Viola raises $250m for early-stage deals in Israel

Tel Aviv-based venture firm Viola Ventures has closed its sixth fund with $250 million in commitments. The firm said the early-stage fund was oversubscribed and reached its hard cap.

PRESS RELEASE

Viola Ventures Announces New $250M Fund for Early-Stage Investments

Tel Aviv, Israel, January 19, 2022 – Viola Ventures, Israel’s leading venture capital firm, today announced the closing of its sixth fund of $250M, crossing $1.25B in assets under management (AUM), dedicated solely to early-stage investments. The fund was oversubscribed and reached its hard cap. Viola Ventures supports some of the most successful technology companies in the Israeli ecosystem, including global category leaders ironSource, Payoneer, Redis, Verbit, Outbrain, Pagaya, Lightricks and Immunai.

2021 has been a record year for the Israeli tech ecosystem with tech firms raising $25.6B  (representing 136% growth in equity investments over 2020) and 22 tech companies going public with a cumulative market cap of >$84B. On the heels of this, Viola Ventures had an incredible year with eight of its portfolio companies reaching unicorn status and beyond. Portfolio company ironSource became a Decacorn (one of five in Israel) going public at a valuation of $11B and Pagaya has announced its public listing at an $8.5B valuation. Viola Ventures, which was the first institutional investor in both companies, recorded up to 100x return on these investments.

“It’s not only important to invest in high-performing companies but to invest in them early,” said Danny Cohen, General Partner at Viola Ventures. “Our track record proves that we know how to identify outstanding teams, aggressively be the first money, and then support them to unicorn status and beyond. We are confident that our sixth fund will help grow the next generation of market leaders.”

With the new fund, Viola Ventures will invest in 25-30 early-stage (seed and A-round) companies. The fund will continue to invest in its core verticals in which it has had consistent success such as fintech, vertical AI and deep tech, as well as in verticals it expects to generate the next cohort of global outliers such as digital health, next-gen enterprise infrastructure, SaaS 3.0, Web 3.0, and cybersecurity.

“The Israeli ecosystem has shattered its own glass ceiling reaching 60 unicorns, 33 of them in the last 12 months. Viola Ventures invested less than 0.5% of the capital deployed in Israel in 2021 and has ~15% of Israel’s total unicorns,” said Omry Ben David, General Partner at Viola Ventures. “The Israeli tech ecosystem is definitely evolving. Israeli entrepreneurs have growing aspirations and we are seeing more Israeli companies going public and staying independent, thus controlling their own destiny for longer.”

Viola Ventures is evolving with the ecosystem both as an investment team and as a value-add platform. The fund recently promoted Yael Alroy, a principal at the fund, to Partner and appointed a dedicated Partner from the executive search industry, Jeff Shapiro, to assist portfolio companies in building their global and local management teams, a growing challenge for Israeli startups as they scale.

The Viola Ventures investment team includes Shlomo Dovrat, Avi Zeevi, Daniel Cohen, Omry Ben David, Zvika Orron, Yael Alroy, Itzik Avidor, and Rotem Shacham.

About Viola Ventures

Viola Ventures is part of the Viola group, Israel’s leading tech-focused investment firm with over $4B AUM. Founded in 2000, Viola Ventures empowers early-stage start-ups to become global category leaders. The fund manages over $1.25B and has backed some of Israel’s unicorns such as ironSource, Payoneer, Redis, Verbit, Lightricks, Outbrain, Immunai and Pagaya.

For more information please visit: www.viola.vc