Aliavia Ventures

12/02/2021

Great to have Aliavia Ventures profiled in the latest Australian Institute of Company Directors mag alongside great female investors including Carol Schwartz and Catherine Robson.

"The US venture capital space is still dominated by men, with 65 per cent of firms in 2020 having no women partners — and in Australia, only about 10 women GPs in 130 firms.

and.....to put that in perspective, in 2019, WeWork raised US$5b — more than all the money raised by women founders in the US," says Vale

Clearly we need more women in VC GP and partner roles, as they are more likely to invest in female founders.

“A company you found is like your baby, then you pitch to 20 people and they tell you it’s ugly," says Deb Noller. “Men don’t get asked those questions.”

10/29/2021

Mentioned in the AFR last week....

"Carol Schwartz AO has this year been searching for suitably qualified women to run a specialist venture capital fund in Australia. The search led her overseas, where she found several women in the United States, but she was disappointed not to find anyone in Australia.....This year, she was the foundation investor in Aliavia Ventures – a California-based firm focused on early stage venture capital investing in the US and Australia with female [tech] founders."

Great article highlighting the massive gap in female fund managers from growth equity to VC in Australia. Amazing in 2021 ALIAVIA is still the only VC firm focused on investing in female tech founders in Australia. To add there are less than 10 female GP's in the whole of VC Australia, Kate Vale & Marisa Warren take up 2 of those seats!

As a venture industry in Australia we need to do better. Promote more females to General Partner and back more emerging female focused funds.

ESG is flavour of the month ahead of the COP26 summit in Glasgow, and this is causing some ironic smiles among women excluded from the conversations about diversity.

08/12/2021

Aliavia Ventures is proud to be partnering with Silicon Valley Bank to co-host this exclusive virtual networking event for Australian female tech founders who are looking to expand to the US.

Apply now to attend, only 30 companies selected https://bit.ly/3xBe3zS

Event format includes a fireside chat, followed by an interactive networking session where founders will be matched via breakout rooms with experienced US and Australian investors.

08/11/2021

Super excited to announce the first 6 experts for the ELEVACAO Investor Ready Program for Women Tech Founders, kicking off September 7. Apply now! https://bit.ly/3iCabu8

Our program is designed to accelerate women tech founders through the early stage of business growth - equipping our founders with the confidence, knowledge and connections they need to get investor ready and raise funding.

Since our New York launch in 2015, we've had 165 women through the program, who have raised more than $80M and produced 3 exits! So I guess we know how to find great founders :)

07/07/2021

Early stage Aussie (and US) there is a new VC in town....so happy to share Aliavia Ventures Australian launch in the AFR, with the incredible support of Carol Schwartz AO and the Trawalla Group team Mat Rangeley and Sarah Buckley as a key investor.

Love that our first Australian investment was in an ELEVACAO alum, HowToo. Lisa Vincent and Jenny Barltrop we are super excited to be involved as you scale the business globally and transform the digital learning space.

Great to be co-investing with you Will Botha from MA Financial Group and Alon Greenspan from Jelix Ventures on HowToo!

Thank you Jessica Sier for the great write-up!

RBA board member and property sector leader Carol Schwartz has put money into a new venture capital fund, focused entirely on backing female-founded tech companies.

04/21/2021

Join Marisa Warren & Vale on this incredible Clubhouse panel today (5:30pm PST) talking about such a powerful topic - how do we get better diversity in the VC and Tech worlds!

Sindhya Valloppillil love the work you are doing to bring actionable awareness to the diversity issues we see daily.

Wednesday, April 21 at 8:30pm EDT with Sindhya Valloppillil, Saba Karim, Kate Vale, Jonathan G. Blanco, Marisa Warren, Harold Hughes, Chip Hazard, Charlie Hanna, Tiffany Mcghee, Vaughn Crowe, Chris Moreno, Terell Sterling, Aegen Smith, Pialy Aditya. Applying lessons from Reid Hoffman’s Bliztscalin...

03/25/2021

Sharing our insights in this Forbes article around why funding declined for female founders in 2020 to 2.3%. Yep just 2.3%…..

Unfortunately over the years the stories like Audra Everett Gold's, Sansan Fibri, Vincent and Jenny Barltrop's are all too familiar.

Proud to see they are building great tech companies despite the odds. But we 'the investment community' can do more. Fund more female founders and funders at an early stage! Simple.

Thank you Annie Brown for amplifying this critical message.

Vale, Aliavia Ventures & ELEVACAO portfolio companies Vurbl, My Dream Chat, How Too Pty Ltd

Due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, venture capital firms began stating that they were “doubling down on portfolio companies,” but often, what that translated to was “we're going to only invest in what we know,” which meant investing primarily in white male founders.

01/04/2021

We know the data that investing in female-led businesses deliver on average 35% higher ROI than male-led firms. BUT did you know that investing in female fund managers deliver better results as well!

“Even after adjusting for risk, female managed funds outperformed their male counterparts amid the coronavirus-related market swings,” said David Kostin, Goldman Sachs’ chief US equity strategist.

Diversity at the funder & founder level is not only a good thing for society but it will deliver better returns. So why wouldn't you back a female!!

Goldman Sachs analysis suggests IT and financial sector weightings contributed to better results

12/30/2020

Great to see our founders Marisa Warren and Kate Vale in this powerful Forbes article by Annie Brown about the importance of ensuring we fund women tech founders building AI companies.

"Women investing and creating their own wealth is a powerful symbol....The combination of AI and gender diversity not only means successful companies, but a more equitable, sustainable future."

The exciting potential of women in AI is that their presence has such a wide reach. Not only is AI one of the most pervasive technologies industry-wise, the data it produces can have significant social impacts on our society.