund III, we are thrilled to announce Matchstick Ventures will continue our investments in pre-seed and seed-stage technology startups with a connection to the Rockies and the North regions of the United States.
Over the last six years, we have invested in over 100 companies and watched the tremendous growth and interest in supporting these regions. In Colorado, investors have already committed $2.6 billion across 168 rounds through mid 2021, more than any full year prior to 2019 and matching what was raised in 2020. The North region is also seeing incredible growth and interest, showing the strength of the entrepreneurs in the market and the interest from investors.
With the close of Fund III, we will continue our investments in software-centric companies, with a focus on pre-seed and seed rounds for companies with a connection to the Rockies and North, such as being based here, a founder here, customer relationships, or a network in these regions.
As our largest fund to date, we will also have more flexibility to write checks between $500,000 and $1.5 million in each company, both leading rounds and also working as a helpful syndication partner. We will always choose the vision and ambition of the entrepreneurs we work with over a specific industry or vertical, and look forward to finding new breakout companies to add to our list, which currently includes:
- Soona – creating fast casual content for ecommerce brands (raised $10.2M Series A from Union Square Ventures)
- Ordermark – powering online ordering for restaurants and ghost kitchens (raised $120M from Softbank)
- Inspectorio – running critical compliance infrastructure for the global supply chain (raised $10M Series A from Techstars)
- Branch – providing accelerated payments to workers (raised $42M Series B from Addition Partners)
- Fiveable – modernizing remote education communities
- Spekit – streamlining employee training and onboarding (raised $12.2M Series A from Foundry Group)
- Parallax – helping service employees stage engaged and accounts profitable (raised $7M Series A from Grotech)
- Cured – enabling healthcare systems to better engage users
- Airspace Link – making drones safer for operators and communities (raised $10M Series A from Altos Ventures)
- and many more!
Beyond just offering funding, as part of Fund III we are also excited to expand our community around the fund and our founders. Much like what we’ve developed at Techstars, we believe that mentorship, connections and access to amazing people can help startups make more progress, faster.
That’s why we are also announcing the launch the Matchstick Strikers, a network of amazing local and national leaders to help companies in the following areas:
- Creating community so our founders have a big network to rely on for help and support
- Finding and attracting great talent
- Solving key problems through hands-on mentorship from experienced operators and leaders
- Connecting with more customers through a network who will facilitate introductions and help our portfolio companies get in front of the right people, partners, and potential customers
- Accessing additional capital through an organized network of co-investors who are specifically interested in investing in these geographic markets and providing additional capital when needed
- Creating world-class cultures and cultivating leadership through an emphasis on personal growth as a catalyst to professional success via coaching
- Adding diversity and focusing on sustainability through resources and connections to help companies understand how diversity and sustainability show up in their company and how they can help to meet their goals
To facilitate this network and help our portfolio companies navigate these new resources and others across our community, we will also be bringing on a Head of Network.
Beyond their financial success, we are also proud that in our last fund 31% of our portfolio companies are impact companies, companies that we believe will generate a measurable, beneficial social or environmental impact alongside financial returns. 54% of our companies are led by at least one underrepresented founder, 31% of our companies have a female founder, 37% of our companies have a non-white founder, and 14% of our companies have a Black founder. We share this data to express pride in our history of working with underrepresented populations, and to ensure they feel comfortable engaging with us as we continue our work with Fund III. We are also proud to have joined Pledge 1% with this Fund and will be donating 1% of our returns to charities through the Pledge 1% organization.
We know we couldn’t have done any of this without you, our community.
We are incredibly grateful to Foundry Group for their continued backing with this fund, as well as a host of incredible institutional and individual limited partners, many of whom call the Rockies and the North home. And the Techstars network, which continues to be a key relationship for us. We appreciate your support and involvement.
We also thank the many founders who have trusted us as a partner on your journey already, and our friends and family who support us on our mission of helping founders.
Lastly, we thank our startup communities in the Rockies and North for your inspiring, positive, and ambitious attitudes, big dreams, and interest in improving our corner of the world.
We’re looking for ambitious founders with novel ideas and who move fast. If that is you, and you have a connection to the Rockies or North regions of the US, we want to hear from you. Please visit matchstickventures.com or reach us on Twitter @MatchstickVC, @NattyZ, @rbroshar.
If you are an investor interested in co-investing in these markets with us at Seed or Series A, please let us know so we can add you to our list of co-investors.
If you are a leader with startup experience and are interested in applying to be part of the Matchstick Strikers, let us know.
Originally posted on: September 20th, 2021
