Solutions Ecosystems Reports Resources Data Pricing Login Book a demo
Investor profile

First Round Capital

VC firm · San Francisco, USA · Founded 2004 · Active in 2026

← Power Law Ranking

A public taster of the full Dealroom platform — request a demo to explore live deal flow, full investor history, and team intel. · Last updated 15 Apr 2026 · Methodology

48 Power Law outcomes Power Law Ranking #6 · 48 Power Law outcomes · Active 2026
Enterprise value ↑ 18% 5y
$361B
Unicorns ↑ 22% 5y
39
Decacorns ↓ 33% 5y
4
Thoroughbreds ↑ 32% 5y
45
Featured in #6Power Law Investor Ranking · Global · 2026 Top 0.5%by Seed → $100M+ revenue outcomes

First Round Capital was founded in 2004 by Josh Kopelman in Philadelphia and San Francisco. The firm pioneered the 'Seed-only by design' model — First Round explicitly does not write Series A or later cheques, by philosophy. Each company gets a Seed cheque plus access to the First Round Network: a private community of First Round founders and operators.

The firm runs the Dorm Room Fund and the Angel Track program, both feeders into the broader Seed ecosystem. Notable bets include Square, Uber, Roblox, Notion, and Looker.

Portfolio analysis

The 48 First Round Power Law outcomes ($100M+ revenue and above).

Snapshot of where the outcomes are concentrated by country, sector, and stage entered.

By countryCount
  1. USA46
  2. France1
  3. Canada1
By sectorCount
  1. Fintech10
  2. Other B2B Software7
  3. eCommerce & Marketplaces7
  4. AI6
  5. Marketing4
  6. Health Tech & Medtech3
  7. Cybersecurity3
  8. Other2
  9. Biotech & Life Sciences2
  10. Transportation1
  11. Food1
  12. Space1
By stage enteredCount
  1. Series B+4
  2. Series A14
  3. Seed29
01 · Portfolio market map

First Round's 48 Power Law outcomes.

Toggle between a sector landscape and a world map. Both views respond to the stage and outcome-tier filters. The faded names at the bottom of bigger boxes are part of the full list — click "+ N more" to reveal them.

Stage entered
Outcome tier
Region
Group by
48 of 48 Power Law outcomes
Logos hosted by Dealroom; click any chip to open the company in app.dealroom.co. The dot inside each chip shows the company's highest tier — red Gigacorn, violet Centicorn/Decacorn, lavender Unicorn, blue Thoroughbred, green Colt. Tiers are inclusive: a Unicorn (e.g. Klarna) also matches the Thoroughbred filter, a Decacorn also matches Unicorn and Thoroughbred, and so on up the ladder. Colt is a separate axis (high-growth, smaller revenue) and only matches itself. Map dots use the same colour code; hover for details. Sectors are mutually exclusive (priority-ordered classification). Stage entered = the round First Round first invested in (where data is available — coverage 93%).
02 · Origin of portfolio founders

Where First Round's founders come from — and where they study.

99 founders across the 48 Power Law outcomes — split by country of origin, university attended, and the company they worked at before founding. Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and Microsoft are the deepest single pipelines.

LocationCount
United States47
Turkey6
China5
Russia4
Canada3
France3
Sweden3
Pakistan2
India2
Poland2
+2 more →
UniversityCount
Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania10
Stanford University10
Massachusetts Institute of Technology7
University of Michigan5
Brown University3
MIT Sloan School of Management3
University of Southern California3
Berkeley3
Dartmouth College3
University of Waterloo2
+31 more →
Origin companyCount
Microsoft16
Alphabet | Google12
Flatiron Health4
Apple4
Zynga4
Meta4
Digital Turbine2
Yahoo!2
Yammer2
Pivotal2
+40 more →
Origin = country a founder is born in or grew up in (founders may have multiple origins; counts include all entries). University = highest-listed degree. Origin company = a previous employer where the founder was tagged before starting their current company. Explore the full Sequoia infographic on Thoroughbreds & Unicorns →
03 · Key people

Key people at First Round.

Josh Kopelman
Josh Kopelman
Founding Partner
Forbes Midas 2025 · #89
Roblox
Photos sourced from public partner pages (firm websites + Wikipedia). Roster and Midas ranks are sourced from the official Forbes 2025 Midas List (compiled by Forbes & TrueBridge Capital Partners). Notable-deal attributions are the most-cited public lead deal for each partner; corrections welcome at [email protected].
04 · Compare with peers

How does First Round stack up?

First Round in orange, your selection in blue and other colours. Pick from the global roster of 35 peer investors — filter by region or hit "Find similar shapes" to auto-pick the three closest. The funnel matrix mirrors the spider chart on the ranking page; the line chart shows each firm's share of global unicorns minted that year — peaks reveal vintage years.

Compare against

Stage focus

Companies by entry stage and outcome tier

Sector focus

Companies per investor across the 10 highest-volume sectors

Share of new unicorns per year

% of all global unicorns minted that year, year by year
Source: Dealroom Power Law dataset. Investors shown are the 2026 Power Law top 35 by combined entry-to-outcome score, drawn from the overview and locations_data sheets. Funnel-matrix axes rescale per-axis using the maximum among the currently selected investors, so the polygons always fill the chart for shape comparison.

Want the full picture on First Round Capital?

The Dealroom platform tracks every round, every co-investor, and every portfolio company in real time — across 25,000+ investors and 3M+ companies globally.

View First Round in app → Book a demo
Data as of 15 Apr 2026 · Source: Dealroom Power Law dataset · Methodology
Suggest an edit