IVP (investment company)

IVP (investment company)
Name	IVP
Type	Private
Industry	Venture capital
Founded	1970s
Headquarters	Menlo Park, California
Key people	Burt McMurtry, Reid Dennis, Ted Doolittle
Products	Growth-stage venture capital

IVP (investment company) IVP is a Menlo Park–based growth-stage venture capital firm with a history of financing media, software, and consumer technology companies. The firm has participated in rounds for publicly traded firms and private companies across Silicon Valley, Boston, New York, and international tech hubs. IVP’s operations intersect with leading venture capital, private equity, corporate venture, and startup ecosystems.

History

IVP traces its origins to the late 1970s and early 1980s venture circles that produced firms such as Sequoia Capital, Accel Partners, Benchmark (venture capital firm), Kleiner Perkins, and Greylock Partners. Early partners and alumni moved among firms including Oak Investment Partners, Bessemer Venture Partners, Walden International, Mayfield Fund, and NEA (New Enterprise Associates). Noted founders and investors associated with IVP-era activity overlapped with figures connected to Intel, Hewlett-Packard, Apple Inc., Sun Microsystems, and Oracle Corporation. During the dot-com boom and bust, IVP navigated rounds with companies later linked to Amazon (company), eBay, AOL, Yahoo!, and Netscape, while contemporaries included Andreessen Horowitz and SoftBank Vision Fund. In subsequent decades IVP expanded relationships with corporate partners such as Google LLC, Microsoft Corporation, Cisco Systems, Facebook, and Twitter.

Investment Strategy

IVP focuses on late-stage and growth equity investments in technology-enabled companies, competing with firms like TPG Growth, Insight Partners, Battery Ventures, General Atlantic, and Summit Partners. Transactions often involve private secondary purchases, pre-IPO rounds, and participating in Series C–F financings alongside Tiger Global Management, Coatue Management, Dragoneer Investment Group, and Founders Fund. Target sectors have included enterprise software, digital media, mobile applications, cloud infrastructure, fintech, and consumer internet platforms such as Stripe (company), Square (company), Dropbox, Slack Technologies, and Pinterest. IVP’s diligence processes engage advisors from firms and institutions like Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan Chase, BlackRock, and SV Angel.

Notable Investments and Exits

IVP’s portfolio has included companies that later listed on exchanges or were acquired by major corporations. Public exits and M&A events involved buyers and markets such as Alphabet Inc., Meta Platforms, Microsoft Corporation, IBM, Salesforce, Adobe Inc., and Oracle Corporation. Notable portfolio companies and outcomes parallel transactions seen with Netflix, Snap Inc., DocuSign, Twilio, Spotify, Roku, Uber Technologies, Lyft, Airbnb, Shopify, Zoom Video Communications, Okta, and Workday. Secondary transactions have connected IVP to funds and investors like Sequoia Capital China, DST Global, Index Ventures, Balderton Capital, and Northzone.

Organizational Structure and Leadership

IVP’s partner and principal roles mirror structures used at Andreessen Horowitz, Greylock Partners, and Benchmark with investment committees, operating partners, and limited partner relations teams. Leadership over time has included individuals who engaged with boards alongside executives from Cisco Systems, HPE, Oracle Corporation, Intel Corporation, and Adobe Inc., and cooperated with board members from Netflix, Facebook, Uber Technologies, Dropbox, and Slack Technologies. The firm’s limited partners have comprised public pensions, endowments, family offices, and sovereign wealth funds such as CalPERS, Yale University, Stanford University, Harvard University, and Norway Government Pension Fund Global.

Financial Performance and Fundraising

IVP raises dedicated growth funds that track industry peers like Insight Partners, General Atlantic, TPG Growth, and Silver Lake Partners. Fund sizes historically have ranged in scales comparable to vehicles managed by Accel Partners, Sequoia Capital, NEA (New Enterprise Associates), and Bain Capital Ventures. Returns and internal rates of return have been benchmarked against public indices and venture cohorts monitored by firms such as Cambridge Associates, PitchBook, Preqin, and CB Insights. IVP’s fundraising cycles engaged institutional investors including Pension Protection Fund, CalSTRS, Massachusetts Pension Reserves Investment Trust, and family office allocators tied to The Rockefeller Foundation and Ford Foundation.

Industry Impact and Controversies

IVP’s role in late-stage financings has shaped valuation practices amid comparisons with SoftBank Group, Tiger Global Management, Sequoia Capital, and Andreessen Horowitz. Debates involving secondary trading, share liquidity, and late-stage pricing have included conversations with regulators and market participants such as Securities and Exchange Commission and trade bodies akin to NVCA and CAIA Association. Controversial episodes in the broader late-stage market—linked to firms like WeWork, Theranos, Quibi, and Blue Apron—have influenced industry scrutiny, governance discussions with auditors like Ernst & Young, KPMG, Deloitte, and PricewaterhouseCoopers, and led to renewed focus on board composition, favoring independent directors with backgrounds at NASDAQ, NYSE, Blackstone, and KKR & Co. Inc..

Category:Venture capital firms