It was just 18 months ago that Hunter Walk and Satya Patel formally launched Homebrew Ventures, a $35 million venture fund focused on investing in what they called the “bottom-up” economy. Those former product guys have raised even more money for their second fund, which tops out at $50 million.
Homebrew has made 17 investments since being founded, focusing mainly on companies that, as my former colleague Leena Rao wrote at launch, can help “drive economic growth and innovation through simpler, cheaper and more direct access to technology, information and customers.” That includes companies like on-demand shipping company Shyp, legal help marketplace UpCounsel, and office cleaning and management startup Q.
For Fund II, not much has changed in terms of focus, although the size of the fund has increased a bit. As the blog post notes:
Homebrew II is a $50 million fund. It’s slightly larger than our first fund because we intend to deploy entry capital over a 30-36 month period, whereas we invested the initial fund in 24 months. Our sweet spot is, and will remain, playing a leadership role in first institutional financing rounds. That usually looks like a $500k-$1m check as part of a $1m-$3m fundraising.
In addition to Fund II, Homebrew has raised an additional $35 million “Moonshine Fund” for doing investments in companies that grow beyond its initial seed or early Series A focus and raise follow-on financings. That’ll enable it to support investments in its most successful portfolio companies.