Pejman Nozad | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Nationality | American, Iranian |
| Occupation | venture capitalist |
| Years active | 1999–present |
Pejman Nozad is an Iranian-American venture capitalist known for co-founding Pear VC and Amidzad Partners. [1] He is also a former radio host and professional soccer player. [2] [3] He was ranked in the 15th spot in Forbes ' annual Midas List in 2021 and also 2022. [4] He was #1 on the seed investors list in 2024. [5]
Nozad grew up during the Iranian Revolution. [2] [3] He attended a German school in Tehran that eventually shut down because of the ongoing conflict. [2] Nozad wrote for a sports column when he was 16 and created and hosted a sports radio talk show when he was 18. [2] [3] [6]
Nozad played soccer professionally in Iran for three years before eventually moving to Germany to play soccer on a scholarship in the 1980s. [2] [7] He immigrated to the United States in 1992. [2] [8] Before taking up investing, Nozad served as a car washer, yogurt shop employee, and rug salesman at the Medallion Rug Gallery. [7] [9]
Nozad founded investment firm Amidzad Partners in 1999 with Rahim and Saeed Amidi, who also own the Medallion Rug Gallery and Plug and Play Tech Center. [7] [9] With Amidzad Partners, Nozad invested in companies such as Qwiki. [10]
He also co-founded venture firm Pear VC with Mar Henshenson under the name Pejman Mar in 2013. [11]
For his work with Pear VC, he was also ranked in the 15th spot in Forbes ' annual Midas List in 2021. [12] In 2022, he retained the number 15 rank in the Midas List [13] and was ranked number 2 on the Midas Seed List. [14]
Joshua Kopelman is an American entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and philanthropist.
Index Ventures is a European venture capital firm with dual headquarters in San Francisco and London, investing in technology-enabled companies with a focus on e-commerce, fintech, mobility, gaming, infrastructure/AI, and security. Since its founding in 1996, the firm has invested in a number of companies and raised approximately $5.6 billion. Index Venture partners appear frequently on Forbes’ Midas List of the top tech investors in Europe and Israel.
David Frankel is a South African-born American entrepreneur and venture capitalist. He is the co-founder of Founder Collective, a seed-stage venture capital fund with offices in New York City and Cambridge.
Klaus Hommels is a German venture capitalist. He focuses on early and growth-stage investments and has founded his own venture capital fund by the name of Lakestar, through which he has been investing mainly in digital businesses. He has been invested in Facebook, Skype and Xing; other examples are Klarna and Revolut.
Danny Rimer OBE is a partner at Index Ventures, a global venture capital firm founded in Geneva in 1992. Rimer opened the firm's London office in 2002 and its San Francisco office in 2012. He has become a leading voice on venture capital in Silicon Valley and Europe, and has been actively involved in various philanthropic and cultural activities.
Babak "Bobby" Yazdani is an Iranian-American entrepreneur and investor specializing in early-stage, private U.S.-based modern enterprise technology companies.
Peter Fenton is an American venture capitalist based in Silicon Valley. He is a general partner at Benchmark, a venture capital firm. Fenton has steadily worked his way up the Forbes Midas List of the 100 top technology investors, starting at no. 94 in 2007, then rising to no. 62 in 2008 and no. 50 in 2009. Fenton was ranked no. 4 when Forbes resumed publishing its Midas List in 2011 and was described as the "most productive venture capitalist on our list". In 2012, Fenton was ranked no. 5 on the Forbes Midas List and was no. 2 in 2015. He has been a perennial member on the Midas List since 2007.
Lightbank is a financial organization that specializes in making venture capital investments including seed investments, Series A round and late-stage investments in companies across the United States. The company was founded in 2010, and is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois, United States.
Uncork Capital is a venture capital firm based in San Francisco, California, founded by Jeff Clavier. Considered one of the most active established seed funds in Silicon Valley, it has invested in companies such as Postmates, Eventbrite, Fitbit, and SendGrid.
Aileen Lee is a U.S. venture capital angel investor and co-founder of Cowboy Ventures.
Women in venture capital or VC are investors who provide venture capital funding to startups. Women make up a small fraction of the venture capital private equity workforce. A widely used source for tracking the number of women in venture capital is the Midas List which has been published by Forbes since 2001. Research from Women in VC, a global community of women venture investors, shows that the percentage of female VC partners is just shy of 5 percent.
Initialized Capital is a venture capital fund founded in 2011 and headquartered in San Francisco. It was founded by Alexis Ohanian, Harjeet Taggar, and Garry Tan.
Theresia Gouw is an entrepreneur and venture capital investor in the technology sector. She worked at Bain & Company, Release Software and Accel Partners before co-founding Aspect Ventures, a female-led venture capital firm, in 2014. Gouw was named one of the 40 most influential minds in tech by Time Magazine. and has been recognized seven times on the Forbes Midas List as one of the "world's smartest tech investors". According to Forbes, Gouw is the richest female venture capitalist, with a net worth of approximately $500 million, primarily due to her involvement with Accel (company)'s early investment in Facebook.
Jenny Lee is a Singaporean venture capitalist and Senior Managing Partner of Granite Asia based in Singapore. Lee was the first woman venture capitalist to break into the top 10 of Forbes Midas List in 2015.
Kirsten Green is an American venture capitalist, the founder and managing partner of Forerunner Ventures.
Jennifer Fonstad is an American venture capital investor and entrepreneur. She is the managing partner and a co-founder of the Owl Capital Group, a venture firm based in Silicon Valley. Fonstad was Managing Director of Draper Fisher Jurvetson (DFJ) for 17 years. She is also co-founder of angel investing network Broadway Angels. Fonstad has been recognized as a top 100 tech investor on Forbes’ Midas List twice and was named 2016 Venture Capitalist of the Year by Deloitte. She is also a Founding Member of All Raise.
Mamoon Hamid is a Pakistani-American venture capitalist currently serving as a Managing Member and General Partner at the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins.
Mar Hershenson is a Spanish-American venture capitalist, electrical engineer, professor, and business executive in the electronic design automation industry. She is the co-founder and managing partner at Pear VC. In 2021, she ranked #29 on Forbes' Midas List.
Anna Fang is a Chinese venture capitalist. She is the founding partner and CEO of ZhenFund.
Pear VC is a seed-stage venture firm based in Menlo Park, California. It was founded by Pejman Nozad and Mar Hershenson in 2013. Pear VC works with early-stage companies. The company was originally based in Palo Alto, California before relocating to Menlo Park.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)