Top 20 Venture Capital Firms in Los Angeles California

12 Jul 2021 • 10 min read

Establishing a business does not end with a plan's execution. Running a business entails huge responsibilities, experience and knowledge. Also, you need to ensure that your business can stand against your competitors and can operate for a long span of time to hit the success you and your team are aiming for from the very beginning. One of the main ingredients to make a business more successful is the funds. Aside from the human prowess, expertise, and strategic business approach, proper and enough funding also contribute to your company’s success.

In today’s article, we will discuss the top 20 venture capital firms based in Los Angeles that fuel and backup startups and growing businesses within the area and its neighbouring areas.

Top 20 Venture Capital Firms in Los Angeles, CA

Getting financial support from investment firms like venture capitals is the fuel that keeps Los Angeles startups and companies running and heading down the road. Below are the top 20 VC firms that are particularly reliable and noteworthy to consider for your business financial backup.

Mucker Capital

Mucker Capital is a venture capital firm and private equity firm working with entrepreneurs and founders in the Los Angeles area to provide initial financial assistance and business management to help each portfolio company in Los Angeles and broader Southern California launch and scale their new products or services. The VC firm specializes in incubation, startup, early-stage, pre-seed, seed, and Series A investments.

The main sectors they are investing in include Internet software, services, and media ventures. Other areas they prefer to invest in are Enterprise, fintech, B2B and Consumer Products.

Some of their notable portfolio companies include BloomNation, Retention Science, ServiceTitan, Surf Air, Trunk Club, Twenty20, and many more.

Baroda Ventures

Baroda Ventures is a venture capital and private equity firm interested in pre-seed and seed-stage investments. They seek to invest in startups and companies in the consumer internet, digital media, e-commerce, mobile, SaaS, and other tech-enabled industries. Other than that, they are also open to investing in late-stage companies operating within hardware, cleantech, and healthcare sectors. Usually, the firm provides investments of $0.1 million and $5 million to their portfolio companies.

Related: Top Virtual Startup Accelerator Programs for Remote Founders

However, same with many other VCs, the huge majority of Baroda's investments are allocated to local LA companies. Baroda Ventures works with a diverse and huge number of startup entrepreneurs and founders who are dedicated to creating game-changing products and services, while building long-lasting businesses.

Double M Partners

Double M Partners is a fund investment firm managed by Mark Mullen who has 25 years of technology investing and M&A experience within the IMC sector. The VC prefers to invest in the early-stage and seed-stage investment with a focus on B2B infrastructure, management platforms, hardware. software, and security. They are also interested in backing up startups and businesses operating within the Internet, Software and Technology sectors and those businesses offering Business-to-Business infrastructure, software, security, and management services. They usually offer investment ranges from $0.1 million and $0.50 million in its portfolio companies.

However, Double M Partners and Mull Capital stop making investments since they have joined forces with other VC to form a new VC firm named Bonfire Ventures. Currently, all investment is now made through Bonfire Ventures.

Crosscut Ventures

Crosscut is a venture capital and private equity firm. It was founded by Rick Smith, Brian Garrett, and Brett Brewer. Although they define themselves as a national fund, the main focus of the firm is to support the SoCal startup ecosystem in LA. They focused on early-stage to late-stage and seed companies that have the potential to scale and turn into large markets. Particularly, those companies passionate about creating and developing revolutionary tech-enabled devices and products.

The VC firm has been committed to scaling the entrepreneurship community in southern California since 2008. Some of the LA portfolio companies they are investing in are The Black Tux, Omaze, DataScience, HelloTech, GumGum, ClubW, and EventUp.

Anthem Venture Partners

Anthem Venture Partners is interested to invest in early-stage Series A and B technology companies as well as late-stage companies. It was founded by William Woodward in 2003 in California. They are active investors who support companies, and take a board seat primarily on Southern California based companies. Generally, the VC firm prefers to take a lead or co-lead position where they can have access and influence on the Board of Directors to get direct ties to the management team.

The areas of their investment focus are internet, mobile, semiconductor, and software industries. While their initial investment ranges between $1million and $5 million with reserve for follow-on investments. Some of their portfolio companies include Buzz Media, Demand Media, Surf Air, Scopely, and TRUECar.

Related: Top 20 Venture Capital Firms in San Francisco California

Arena Ventures

Arena Ventures is a private placement firm in LA founded by Jeff Lo and Paige Craig in 2015. The VC firm makes seed-stage and growth investments in technology-based startups in LA and San Francisco. They invest first with people before their companies, particularly they seek to find entrepreneurs and founders with unique ideas that can transform their industry into leading markets. They have a fully integrated connection with AngelList, allowing other investors to engage and join their deals.

