Press Release
February 28, 2007
O'Reilly AlphaTech Ventures Closes $51 Million Fund: New Venture Firm Focuses on Funding "Alpha Geeks"
San Francisco, CA--O'Reilly AlphaTech Ventures (OATV) today announced
the closing of its initial $51 million fund. The fund will focus on seed
and early-stage investments that leverage partner O'Reilly Media, Inc.'s
previous investments and relationships with the technology early adopters
they have dubbed the "alpha geeks." The fund's Managing Directors include
Mark P. Jacobsen and Bryce T. Roberts. Said Roberts of the fundraising,
"We were very pleased with the reception we received from the LP
community. Our differentiated story and properly aligned fund size
attracted a stable of very influential individual and institutional
investors."
OATV will target investments in various emerging technologies including
those related to the DIY and personal fabrication movement, Web 2.0
services, mobility and telephony applications, location-aware services,
open hardware devices, sensor networks, and renewable power.
On the timing and strategy of the fund, Jacobsen notes, "We believe the
timing is right for a fund to seed innovative technologists and
entrepreneurs who are building cash-efficient businesses using open
source software and inexpensive hardware to disrupt markets and grow
lasting businesses."
Jacobsen and Roberts bring deep business and technology experience to
OATV. Jacobsen, in more than 20 years of advising companies and
entrepreneurs, has garnered significant investment and board experience
along with extensive deal-making expertise and executive-level
operational experience. The former Executive VP for New Ventures and
Business Development at O'Reilly, he managed the company's investment
portfolio for nine years. Roberts began his VC career at Wasatch Venture
Fund, a Draper Fisher Jurvetson affiliate, after a substantial stint as a
technologist in both startups and enterprise IT. In 2004, he co-founded
the Open Source Business Conference (since sold to IDG).
"O'Reilly has a long history of spotting trends by watching the alpha
geeks," said O'Reilly Media founder and CEO Tim O'Reilly. "Our publishing
and conference business was built on uncovering and evangelizing the work
of the hackers and inventors who explore new technology for the fun
of it, inventing the future in the process. Through our unique connection
with that often-unheralded technology elite, we were alerted early on to
the Internet, open source software, the DIY resurgence, and Web 2.0. With
OATV, we can now invest more directly in the opportunities we uncover."
OATV has made four investments to date. The three announced investments
are Instructables (http://www.instructables.com), a service for showcasing
and collaborating on DIY, Chumby Industries (http://www.chumby.com), which
is producing an open, hackable, WiFi-enabled device, and Wesabe
(http://www.wesabe.com), a Web-based tool that gives its members a better
understanding of how they spend, and links them to a community dedicated
to helping each other make good financial decisions.
About O'Reilly
O'Reilly Media spreads the knowledge of innovators through its books, online services, magazines, and conferences. Since 1978, O'Reilly Media has been a chronicler and catalyst of cutting-edge development, homing in on the technology trends that really matter and spurring their adoption by amplifying "faint signals" from the alpha geeks who are creating the future. An active participant in the technology community, the company has a long history of advocacy, meme-making, and evangelism.
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