UK-based Ada Ventures is an unusual VC. Rather than just talking about SaaS and AI, we hunt down founders who are committed to inclusivity and diversity. Rather than confuse LPs, this methodology attracted them, and the final close of the second fund reached the $80 million level (the first close last October reached $44.7 million). ).
The fund's LPs include British Business Bank, University of Edinburgh, Big Society Capital, Legal & General Capital, Atomico, Danish Export Investment Fund (EIFO) and Molten Ventures.
Additionally, founding investors including Taavet Hinrikus (founder of Wise) and Illusian (family office of Supercell co-founder and CEO Ilkka Paananen) are backing the new fund.
Ada said the second fund would invest between £250,000 and £1.5m in pre-seed and seed-stage startups, with a “substantial amount” earmarked for follow-on investments. To date, 12 investments have been made from Fund No. 2. These will focus on climate justice, economic empowerment and healthy aging.
Companies participating in the second fund so far include Alive, BlackBear Glowb, Greenwork, Materials Nexus, MultiOmic, Boldr, and JunoBio.
Founded in 2019, Ada Ventures is also on a mission to pay attention to the diversity of the founding teams it supports. To that end, the firm claims its portfolio is 14 times more diverse in terms of gender and race/ethnicity than the average UK VC. However, this is proprietary research data, so take it with a grain of salt.
How do you go about finding a diverse founding team, a challenge that many other VCs may not be able to engage in?
Simply put, we are a diverse network of Scouts and Angels. The Ada Scout program is made up of around 100 Scouts and a 20-strong group of 'Ada Angels', with each Scout having access to an investment pot of up to £50,000. Mr. Ada claims that 30% of his investments from Fund I and Fund II were raised in this manner.
Co-founder and CEO Check Warner told me: People often become leaders in diverse communities. This means that the all-female team has produced 10 times more than her industry benchmark. ”
Ada also has a program from a startup called Bubble that allows founders to bring in emergency childcare if needed.
Warner said: “We launched this first-in-Europe service for founders around the world, providing back-up emergency childcare for all founders. So if a nursery school says they need to pick up their children, If we can't do that, we'll let our kids use this backup and we'll pay for it. It's the first time VC has done something like this and we think it's crazy. We believe that by providing comprehensive support to founders, we will help them become better business leaders.”
Diversity is a core tenet of Ada products, so I asked Warner what he thought about the recent controversy surrounding Hoxton Ventures' Hussein Khanji.
When I asked Mr. Sifted why Mr. Hoxton still didn't have a female partner, he gave a long and winding answer that there were too few female partners in Europe worth poaching and that a US-based partner would be better. .
Mr. Warner countered: “We have over 350 amazing female VC partners in Europe. We have literally thousands of employees and presidents, and as leaders we all have a responsibility to openly attract the best women, men, and anyone else into our industry. I think we need to collectively understand that. And I think anything that risks not doing that will set us all back as an industry. And those comments are taken out of context. I think it may have been.”
Did she think Hoxton itself had a leadership problem?: “I think all VC fund leaders need to do everything they can to attract the best talent in the industry. There are so many great opportunities and adventures out there, and it's going to grow even more in the coming years, and I think we all need to make sure that working in VC is as attractive as possible for everyone. ”