Foundry

Investment decisions were historically made by consensus among the four co-founders: Brad Feld, Seth Levine, Ryan McIntyre, and Jason Mendelson. As of 2024, new-deal authority has transitioned to the next generation of partners, including Jaclyn Hester and Chris Moody, under the Foundry Next umbrella. The founding partners remain involved in portfolio management and board seats.

Foundry executed one of the most transparent succession plans in venture history. The co-founders announced years in advance their intention to sunset the legacy Foundry Group fund family and raise a successor vehicle led by a new generation of partners. That transition became operational in 2024 with the close of Foundry Next, where Jaclyn Hester and Chris Moody now lead new investments. This pre-announced, multigenerational handoff is unique among firms of Foundry's vintage.

Foundry typically leads or co-leads seed and Series A rounds — it is not a passive, index-style seed investor. The firm reserves meaningful follow-on capital for its portfolio companies and takes active board seats as part of its standard early-stage practice. This concentrated, board-level strategy is a core tenet of the partnership's approach to company-building.

Brad Feld co-founded the Techstars accelerator in Boulder in 2006, a year before launching Foundry. While the two entities share philosophical DNA around founder-first early-stage investing, Foundry operates as an independent venture capital firm with no formal structural tie to Techstars. The relationship creates a complementary, but arms-length, position in the Boulder and broader startup ecosystem.

Foundry invests across the United States and Canada, with no formal geographic restriction. While the firm's headquarters are in Boulder, Colorado, it has maintained offices in San Francisco and New York to stay connected to coastal deal flow. Its thesis has always explicitly rejected the idea that great software companies must be built in Silicon Valley.

Foundry most recently closed Foundry Next 2024, the successor vehicle transitioning authority to the firm's next-generation leadership. As the founders step back from new-deal activity, the firm is expected to return to market under the Next brand with a similar seed and Series A software focus, though no specific fundraising timeline has been publicly disclosed as of mid-2026.

Foundry invests in software and software-enabled businesses. The partnership has historically avoided capital-intensive sectors such as biotechnology, medical devices, semiconductors, and hard industrial manufacturing. The firm's generalist partner model focuses on early-stage information technology companies where its board-level engagement and operational advice apply directly.