Venture is simple: back generational companies early, and win those founders’ love. Then repeat. That’s how firms get to the top, and then remain on top for decades.
Every founder wants the same thing from investors: a partner who helps them win customers, hire leaders, and raise the next round, all without slowing them down. Many firms promise this, but after the wire hits, most fade away.
From day one, MVP Ventures’ (MVP) mission has been to make partnering with us a no-brainer — not by writing the biggest check — but by delivering the most value per dollar. That focus has fueled our momentum from our first investments to our recent $125 million Fund II, built on the same founder-first model that earned us a lasting place on the cap tables of the founders we back.
We believe the right way to do venture is to back founders early, follow through on the promises we made when winning allocation, and systematically improve our value-add offering year over year. This is how we are building the next aspirational brand that category-defining founders actively pursue.
How We Earn Our Place on the Cap Table
MVP’s model is built on two principles: back generational companies early and have those founders love us.
Backing generational companies early starts with sourcing. Our proprietary tools identify breakout teams, allowing us to meet founders early, often before their very first term sheet, and connect them with the right lead investors through our network. This approach consistently earns us a seat at the table with the best. MVP has invested in more than 75 companies at the same entry point and on the same terms as top-25 firms like Sequoia, a16z, Founders Fund, and General Catalyst.
Most firms here would celebrate a job well done. At MVP, it’s where the actual work begins.
Earning founders’ love is hard. Most firms fail here. To ensure we succeed, we’ve built ten times more post-investment infrastructure than our peers. Nearly half of our team focuses on value post-investment. Our seven full-time operators come from institutions like a16z, Robinhood, DocuSign, Morgan Stanley, and the Department of War, bringing deep functional expertise and startup experience to every engagement. We then operate like a startup ourselves: fast, collaborative, measurable, and accountable.
We intentionally don’t try to do everything that founders ask for. We focus on doing a handful of things very well: Go-to-Market, Talent, Government, and Capital Markets. We have defined and measured strategies across each. We push ourselves to create unfair advantages — whether through our LP base, tech stack, or expanding our team — that other firms can’t, or are unwilling to do. When a founder needs a customer introduction, an expert in their vertical, an accelerated round, or a trusted executive hire, we activate these unfair advantages to make it happen.
Turning Partnership into Performance
MVP’s value-add first approach is good business. Fifty-three out of 65 of our Fund I founders consider MVP their most valuable per-dollar investor. This is a 5-10x higher rate than other firms. This is our moat. It’s why we win allocation in the next generational opportunity.
And the strategy produces results. Since its inception, MVP has backed nine unicorns out of 99 investments — a hit rate higher than other leading firms, including Sequoia and a16z. We’ve had the privilege of supporting companies from their earliest stages onward, including Turing, Stoke Space, Anduril, Gecko Robotics, Prepared, Neon, and Saronic.
Our fund performance is consistently elite, placing us in the top 5% in 2020, the top 25% in 2021, and the top 1% in 2024. Even more telling, founders are increasingly expanding rounds or cutting back other investors to make room for us. These accelerating data points solidify that our strategy is working.
MVP’s success is a testament to the work we put in to support founders and the work they do to build generational companies. We’re honored when exited founders come to us first when raising for their next company. We will support them in crafting the best round possible, still, humbly, as the second-largest check in the round.
Five Years In and Looking Ahead
We built MVP from scratch through a pandemic and a downturn. It was the most fun we never want to have again. But no matter the obstacles, we’ve always chased the same standard: Be our founders’ MVP, and everything else follows.
Five years later, that principle still drives us. This week, we were proud to announce the close of MVP’s Fund II at $125 million, with the firm’s total assets under management now exceeding $300 million.
Fund II is more than a milestone; it is proof that a founder-first model scales, and we’re doubling down. We’ll keep over-investing in the people, infrastructure, and network that ensure 100% of our founders absolutely love us. It’s a no-brainer.
Want to learn more about how we back founders early and deliver after the check clears?
Explore what makes partnering with MVP a no-brainer: mvp-vc.com | LinkedIn | X