Convergence Partners Launches B2B Venture Fund
New $125 Million Fund to Focus Primarily On Business-to-Business e-Commerce
MENLO PARK, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 20, 1999--Convergence Partners, a Silicon Valley venture capital firm founded in 1997, announced today the formation of Convergence Ventures II LP, a new venture fund focused on the development of business-to-business electronic commerce solutions companies.
The $125 million fund is expected to provide early-stage funding for 15 to 18 start-ups.
''The numbers speak for themselves -- the business-to-business e-commerce market is expected to be 10 times the size of the business-to-consumer market, reaching $1.5 trillion by 2004,'' said Russ Irwin, co-founder and general partner of Convergence Partners. ''Our new fund will seek the entrepreneurs that are transforming businesses worldwide by offering services that dramatically increase the productivity and efficiencies of their customer's business processes.
''These new services are all made possible through leveraging the enormous power of the Internet.''
Business models most likely to receive attention from Convergence Partners include infrastructure services, application services and vertical exchanges.
Convergence Partners will build upon the solid portfolio it has assembled over the last two years, including B2B portfolio companies that include Adauction.com, an online media exchange offering opportunistic buys on premium advertising inventory -- online, print, broadcast and out-of-home, AdForce (acquired by CMGI), Chameleon Systems, Decisive Technology (acquired by MessageMedia), Entegrity, HiFive.net, Magnifi, eCompany Network, Signio and Tropian.
''The rapid success of companies like Adauction.com and Signio has proven to us the vitality of these entrepreneurs and business models. With Convergence Partners I am looking forward to aggressively pursuing more opportunities in the B2B sector,'' said 'ecosystem entrepreneur' and recently appointed venture partner Robb Wilmot.
Convergence Partners is a venture capital firm focused primarily on early-stage business-to-business e-commerce solutions. The firm was founded in 1997 by general partners Paul Dali, Eric Di Benedetto and Russ Irwin. Venture partner Robb Wilmot and administrative partner and CFO Chen Tang joined the founding team in 1999. Convergence Ventures II LP, a $125 million venture capital fund, was recently raised from limited partners including NEC, SEMA Group and CALPERS.
Convergence Partners 3000 Sand Hill Road Building 2, Suite 235 Menlo Park, CA 94025 Phone 650/854 3010 Fax 650/854 3015 convergencepartners.com Inquiries should be sent to: mailto:Info@convergencepartners.com
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