GFT Ventures Q3 2022 Update
Welcome to the Q3 2022 newsletter from GFT Ventures! We hope you will benefit from our fund updates and portfolio company highlights, as well as our overall industry observations and thought leadership exchanges. Please feel free to share our newsletter with your colleagues and friends using the “Share” button at the bottom of this post. Any additional questions or comments may be directed to team@gft.vc. And you can always visit our GFT Ventures website to learn more about us.
Momentum Continues for GFT Ventures’ Fund I
As we’ve reported to you previously, GFT Ventures’ inaugural fund is now well oversubscribed from our initial $100 million target. Based on the tremendous startup investment opportunities we’re currently seeing (at what we politely/internally refer to as “more typical” early stage valuations), it now appears that our fundraise timing could not have been more ideal. It’s equally exciting to us that we continue to enjoy strong inbound interest from new potential LPs in the fund. As a result, we have decided to continue to fundraise, on an extremely selective basis, with our absolute final closing expected before year end 2022.
Despite a bit of a summer slowdown as markets have “adjusted”, GFT Ventures has continued to aggressively evaluate promising early-stage companies in our key investment areas (AI, Data Science, Automation and Blockchain). And we are pleased to announce that we’ve closed two new investments in the past quarter. Mighty Technologies is GFT’s first digital healthcare investment. The company’s innovative flagship product, Mighty Health, is a nutrition and fitness wellness app tailored to older adults. In addition, we led the Series A financing for Ronday Technologies, which provides a virtual connection/collaboration platform enabling Web3 communities to work together in shared online spaces. Additional details on these new deals can be found in the Featured Portfolio Companies section below.
As always, thank you for your continued support of the GFT Ventures franchise. We are privileged to enjoy significant, undeployed “dry powder” during this challenging period of adjustment and consolidation. And we remain laser focused on our mission to partner with the most talented founders solving the world’s most challenging frontier technology problems for the largest markets.
Best regards,
Jeff Herbst and Jay Eum
Founding Managing Partners, GFT Ventures
Featured Portfolio Companies
GFT Ventures invested in Mighty Technologies’ Seed Round
What it does:
The Mighty Health app is an easy-to-use wellness app for older adults (50+ years) that consists of live coaching, nutritional and fitness content, and a very active member community. The platform enables users to achieve personalized health goals, ranging from weight loss, anxiety / stress management, maintaining strength, managing joint pain, and preventing heart diseases.
Why we found it exciting:
Life expectancy for Americans is increasing and demographic composition is changing. According to the American Association for Retired People, 1 in 5 Americans will be a senior (65+ y/o) by 2040, and senior care is a $740B market that is ripe for disruption. Mainstream fitness tech often targets the young and fit via advertisements and cardio-heavy exercises, effectively excluding aging adults from participating. This is where the opportunity lies for Mighty Health – older adults are living with greater vitality than ever before, and they are increasingly tech savvy and focused on staying healthy. Mighty Health intends to become the go-to health and fitness solution for this demographic. We are also impressed with founder James Li’s progress on cracking the code on B2B partnerships and his vision to expand offerings into chronic disease management. The team has expertise in this area and plans to leverage its existing customer base and apply their same growth playbook to target diabetes, heart disease, and MSK.
GFT Ventures led Ronday Technologies’ $7M Series A Round
What it does:
Ronday Technologies provides a new kind of “Presence Platform” for authentic online connection and collaboration. The platform blends elements of videoconferencing, productivity software, games, and digital identity to bring the genuine sense of presence felt in the real world to shared online spaces. It started out as a remote work collaboration platform, but we invested with the thesis that a more promising use case is for fostering communities in Web3; ultimately, it can serve all groups of people who want to connect remotely.
Why we found it exciting:
Web3 companies are driven by digital natives who rely on online platforms to build vibrant communities to bring their products to life. The majority of them have no physical offices at all, yet the community-governed-and-owned ethos of Web3 means that they constantly have to connect with each other to build and promote projects. Discord and Twitter are the primary platforms for Web3 communities today, but they weren’t built with Web3 in mind and therefore lack in user experience. Ronday has an opportunity to address this gap by offering a superior, more engaging experience, thereby becoming the de-facto community-building platform for Web3 players. Animoca Brands, a leader in blockchain gaming and Web3 entertainment, also saw Ronday’s potential and co-invested in this round of financing. We are thrilled to partner with Animoca to help Ronday the world’s most prominent and successful Web3 community platform.
GFT Ventures in the Spotlight
GFT Ventures Enjoyed a Significant Presence at the Annual Global Corporate Venturing Summit in Monterey, California
GFT Founding Managing Partner, Jeff Herbst, chaired three separate AI-related sessions at the sold-out GCVI Summit held this past June. They included a spotlight session on “unlocking the potential and realizing value” in AI, as well as a keynote interview with Rich Lyons, the Chief Innovation and Entrepreneurship Officer (and former Haas Business School Dean) at UC Berkeley. A couple of the highlight photos are included below.
GFT Ventures Participated in the Keynote VC Panel at the Valley ML AI Expo
For the second year in a row, Jeff Herbst participated in the Keynote VC Session of the Valley ML AI Expo. It was a lively session and debate, covering a variety of topics, including what’s needed to build a successful AI startup.
A full recording of the session can be found here!
At around 13 minutes into the video, Jeff gives a very succinct overview of what it takes to build a successful AI startup.
GFT Ventures Featured as a Speaker at the Inaugural AAAIM VC Summit
GFT Founding Managing Partner Jay Eum moderated an LP Panel at the VC Summit hosted by AAAIM (Association of Asian American Investment Managers), featuring Erik Landsness (CEO of TAMCAP), Elise Huang (Managing Partner at Gopher Asset Management) and Dylan Weening (Senior Vice President at Talipot*Holding).
The session was packed with candid conversations about the venture capital and the fundraising environment, and you can learn more about the event here.
@jeff.. is gft doing anything in autonomous drive? Lidar space? U been on microvision board .. would you put any colors? Thanks a lot