Participated · Series A · Nov 2022

Fizz is a two-year-old social network that launched at Stanford and centers on anonymous, campus-specific posting with upvotes/downvotes, a karma system, and visible "fizzfluence" metrics. The app originally invited users via Stanford email addresses and has expanded to more than 80 college campuses, with a stated goal of reaching 250 schools by year-end. Its core product emphasizes local, real-time campus conversation and community discovery, with moderation handled largely by volunteer student moderators. The company is testing product extensions including an online marketplace for students and has discussed adding job listings; a prominent, unnamed executive is slated to join as chief product officer next month. Fizz’s business model is described as a "work in progress," and executives acknowledge monetization is a current focus. The platform has faced content-moderation challenges and a 2021 privacy breach; company leaders say security practices have since evolved. Financially, Fizz has attracted venture funding to support growth while it refines product and moderation practices. Fizz is a college-only anonymous social app that gives each campus its own community where students can publish text posts, polls and photos without usernames and classmates can upvote or downvote content. Users can DM each other and choose to reveal their identities; the app is currently iPhone-only. Fizz launched on 13 campuses and expanded to 25 in under two months, and it reports 95% penetration among iPhone users on campuses like Stanford, Dartmouth, Pepperdine and Bethune-Cookman. The company says over half of its users engage with the app daily. Fizz has grown from a two-person founding team to about 25 employees and closed a $4.5M seed in June followed by a $12M Series A; it aims to reach 1,000 campuses by the end of 2023. The app experienced a November 2021 security vulnerability that exposed identifying data and PII; Fizz says it fixed the issue within 24 hours, moved PII to a separate secure database, notified users, and has since evolved its security practices. Fizz is an anonymous, campus-restricted social app built by and for college students that supports anonymous text posts, polls, photos and direct messages. Access is limited to students with a valid .edu address and each campus has its own community. The company supplements AI screening with paid peer moderators — about 15 per school — and reports posts are removed within less than a minute on average. Fizz says it has very high adoption in some places (95% of Stanford undergrads have downloaded the app; 70% at Rice) and estimates 50–60% of users on a given campus use the platform daily. The startup is not currently monetizing but has considered a marketplace for student-to-student sales (textbooks, bikes, etc.). Fizz operates with 22 full‑time employees out of a house in Palo Alto and plans to expand to more than 1,000 U.S. campuses by the end of next year.

Participated · Series C · Jul 2021

SonderMind operates a technology platform that connects individuals with therapists who accept their insurance and are a clinical fit, while providing therapists with billing, telehealth, clinical assessments and practice support. The company emphasizes personalized mental health journeys and data-driven, clinically verifiable outcomes for users. SonderMind’s platform handles matching, payments, telehealth and a full technology suite so clinicians can focus on care. The company says the new funding will accelerate expansion into all fifty states and bolster its technology capabilities. SonderMind positions itself around affordability and accessibility, aiming to help millions of Americans find the right therapist. As of the announced round, the company has raised a total of $183 million in capital. SonderMind operates a marketplace that connects consumers to licensed behavioral-health professionals while enabling clinicians to focus on care rather than running a practice. Its SonderMind Solution™ handles matching clients, payments, telehealth, a full technology suite, clinical assessments and a supportive team of behavioral-health experts. The company currently operates the largest integrated network of community behavioral-health professionals in Colorado and is expanding its business in Texas and Arizona. SonderMind intends to use new capital to accelerate entry into new markets, deepen and broaden enterprise partnerships with payors, employers and health systems, and further build out the technology platform that drives its solution. Leadership includes co-founder and CEO Mark Frank, and the company recently added Eric Roza and Kent Thiry to its board. SonderMind completed a $27 million Series B financing to support these growth plans. SonderMind offers the SonderMind Solution™, a behavioral-health platform that matches clients to vetted therapists while handling scheduling, payments, insurance coordination, and a lightweight EHR and practice-management tools. The product includes a matching platform that factors clinical fit and mutual preferences, a mobile app with voice notes, calendar and messaging, and support for provider billing and administration. The company operates the largest integrated network of community behavioral-health professionals in Colorado. SonderMind plans to expand beyond Colorado into Austin, Texas and Phoenix, Arizona in the near term and to scale the offering nationally. Financially, the company completed a $3 million Series A in April 2019 to support ongoing launch, program and technology initiatives and to hire key personnel. The company also appointed Jonathan S. Bush to its board as it executes its growth strategy from its Denver base.

