U.S. Venture Partners (USVP) is a

venture capital Venture capital (VC) is a form of private equity financing provided by firms or funds to start-up company, startup, early-stage, and emerging companies, that have been deemed to have high growth potential or that have demonstrated high growth in ...

investment firm specializing in early-stage ventures in

enterprise software Enterprise software, also known as enterprise application software (EAS), is computer software used to satisfy the needs of an organization rather than its individual users. Enterprise software is an integral part of a computer-based information ...

cybersecurity Computer security (also cybersecurity, digital security, or information technology (IT) security) is a subdiscipline within the field of information security. It consists of the protection of computer software, systems and networks from thr ...

, consumer,

e-commerce E-commerce (electronic commerce) refers to commercial activities including the electronic buying or selling products and services which are conducted on online platforms or over the Internet. E-commerce draws on technologies such as mobile co ...

healthcare Health care, or healthcare, is the improvement or maintenance of health via the preventive healthcare, prevention, diagnosis, therapy, treatment, wikt:amelioration, amelioration or cure of disease, illness, injury, and other disability, physic ...

, and IT-enabled healthcare services. The venture capital partnership is headquartered in

Menlo Park, California Menlo Park ( ) is a city at the eastern edge of San Mateo County, California, San Mateo County in the San Francisco Bay Area of California, United States. It is bordered by San Francisco Bay on the north and east; East Palo Alto, California, Eas ...

. Since its inception in 1981, USVP has invested over $4.3 billion across a wide range of sectors. Out of the 524 companies financed by USVP, 93 have completed an initial public offering.

History

Founded by

Bill Bowes William Eric Bowes (25 July 1908 – 4 September 1987) was an English professional cricketer active from 1929 to 1947 who played in 372 first-class matches as a right arm fast bowler and a right-handed tail end batsman. He took 1,639 wicket ...

, Stuart Moldaw, and Robert Sackman, U.S. Venture Partners was an early entrant to the burgeoning venture capital industry in

Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that is a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical area of the Santa Clara Valley ...

in the late 1970s and early 1980s. As of 2022, the firm was investing out of its thirteenth fund, USVP XIII. Composed of former venture investors, entrepreneurs, CEOs, technologists, corporate executives, financial professionals, and industry domain experts, USVP has a combined 150 years of investment and operating experience with backgrounds across a wide array of sectors. The investment team is composed of Jacques Benkoski, Steve Krausz, Rick Lewis, Jonathan Root, Casey Tansey and Dafina Toncheva. The firm makes investments between $5 million and $10 million in markets with revenue potential exceeding $1 billion. USVP prefers to invest in companies with a market greater than $300 million and avoids companies in direct competition with each other. On average, USVP will invest for a period of three to ten years.

Investments

The firm has invested across multiple sectors over the years and is focused on enterprise software, IT security, consumer internet, mobile, e-commerce, healthcare, and IT-enabled healthcare services. The firm's recent investments include Arkose Labs, Box, Carrot Fertility,

Cato Networks Cato Networks Ltd. is a Tel Aviv, Israel-based network security company that develops Secure access service edge, Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) technology, which combines enterprise communication and security capabilities into a single cloud ...

, Happy Returns, HeartFlow,

HotelTonight HotelTonight is a travel agency and metasearch engine. It serves for users to book last-minute lodging in the Americas, Europe, Japan and Australia. History HotelTonight was founded in December 2010 by Sam Shank, Jared Simon, and Chris Bailey. ...

, Human Interest, Inari Medical, Inspire Medical Systems, Intersect ENT, Medigate, Omada Health,

Pluto TV Pluto TV is an American free ad-supported streaming television service owned and operated by the Paramount Streaming division of Paramount Global. Founded by Tom Ryan (business executive), Tom Ryan, Ilya Pozin and Nick Grouf in 2013 and based in ...

, ThreatMetrix, and Zerto. Notable historical investments include:

Sun Microsystems Sun Microsystems, Inc., often known as Sun for short, was an American technology company that existed from 1982 to 2010 which developed and sold computers, computer components, software, and information technology services. Sun contributed sig ...

Callaway Golf Callaway, legally Topgolf Callaway Brands Corp., is an American global sports equipment manufacturing company that designs, manufactures, markets and sells golf equipment, more specifically golf club, clubs and golf ball, balls, also including a ...

, St. Francis Medical, SanDisk,

Ross Stores Ross Stores, Inc., operating under the brand name Ross Dress for Less, is an American chain of discount department stores headquartered in Dublin, California. It is the largest off-price retailer in the U.S.; as of July 2024, Ross operates 1, ...

Ask Jeeves Ask.com (known originally as Ask Jeeves) is an answer engine, e-magazine, and former web search engine, operated by Ask Media Group. It was conceptualized and developed in 1996 by Garrett Gruener and David Warthen (based in Berkeley, Califo ...

, Adify,

PetSmart PetSmart Inc. is a privately held American chain of pet Big-box store, superstores, which sell pet products, services, and small pets. It is the leading North American pet company, and its direct competitor is Petco. Its indirect competitors ...

Check Point Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. is an Israeli multinational provider of software and combined hardware and software products for IT security, including network security, endpoint security, cloud security, mobile security, data security ...

Mellanox Mellanox Technologies Ltd. () was an Israeli-American multinational supplier of computer networking products based on InfiniBand and Ethernet technology. Mellanox offered adapters, switches, software, cables and silicon for markets including high ...

, Vontu, Proteolix, Dotomi,

Imperva Imperva, Inc. is an American cyber security software and services company which provides protection to enterprise data and application software. The company is headquartered in San Mateo, California. French multinational Thales Group acquired the ...

, Guidewire Software,

Yammer Viva Engage (formerly Yammer) is an enterprise social networking service that is part of the Microsoft 365 family of products. It is used mainly for private enterprise social software, communication within organizations but is also used for net ...

, Trusteer, Nanostim and Trunk Club."OUR PORTFOLIO." USVP
www.usvp.com/portfolio/
Retrieved August 5, 2018

References

{{Reflist Venture capital firms of the United States 1981 establishments in California