Greetings!

Welcome to the first Touchdown Ventures email newsletter: The Huddle!

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Our newsletter will be published approximately four times per year and will focus on the best of corporate venture capital: highlights from our expanding network of corporate partners, our own original blogs, news about our growing team, and more.

We hope you find this useful, and we are always open to your feedback and suggestions. Please forward this to anyone you think would enjoy it. 

Thank you!
Fund Announcements
In the last year, Bentley Systems, Masco Corporation, Scotts Miracle-Gro, and T-Mobile announced their funds managed in partnership with Touchdown.
Learn more about Bentley Systems and the launch of its $100 million corporate venture fund, Bentley Ventures here
Learn more about Masco Corporation and the launch of a new $50M corporate venture fund, Masco Ventures here 
Learn more about Scotts Miracle-Gro and the launch of its corporate venture fund, 1868 Ventures here
Learn more about the launch of T-Mobile's new corporate venture fund, T-Mobile Ventures here

Touchdown Originals
Many of our team members write original blogs capturing our thoughts on best practices for corporate innovation, venture capital, and entrepreneurship. Our blog lives on Medium, and some of our team members also contribute to Forbes, TechCrunch,
and VC Journal.

Here are a few of our recent articles:
Brian Laegeler explores the potential value that corporate VCs can bring to startups completing public offerings.
At Touchdown we divided into four teams, to pursue what we believe are scalable approaches to addressing systemic racism.

Please reach out if you would like to learn about "micro-interns" or teaching "Venture 101" in high schools.
Corporations frequently ask us whether they should just acquire startups instead of making minority investments, but there are three main reasons why M&A might not be the best transaction type.
Selina Troesch Munster presents her latest update on corporate venture capital programs’ potential impact on public stock price performance.
⚡ The Blitz ⚡
Here are some newsworthy items, which we also share through our Twitter and
LinkedIn accounts:
Alex Nwaka shares his thoughts on "Why now could be emerging managers' time to shine".

Scott Lenet provides insights on the evolution of CVC in the last ten years.

This article highlights how David Horowitz has used his love for trivia to give back to the community during the Covid pandemic.


We are proud of our colleagues Will Geiger and Brett Kadesh for being recognized among the top 50 CVC Rising Stars by Global Corporate Venturing
We are proud to have grown from three founders, seven years ago, to over 50 fabulous team members today. We are working hard to build an inclusive culture of smart, fun, nice, honest, hard-working, and nerdy venture capitalists.

