Thanks to enterprise capitalists’ appetite for AI deals, startups saw a measurable increase in funding last 12 months. However, not all investors shared in the profits equally.
A handful of corporations, most of them in various stages, have raised each the largest number and most respected rounds, in keeping with Crunchbase data. For those that follow startup financing, these are mostly familiar names.
The company was at or near the top of the list on many metrics Andreessen Horowitzalso referred to as a16z. The Silicon Valley company, a U.S.-focused investor, has long been known for each the large variety of deals it backs and the large sums it spends.
It looks like 2024 was no exception. Andreessen was recognized as the most energetic global post-seed investor, having participated in 100 reported rounds. Y Combinator 1, Generic catalytic converter AND Partners of the Lightspeed enterprise it filled the next three slots with 97, 84 and 79 rounds respectively.
To get a broader picture, we have rounded up the 13 most energetic post-seed investors below.
Notably, all but two of the most energetic investors listed above participated in more deals in 2024 than in 2023. Several of them significantly accelerated their pace, including Capital of Sequoia, Speed up AND Index ventures.
The most energetic and highest-spending leading investors
In addition to looking at who participated in the most rounds, we also took into account the most energetic lead or co-lead investors. This gives us a sense of which investors also made large bets in the rounds they participated in.
By this metric, General Catalyst took a slight lead, serving as lead or co-lead investor in 41 post-seed financing deals last 12 months, well above 2023 levels. A16z and Alumni’s projects filled the No. 2 and No. 3 spots, respectively.
Below is a list of the 14 most energetic lead and co-lead investors this 12 months. As you may see, all but one were more energetic in 2024 than in 2023.
Of course, it isn’t just the variety of rounds a company conducts that matters. It is also vital how much the investor will put into these transactions.
Unfortunately, there is no exact technique to determine who spent the most. This is because multi-investor rounds rarely include a disclosed breakdown of each sponsor’s shareholding.
However, we will get a general idea of who has put in the most capital by looking at the total size of the rounds a given investor has led or co-led.
According so far of reference, he is the leader Develop capitallargely as a result of its role as lead sponsor in two massive fourth-quarter financings: a $10 billion closing round for Data cubes and a $6.6 billion investment OpenAI.
A16z took second place, boosted by its role as co-chair sponsor of the Databricks round, in addition to its $1 billion financing for the cybersecurity provider Wizard (which Thrive also co-hosted). Insight Partners took third place, largely as a result of its role as co-lead investor in the Databricks round.
For more complete representation, we have ranked the 16 investors who led or co-led the rounds with the highest aggregate size in 2024 below.
The seed of super-investors
Global seed investment in 2024 declined barely year-on-year, based on data reported so far. Given this, it isn’t entirely surprising that roughly half of our most energetic seed investors also had fewer reported deals last 12 months, as shown below.
However, it is not the case that the activity has stopped. For example, top leader Y Combinator alone has made nearly 700 seed investments. Runners-up Shovel AND Technology stars there have been over 300 and almost 200 respectively.
Wide fluctuations in the variety of trades reported are also not unusual for seed investors, who often report investments in batches. We also expect these numbers to extend barely in the coming weeks and months as more seed deals are added to the data set with a lag.
Onward to 2025
Overall, there is no clear indicator of a slowdown in the coming months in the rankings of the most energetic investors. In dollar terms, funding actually increased significantly in the fourth quarter, driven by the closing of giant rounds for corporations including Databricks and OpenAI.
That said, some of the recent momentum is as a result of waning investor optimism, and IPOs in particular will see a revival this 12 months. If this does not occur, investors could be expected to chill down some of their current enthusiasm.