LA Fire & Police and SFERS back Pelion’s eighth flagship

Pelion Venture Partners, a Utah-based tech investor, has held a first close on its eighth flagship fund, with support from the Los Angeles Fire & Police Pension System and San Francisco Employees’ Retirement System.

Pelion Ventures VIII, which is targeting $250 million, has closed on about $146 million from 22 investors, according to a regulatory filing. Greenstone Placement Management of Dubai is helping with the fundraising effort.

Separately, it disclosed in a filing that it has set out to raise $100 million for a vehicle called Pelion Olympus Fund I.

Partner Blake Modersitzki, who signed the filings for both Fund VIII and the Olympus fund, did not respond to an email seeking comment.

Regarding Fund VIII, Pelion did not disclose the names of its investors, but LA Fire & Police committed $22.5 million to the new fund, while SFERS committed $25 million, according to Venture Capital Journal research.

The two public pensions previously backed Pelion’s sixth and seventh funds, which closed on $206 million in July 2015 and $365 million in October 2021, respectively. LA Fire & Police committed $15 million to both funds, while SFERS committed $25 million to Fund VI and an undisclosed amount to Fund VII.

Other Fund VI investors included Deseret Mutual Benefit Administrators, the George S and Dolores Doré Eccles Foundation, investment firm Private Equity Holding AG and fund of funds Renaissance Venture Capital.

Fund VI, which is roughly eight years old, generated a TVPI multiple of 1.95x and IRR of 14.9 percent as of June 30, 2022, according to performance data from SFERS. Benchmarking data for similar funds of the same vintage was unavailable.

Performance data for Fund VII was unavailable.

Pelion, with headquarters in Salt Lake City, was founded in 1986 and was previously known as UV Partners. It focuses on early-stage investments in tech companies across the US.