Obvious Ventures has closed its fifth fund at $360,360,360, a characteristically playful figure that doubles as strategy. The number underscores the firm’s integrated lens on planetary health, human health, and economic health—an all-angles approach the team says is now table stakes for building durable, high-value companies.
A Playful Number With a Serious Thesis on Strategy
The firm, co-founded by Evan Williams alongside James Joaquin and Vishal Vasishth, has long favored math-flavored fund sizes. But the new total signals more than whimsy. The 360 motif reflects a commitment to evaluate systems, incentives, and second-order effects across markets, regulation, and technology before writing a check. In practice, that means underwriting not just category creation, but commercial viability and policy tailwinds as well.
Keeping the vehicle intentionally modest is part of the thesis. Obvious Ventures aims for a fund where a single outlier can return the pool, a discipline that has become increasingly rare amid mega-funds. That constraint informs ownership targets and a focus on company durability over momentum alone.
Return Discipline And Track Record in Focus
The strategy has produced real outcomes—and a few hard lessons. Beyond Meat vaulted to a multibillion valuation after its public debut before giving up most of those gains, a reminder that impact and market adoption can move at different speeds. Even so, Obvious Ventures points to meaningful cash distributions across core funds and a slate of public exits and late-stage step-ups that validate the model.
Planet Labs, backed early and later listed via a SPAC, carries an enterprise value around the high single-digit billions. Recursion Pharmaceuticals, another early bet, maintains a multibillion market cap as it scales an AI-enabled drug discovery platform. In the private markets, Gusto is valued north of $9 billion and is frequently cited by bankers and secondary buyers as an IPO candidate.
Three Pillars in Action Across Health and Economy
On the planetary health front, Obvious Ventures backed Zanskar, which uses proprietary subsurface data and machine learning to pinpoint and de-risk geothermal resources. Zanskar recently announced a $115 million Series C, positioning geothermal as a cost-effective, firm, clean power source that can help feed energy-hungry AI data centers. The International Energy Agency has highlighted geothermal’s reliability as baseload power, a trait increasingly prized as grids strain under new loads.
In human health, the firm invested in Inceptive, an AI-native platform for molecular design founded by transformer co-author Jakob Uszkoreit. The bet reflects an accelerating convergence of deep learning and wet lab automation, where data network effects and model quality can widen moats faster than traditional biotech timelines.
For economic health, the firm points to Dexterity Robotics, valued at roughly $1.65 billion, which builds systems to take on dull, dirty, and dangerous workflows in warehouses and factories. With labor shortages and safety mandates reshaping logistics, robotic throughput and reliability are becoming as strategic as software uptime.
Why Fund Five Matters in Venture Capital Today
Reaching a fifth institutional fund is a meaningful milestone in venture. Only 17% of firms raise more than three funds, according to research from Sapphire Partners, a reflection of how unforgiving performance and pacing can be. The raise signals that limited partners see repeatable process, not just one-off wins.
It also tracks with the mainstreaming of impact as a risk-adjusted growth strategy rather than a sidecar. Carbon accounting is standardizing, clean power costs have fallen, and AI is accelerating discovery in materials, biology, and robotics. These shifts increase the odds that mission-centric startups can also become category leaders with resilient unit economics.
Deployment Plan and Team for Fund V Investments
Obvious Ventures plans to back about 10 new companies per year, primarily at Seed and Series A, with initial checks typically between $5 million and $12 million and reserves for follow-ons. That pace keeps partner bandwidth focused on hands-on company building—recruiting, early customers, regulatory navigation, and capital strategy.
The investing bench includes co-founder Vishal Vasishth and James Joaquin, with Evan Williams continuing as a co-founder and adviser. The firm says the goal is consistent: fund founders tackling systemic problems where doing the obvious right thing is also a compelling business. With Fund V, the bet is that a 360-degree view will create 360-degree outcomes—returns for LPs, resilience for the economy, and benefits for people and the planet.
