UPDATE: Norwest closed NVP Fund 17, our newest $3 billion venture and growth equity fund. Read our announcement for details.
Investing in Great Leaders, Great Ideas, and Great Businesses—Welcome NVP XVI!
Today marks a major milestone for us as we announce the closing of NVP XVI, a $3B venture and growth equity fund, which brings our total capital under management to $12.5B. With this new fund we will continue to invest in innovative companies with transformational businesses and empower our portfolio leaders with the resources and connections to enhance their growth and create sustainable value.
We’re excited to celebrate our investment team and next generation of leaders, while also recognizing the entire Norwest family for its contributions. We’ve always believed that our people are Norwest’s most valuable differentiator. This is evidenced across every department and sector, from IT to finance, to portfolio services and data science, to the reception and EA teams.
Since our inception, we’ve been committed to championing greatness. Norwest has always taken an invited guest approach with our portfolio companies, along with a “leave your ego at the door” philosophy. We believe in empowering our founders and supporting their success with decades of experience navigating the ups and downs of growth.
Norwest Momentum Since Fund XV
Since we closed XV in November 2019, a global pandemic forced many of us to work remotely and rethink much of our way of life. In turn, we all found new ways to stay connected. Our firm responded quickly to help portfolio companies safely navigate uncertain and challenging times. Through programs such as preferred portfolio pricing for telehealth benefits, informal portfolio discussions, COVID medical Q&As, office re-entry guides, and best practices webinars, we ensured that their businesses and people continued to thrive.
Last week we reported the results of our annual Talent & People Practices Benchmark Survey, which offered insights into how these companies adapted, key trends and HR advice for 2022.
Even with virtual collaborations replacing boardrooms, we provided new funding and a wide array of portfolio services to more than 60 pioneering and impactful companies, including Classy, Dave, Devoro Medical, Fabric, Faire, ICON, Qualified, and UPSIDE Foods.
Over this same period, we helped approximately 30 portfolio companies, including the following, to achieve significant liquidity events.
- Consumer – Opendoor, Talkspace, Udemy
- Enterprise – Aporeto, CyberX, Galvanize, Shape Security
- Healthcare – Devoro Medical, VisitPay
- India – Five Star Business Finance, Kotak, NSE, Swiggy
Expanding Access for Underrepresented Groups
Since our last fund, our world has also experienced transformative cultural shifts. We recognized a shared sense of urgency and responsibility to address inequities and cultivate lasting change. During the Spring of 2020, we formed three DEI working groups across Norwest: Investing, Hiring & Retention, and Portfolio Services. The mission of these teams is to promote a more inclusive society and expand our network of investors and entrepreneurs from underrepresented groups.
This year, we invested in companies such as Praxis Labs and supplier.io that deliver technology solutions to act on bias and supplier diversity.
Norwest has also invested in 52 woman-founded companies to date, most recently adding Babylist, Pequity, and Praxis Labs to the portfolio, building on investments in such companies as Birdies, Galvanize, HoneyBook, Intersect ENT, JOLYN, Kendra Scott, Madison Reed, Minted, OfBusiness, Policygenius, Ritual, SENREVE, Silk Road Medical and Talkspace. This figure represents a 2x jump over where we were in 2019.
Our work on DEI will continue, and we are ever committed to creating greater opportunities and impact.
Making Our Worldview Known
We appreciate now more than ever the importance of our commitments to society and our planet and the power they have to drive sustainable results. We continue to explore ways we can best support environmental and socially impactful companies.
Throughout our history, we’ve been inspired by opportunities to invest in high-integrity founders with world-changing visions. The proof points can be found in recent investments in companies such as Classy, Grove Collaborative, ICON, Imperfect Foods, and UPSIDE Foods.
These investments and others are showcased on our Worldview page here on nvp.com, and we encourage you to read more about why we are so proud to elevate companies creating positive disruptions and better futures. We also hope this sampling of Norwest’s investments encourages more mission-driven founders to come to Norwest and invite us to join them on their journeys.
As part of our worldview, we are unveiling the Norwest ESG policy which formalizes our long-standing dedication to backing companies that care about environmental and social sustainability. The policy defines our approach to due diligence, investment and portfolio management processes.
Our expressed worldview not only influences our investment decisions and the way we engage our founders, but it’s also the fabric of our firm culture, the people we hire, and how we treat them.
Paving the Way for our Next Leaders
In addition to our fund, we’re excited to celebrate new leadership and promotions within the Norwest family. These individuals possess impressive track records, optimism, and expertise in a breadth of industries.
Tiba Aynechi will join us as General Partner on the healthcare team in January 2022, following 11 years at Novo Ventures Holdings A/S where she focused on early- and mid-stage biotechnology, medtech, and healthcare IT. Some of her notable investments include MDLive, Mirum Pharmaceuticals, and Nkarta Therapeutics.
In 2020, Dave Zilberman became our newest General Partner on the enterprise team. Dave was previously managing director at Comcast Ventures, where he made notable investments in DocuSign, EdgeConneX, and Slack.
Senior leadership promotions include:
- Parker Barrile and Dror Nahumi were named co-sector heads of the consumer and enterprise teams, respectively.
- Stew Campbell and Ran Ding were promoted to partners on the growth equity team.
- Ryan McDonald was promoted to principal on the healthcare team.
A Future So Bright
Many thanks to everyone on the Norwest team who has contributed to our incredible culture of collaboration and dedicated their energy to founder success. We are also so grateful for the exceptional entrepreneurs in our portfolio companies who have chosen us to join them in building high-impact companies and brighter futures!
