Dundee Venture Capital is raising a new venture fund to invest in early-stage startups across the Midwest.
Dundee announced it has raised $25 million for its third fund. It's the first close of what the firm expects will ultimately be a $50 million fund, its largest to date. In 2016 Dundee raised $31 million for its second fund.
Omaha, Nebraska-based Dundee writes checks between $500,000 and $1 million, Dundee Partner David Mann said. It's typically the lead investor in seed rounds and is focused primarily on the Midwest. The firm has made more than 50 investments in startups across 20 cities since 2010.
Mann, who heads up the firm's Chicago office, said access to early-stage funding remains a pressing need for many startups in the Midwest, and Dundee is helping fill that gap for the region.
"It's really obvious to those that are in the space how much talent and capability there is across the broader Midwest," he said. "What's always lagged a little bit here is access to capital."
Dundee's portfolio includes Chicago companies like PartySlate, Popular Pays and Inventables. Other notable investments include Summersalt, a St. Louis apparel startup that's raised over $25 million, and Mission Control, another St. Louis company that develops technology for esports. Its largest exit came in 2019 when its portfolio startup Phone2Action was acquired by private equity firm Frontier Capital, Mann said. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
The news comes as several Midwest VC firms close their latest funds. High Alpha, an Indianapolis-based VC firm, raised $110 million for its next VC fund, and Chicago's Lightbank and Chicago Ventures raised $180 million and $63 million for their respective funds.
Along with its Omaha headquarters, Dundee has offices in Chicago, Minneapolis and St. Louis.
