Firm overview
f7 Ventures is an early-stage venture fund based in San Francisco started by seven women operators and leaders in tech. They leverage their combined 20 years of leadership and deep operating experience in Silicon Valley to improve outcomes for founders and to increase the number of women check writers.
General partners Kelly Graziadei and Joanna Lee Shevelenko lead the investments and operations of f7. Kelly brings a wealth of go-to-market experience from building teams in the early days of Yahoo to over seven years in leadership at Facebook, with roles in global product marketing and sales and account management. Joanna brings deep operational expertise to the fund and founders they support, having spent nine years at Facebook as one of their earliest employees building multiple foundational teams 0-1 and later spending five years in COO roles at Series B and Series C companies.
Firm strategy
As 7 female leaders at Facebook, one of Silicon Valley’s defining companies over the past decade, Kelly, Joanna and team know the struggle of scaling and running a high-velocity business—and the struggle facing women trying to scale their careers in Silicon Valley. f7 works to create an even playing field for underrepresented founders, with a focus on companies tackling the future of work, mental and physical health, and connected communities. From the time of investment, f7 looks to take an active role helping founders scale and operate their businesses, tapping into the diverse set of experiences from their founding partners as well as their Operator Council, a 16-member group of tech executives from underrepresented communities applying their expertise and experience from a range of successful companies to support early-stage founders. With only a portion of seed companies reaching Series A, f7 helps founders see around corners and brings expertise and resources to help them reach this critical milestone for product-market fit.
Why we invested
It was obvious from our first meeting that f7 was a unique and compelling opportunity. Being able to invest in a group of operators who worked together and found success at one of the most successful companies of the 2000s is definitely a rarity. We were immediately impressed by the mix of experience that Kelly, Joanna, and the rest of the f7 investment team brought to the table, and by the passion with which they spoke about transforming different markets and empowering underrepresented founders and funders. It’s not hard to see why founders would be compelled to see them as a value-additive slot on their cap table—one of the many reasons we’re excited to partner with f7 as a part of their LP base.