• Angular Ventures announces $80M Fund II to continue backing early-stage enterprise and deep-tech companies across Europe and Israel

• Fund I invested in 21 early-stage companies across a range of areas including: Agtech (Trellis), next-gen AI/data mesh (Firebolt, Paradime, Valohai), automation (Levity), industrial (Aquant, CruxOCM), infrastructure (Aspecto), low/no-code (Budibase, Candu, Datos), and nano-technology (Dust Identity) many of whom have since raised their Series A from Tier 1 US VCs including Bessemer, Boldstart and Insight

• David Peterson, previously head of growth at Airtable, joins as a full Partner

Angular Ventures today announces the closing of its second fund, and that David Peterson has joined founder Gil Dibner as the firm’s second full partner. With the $80M second fund, Angular will double down on its strategy of backing European and Israeli companies with their first check, at the earliest and riskiest stages. 

With a focus on deep tech companies working to disrupt huge global industries with unique and advanced technologies, Angular’s remit covers enterprise software, nanotechnology, advanced healthcare infrastructure, space technology, agricultural software, and a wide range of advanced machine learning applications and tooling.  

Double the fund size

The new $80M fund, nearly double the size of the firm’s first fund, was raised in a matter of weeks due to strong LP interest following the performance of Angular I and of Gil Dibner’s pre-Angular portfolio, which earned him a slot on the Forbes Midas List for European and Israeli VCs. Angular’s LP base consists of leading institutional investors, mostly from the US, and expanded to include two additional major US institutions in Fund II. 

“Our new fund size will allow us to write larger high-conviction first checks, even earlier in a company’s lifecycle,” said Gil Dibner, Partner at Angular Ventures.

“We are most comfortable being the very first investor in a startup, especially in cases where no other investor is willing to move. That is where we can add the most value as coaches, sparring partners, advisors, cheerleaders, and force multipliers. This is what having a venture firm as a true partner means to us. It’s not just about investing, it’s about being fully invested as a VC in the companies we back.”

Jonathan Roosevelt, managing director at Industry Ventures, one of Angular’s LPs, comments: “Angular Ventures is a special kind of fund…. Super scrappy, driven by their own very early conviction, and loved by LPs, other VCs, and pound-the-table happy founders.”

Another of Angular’s LPs, Michael Kim, founder of Cendana Capital, comments: “Angular is special in today’s world because they have a high conviction approach to investing, enabling it to become a trusted advisor to their founders. Coupled with a remarkable ability to identify great founders, we believe they will deliver significant alpha.”

Doubling down on the strategy

Angular plans to use its larger fund size to double down on the same strategy, but writing larger checks of $250K to $3M at the earliest possible stages of company formation. 

The firm typically leads rounds, usually within the first $1M of investment, and often the very first round. Angular typically invests pre-revenue, usually pre-product, and - occasionally - pre-company. 

Angular’s investment strategy and approach has generated outstanding performance. US-based co-investors in Fund I portfolio companies already include Bessemer, Bain Capital Ventures, Boldstart, Bullpen, CRV, Fathom Capital, Gradient, Haystack, Initialized, Insight, Lightspeed, Kleiner Perkins, Root Ventures, Two Sigma, Uncorrelated, Zeev Ventures, and others. Gil Dibner’s pre-Angular track record includes 26 companies from across Europe and Israel, five of which have achieved valuations greater than $1B, six of which have exited, and one of which has gone public (Nasdaq: FROG). The collective performance of that pre-Angular portfolio is substantially over 20x, positioning it as one of the strongest early-stage track records on this side of the Atlantic.

Doubling the partnership

David Peterson joins Angular Ventures from Airtable where he was an early employee and drove the company’s early go-to-market strategy, leading growth and partnerships as Airtable scaled to over 500 employees, grew from zero to 200,000 customers, and reached a $5.77B valuation. Prior to Airtable, David held growth, marketing and customer-facing executive roles at various startups, founded a company of his own, and worked in seed stage venture capital at New York and Boston-based Founder Collective.

“I’ve been lucky enough in my career to have helped build and scale companies from the earliest stages,” said David Peterson. “I know from experience that early stage startups are full of uncertainty and risk and often have more questions than answers. They’re messy, and that’s what I love about them. This is why I’m so excited to join Gil in building Angular, a young firm itself that takes a hands-on approach to supporting - through investment and mentoring - pioneering founders who are still figuring it out.”

“Since 2005, I have been focused on backing disruptive contrarian companies at the earliest stages. By bringing David Peterson on board as a full partner, with double the resources, we look forward to providing impact and growth levers for more of the companies who are driving changes through deep technology solutions,” says Dibner. “We’ve been working together under the radar for several months now, and the impact on our portfolio companies has already been amazing.”

David Peterson is the latest addition to a team that includes Head of Platform Anne Blum and Senior Associate Andrew Poesaste. In addition, the broader Angular Ventures team includes four venture partners: Fred Simon (chief architect and co-founder of JFrog), Eldad Farkash (co-founder of SiSense and Firebolt), Ron Yachini (Head of the Allen Institute of AI in Israel), and Phil Wickham (founder of Sozo Ventures and Chair and CEO Emeritus of the Kauffman Fellows Program).