North Venture

Investment decisions are led by the partner group, which includes Heidi Aven, Linn-Cecilie Linnemann, Espen Halvorsen, Berg Moe and Jeanette Grendahl. Aven and Linnemann co-founded the firm and the associated SHE Community initiative. Each partner carries an operator background — Aven exited SmartWorks, Linnemann exited Design Container, and Halvorsen exited an internet firm he founded in 1997 — which means origination is tightly coupled to their personal networks within Nordic technology.

The firm sources through several channels: the partners’ own networks as former founders and operators in the Nordic market, the SHE Community ecosystem, and the StartupLab Founders Fund, where North Venture is a limited partner. The StartupLab relationship gives the firm proximity to companies emerging from Norway’s largest technology incubator, while SHE Community provides deal flow from female-founded Nordic tech companies. Linn-Cecilie Linnemann’s concurrent role as a partner at LUMO Labs in the Netherlands also extends the firm’s origination into the broader European impact-VC circuit.

The Full Potential Plan is North Venture’s internal operating framework applied to portfolio companies. It covers branding, marketing, digital communication, recruitment, sales strategy, new-business commercialization and cash-management routines. Rather than functioning as a standalone consulting unit, the plan is delivered by the partners themselves, who embed in board positions or day-to-day advisory roles at the portfolio companies. This model means the firm underwrites not just capital but a defined operational workload per investment.

North Venture writes direct checks to Nordic early- to growth-stage companies across agritech, edtech and fintech, and also invests as a limited partner in the StartupLab Founders Fund. Direct investments include board seats or board-chair roles where partners actively drive go-to-market planning. The fund commitment extends the firm’s reach into earlier-stage seed companies within the StartupLab community while preserving the hands-on model for its own balance-sheet positions.

The firm targets buyout, early-stage startup and growth-stage opportunities, according to internal Altss research. Public portfolio disclosures show entry points from early venture rounds (Vignita in 2022, Frid in 2021) to growth-stage companies that are already commercializing, such as Nofence. The firm does not publish stage definitions or check-size ranges, but its model allocates partner time as a scarce resource, which favors concentrated positions where operational involvement can materially shift the trajectory.

Heidi Aven and Linn-Cecilie Linnemann co-founded SHE Community in 2015, a platform that promotes female representation in Nordic tech leadership and investing. SHE Community operates as a separate organization from the investment firm, though Aven and Linnemann’s dual roles mean the community’s network feeds into North Venture’s talent and deal pipeline. The firm does not describe SHE Community as a grant-making foundation; it functions as an advocacy and networking platform.

The firm has not publicly detailed a formal co-investment program, but its thematic overlap with edtech, agritech and fintech ecosystems in Oslo creates natural intersection with local venture GPs. The LP position in the StartupLab Founders Fund suggests a willingness to partner with seed-stage vehicles. Linn-Cecilie Linnemann’s concurrent partner role at LUMO Labs indicates a pipeline connection to the European impact-VC community, though the firm has not disclosed a structured co-investment vehicle.