Top 100 Venture Capital Firms

Menlo Park, CA | Apple, Google, Stripe, WhatsApp

Founded by Don Valentine in 1972, Sequoia is the most legendary venture firm in history. Backed Apple, Google, Oracle, Cisco, YouTube, WhatsApp, Stripe, and Airbnb. Their scouts and seed program redefined early-stage investing.

Don Valentine passed on investing in Microsoft because he thought Bill Gates was 'too young and too cocky.' He still built the greatest VC track record of all time.

Menlo Park, CA | Facebook, GitHub, Coinbase, Airbnb

Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz launched a16z in 2009 and blew up the venture model by treating portfolio companies like clients with dedicated marketing, recruiting, and executive talent teams. Now manages over $35 billion across crypto, bio, and AI funds.

Marc Andreessen wrote the famous 2011 essay 'Why Software Is Eating the World' — then spent the next decade funding the companies doing the eating.

San Francisco, CA | eBay, Twitter, Uber, Snapchat

The anti-mega-fund. Benchmark runs a small equal-partnership model with no junior associates and no growth fund. Their $6.7 million investment in eBay in 1997 turned into $5 billion, one of the greatest VC returns ever.

Bill Gurley's early Uber investment turned roughly $12 million into nearly $9 billion at IPO, but the board drama with Travis Kalanick became Silicon Valley legend.

Palo Alto, CA | Facebook, Spotify, Slack, Dropbox

Jim Breyer's $12.7 million Series A investment in Facebook in 2005 became one of the most famous venture bets in history. Accel has been a top-tier firm since Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz founded it in 1983.

Accel's Facebook stake was worth over $9 billion at IPO — a 700x return on the original investment.

Menlo Park, CA | Amazon, Google, Genentech, Twitter

The firm that funded both the PC revolution and the internet boom. John Doerr's investments in Amazon, Google, and Netscape cemented Kleiner Perkins as Silicon Valley royalty throughout the 1990s and 2000s.

John Doerr called his Google investment 'the single best investment I've ever made.' His $12 million turned into roughly $2 billion.

San Francisco, CA | Airbnb, Stripe, Dropbox, DoorDash

Paul Graham invented the modern startup accelerator in 2005. YC has funded over 4,000 companies with a combined valuation north of $600 billion. The twice-annual Demo Day is the Super Bowl of seed investing.

YC's first batch in 2005 included Reddit, which Sam Altman (later YC president, then OpenAI CEO) helped grow. The full-circle AI moment writes itself.

Menlo Park, CA | Snap, Affirm, Mulesoft, Nutanix

Founded in 2000 by Barry Eggers and partners, Lightspeed has grown into a multi-stage global firm managing over $18 billion. Known for early bets on enterprise software and consumer tech alike.

Lightspeed partner Jeremy Liew was reportedly the first VC to invest in Snapchat after finding Evan Spiegel through a random Forbes '30 Under 30' article.

New York, NY | Stripe, Flipkart, ByteDance, Instacart

Chase Coleman III turned Julian Robertson's Tiger Cub legacy into the most prolific late-stage venture machine of the 2020s, deploying billions at warp speed with minimal due diligence. The 2022 drawdown was historic, but so was the portfolio.

In 2021 alone, Tiger Global made over 300 investments — roughly one new deal every business day. Partners joked they were 'the index fund of venture.'

San Francisco, CA | SpaceX, Palantir, Facebook, Airbnb

Peter Thiel's firm famously declared 'We wanted flying cars, instead we got 140 characters.' They put their money where their mouth was, backing SpaceX, Palantir, and other deep-tech moonshots that most VCs wouldn't touch.

Founders Fund's early SpaceX investment is now worth an estimated 100x+ return. Thiel also made the first outside investment in Facebook — $500,000 for 10.2% of the company.

Menlo Park, CA | LinkedIn, Facebook, Airbnb, Discord

One of the oldest VC firms in Silicon Valley, founded in 1965. Reid Hoffman joined as a partner and brought LinkedIn. David Sze led the Series A into Facebook. Greylock consistently punches above its weight with a small, elite team.

Greylock's fund from 2006 that included Facebook and LinkedIn is rumored to be one of the best-performing venture funds of all time.

Menlo Park, CA & Washington, DC | Cloudflare, Robinhood, Coursera

Founded in 1977, NEA is one of the largest and most active venture firms in the world, with over $25 billion under management. They invest across healthcare and technology from seed through growth.

NEA's healthcare portfolio has produced more biotech IPOs than almost any other venture firm, making it a rare dual-threat in tech and life sciences.

San Francisco, CA | Shopify, Twilio, LinkedIn, Pinterest

The oldest VC firm in America, tracing its roots to Andrew Carnegie's fortune. Bessemer has backed over 200 IPOs and is famous for both legendary hits and their brutally honest 'Anti-Portfolio' of deals they passed on.

Bessemer's Anti-Portfolio page cheerfully admits they passed on Apple, Google, Facebook, Tesla, Airbnb, and FedEx. It might be the most honest page in all of venture capital.

