Sevin Rosen is trying to raise a tenth fund, according to Al Schuele a partner with the Dallas-based venture capital firm, who spoke on a panel in Austin, Texas today. The venerable investment firm, which backed Compaq and other PC revolutionaries, hasn’t been on the scene since about 2006, when it stopped raising money on a proposed fund and returned $ 250 million back to investors. At the time it seemed like the venture industry had changed and Sevin Rosen had failed to change with it.
However, Schuele had confirmed rumors I had been hearing about the firm’s plans, which include a fund in the $ 150 million range that should be completed next year. However, the firm has been raising the fund for at least a year, and has so far found the going slow, according to a source I spoke with earlier. Schuele declined to go into details about the fundraising.
Sevin Rosen will be a smaller firm if it raises $ 150 million, but it won’t have as many partners to worry about, as the firm’s Silicon Valley partners left in 2008. In recent months, the fund has seen a few exits including the IPO of Tangoe, a mobile device management provider, and the sale of Innovalight to DuPont over the summer. This should help it provide returns that will entice investors to get on board.
As for plans for the types of deals a newly reinvigorated Sevin Rosen might do, Schuele said today on his panel that services, especially cloud services and platforms are a great opportunity as is the M2M space. And while the overall semiconductor industry is no longer a venture darling, Schuele won’t give up on the chips.
Image courtesy of Flickr user Kennymatic.
Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.
- Flash analysis: the future of Yahoo
- The mobile backhaul market, 2011-2012: more innovation, greater competition
- NewNet Q3: Facebook remakes headlines in social media
