Venrock

Venrock Management, LLC
Company typeLimited liability company
IndustryVenture capital
Founded1969 (1969)
FounderLaurance Rockefeller
HeadquartersPalo Alto, California, United States
ProductsInvestments
Websitevenrock.com

Venrock (portmanteau of Venture and Rockefeller) is an American venture capital firm formed in 1969 to build upon the successful investing activities of the Rockefeller family[1] that began in the late 1930s. It has offices in Palo Alto, California, and New York City.

History

Beginning in 1934, Laurance S. Rockefeller (1910–2004) the fourth of the six children of John D. Rockefeller Jr. began investing in early-stage businesses.[2] The first was a store that sold Finnish furniture. The second, borne of his friendship with the pilot Eddie Rickenbacker, led to the creation of Eastern Airlines.[2]

He continued investing portions of his family’s fortune and ultimately grew roughly $8.7 million into more than $28 million by the late 1950s. After identifying an early-stage opportunity, he would occasionally bring his brothers and sister in as partners. Using his wealth to seed start-up ventures was a relatively unknown practice at the time.[2]

In 1969, Rockefeller formalized these activities by establishing Venrock Associates as a limited partnership funded by family members[3] and some of the institutions the family supported including the Museum of Modern Art, Rockefeller University and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.[2] By 1996, Venrock had financed 221 early-stage companies across aviation, electronics, computers, and biotechnology.[2] Some of its earliest investmens include Intel, Apple, 3Com and Gilead Sciences.[3]

Venrock closed its seventh fund in July 2014 with 8 partners and its eighth fund in January 2017 with 15 partners, each fund totalling $450 million.[4][5]

Investments

Venrock invested more than $2.5 billion in more than 440 companies, resulting in 125 initial public offerings. Venrock focuses its investments on early-stage and start-up companies in information technology, healthcare and emerging technologies. These include: Intel, Apple,[1] AppNexus, Astranis, StrataCom, Check Point Software, Dapper Labs, DoubleClick, 3Com Corporation, Mosaic, PGP, Itek, Digex, Interos,[6] Shape Security, Phoenix, Second Rotation (gazelle), RedSeal, CTERA Networks, and Juno Therapeutics. It also has a significant venture in the nascent nanotechnology field, with early funding of Nanosys and the nanotech division of Du Pont.[7] Others include BioTime.[8][9]

In the healthcare sector with partners such as Bryan Roberts, Venrock has invested in athenahealth, Grand Rounds, HealthSouth Corporation, MedPartners, Inc., Castlight Health, Caliper Technologies Corporation, Centocor, Geron,[10] senolytic startup UNITY Biotechnology,[11] Genetics Institute, Idec Pharmaceuticals Corporation, Illumina, Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Sirna Therapeutics, and Sugen.

See also

References

  1. ^ a b Reinhold, Robert (6 February 1984). "STARTING UP IN SILICON VALLEY: LONG HOURS, FORSAKEN LIVES". The New York Times. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  2. ^ a b c d e Kaufman, Michael T. (2004-07-12). "Laurance S. Rockefeller, Passionate Conservationist And Investor, Is Dead at 94". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2026-03-06.
  3. ^ a b Dolan, Kerry A. "How Venrock Is Reinventing Itself". Forbes. Retrieved 2018-08-13.
  4. ^ Loizos, Connie (January 26, 2017). "Venrock has raised $450 million for its eighth fund — just like its seventh fund". TechCrunch. Retrieved June 20, 2017.
  5. ^ Dolan, Kerry A. "How Venrock Is Reinventing Itself". Forbes. Retrieved 2017-12-06.
  6. ^ Interos (2020-03-12). "Interos Raises $17.5M from Venrock and Kleiner Perkins to Grow Third-Party Risk Management Platform" (Press release). GlobeNewswire News Room. Retrieved 2021-08-16.
  7. ^ Feder, Barnaby J. (March 15, 2004). "TECHNOLOGY; Bashful vs. Brash in the New Field of Nanotech". The New York Times. Retrieved May 2, 2017.
  8. ^ "SEC Schedule 13G, filed Feb. 17, 1999". Archived from the original on 2016-03-06. Retrieved 2013-08-15.
  9. ^ "Bloomberg Link speaker profile". Archived from the original on 2013-08-03.
  10. ^ "SEC Schedule 13G, filed Feb. 17, 1999". Archived from the original on 2016-03-06. Retrieved 2013-08-15.
  11. ^ Timmerman, Luke (27 October 2016). "Arch, Fidelity, Bezos Bet $116M On Startup To Fight Diseases Of Aging". Forbes. Retrieved 2 January 2017.

Further reading

  • Harr, John Ensor, and Peter J. Johnson. The Rockefeller Century: Three Generations of America's Greatest Family. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1988.
  • Winks, Robin W. Laurance S. Rockefeller: Catalyst for Conservation. New York: Island Press, 1997.
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