Mountain View, CA | Uber, Slack, Stripe, Nest

Alphabet's venture arm invests with a unique advantage: the resources and technical expertise of Google behind every portfolio company. Founded in 2009, GV has backed over 500 companies across life sciences, enterprise, and consumer.

GV's investment in Uber was made by partner Bill Maris, who also pushed for Google Ventures to invest heavily in life science and anti-aging research.

San Francisco, CA & London | Figma, Discord, Roblox, Deliveroo

A transatlantic powerhouse founded in Geneva in 1996. Index backed Skype, Dropbox, Figma, and Roblox. Their European roots give them a unique edge in finding breakout companies on both sides of the Atlantic.

Index Ventures partner Mike Volpi led the investment in Discord when it was still a gaming chat tool — long before it became the default hangout for an entire generation.

Cambridge, MA | Stripe, Snap, Airbnb, HubSpot

Founded in 2000 by Joel Cutler and David Fialkow, General Catalyst has grown from a Boston-based firm into a global platform. Hemant Taneja now leads the firm with a focus on 'responsible innovation.'

General Catalyst acquired health system operator Summa Health in 2023, making it one of the first VC firms to literally own a hospital system.

Tokyo & London | Uber, WeWork, DoorDash, ByteDance

Masayoshi Son raised a $100 billion mega-fund and rewrote the rules of venture. Vision Fund I was a rollercoaster of massive wins (Coupang, DoorDash) and spectacular flameouts (WeWork), but its sheer scale changed how startups raise capital.

Son's original $20 million investment in Alibaba in 2000 turned into roughly $60 billion — possibly the single greatest venture return in history.

San Francisco, CA & Boston, MA | Twitter, Slack, Tumblr, Oculus

Bijan Sabet's early bet on Twitter defined Spark Capital. The firm has continued to find breakout consumer and enterprise companies, combining Boston grit with San Francisco ambition.

Bijan Sabet discovered Twitter before most of Silicon Valley — he invested in the seed round after becoming obsessed with the product as a user.

New York, NY | Twitter, Coinbase, Etsy, Tumblr

Fred Wilson's thesis-driven firm invested early in networks and marketplaces. USV was an early backer of Twitter, Etsy, Coinbase, and Tumblr. Wilson's daily blog at avc.com made him the most transparent VC in the business.

Fred Wilson blogged nearly every single day for over 15 years — making him one of the most widely-read voices in tech and a pioneer of VC transparency.

Hong Kong | Facebook, Twitter, Spotify, Airbnb

Yuri Milner built DST Global into the ultimate late-stage crossover fund. He famously invested $200 million in Facebook in 2009 when most investors thought social media was overvalued. He was right about everything.

Milner funded the Breakthrough Prize, which gives $3 million awards to scientists — more than the Nobel Prize. He wants science to feel like the Oscars.

New York, NY | Twitter, Shopify, DocuSign, SemRush

Founded in 1995 by Jeff Horing and Jerry Murdock, Insight pioneered ScaleUp investing — growth equity for software companies ready to dominate their category. Over $80 billion in committed capital across 30+ funds.

Insight's model of using proprietary data analysis to pick software winners influenced an entire generation of growth-stage investors.

New York, NY | DoorDash, Snap, Instacart, Airtable

Philippe Laffont's hedge fund turned venture juggernaut. Coatue uses quantitative analysis and deep tech research to pick winners across public and private markets, managing over $48 billion.

Coatue built an in-house data science team that scrapes app store rankings, satellite imagery, and credit card data to evaluate startups — part hedge fund, part intelligence agency.

Boston, MA | Groupon, Glassdoor, Coinbase, Wayfair

Founded in 1983, Battery is one of the longest-running tech-focused VC firms. They invest from seed to growth across enterprise software, consumer tech, and industrial technology.

Battery's annual list of the highest-rated private cloud computing companies, the Battery Cloud Index, has become a must-read for enterprise software investors.

San Francisco, CA | Netflix, Stripe, Snowflake, Twilio

Spun out of Institutional Venture Partners in 1999, Redpoint has been an early backer of category-defining infrastructure and enterprise companies. Tomasz Tunguz's data-driven blog made him one of the most-followed voices in SaaS.

Redpoint was an early investor in Netflix's streaming pivot — a bet that most traditional media investors completely missed.

San Francisco, CA | Apple, HubSpot, Oculus, Zendesk

One of the original Silicon Valley firms, Matrix was an early Apple investor and went on to back JBoss, HubSpot, Oculus VR, and Zendesk. After decades of excellence, their US fund wound down in 2023, but the India and China arms continue.

Matrix Partners India continues as a standalone powerhouse, having backed Ola, Razorpay, and other Indian tech giants.

San Francisco, CA | Uber, Square, Notion, Roblox

Founded by Josh Kopelman in 2004, First Round created the modern pre-seed/seed playbook. Their community, content, and operator network became the gold standard for early-stage support.

First Round's 2004 investment in Uber's seed round returned an estimated 2,500x. Their annual 'State of Startups' survey is the most widely-cited founder sentiment index in tech.