Uncork Capital (formerly known as SoftTech VC) is a

venture capital Venture capital (often abbreviated as VC) is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth potential or which ha ...

firm based in San Francisco, California, founded by Jeff Clavier. Considered one of the most active established seed funds in

Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that serves as a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical areas San Mateo County ...

, it has invested in companies such as

Postmates Postmates is a food delivery service, founded in 2011, and acquired by Uber in 2020. It offers local delivery of restaurant-prepared meals and other goods. It is headquartered in San Francisco, California. , Postmates operates in 2,940 U.S. c ...

Eventbrite Eventbrite is an American event management and ticketing website. The service allows users to browse, create, and promote local events. The service charges a fee to event organizers in exchange for online ticketing services, unless the event is f ...

Fitbit Fitbit (stylized as fitbit) is an American consumer electronics and fitness company. It produces wireless-enabled wearable technology, physical fitness monitors and activity trackers such as smartwatches, pedometers and monitors for heart rate, ...

, and

SendGrid SendGrid (also known as Twilio SendGrid) is a Denver, Colorado-based customer communication platform for transactional and marketing email. The company was founded by Isaac Saldana, Jose Lopez, and Tim Jenkins in 2009, and incubated through the ...

History

The firm was founded in 2004 by

angel investor An angel investor (also known as a business angel, informal investor, angel funder, private investor, or seed investor) is an individual who provides capital for a business or businesses start-up, usually in exchange for convertible debt or owners ...

Jeff Clavier when he transitioned his portfolio into a formal venture firm. Partners include Andy McLoughlin (formerly of

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), Susan Liu (formerly of

Scale Venture Partners Scale Venture Partners is an early-stage venture capital firm that typically leads Series A or Series B rounds. Over the last 20 years, Scale has made over 380 investments in Cloud, SaaS and Infrastructure companies, with over 159 exits, inclu ...

) and Tripp Jones (formerly of

August Capital August Capital, legally August Capital Master Management Company, LLC, is a venture capital firm founded by David Marquardt and John Johnston in 1995. It is focused on information technology and is based in Menlo Park, California. Company Aug ...

). As of 2022, the firm had invested in over 240 early stage start-ups. In 2017, the firm changed its name from SoftTech VC to Uncork Capital.

Investments

The firm primarily invests in SaaS (software as a service), marketplaces, consumer services and "frontier technology" ventures. With a focus on seed-stage funding, the firm generally aims to secure between 8-12% ownership of the companies it invests in. The firm's first fund raised less than $1 million, while the second fund raised $15 million in 2007. In 2012, Fund III oversubscribed at $55 million, and, in 2014, they closed their fourth fund at $85 million, bringing their capital under management to $155 million. In 2016, the firm raised $100 million for SoftTechVC V and $50 million for a breakout fund. In 2019, the firm raised $100M for Uncork VI and $100 for their second breakout find, Plus II. Notable investments have included:

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August Home August, Inc is a San Francisco home automation company, focusing on Wi-Fi connected door locks and doorbell cameras. The company was founded in November 2012 by Yves Béhar and Jason Johnson. On October 19, 2017, Swedish lock manufacturer Assa ...

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Curse LLC Curse is a network of gaming websites. The company is headquartered in Huntsville, Alabama, and has offices in San Francisco, New York City, Los Angeles, Brighton, and Berlin. Curse initially focused on offering mods for various video games. As ...

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Kongregate Kongregate is an American web gaming portal and video game publisher. Its website features over 110,000 online games and 30+ mobile games available to the public. The company also publishes games for PC, mobile, and home consoles. It was purchase ...

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Next Big Sound Next Big Sound (NBS) is a New York-based company which provides analytics for online music. The company analyses the popularity of musicians in social networks, streaming services, and radio. The company was acquired by Pandora Radio in May 20 ...

References

External links

* Venture capital firms of the United States Private equity firms of the United States Companies based in Palo Alto, California Financial services companies established in 2004 {{US-private-equity-company-stub