Website www.usv.com Founded 2003 | Founder Fred Wilson Type of business Private | |
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Key people Fred Wilson, Managing Partner
Brad Burnham, Managing Partner
Albert Wenger, Managing Partner
John Buttrick, Partner
Andy Weissman, Partner Headquarters New York City, New York, United States Profiles | ||
Fred wilson managing partner union square ventures
Union Square Ventures (USV), is an American New York-based venture capital firm, that manages assets totaling $1 billion as of March 2016. The firm is one of the top returning venture capital funds in the world, its 2004 fund returning 13.91 times cash-on-cash with an IRR of 67.0%. The firm has had a billion dollar exit every year since 2011 including Zynga ’11 at 7.7B, Indeed ’12 at 1.4B, Tumblr ’13 1.1B, Twitter ’13 at 14.2 B, Lending Club ’14 at 5.42B, Etsy ’15 at 1.78B and Twilio ’16 at 1.23B. Additionally, the firm's founder Fred Wilson, who is well recognized as one of the best venture capitalists in the world, has acquired a celebrity status in the tech world stemming in part to his blog AVC.com
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Firm
Union Square Ventures was founded in 2003 by Fred Wilson (a former partner of Flatiron Partners) and Brad Burnham (a former Executor in Residence with AT&T Ventures). The two men created USV with the intent of investing in and fostering the development of early-stage companies. Their investments are “mostly U.S.-based Internet and mobile companies considered to be ‘disruptive’”.
In 2007, Albert Wenger, the former president of del.icio.us, joined the firm as a partner. The team was rounded out by the subsequent additions of John Buttrick and Betaworks founder Andy Weissman.
USV is one of a handful of firms that regularly included in Red Herring’s lists of top venture capital firms.
In 2011, USV was deemed as being the best performing VC in the US based on investment return rate.
Portfolio
Among USV’s notable early-stage investments are: