Spark Capital and Union Square Ventures – So Happy Together

Spark Capital and Union Square Ventures’ recent Tumblr success is far from the first time the two firms have invested together.  The firms are veritable BFFs having also invested together in many firms including but not limited to Foursquare, Twitter, Kitchensurfing, and Skillshare as well as Tumblr (the biggest venture exit in NYC history).  So we thought we’d take a look at who else frequently shares deal flow, networks and/or overlapping investment strategies with these two firms.  Using the Investor Syndicate visualization on either of their profiles, we can who each firm’s bosom buddies are since 2010.

After Union Square Ventures, Spark most frequently co-invests with SV Angel, followed by Lerer Ventures and First Round Capital. Unsurprisingly, all of Spark’s co-investments with micro VC SV Angel came at the Seed or Series A stages with shared portfolio companies including FundersClub, OnSwipe and Priceonomics. Two of Spark’s three co-investments with New York-based Lerer Ventures were in New York-based companies, Group Commerce and Keep Holdings.

For Union Square Ventures, the top co-investors are quite different after Spark.  They’ve co-invested in eight venture rounds each with both Andreessen Horowitz and Index Ventures followed by five co-investments with early-stage fund Founder Collective. Seven of USV’s co-investments with Andreessen Horowitz came at the Series C stage or later into companies including Foursquare, 3D printing marketplace Shapeways, and mobile payments company Dwolla while three of USV’s shared investments with Index Ventures originated at the Series B stage including Codecademy, Funding Circle and Stack Exchange.

One of the interesting things you can see from the profile of Union Square Ventures is which angels they tend to co-invest with.  For those trying to see who might be scouts for dealflow, these might be some folks to know.  To see all of their co-investors, login and visit the profiles of Union Square Ventures or Spark Capital and look under Investor Analytics for Investment Syndicate visualization.