Inspired Capital Fund II Raises $281 Million

Text size

Inspired Capital needed just six weeks to raise $281 million, making it one of the largest venture-capital funds led by women. 

Alexa von Tobel and Penny Pritzker are the founders of Inspired Capital. The New York-firm began fundraising for its second pool at the end of May and had racked up $281 million in commitments by June 30. Inspired did not use a placement agent. Cooley served as its legal advisor. 

“I’m truly proud of the progress we have made,” von Tobel told Barron’s. “In two-and-a-half years, we are making great strides against our vision of building an early stage fund committed to the best founders of the future.”

Von Tobel is the founder of LearnVest, which she sold to Northwestern Mutual for $375 million in 2015. Tobel later became Northwestern’s chief digital officer and then chief innovation officer where she oversaw its venture arm. Pritzker is the former U.S. Secretary of Commerce under President Barack Obama. She is also founder and chairman of investment firm PSP Partners.

Von Tobel and Pritzker launched Inspired in 2019 as a generalist fund that focuses on tech-enabled businesses in any sector. Inspired’s first fund, which collected $200 million in 2019, has invested in about 25 companies. This includes digital bank Rho; Latin American real estate firm Habi; Finix, a provider of embedded payments; and Orum, a financial infrastructure company incubated by Inspired. Inspired manages nearly $500 million of assets. 

Inspired’s second fund will follow the same strategy as the debut pool, von Tobel said. The firm will lead and co-lead seed and series A rounds, investing from between a few hundred thousand to north of $15 million, in startups, she said. 

“As business-builders ourselves, we share a passion for supporting entrepreneurs in the early days of their journey and beyond. We strive to be our founders’ first call and believe we are uniquely positioned to be both a sounding board and a thought partner,” Pritzker said in a statement. 

Von Tobel said there are “not enough” women-led venture funds. She pointed to Mary Meeker’s Bond fund, which spun out of Kleiner Perkins Digital Growth fund in 2018. Bond, a growth stage fund, raised $2 billion with its second pool earlier this year. And Theresia Gouw’s Acrew fund. “We’re here to change those numbers,” von Tobel said. 

The Covid-19 pandemic helped spur a wave of digitization that has impacted companies in all sectors. Businesses that were reluctant to digitize are “leaning into technology,” von Tobel said.

There are still sectors in the early stages of digitization, von Tobel said. Retail is still only 20% online penetration, while healthcare is rapidly moving online. “The past year has pushed us headfirst into the biggest digital transformation in our lifetime. At Inspired, we are energized to invest in founders who are building our shared future—fellow entrepreneurs who are seizing this moment to accelerate how technology will improve every aspect of our lives,” von Tobel said in the statement. 

Write to Luisa Beltran at luisa.beltran@dowjones.com