Pear VC, a pre-seed and seed stage VC firm specializing in helping early-stage founders build legendary companies, has closed a $432 million seed fund – one of the largest seed funds raised recently by a non-multistage fund, creating a bright spot in the venture capital industry’s otherwise choppy environment. The early-stage seed fund will help double down in areas such as AI, and support programs like PearX, Pear’s early-stage bootcamp for founders and Pear’s Female Founders Circle, a community for technical female entrepreneurs. In addition, Pear Dorm, which supports student builders, will be expanded with new programs. This fundraise has come at a time when markets continue to cool, yet many of Pear’s Limited Partners doubled down on their investments from previous Pear funds, showing that investors are particularly impressed with Pear’s track record to date and its future prospects.
Pear VC is a top-performing firm, having seeded three public companies, including DoorDash, Guardant Health, and Senti Bio, and many others valued over $1B. Pear runs multiple programs to support early-stage entrepreneurs, including PearX, a 14-week long early-stage bootcamp for founders and Pear Dorm, which supports student builders. Pear is also known for its deep history of investing in student builders. Today, 50% of Pear’s portfolio companies are student-founded, representing $15 billion in total valuation. Pear runs a Female Founders Circle program, which is focused on helping train technical female founders moving into entrepreneurship. The company is a team of company builders and has founded over ten companies themselves.
