Fund-of-fund manager
HRJ Capital on Monday closed its HRJ VC V Fund with $273 million
in committed capital from what it termed a "diverse group of investors
including endowments, foundations, corporate plans, family offices, investment
advisers and select high-net-worth individuals," returning to scrimmage with its 11th fund overall to invest in U.S. and
international venture capital funds.
The investor roster has broadened a bit, but the new
fund goes to the roots of the firm's original kickoff fund, which was launched in 1999 as Champion Ventures to capitalize
on high-profile participation by former San Francisco 49ers players Harris Barton,
Ronnie Lott and Joe Montana as general partners, along with a team of
professional investors. At the time, Barton led the effort to recruit 99
professional athletes, including football players Steve Young, Jerry Rice, Brent Jones, Junior
Bryant, Merton Hanks and Dan Marino; baseball's Barry Bonds, Eric Karros
and Ryne Sandberg; and basketball player Steve Kerr. The idea was to use celebrity
cachet to land positions in hot Silicon Valley technology venture funds including Accel
Partners, Benchmark Capital, ComVentures, Crosspoint Venture Partners, Mayfield
Fund, Mohr Davidow Ventures, New Enterprise Associates, Redpoint Ventures,
Sequoia Capital and Technology Crossover Ventures.
Since then, Champion has changed its name to HRJ, taken on more
institutional investors and broadened its focus to include funds in real
estate, buyouts and other traditional Wall Street-oriented hedge fund assets. The strategy led to a high-profile washout last August,
when Bloomberg News obtained a letter to shareholders revealing that HRJ's
Legends Multi-Strategy Plus Fund, battered by the housing market, lost 12.3% of its value in the first two weeks of August, wiping out 12.4% gains
the fund had made on the year.
Investor confidence in HRJ's VC prowess still appears
strong, however, as commitments to VC V were up 42% from the firm's $157 million
VC IV Fund. The firm confirmed that it still has a number of professional athlete investors, but it has focused primarily on institutional investors in recent funds. - Clifford Carlsen
See Aug. 24 post from DealBook
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