CRV (venture capital firm)

CRV
Company typePrivate
IndustryVenture capital
Founded1970
HeadquartersPalo Alto, California, United States
ProductsInvestments
Total assets$4.3 billion
Number of employees
20+
Websitewww.crv.com

CRV is a venture capital firm focused on early-stage investments in technology. The firm was founded in 1970 to commercialize research that came out of MIT. Its name comes from the Boston area Charles River.

History

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The firm has raised over $4.3 billion since inception across 18 funds. Upon closing of the 16th fund, the firm rebranded to CRV.[1] Prior to that, CRV's 15th fund closed in February 2012 with $375 million of investor commitments.[2] CRV's 14th fund raised $320 million of commitments.[3]

In 2013, it purchased a large portion of Pebble Technology for $15 million and is credited as the primary reason why Pebble was sold to Fitbit in December 2016. This netted CRV nearly $40 million.[4]

In 2024, CRV returned 275 million dollars from the 500 million it had raised in its current fund back to investors, stating that their focus would shift away from late-stage investments and toward the early stage.[5]

Among CRV's portfolio companies are Aveksa,[6] mabl,[7] OneLogin,[8] Stella,[9] Sybase,[10] Yammer,[11] and Zendesk.[12]

References

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  1. ^ Lawler, Ryan (14 July 2014). "Now That Charles River Ventures Has Closed Its 16th Fund, It Wants To Be Called CRV". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2016-07-15.
  2. ^ Charles River Raises A $375M Fifteenth Fund For Early Stage Investing. peHUB, February 28, 2012
  3. ^ Charles River Ventures Raises $320 Million For Its Fourteenth Fund. TechCrunch, March 30, 2009
  4. ^ Orlowski, Andrew. "Who killed Pebble? Easy: The vulture capitalists". www.theregister.co.uk.
  5. ^ Griffith, Erin (Oct 2, 2024). "A Venture Capital Firm Does Something Rare: Give Money Back". New York Times. Archived from the original on Oct 2, 2024. Retrieved Oct 2, 2024.
  6. ^ McBride, Ryan. "Investors Back Growing Bay State Software Firms Aveksa and Apparent Networks in Pair of Series C Financings". xconomy. Retrieved 5 April 2013.
  7. ^ Lardinois, Frederic (February 21, 2018). "With $10M in funding, Mabl brings machine learning to software testing". TechCrunch.
  8. ^ Gage, Deborah (October 3, 2013). "OneLogin Picks Up $13 Million to Manage Online Corporate Identities". Wall Street Journal.
  9. ^ "This week in N.Y.C. funding news: Ellevest, Ripple, KeyMe - New York Business Journal". Retrieved 2016-09-16.
  10. ^ Sybase President Gains The Confidence of Apple. The New York Times, August 25, 1987
  11. ^ Geron, Tomio. "Before $1.2 Billion Deal, Yammer Was Side Project: Largest Investor George Zachary". www.forbes.com.
  12. ^ Konrad, Alex. "Charles River Ventures Wins Big On Zendesk's IPO, But For Boston Venture It's Bittersweet". www.forbes.com.
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