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Investor profile

First Round Capital

VC firm · Founded 2004 · Active in 2026

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.

53 Power Law outcomes Power Law Ranking #16 · Global · 53 Power Law outcomes · Active 2026
Unicorns ↑ 42% 5y
44
Decacorns ↓ 33% 5y
4
Thoroughbreds ↑ 68% 5y
39
01 · Exits

Sequoia’s biggest exits.

Sequoia portfolio companies worth $1B+ that have IPO’d or been acquired. Each shows its valuation at exit and, in grey, its current value if still public.

IPO · 1999
Entered SeedNow $5.2T
IPO · 2004
Entered Series ANow $4.6T
IPO · 1980
Now $4.5T
IPO · 2014
Entered Series B+Now $306B
$214B IPO · 2021
Entered Series B+Now $20.1B
IPO · 2012
Entered Series ANow $207B
$82.0B IPO · 2019
Now $153B
IPO · 2012
Entered Series B+Now $103B
$95.0B IPO · 2020
Entered SeedNow $69.1B
$93.9B IPO · 2020
Entered Series B+Now $58.4B
$24.0B IPO · 2018
Entered Series B+Now $73.3B
$39.0B IPO · 2020
Entered Series ANow $67.6B
$32.0B IPO · 2021
Entered Series B+Now $67.5B
$41.5B IPO · 2021
Entered SeedNow $64.4B
$60.0B IPO · 2021
Entered Series B+Now $28.0B
$55.5B IPO · 2026
Entered Series B+Now $55.5B
$52.8B IPO · 2018
Entered Series ANow $49.6B
IPO · 2013
Now $45.0B
IPO · 2015
Entered Series B+Now $39.4B
IPO · 2002
Entered SeedNow $39.1B
$32.0B acquisition · 2025
Entered Seed
$12.0B IPO · 2021
Entered Series B+Now $29.5B
IPO · 2014
Entered Series B+Now $28.6B
IPO · 2015
Entered Series ANow $28.2B
03 · Portfolio analysis

The 53 First Round Power Law outcomes ($100M+ revenue or $1B+ valuation).

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

By countryCount
  1. USA51
  2. Canada1
  3. France1
By sectorCount
  1. Fintech10
  2. AI8
  3. eCommerce & Marketplaces7
  4. Other B2B Software7
  5. Health Tech & Medtech5
  6. Marketing5
  7. Cybersecurity3
  8. Other2
  9. Biotech & Life Sciences2
  10. Transportation1
  11. Energy1
  12. Space1
By stage enteredCount
  1. Series B+4
  2. Series A16
  3. Seed30
Estimated holdings

First Round’s biggest current holdings.

An estimate of First Round’s largest live positions — disclosed shareholding × Dealroom’s latest valuation — across 8 companies where First Round is a named shareholder, worth about $2.4B in estimated equity value.

#CompanyEst. stakeValuationEst. value
  1. 1 VerkadaSecurity · Unicorn 16% $5.8B $928M
  2. 2 NotionEnterprise Software · Decacorn 5.5% $10.0B $550M
  3. 3 ClayEnterprise Software · Unicorn 13% $3.1B $403M
  4. 4 Rec RoomGaming · Unicorn 6.5% $3.5B $228M
  5. 5 PersonaEnterprise Software · Unicorn 7.5% $2.0B $150M
  6. 6 FalMedia · Unicorn 2% $4.5B $90M
  7. 7 7.5% $944M $71M
  8. 8 2% $1.0B $20M

2 companies hidden on this public profile. Estimated value = First Round’s disclosed ownership % × Dealroom’s latest company valuation; direct named stakes only, exited positions excluded. Figures are indicative, not reported marks. First Round also appears inside investor groups in Flexport, Together, where a standalone stake isn’t disclosed. See the underlying cap tables on Dealroom →

First Round’s biggest exits.

First Round portfolio companies worth $1B+ that have IPO’d or been acquired. Each shows its valuation at exit and, in grey, its current value if still public.

$82.0B IPO · 2019
Entered SeedNow $153B
$45.0B IPO · 2021
Entered Series B+Now $33.1B
IPO · 2015
Entered Series ANow $39.4B
$2.8B IPO · 2021
Entered SeedNow $15.6B
$6.0B IPO · 2021
Entered SeedNow $3.0B
$5.4B IPO · 2021
Entered Series ANow $1.5B
$1.8B IPO · 2020
Entered SeedNow $4.0B
$1.6B IPO · 2019
Entered Series B+Now $3.3B
$3.3B IPO · 2017
Entered SeedNow $100M
$2.6B acquisition · 2019
Entered Seed
$1.9B acquisition · 2018
Entered Series A
$1.8B acquisition · 2018
Entered Seed
$1.4B IPO · 2021
Entered SeedNow $1.6B
$350M acquisition · 2017
Entered Series ANow $1.4B
$1.3B buyout · 2025
Entered Seed
$1.1B IPO · 2021
Entered Series ANow $220M
$1.1B acquisition · 2023
Entered Series A
$1.1B IPO · 2026
Entered SeedNow $1.1B
$1.0B acquisition · 2018
Entered Seed
04 · Portfolio market map

First Round's 53 Power Law outcomes.

Stage entered
Outcome tier
Region
Group by
53 of 53 Power Law outcomes
05 · Power Law comparison

How does First Round stack up?

First Round in orange, your selection in blue and other colours. Pick from the global roster of 609 peer investors — scope by startup location 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 unicorns minted in the selected startup location — peaks reveal vintage years.

Compare against

Share of new unicorns per year

% of global unicorns minted that year, year by year · hover the chart to see which unicorns
Performance window All-time → 2026

Stage focus

Companies by selected outcome stage

Sector focus

Companies per investor across the 10 highest-volume sectors

Beyond Unicorns — how the portfolio compounds

% of each investor's unicorn portfolio that later crossed $10B, $25B and $50B. Pick a sort tier and entry stage.
Sort by
Entry stage
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.
06 · Portfolio founders

Where Sequoia's portfolio founders come from — and where they studied.

106 founders across the 53 Power Law outcomes — split by country of origin, university attended, and the company they worked at before founding. Stanford University and Microsoft are the deepest single pipelines.

LocationCount
United States55
Turkey6
China5
Russia4
Canada4
France3
Sweden3
Pakistan2
India2
Poland2
+3 more →
UniversityCount
Stanford University13
Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania11
Massachusetts Institute of Technology7
University of Michigan5
Berkeley4
Dartmouth College3
MIT Sloan School of Management3
University of Southern California3
Brown University3
University of Waterloo2
+33 more →
Origin companyCount
Microsoft15
Alphabet | Google14
Apple6
Meta5
Zynga4
Flatiron Health3
Uber3
Digital Turbine2
Yammer2
DroneDeploy2
+51 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.

Market sentiment

What the market is saying about First Round Capital

An AI-synthesized read of the highest-engagement posts about First Round on X over the past 7 days. We rank by likes & retweets, ignore corporate channels, and surface the themes that broke out from real people.

Reading the room on X — pulling top posts and synthesizing themes…

Source: X recent search ranked by engagement (likes + retweets) · Synthesis by Claude · Cached for 1 hour

In the news

Latest news about First Round Capital

Recent press, funding announcements, and portfolio moves mentioning First Round — pulled live from Dealroom's news feed.

See all news

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.