Super Angel Boris Wertz Raises $15M Fund

This morning, Vancouver-based Boris Wertz announced on his blog the launch of Version One Ventures and that he’s raised $15 million for the microVC fund. The fund–which last week took part in the Series A funding of Top Hat Monocle–will invest $250,000 to $500,000 in seed and Series A deals for consumer Internet, ecommerce, SaaS and mobile companies.

Wertz–former COO of Victoria’s AbeBooks and who’s listed as a venture partner at Acton Capital Partners–says that he has made some three dozen angel investments and that six have exited to date.

BLOG POST

Announcing Version One Ventures

I am excited to announce today the launch of Version One Ventures, a new $15 million micro-VC fund. Version One will back outstanding web and mobile entrepreneurs across North-America with $250,000 to $500,000 investments in Seed and Series A rounds.

The fund builds on my successes with over 35 angel investments which include six exits – among them acquisitions by Google, Twitter, Salesforce, and Groupon. My simple investment thesis: back passionate entrepreneurs who are trying to solve a big problem with a strong product vision.

Version One came to life in the same way that most start-ups evolve. I bootstrapped my first angel investing projects with my own funds, found product-market fit and in the past 2 years have gotten significant traction with exits and follow-on rounds for portfolio companies (most recently for social publisher Wattpad, crowdfunding platform Indiegogo and educational network Edmodo).

With the Internet rapidly moving into everybody’s hands, today’s entrepreneurs will be in the position to build the companies we all dreamt of in 1999 when I started my own start-up JustBooks.The timing was therefore right to take my “angel investing project” to the next level and create a larger fund with a big vision: to become one of the most respected early-stage funds in North-America by being a trusted and helpful partner for entrepreneurs.

As a former entrepreneur myself, I feel the most rewarding aspect of being an investor is to help other entrepreneurs start, build and scale companies and to pass on some of the lessons I learned the hard way over 8 start-up years. Helping others to achieve greatness is what venture capital is all about and how I see my role.

I am fortunate to have found outstanding investors who share this vision. Led by Jeff Mallett (the former President and COO of Yahoo), Version One Ventures is backed by over a dozen successful American and Canadian Internet entrepreneurs as well as a number of high-net worth individuals.

Version One’s typical investment will be $250K to $500K in Seed and Series A financing rounds in consumer Internet, e-commerce, SaaS and mobile companies. To date Version One has already made 5 investments: Top Hat Monocle (interactive learning platform), Julep (multi-channel beauty brand), Jobber (business management software for contractors), Instacanv.as (Instagram artist marketplace) and Sunnytrail (social intelligence platform).

I am very grateful to a number of people who have helped me grow as an investor, especially Albert Wenger and Fred Wilson from Union Square Ventures, Jeff Clavier from Softech, Chris Fralic from First Round Capital and Christoph Braun from Acton Capital. Thank you for your support and mentorship.

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