Aside from the capital, they also provide advisory services to family offices, high net worth entrepreneurs, powerful angels and founders all over the globe. In Particular, they work with European and Middle Eastern startups operating within the digital and tech sectors. Some of their notable Portfolio Companies include DSTLD, Laurel & Wolf, HONK, and Meerkat.

Canyon Creek Capital

Canyon Creek Capital is an early-stage fund investment firm and private equity firm established in Los Angeles offering A series of investments on the Westside of LA. The VC firm primarily provides financial support to the "Bridge to A" and Series space. They seek to invest in tech-enabled startups and companies that are also seeking to find disruptive and better solutions to address the challenges of their industry.

Canyon Creek Capital strongly upholds the belief that by building and leveraging an extensive network of investors and contacts they can provide significant value to founders and individual entrepreneurs and help them grow and achieve great success in their niche. Some of their successful portfolio companies are Bridg, ChowNow, Amplify.LA, Bringhub, Winc, Pixalate.

Frontier Venture Capital

Frontier Ventures Capital acts as venture capital and private equity firm interested in financing early-stage media and technology-based companies. With strong partnerships in California, Colorado, New York, and Oregon, the VC firm can provide investments in early-stage technology companies across the United States. In particular, they are open to back up uniquely capable founders in any market as long as they are operating within the areas of alternative energy, biotechnology, information services, nanotechnology, and software.

Since its founding year, Frontier actively supports exceptional entrepreneurs and founders by backing up world-changing technology products and services around the globe. They have a great team of investors who are open to founding companies, ranging between $100,000 to $1 million with additional capital reserved for follow-on investments.

Karlin Ventures

Karlin Ventures is a California-based venture capital firm with a great focus on advertising technology, e-commerce platforms, education technology, enterprise software, software and marketplace companies on the West Coast. The VF firm prefers to have a co-investor role in their portfolio companies, to openly participate in follow-on rounds. Usually, their initial investments are ranging from $250,000 to $2 million. Their main goal is to be a value-add partner helping individual entrepreneurs and founders with great approaches to develop effective solutions to industry issues. Some of the notable Portfolio Companies they are investing include AmplifyLA, ChowNow, HONK, Bitium

Pritzker Group Venture Capital

Pritzker Group Venture Capital is an investment and private equity firm co-headquartered in Chicago and Los Angeles seeking to fund Series A and Series B companies within the technology sector. The VC firm is constantly leveraging its huge network of investors to help companies grow and scale their businesses. Since their founding in 1996, they have been intensively working along with entrepreneurs and managed to invest in more than 100 companies around the globe, developing game-changing technology.

Some of its successful portfolio companies include Fleetmatics (NYSE: FLTX), SinglePlatform (acquired by Constant Contact), Zinch (acquired by Chegg), Playdom (acquired by Disney), LeftHand Networks (acquired by Hewlett-Packard), and TicketsNow (acquired by Ticketmaster).

Steamboat Ventures

Steamboat Ventures is an early-stage investment and private equity firm operating under the Walt Disney Company umbrella. Generally, the VC firm was named after the Mickey Mouse cartoon Steamboat Willie in 1928—the screen debut of Mickey Mouse. The VC firm is mainly interested in backing up early through growth stage technology-based, digital media and consumer tech-enabled companies. Although they are based in LA, they also have many conveniently located offices around Asia.

Since their founding year, they are helping startup companies starting from scratch to face the challenges in the industry and eventually turning them into market leaders. Through their financial, technical and operational experience, they already made many successful exits.

Related: Top Investor Update Softwares That Save Startup Founders’ Time

A-Grade Investments

A-Grade Investments is a venture capital and private equity firm founded by Ashton Kutcher, Guy Odeary and Ron Burkle in 2010 in Los Angeles. The main focus of the company is on seed, early-stage and debt financing investments. Usually, they are interested in investing in technology-based startups and growing companies. In particular, their primary targets are consumer-focused internet and consumer-oriented technology businesses that adapt and improve the method of how consumers share information.

Some of the notable portfolio companies that they have successfully invested in are Casper, Fab.com, Getaround, SocialCam, and Victorious.

Tech Coast Venture

Tech Coast Angels is a venture capital firm and the largest angel investment organization founded in 1997 and headquartered in Southern California. They are interested in investing in early-stage startup and high-growth companies operating in biotech, consumer products, green-tech, medical devices, the internet, and the software sectors.

Since its founding year, it has invested in more than 200 companies. The company team comprises four chapters, with more than 450 members in five regional networks across Southern California. All of their members are founders and passionate entrepreneurs who have profound knowledge and business practices in the investment field. Along with the capital, they are also providing companies with counselling, mentoring and easy access to a huge network of investors, professionals and strategic partners.

