Folsom-based venture capital firm Moneta Ventures confirmed it is raising a $300 million third fund to invest in early-stage technology companies.
The Business Journal reported the new fund in June, but Moneta didn’t confirm the value of it at the time. Kevin Nagle, a member of Moneta’s investment board, told the audience at a Startup Folsom event Thursday that it will be $300 million.
Nagle said it will be “by far the largest fund ever in Sacramento."
Moneta’s first two funds, the first launched with $25 million in 2014 and the second with $60 million in 2016, have been wildly successful, Nagle said, adding that their success shows there is startup talent in the Sacramento region.
Generally, the new fund will follow the same investment strategy of the previous funds, seeking out seed and early-stage funding for software and technology companies, said Lokesh Sikaria, founder and managing partner of Moneta. It has also invested in some social media technology, hardware companies and medical device companies. It has not invested in cryptocurrency, Sikaria said.
The new fund could close by the end of the year or early next year, he said.
Moneta has 12 employees and offices in Folsom; Portland, Oregon; Houston and Austin, Texas.
With its new fund, Moneta aims to make investments between $1 million and $20 million in pre-seed, seed and series A and B funding rounds. It often invests alongside other venture capital firms.
Since the beginning of this year, some of the very large venture capital funds out of the Silicon Valley, San Francisco and Boston have been telling their portfolio companies to make due with investments they have already received, and not expect waves of follow-on funding.
Current market conditions are more of an issue for very large investors, Sikaria said. The larger funds that are cutting back have portfolio companies that are closer to exits or to potential initial public offerings, and those portfolio companies are seeing their valuations being diminished. For an early-stage investor like Moneta, that is less of an issue because its companies are still in growth and development mode, and exits may be years down the line, which means current market conditions are far less of a factor.
