The active participation of the most cash rich companies in corporate venturing was strengthened last week with Amazon unveiling a formal investment effort, the up to $100m Alexa fund.
The Alexa Fund is named after the cloud-based voice service Amazon uses in its Amazon Echo personal assistant device, will invest in voice-based technologies that use the self-service tools kit Alexa Skills Kit or its Alexa Voice Service software. The Alexa fund has already made seven investments, which can be read in our news story.
The move echoes groups like Apple looking to kickstart its app store in partnership with venture firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB), as well as Google Ventures, the corporate venturing unit of the US-based technology company, setting up a Glass Collective with KPCB and venture firm Andreessen Horowitz to invest in deals related to the Google Glass ecosystem.
As we previously analysed, nearly 90% of the most cash rich corporations, based on a list by rating agency Moody’s, do corporate venturing. This compares to the nearly half of the Fortune 100, which do corporate venturing.
Amazon has always done minority investments to support Amazon Web Services, yet with Amazon’s involvement in corporate venturing now more official, it is now becoming a surprise to see a cash-rich group, which doesn’t do corporate venturing. It seems inevitable that the capital corporate venturing groups are putting to work will continue to rise.