E.Ventures, the Germany-based venture capital firm that counts mail order and e-commerce company Otto Group as a major investor, closed a $150m early-stage fund today.
Founded in 1998, E.Ventures has offices located in Berlin, San Francisco, Beijing, Tokyo, Moscow and São Paulo. It has more than $1bn under management, and invests in companies operating in the consumer internet, media and mobile spaces.
The fund will back startups at seed and series A stage, operating alongside a $290m growth capital unit that will invest at later stages. E.Ventures has also hired Bernardo Hernández, formerly Google’s head of consumer marketing and the owner of seed fund Solon Inversiones, as a general partner.
Hernández said: “Joining E.Ventures appealed greatly to me as our investment philosophies are the same. Its use of technology to identify investment opportunities and the always available operational support to entrepreneurs are features I believe will come to define venture capital in the future.
“Joining at the same time as closing this fund is something truly exciting and my priority is to uphold the high standards of quality and effort set by the team.”
News of the fund’s closure follows a regulatory filing last week that revealed a single investor had provided $60m for a fund being raised by E.Ventures that was expected to reach $175m in size.