Participated · Equity · Aug 2020

Epic Games is the maker of Fortnite and the Unreal Engine, and has expanded Fortnite into a hub of user-generated game modes and brand collaborations. The company is broadening its scope with standalone titles like Lego Fortnite, Rocket Racing and Fortnite Festival and operates a lucrative in-game store for skins and digital goods. Epic will use Unreal Engine and its online social gaming infrastructure to build an “all-new games and entertainment universe” in partnership with Disney. The collaboration will bring characters and storylines from Disney, Marvel, Star Wars, Pixar and others into interoperable experiences tied to Fortnite. Disney’s $1.5 billion equity stake accompanies the partnership and signals a major strategic entry into games for Disney. The project aims to let players “play, watch, shop and engage” and is described as persistent, open and interoperable, with a release timeframe described as “soon(ish).” Epic Games is best known as the maker of Fortnite and as a platform for social, interactive entertainment. The company is partnering with Lego to build a kid-focused metaverse and says the product will prioritize child safety, privacy, and tools that give users control. Epic frames the planned digital experiences as family-friendly spaces that empower children to be creators and explore connections between digital and physical worlds. The company announced a $2 billion capital infusion to accelerate those efforts and support continued growth. Epic emphasized three safety principles for the project: prioritizing children’s well-being, safeguarding privacy, and equipping users with control over their digital experience. There is no timeline or detailed product description yet for the proposed virtual world. Epic Games is best known for the blockbuster Fortnite and also provides core developer tools such as the Unreal Engine, Epic Online Services, and the Epic Games Store. The company says it is focused on building connected social experiences across Fortnite, Rocket League and Fall Guys and on empowering game developers and creators. Epic has been using its cash to acquire studios, including the March acquisition of Mediatonic, maker of Fall Guys. Management, led by controlling shareholder and CEO Tim Sweeney, frames the company’s work as part of a broader Metaverse strategy. Epic has an ongoing legal battle with Apple and Google over in-game payment revenues that has been consuming company attention. The company’s latest fundraise values it at an equity valuation of $28.7 billion. Epic Games operates Fortnite, one of the world’s largest games with over 350 million accounts and 2.5 billion friend connections, and develops Unreal Engine, which is used across games and industries such as film, architecture, automotive, and simulation. Through Unreal Engine, Epic Games Store, and Epic Online Services it provides an end-to-end digital ecosystem for developers and creators to build, distribute, and operate games and other content. The company has over 40 offices worldwide with headquarters in Cary, North Carolina and was founded in 1991. Epic announced a $1.78 billion funding round consisting of primary capital and secondary purchases from employee equity holders, and its post-money equity valuation is $17.3 billion. Investors named in the round include Sony (a previously announced $250 million strategic investment), Baillie Gifford, funds and accounts managed by BlackRock, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Lightspeed Venture Partners, the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board, funds and accounts advised by T. Rowe Price Associates, David Tepper, and existing investors KKR and Smash Ventures. Epic said the financing will accelerate its efforts to build a new kind of digital ecosystem using real-time 3D technology, services that connect hundreds of millions of people, and a digital storefront offering a fair business model; the company will remain controlled by founder and CEO Tim Sweeney and retain a single class of common stock. Epic Games is the creator of Fortnite and the long-running Unreal game development engine. The company has historically released free-to-play games as a loss leader to showcase its Unreal toolkit. Fortnite’s massive success has allowed Epic to reduce Unreal Engine prices while continuing to upgrade the technology. Epic recently raised $1.25 billion in a new round of financing and has been reinvesting cash into the community, including a $100 million commitment to Fortnite esports competitions. The company’s cultural impact includes dance crazes, merchandise tie-ins, and broader mainstream attention. Tim Sweeney remains in control of the company while new investors have joined its cap table.