Pack Ventures

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Overview

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About Pack Ventures

Investor type

VC firm

First check

$50k to $500k

Lead

Sometimes

Themes

therapeutic

lifescience

psychedelic

subscription

drug

biopharma

life sciences tools

+36

See all

Funding Stages

1. Idea or Patent 2. Prototype 3. Early Revenue

Countries of investment

USA

Who we are

We are Pack Ventures - a preseed and seed fund backing research led-companies by leveraging the resources of a $11B research university for deal flow and company support. We source our startups on campus, from the 550k+ alumni and globally when the U.W. resources can drive the success of the startup.

Funding Requirements

We invest in A.I. companies from chips to robots and all of the software in between, as well as techbio companies building at the intersection of A.I. and bio, through Pack. The defining companies of the next generation will be research-led, and Pack has unique access to the #1 publicly funded research university—the University of Washington.

Value add

We deploy UW's $1.7B research engine — labs, clinical infra, talent, IP — into the best frontier founders anywhere, winning cap-table spots capital can't. We have 1200+ VC contacts that we leverage for follow on funding. We also tap into UW and the UW network for customers and talent.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is your preferred ownership target?

5-10%

What is your typical due diligence process?

We typically engage in deep technical diligence. Robust customer diligence, and reference checks. We have a network of ~200 LPs that are executives, former founders and phds that we use as experts. Additionally we have access to 3000+ principle investigators (professors, and lab leaders) from across the university of Washington that are award winning scientists and researchers to support technical diligence. Our experience and networks at Amazon, Google and Microsoft, give us deep insights from large tech.

What is your average time from first meeting to decision?

2 weeks, we have moved in days, but have also worked on Builds to create new companies over 18-24 months (before those inventors even consider themselves founders) while their research reaches commercial readiness. We meet many founders inside their labs and through commercialization programs that help develop companies, on campus at UW and from the top programs globally.

What do you expect from founders after investing?

Quarterly financial reports including revenue, burn, new customers, hiring and other traction metrics is the minimum we require, but often our founders want weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly check-ins with one of our partners.

Do you take board seats?

Most often observed seats to keep our information access high, but our time commitments reasonable for a fund with 25-50 companies per portfolio. We have one official director seat at this time.

Do you reserve capital for follow-on rounds?

We reserve about 10% of fund capital for following and support, and instead have a very efficient and structured sidecar program to offer our LPs access to our winners. LPs who invest $500k or less into the fund pay 0% mgmt fee/20% carry on sidecars Under $1m pay 0% mgmt fee/10% carry Fund LP commitments of $1M+ pay 0%/0% on side cars. All LPs get our diligence, the pitch deck and a recorded lunch and learn of the founder pitching and Q&A.

Do you invest in solo founders?

Yes, but rarely

What does success look like for you in an investment?

Every investment needs the potential to return the entire fund with one check. With 2.5% ownership at exit, a company must surpass $2B when we exit to pay the entire fund. Additionally we expect regular updates so we can make informed decisions on when to exit or offer sidecar investments to LPs with our updated information asymmetry vs other investors. A successful investment must also balance our risk, diversity and exposure across the entire portfolio. We do not want concentration into one specific area from several portfolio companies. I.e. we shouldn’t have multiple biotechs targeting the same indication with too similar of methods of action. Given we are an early investor, 90%+ of our investments will need significant additional capital before they reach our required exit valuation. Our founders and investments need the ability to recruit additional resources - capital, talent and other forms of support - to reach that exit. We help teach some of this, but our founders must be able to adapt and learn the skill. An ideal investment gives us the opportunity to return a significant portion of the fund (over 50%) between years 7-10, with a goal of reaching 1x DPI by year 7/8. Sometimes this will happen through secondary sales (full or partial) that help secure returns for our LPs while maximizing the opportunity for a 10x+ fund.