We’ve been fortunate to be able to expand despite the pandemic, adding meaningfully to our team over the past year:
Photo taken at our last in-person firmwide offsite in Fall of 2019
Austin Chung joins us as an Analyst after graduating from the University of Chicago with a MS in Computer Science and Finance and spending several months interning with KB Partners and the George Shultz Innovation Fund. Austin also previously interned with Tesla, Nvidia, and Intel.
Sophia Dodd joins us as an Associate with prior experience in commercial real estate investments and asset management at Brookfield Properties. Sophia graduated from Wake Forest University with a BA in business & enterprise management.
David Feldman joins Touchdown as an Associate after four years at Indicator Ventures, where he focused on enterprise SaaS businesses. Before Indicator, David worked at Examity, an education technology company. David holds a BS in Finance from Elon University in North Carolina, and course certifications for Artificial Intelligence and Macro-Economics from MIT Sloan and the London School of Economics, respectively.
Laure Fischer is a Senior Associate at Touchdown with past experience at AngelList, working as an engineer at America's Test Kitchen and a consultant at Deloitte. Laure earned an MBA from Harvard and a BA from Northwestern.
Aubrey Flagler joins as an Analyst after two summer internships with the Touchdown team. She holds a BA from Notre Dame where she served as a Venture Coach and led the program at Notre Dame’s IDEA Center.
Brian Gong joins us as an Analyst with prior experience in early-stage PropTech startups in Boston in operations. Before becoming an operator, Brian learned about sector-specific corporate venture capital while on staff of LearnLaunch’s Breakthrough Accelerator program and DCU’s FinTech Innovation Center. Brian holds a BS in entrepreneurship and marketing from Boston College.
Rachel Gutnick joins Touchdown as a Senior Associate with experience in digital marketing, account management, and data analytics. Rachel also started Women Who Launch, an organization aimed at involving women in entrepreneurship and VC. She has an MBA from University of Michigan and a BA from Lehigh University.
Dylan Hoffman joins us as a Senior Associate with investment experience in the consumer products startups at Brand Foundry Ventures. He also worked at Boeing as a digital product manager and Accenture as a business strategy consultant in gaming and media. Dylan earned a BA from Seattle University and an MBA from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
Maddi Holman is an Analyst and joins Touchdown after spending two years at Optio Ventures, consulting startups on growth and fundraising strategy. Maddi has a BA from Rice University (where she also played volleyball) and a Masters in Innovation, Entrepreneurship & Management from Imperial College Business School.
Adam Lebovitz is a Senior Associate at Touchdown with experience in corporate development at Broad Green Pictures, a startup movie studio in Los Angeles, and working for the Broad Green founders’ family office. Adam has an MBA from Tuck and an AB from Princeton.
Vishnavi Paruchuri is an Analyst at Touchdown with past experience working with both startups and large corporates including Ford Motor Company. Vish holds a BS in Economics and Statistics from the University of California, Berkeley and a Master’s in Financial Economics from the University of Oxford. 
Kathy Quigley is an Analyst and joins Touchdown from ZS Associates, where she worked on strategy for large life sciences companies, following a two-year fellowship at Venture for America working with a healthcare startup. Kathy has a BA from University of Michigan.
J.J. Sass joins Touchdown as a Senior Associate with prior experience in private equity and venture capital at Jasper Ridge Partners, In-Q-Tel, NEA, and Insight Partners. J.J. holds a BBA in Finance from the University of Notre Dame, an MBA from Columbia Business School, and a Master of International Affairs from the Columbia School of International & Public Affairs. 
Matthew Shackelford joins us as a Senior Associate with past experience in FinTech venture capital from Core Innovation Capital. Matthew holds a BSE in operations research and financing engineering from Princeton University, an MBA from Harvard Business School, and an MPP from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government.
Hope Scott joins us as a Senior Associate with prior experience in corporate development at Terminix. Hope also spent several years on the private equity and venture capital research team at Colonial Consulting, LLC (now Crewcial Partners, LLC). Hope holds a BSc in Finance from Boston College, an MBA from Columbia Business School, and is a CFA Charterholder.
Eileen Wixted joins us as an Operations Associate with experience in the continued learning industry from the Wharton Executive Education at the University of Pennsylvania. Eileen graduated from the Catholic University of America with a BA in History.
Ally Wuerfel comes to Touchdown as an Analyst after completing a Corporate Analyst Development program at JPMorgan. She has as BS from Cornell University where she was Project Manager for Cornell Venture Capital working on assignments with various VC firms, including Touchdown. 
We continue to grow our team in all of our locations (Los Angeles, Philadelphia, and San Francisco) and our current job opportunities are listed here. Plus check out the regularly updated job listings of our corporate partner portfolio companies here.

Please forward our newsletter or career page to anyone you think would be a good fit for the Touchdown team.
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Unless otherwise indicated, commentary herein reflects the personal opinions, viewpoints and analyses of the authors and should not be regarded as a description of services provided by Touchdown or its affiliates. The opinions expressed here are for general informational purposes only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual on any security or advisory service. It is only intended to provide education about the financial industry. The views reflected in the commentary are subject to change at any time without notice. While all information presented, including from independent sources, is believed to be accurate, we make no representation or warranty as to accuracy or completeness. We reserve the right to change any part of these materials without notice and assume no obligation to provide updates. Nothing herein constitutes investment advice, performance data or a recommendation that any particular security, portfolio of securities, transaction or investment strategy is suitable for any specific person. Investing involves the risk of loss of some or all of an investment. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.