First Spark Ventures

What is First Spark Ventures?

First Spark Ventures is a Deep Tech venture capital fund that focuses on investing in startups across various sectors including Education, BioTech, Retail & E-Commerce, A.I. & Big Data, HealthTech & Fitness, Developer tools, Medical Devices & Hospital Services, Healthcare & Wellness, and Pharmaceutical & Medicine.

They specialize in Seed and Pre-seed funding stages with investments ranging from a minimum of $100,000 to a maximum of $5,000,000 and a sweet spot investment of around $1,500,000.

Their investment thesis centers around supporting and scaling startups that possess fundamental technological insights in Advanced Compute, Digital Biology & Biotech, and CyberPhysical Systems. First Spark Ventures believes in the transformative power of technologies that can make the world healthier, safer, and more productive.

They seek to work with stellar teams that target large accessible markets and can create massive sustainable differentiation. They consider themselves partners in the growth journey of their portfolio companies, offering interdisciplinary team support.

Their partnership with the Stanford Research Institute (SRI International) further endorses their commitment to pioneering innovation, leveraging SRI's labs and 75 years of innovation history. Some of the key themes First Spark Ventures focuses on include machine learning advancements, computation enhancements, AI-driven biology, and system scaling.

The fund's portfolio includes startups across various verticals that are aligned with their investment areas, and they showcase a commitment to supporting founders who are shaping the future of Deep Tech. Noteworthy investment professionals at First Spark Ventures include Manish Kothari, Ph.D., Aaron Sisto, Ph.D., and other experts who bring a wealth of experience from various domains including academia, entrepreneurship, and strategic investments.