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Fairview Gains Large Backer With Plans to Boost Its VC Programs
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By Yuliya Chernova, WSJ Pro
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Good day. At a time of consolidation in the asset management industry, the investment by insurance company New York Life into Fairview Capital Partners, announced last week, stands out.
New York Life acquired a minority stake in Fairview, a West Hartford, Conn.-based firm founded three decades ago by Managing Partners JoAnn H. Price and Laurence C. Morse. Fairview invests in venture funds, including minority- and female-led firms and emerging managers, which are typically defined as firms that have launched fewer than four funds. Fairview, which itself is minority-led, had $2.7 billion in regulatory assets under management as of March 29, according to a filing.
Aakar Vachhani, managing partner at Fairview, said that New York Life is getting an ownership interest in the Fairview management company, “which they expect to increase in value over time.” He declined to discuss specific terms.
Unlike several other deals in the industry in the past few years—such as the acquisition of Greenspring Associates by StepStone Group in 2021—this was a sale of a minority rather than a majority stake, a crucial point for Fairview. “We’ve been approached for the last four or five years, and especially after 2020 by other private equity firms that were interested in Fairview,” Vachhani said. “We were never going to do something where we’d lose our identity and the brand.”
Fairview retains control over all investment, strategy, and personnel decisions. Vachhani said he expects the deal to give staying power to Fairview and make it easier to persuade institutional investors to back its funds-of-funds.
“We feel like we can probably double or triple what we do just in the emerging manager category,” Vachhani said.
Fairview’s programs to invest in emerging managers that have diverse leadership are perceived as risky by the market, he said. “These are young firms with smaller funds. [The potential limited partners] look at it and they see a lot of risk,” Vachhani said. That, in combination with being seen as a boutique firm, made it harder to attract major institutions to its funds, he said. “People always questioned or doubted how long we’ll be around,” he said.
The investment by New York Life “puts us in the same category as the other folks, in terms of the perceived stability. That makes us more competitive,” he said.
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And now on to the news...
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A Starlink device on a roof in South Africa; South Africa’s telecommunications regulator has said that use of Starlink is illegal there.
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Disconnection notices. Elon Musk’s SpaceX has begun a crackdown on users who are connecting to its Starlink high-speed internet service from countries where it hasn’t been authorized—taking steps to close an expanding black market for the company’s satellite kits highlighted by a recent Wall Street Journal investigation. Starlink customers in Sudan, Zimbabwe and South Africa have received email notifications from the company in recent days, warning that their access to the service would be terminated by the end of the month. The emails, viewed by the Journal, noted that using Starlink in areas where it hasn’t been approved by local regulators was against the company’s terms of service.
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“The availability of our Mobile Service Plans is contingent upon various factors, including regulatory approvals,” the emails said, referring to Starlink roaming products that allow subscribers to use its internet services in different countries.
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$35.63 Billion
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The combined first-quarter profits of six banks, JPMorgan
Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley.
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Ex-Owner of Parler Social-Media App Files for Chapter 11
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The former parent of Parler, the social network popular among conservatives when former President Donald Trump was kicked off major social-media platforms around the time of the 2021 U.S. Capitol attack, has filed for bankruptcy, WSJ Pro reports. Nashville, Tenn.,-based Parlement Technologies sought protection from creditors Monday in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Del., with assets and liabilities of $10 million to $50 million.
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Parler’s former Chief Executive John Matze, who was fired in early 2021, was listed as its biggest unsecured creditor with a $10 million claim, which Parlement disputes. Matze has since started a new social platform, Hedgehog.
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Alantra Partners Leads Growth Deal for Energy AI-Software Maker
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Alantra Partners led a roughly $55.6 million growth investment in GridBeyond, a developer of artificial intelligence-powered systems that help businesses and grid operators balance electricity supply and demand, WSJ Pro reports. Energy Impact Partners, a clean energy-focused investment firm in New York, also participated in the €52.3 million deal that aims to help GridBeyond speed up its expansion in the U.S. as increasing use of intermittent renewable power creates hurdles for grid operators.
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Funds
Andreessen Horowitz raised a total of $7.2 billion across five new funds focusing on areas including apps, games, infrastructure and growth, alongside a strategy the firm calls American Dynamism.
People
Mobilion Ventures appointed David Abraham as a partner. He was previously at Robert Bosch Technologies Israel.
Israeli investor Symbol appointed Racheli Kogan as a partner. She joined the Tel Aviv-based firm at its inception in 2021.
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Rivos, a Santa Clara, Calif.-based maker of microchip components used in computers optimized for running large language models and data analytics, raised more than $250 million in an oversubscribed Series A3 funding round. Matrix Capital Management was among the investors, with Romit Shah joining the Rivos board.
Finmid, a Berlin-based financial infrastructure provider helping business-to-business platforms offer their customers access to financing support, emerged from stealth with €35 million in early-stage funding from Blossom Capital, Earlybird Venture Capital and others.
Quilt, a Redwood City, Calif.-based smart home climate startup, scored $33 million in Series A funding co-led by Energy Impact Partners and Galvanize Climate Solutions.
Snappy, a New York-based employee and client gifting platform, closed a $25 million Series D round led by Qumra Capital.
Loft Labs, a San Francisco-based provider of platform engineering building blocks, secured $24 million in Series A financing led by Khosla Ventures.
BridgeWise, an AI-based analysis platform for global securities, picked up a $21 million investment from Group 11 and others.
Cynomi, a Tel Aviv-based virtual chief information security officer platform for small and medium-sized enterprises and service providers, added $20 million in new funding led by Canaan.
Miggo, a Tel Aviv-based cybersecurity startup, was seeded with a $7.5 million investment led by YL Ventures.
BreachRx, a San Francisco-based incident response platform, landed $6.5 million in seed funding led by SYN Ventures.
NightVision, a Bradenton, Fla.-based application security startup, collected $5.4 million in seed funding from investors including Danu Venture Group.
Sumday, an Australia-based accounting startup, snagged 5.3 million Australian dollars in seed funding led by Planeteer Capital.
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A 2025 Cybertruck on display at an auto show in Chicago earlier this year.
PHOTO: ALEX WROBLEWSKI/SHUTTERSTOCK
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Tesla delays Cybertruck deliveries, leaving buyers confused
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ASML orders miss forecasts as chip makers await recovery in demand
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Apple weighs manufacturing in Indonesia amid diversification drive
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Volkswagen aims for lower EV costs with new production platform in China
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U.S., China to cooperate in the fight against dirty money
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Are battery-powered home appliances in our future?
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Trump’s Truth Social stake shrinks by $3.4 billion after stock tanks
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Ericsson expects mobile network market to continue falling through 2024
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Amazon is filled with garbage ebooks. Here’s how they get made. (Vox)
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Former top SpaceX exec Tom Ochinero sets up new VC firm, filings reveal (TechCrunch)
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