CAA Ventures

CAA Ventures is a corporate venture arm of Creative Artists Agency, an early-stage venture capital fund and private equity firm based in Los Angeles. The VC firm offers financing support to internet-based companies focusing on the consumer internet, games and e-commerce, mobile platforms, social media, online video and publishing industries with cultural and pop culture ties.

Typically, they are investing $20 million in venture capital investment in early-stage consumer and enterprise technology companies that bring across the film, television, music, sports, fashion, lifestyle, video game, consumer, and retail industries. They are also open to later-stage companies with constant revenue growth and are starting to have dominance in the market.

Wavemakers Ventures

Wavemaker Partners is a multi-faceted cross-border venture capital and private equity firm taking a co-investment approach and using their global resources to help startups bridge the post-angel to the pre-venture field. Typically, their investment ranges from $100,000 to $1 million in early-stage companies. They are interested in enterprise and deep technology companies.

For the past 17 years, Wavemaker is considered one of the most active early-stage VCs in Southern California and Southeast Asia and has managed to invest in more than 360 companies across five continents.

Some of their US-based investments include MindBody (NASDAQ: MB), DigitalGlobe (NYSE: DGI) and StyleHaul (acquired by RTL). Singapore-based investments include Luxola (acquired by LVMH), ArtofClick (acquired by Xurpas), and Pie (acquired by Google).

Okapi Venture Capital

Okapi Venture Capital is an early-stage venture capital and private equity firm based in Southern California. They are providing long-term financial and management support to growing businesses operating within the information technology and life science sectors. The VC firm seeks to fund startups and companies operating in the healthcare, life sciences, and software sectors.

To develop and help businesses achieve a valuable high-growth in the market, Okapi Venture Capital always takes pride in collaborating with talented professionals and operational executive partners that have profound experience and expertise in the field. They also believe that by combining their team's capital, management, operational, and technical expertise, they can transform startups into exceptional and revolutionary market leaders.

Versant Ventures

Versant Ventures is a leading healthcare investment fund and private equity firm supporting startups and growing companies with financial investment and expertise. They specialize in early-stage, later-stage ventures, private equity, and debt financing investments. Versant Ventures prefers investing in the largest market opportunities under the life sciences and healthcare information technology industries with a great focus on medical devices, healthcare services and novel therapeutics discovery and development.

Versant has built a team with a deep investment of around $2.3 billion, wide operating services in Canada, the U.S. and Europe, and scientific expertise that bring a hands-on approach to creating transformational healthcare companies. Since its founding year, they have managed to fund more than 65 Versant companies.

New Enterprise Associates

New Enterprise Associates (NEA) is a leading global venture capital and private equity firm headquartered in Menlo Park, California, and Washington, D.C and has additional offices in Baltimore, Bangalore, Beijing, Boston, Mumbai, New York City, San Francisco and Shanghai.

They are helping individual entrepreneurs and exceptional founders build and develop transformational enterprises that produce game-changing tech-enabled products and services. NEA seeks to invest in companies ranging from seed stage through growth stage operating in different industry sectors across the globe. Some of their verticals include biopharma, healthcare devices, consumer & internet, energy, software & services, systems, technology, and services sectors.

St. Cloud Capital

St. Cloud Capital is a Los Angeles-based private venture capital firm founded in 2001 providing growth to the lower middle-market companies in the U.S, usually those included companies with annual revenues between $10 million and $150 million. The VC firm prefers to invest in commercial products and services, insurance, manufacturing, medical supplies, retail, infrastructure and industrial sectors.

Typically, they invest around $5 million to $20 million in private and public companies operating within their target verticals. St. Cloud offers investments in a combination of the capital structure, including senior secured debt, subordinated debt, and preferred and common equity.

Caltius Equity Partners

Caltius Equity Partners is a venture capital and private equity arm of Caltius Capital Management based in Los Angeles, California. They purchase and develop lower middle-market companies operating with the Business Services, Industrial Services, IT & Managed Services and Consumer Services sectors. The VC firm's target investment size is around $10 million to $30 million for a substantial minority position in companies with $4 million to $12 million in EBITDA. They provide the entrepreneurs and founders with immediate wealth diversification and wealth creation over time from a carried interest in the company as their partner.

Key Takeaways

When it comes to the main sources of capital ventures, Silicon Valley still has the majority numbers, but Los Angeles cannot be denied as the home of plenty of notable venture capitals that made a worthy mark in the investing field. Thus, if you are looking for a VC, LA is never the wrong place to consider. Getting investment for your startups early will give you colossal benefits that can bring your business on top.