When Keith Rabois announced he was leaving Founders Fund to return to Khosla Ventures in January, it shocked many in the venture capital ecosystem — and not just because Rabois is a big name in the industry.
It was surprising because, unlike in many other fields, venture capitalists don’t traditionally move around much — especially those who make it to the partner or general partner level as Rambois had.
VC funds have 10-year life cycles, and partners have good reason to stay that way. In some cases, they can be a “key man” in a company’s fund, meaning that if they leave, the fund’s LPs have the right to withdraw their capital if they choose. Many partners and GPs also have some of their own money invested in their firms’ funds, which gives them additional reasons to stay.
So while big venture capital investor moves aren’t common, they seem to have happened in recent months. So far this year, there have been notable cases of investors returning to old companies, exiting on their own or pausing from investing entirely.
Just todayVic Singh, one of the co-founders of Eniac Ventures, has announced that he is leaving the company he helped start in 2009 to start his own.
Singh joins a growing list of VCs who have recently exited companies.
April
- On April 30, Ethan Kurzweil was announced was leaving his role as a partner at Bessemer Venture Partners after 16 years. Kurzweil will launch an investment firm focused on the early stage, according to report from Axios. Kurzweil will launch the company with Christina Senwho left Andreessen Horowitz after four years on March 29 and Mark Goldberg, who left Index Ventures after eight years last fall.
- On April 1st, Christina Far was announced that she would be leaving OMERS Ventures, where she has served as lead investor and head of the firm’s health technology practice since December 2020. Farr announced to X that she would be working on its health technology newsletter, writing a book focused on the power that storytelling can have in business and consulting with health tech founders.
March
- After six years as a partner at Accel, Ethan Choi announced that he would be leaving the company to head to Khosla Ventures in March. Choi will focus on growth-stage investments at his new company and has backed companies such as Klaviyo, Pismo and 1Password.
- While many of the recent VC moves were made by people looking to start something new or take a different opportunity, not all of them were. On March 13, Chamath Palihapitiya Social Capital was announced that he fired partners Jay Xaveri and Ravi Tanuku. Bloomberg reported that this was due to a fundraising issue for AI startup Groq.
- Rambois wasn’t the only person looking to boomerang back to an old haunt in this recent uptick in investor reshuffles. On March 5, Miles Grimshaw announced that he would be returning to Thrive Capital as a general partner after serving in the same position at Benchmark Capital for three years. Grimshaw originally started at Thrive Capital in 2013 and has backed companies such as Airtable, Lattice and Monzo, among others.
- While the transition from operator to VC is a common career progression in the startup ecosystem, it’s not for everyone. On March 4, Sam Blond announced that he had come to that conclusion and would be leaving Founders Fund, where he had been a partner for about 18 months. Blond said he would return to the operation and has held roles at companies including Brex, Zenefits and EchoSign.
January
- After 12 years at Andreessen Horowitz, Connie Chan was announced was leaving the company on January 23. Chan had served as one of the firm’s general partners for the past five years and had backed companies such as Cider, KoBold and Whatnot.
