There is an emerging trend for emerging VCs to use corporate commitments to add value to their propositions. This could help them compete against the dominance of the big asset managers.
Venture capital fundraising has become massively concentrated in a handful of asset managers, such as Founders fund, A16Z, Benchmark and Sequoia. As PitchBook notes: “just five US managers were responsible for more than half” of the $60.8bn raised globally by VC funds in the first three months of the year.
How can emerging managers compete ? Under the surface, we’re observing a trend among a new wave of emerging managers to use corporate commitments to add value to their proposition.
Last month more than half of VC funds that closed included corporate venturing commitments, according to GCV’s analysis, with a focus on emerging managers, ie those managing their first three funds.
Some of these new funds are specifically managed by in-house CVC units, including BMW i Ventures’s $300m third fund and Kliff Ventures, a new venture arm launched and capitalised by K Hospitality Corp, India’s largest privately held food and beverage company.
Others are sole mandates provided to external or independent general partners (GPs). These include Banco do Brasil setting up new AI-focused fund, BB Ventures 2, run by MSW Capital, and Japan-based DIC, which set up a $62m mandate for Emerald to back physical AI startups in Europe.
Mouro Capital, which originated as Santander InnoVentures (CVC), spun out in 2020 but still has – for now – the Spain-based bank as the sole limited partner (LP) across all funds. Mouro recently closed a new $400m fund — Fund III — and is for the first time seeking to bring in additional LPs beyond Santander.
Similarly, 7Ridge bought Fidelity Investments’ corporate venture arm to form the basis of its recently-closed Ecosystem Impact Fund II with external investors.
Others were commitments by corporations to traditional VC funds, often as cornerstone investors. VKR Holding, the maker of Velux windows, was a cornerstone investor in Kompas VC Fund II alongside other, unnamed corporates/industrial companies, while Germany-based media group Holtzbrinck was a corporate LP in Wisdom Ventures Fund II.
Ridgeline Ventures’s $180m fund II included FedEx and Cisco among its LPs; GlobalFoundries invested in Playground Global’s $475m Fund IV via its GF Accelerate corporate venturing arm, explicitly as a strategic LP to access deep tech innovation in AI data centres and physical AI; and Veriten’s Fund II’s strategic LP base included two major energy corporations, Halliburton and Phillips 66.
GCV is pleased to present the “LP/GP Summit” to foster connections between corporates, family-owned multinationals, pension funds, and other institutions keen to serve as LPs emerging managers and future GPs.
September 23, 2026 — SAN FRANCISCO, CA
The same pattern is happening this month, with UAE-based telecom operator Du launching du Ventures as a $50m corporate venture capital fund managed by investment firm Shorooq; Restive Ventures closing its third fund with $45m in commitments from a new range of strategic investors, including banks and financial institutions, payments firms, and technology companies; and Working Capital Fund making the first close of Fund III at $31m with LPs such as SAP on the books.
LP positions increasing sit side-by-side with a direct investment strategy for corporations. According to GCV’s latest research in the World of Corporate Venturing 2026 report, more than half of corporate venture units take LP positions in external VC funds.
Investing in startups through a fund-of-funds strategy has benefits for corporations. It can provide access that may otherwise be difficult to achieve in “hot” or highly specialised sectors. The best entrepreneurs rarely want only strategic investors directly on the cap table; they also want financial ones to keep the syndicate supportive of maximising the financial outcomes.
But it is in corporations’ interest to invest in a strong and diverse set of GPs. Having just a handful of VCs left in the market puts too much power in the Silicon Valley oligopoly.
Furthermore, massive asset managers rarely provide much beyond a standard financial update to their LPs, regardless of potential strategic interest. Emerging managers tend to be more responsive and creates a way for customer/supplier feedback loops to be established.
It will be fascinating to see what role these corporate-backed VC funds will play as the investment ecosystem reorders.
Institutional investors generally dislike venture capital as the returns are similar to other asset classes outside the few break-out names, the fees are relatively high and set by a proportion of assets under management and performance fees (carry). Most VC firms’ funds are too small for institutional investors to meaningfully allocate to. But working with corporate-backed funds or managers might change the equation giving better returns, greater scale and opportunity for lower fees.
Corporate-backed startups are less likely to go bankrupt, are more likely to exit and at higher multiples than their peers according to GCV analysis, and these benefits can also transfer to VCs portfolios through engagement with corporate LPs. Having more LPs also allows VCs to create larger funds, which often have lower fees as a proportion of assets under management.
Global Corporate Venturing is hosting several events to facilitate the connections between emerging funds and corporate investors. Together with Kauffman Fellows, Coolwater and Silicon Foundry we will be hosting the next LP/GP summit in San Francisco in the autumn, and many of the largest investors will join a Chatham House discussion at the GCV Symposium in London on 23-24 June with the heads of the European Investment Fund and Aviva among others.