Venture capitalfirm Touchdown Ventures has moved from South Jersey to Center City, looking to be closer to Philadelphia's universities and talent pool
Touchdown Ventures manages venture funds and makes investments on behalf of almost 20 large corporations including Conshohocken-based AmerisourceBergen Corp. (NYSE: ABC) and Exton-based Bentley Systems (NASDAQ: BSY). It has grown from a team of three at its founding in 2014 to over 50, with two offices in California along with the new Philadelphia office at 1628 John F. Kennedy Blvd.
Touchdown Ventures had been searching the Philadelphia office market since before the pandemic but put those plans on hold and stuck to its base in Haddonfield. Once offices began to open up, CEO David Horowitz and his team were ready to implant themselves in the city.
A veteran of the venture capital industry, Horowitz's new home is not far from his old one. He was one of the first employees on the Comcast Ventures team in 2000 and Touchdown Ventures new office now overlooks the media giant's headquarters. Horowitz also started the South Jersey Tech Collective and spent 14 years at Comcast before founding Touchdown Ventures.
The firm is subleasing 7,000 square feet from Curalate, a startup that raised over $40 million in VC funding before being acquired by Austin-based Bazaarvoice in 2020. The lease has four years remaining.
Horowitz said that a substantial chunk of his team lives in Philadelphia or in nearby suburbs, making Center City a desirable location. He hopes that number can grow and believes the new Philadelphia office is a chance to further embed Touchdown Ventures in the Philadelphia VC scene.
"We end up hiring a lot of people, so from an attracting and retaining talent perspective, it's really one of the most important reasons why we did it," Horowitz said, pointing to the office's proximity to the city's universities as an advantage of the move.
One of the ways Touchdown Ventures is looking to grow is through the launch of a new internship program called Touchdown Ventures College. Horowitz said he hopes to bring on about 10 interns, giving them experience in the venture capital industry that most colleges don't offer.
The program is a "combination between experience and education" that will teach participants the fundamentals of venture capital, he said.
In total, Touchdown Ventures has a portfolio of about 75 startups, nine of which have had successful exits like OpenPath, Circle Media and Text IQ.
