US-based venture capital firm Ulu Ventures has raised $138m for its third fund from investors including social media firm Twitter and Motley Fool Ventures, the corporate venturing arm of financial advisory service Motley Fool.
University of Rochester and Grinnell College also chipped in, as did financial services firms Bank of America and Goldman Sachs.
The limited partners were filled out by seven foundations – of which only John D and Catherine T MacArthur and Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundations were named – as well as pension fund Los Angeles Fire and Police Pension, funds of funds including Fairview, Plexo and Illumen Capital, VC firm Norwest Venture Partners and family offices One World Investments and the Kwanza Jones & José E Feliciano Supercharged Initiative.
Founded in 2008, Ulu Ventures has more than $200m under management and focuses on diverse seed-stage developers of enterprise IT software. It invests in Silicon Valley generally but also has a specific focus on the Stanford University ecosystem.
The firm began raising capital for Fund III in March 2020 and had a $100m target.
Goldman Sachs’ participation is related to its diversity and inclusion-oriented $1bn investment scheme dubbed Launch with GS.
Suzanne Gauron, head of the initiative, said: “Our investment in Ulu Ventures furthers our shared goal to increase access to capital and facilitate connections for women, black, Latinx and other diverse entrepreneurs.”
– A version of this article first appeared on our sister site, Global University Venturing.
