Morningstar provides independent investment research to investors worldwide.  It offers internet, software, and print-based products for individuals, financial advisors, and institutions. It also supplies asset-management services to advisors, institutions, and retirement-plan participants.  Morningstar was founded in 1984 and is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois.

Morningstar

Contour Venture Partners invests in companies focused on information technology, and the application of innovative software solutions into the enterprise SaaS, vertical B2B SaaS and financial services sectors. The principals at Contour have a long and successful track record, having directly supported over 85 companies through numerous market cycles. We take great pride in the strong bonds we form with management teams, as this is a crucial ingredient to achieving long term milestones while also making the process engaging and enjoyable. We recognize it is the details and pursuit of flawless execution combined with the right long-term vision that makes a company great. We have the experience, intuition, judgment and industry expertise to ensure that the foundation is in place for management to build a great business with a sustainable competitive advantage.

Contour Venture Partners

Astia Angels is a global network of both female and male angel investors that invest in high-growth companies. The angel investor network is actively engaged in the Astia community and screening process (Astia Expert Sift TM) and founded by experienced angel investors. All members are highly involved throughout the investment process and make independent investment decisions.

Astia Angels

Rethink Impact is the largest, US-based impact venture capital firm with a gender lens that invests in female leaders using technology to solve the world’s biggest problems. We believe that the next generation of extraordinary companies (in health, environmental sustainability, education, and economic empowerment) will find success through their relentless pursuit of mission, for the benefit of all communities. We seek mission-driven founders and teams leveraging breakthrough innovations in technology for the benefit of people and planet. Our primary focus is on companies with female CEOs, or in some cases, women in C-level roles (e.g. CTO, COO, CRO, or CFO). We write $2M-$10M checks to lead or co-invest in Late Seed–Series C rounds. We look for companies with $500K-$15M in annual recurring revenue that are on a path to grow to $50M-$100M in the next five years (although, we will invest in later-stage deals where we believe we can have a significant impact and where the company is a fit for our mission more broadly). We have a bias towards capital-efficient, software solutions and marketplaces solving critical problems for businesses (B2B and B2B2C) and, ultimately, the communities they serve. We are actively sourcing investments that are making new digital health and education innovations broadly accessible to improve outcomes and reduce costs, providing tools for individuals and families to move up the economic ladder, and speeding the transition to a more sustainable and resource-efficient economy. We work to actively support our portfolio companies, helping them with everything from their next round of financing to leveraging their mission as a competitive advantage in hiring, growth, and brand building.

Rethink Impact

Ulu Ventures is a leading seed-stage venture fund in Silicon Valley investing in diverse entrepreneurial teams as well as Enterprise IT, EdTech, FinTech, Healthcare, and Sustainability startups.  Ulu is the first Latina-led venture fund in Silicon Valley and is one of the largest in the country with over $200M in assets under management. As well, the firm has designed its investment process to reduce risk and produce better, more consistent returns. Ulu’s process structures intuition and applies it intelligently to investments, avoiding cognitive biases common in VC; systematically identifies key drivers of risk and uncertainty, streamlining due diligence; and calculates a probability-weighted multiple(PWM) on invested capital, ensuring consistent decision-making.

Ulu Ventures

Aspect Ventures partners with entrepreneurs who want to create important and successful businesses for the long term. They focus on the emerging mobile marketplace, bringing the benefit of their track records and fresh perspective to partner with companies across the long arc of their growth – from inception to standalone, sustainable businesses.

Aspect Ventures

Khosla Ventures invests in companies that are bold, early, and impactful. The firm was started in 2004 by Vinod Khosla, co-founder of Sun Microsystems, to provide venture assistance to entrepreneurs. Khosla Ventures invests in a range of areas including AI, climate, sustainability, enterprise, consumer, fintech, digital health, medtech and diagnostics, therapeutics, and frontier technology.

Khosla Ventures

Salesforce Ventures helps enterprising founders build companies that reinvent the way the world works. Since 2009, they’ve invested in and partnered with more than 400 of the world's tenacious enterprise software companies from seed to IPO, including Airtable, Databricks, DocuSign, Guild Education, Hopin, Monday.com, nCino, Snowflake, Snyk, Stripe, Tanium, and Zoom. Salesforce Ventures leverages decades of expertise in the cloud and long-term relationships with key decision-makers at thousands of businesses around the world to give portfolio companies an unfair advantage, help them build credibility, and accelerate growth.

Salesforce Ventures

Founded in 2016 by industry veteran Sonja Perkins, the fund focuses on high technology companies that fill an unmet market need that can only be solved through a combination of technology, marketing savvy and hard work. The fund typically invests in less than 10% of a round and selectively considers board seats. While typically not a board member, the Perkins Fund provides incredible value in fund raising, market positioning and general business strategy.  The Perkins Fund has invested in over 35 companies with entrepreneurs of high character and capability. While the Perkins Fund does not only invest in women, over 50% of the Perkins Fund founders are women compared to a venture capital industry average of less than 5%. The fund's focus is on long term, lasting relationships with entrepreneurs. Over 30% of the founders have been backed by founder Sonja Hoel Perkins in the past. The Perkins Fund invests in all stages, including seed, startup and late stage deals. Over 70% of the portfolio has raised venture capital.

The Perkins Fund

CE Innovation Capital is an investment firm that provides digital innovation and wealth management services. Founded in February 2016, CreditEase FinTech Investment Fund (“CEFIF”) is a venture fund investing in FinTech companies globally. CEFIF has an equivalent of $1 billion in the total committed capital. The fund invests in five sub-segments within the domain of FinTech: Lending, Payment, Personal Finance/Wealth Management, Enterprise Solutions, and Insurance.

CreditEase Fintech Investment Fund

PSP Growth is the investment arm of PSP Partners focused on venture and growth equity investments in early-stage and high-growth businesses.

PSP Growth

Our fund is singularly focused on investing in traditionally underfunded founders - women and other underrepresented innovators - and our team has extensive experience in finding incredible opportunities in startups with this profile. We invest primarily in Seed and Series A companies being built by traditionally underfunded founders. At least 70% of our investments will be in women-led startups. Of that 70%, at least half will go to women who also come from another group traditionally underrepresented in the tech startup space. The remaining 30% must have one of more of the following characteristics: - Founder from any traditionally underrepresented group, such as race, ethnicity, LGBTQ+, socioeconomic background, nationality, age, or location. - Solution focused on increasing diversity, equity and inclusion. - Solution focused on serving traditionally underserved customer groups. We care about profitability over hockey sticks, healthy growth over stacked venture rounds, and don’t rely on a small handful of our portfolio companies to contribute to positive fund performance. We look for technology founders who have a confident path to profits, are excited about the contributions our investment team, our advisors, our LPs and our network could have on their startup, are 100% committed to creating a diverse and inclusive workplace, and care about the well-being of themselves and their team. After all, people are truly the biggest asset a growing company can have. We invest in technology companies that are ethically-forward and are working to make the world better – whether it be by providing more access (that’s a big word for us), creating solutions for underserved markets, promoting the positive use of data, or what have you.

The W Fund

Mastercard is a payments and technology company that connects consumers, businesses, merchants, and governments. They provide data services and marketing center. Their marketing materials help card portfolios and businesses. They also provide fraud prevention solutions and payment ecosystem security.

Mastercard

NextView Ventures is a high-conviction, hands-on seed VC with a thematic investing focus. NextView Ventures invests in companies that use technology to drive a brighter collective future. This includes themes like healthy living, total footprint, economic access, and conversational computing.

NextView Ventures

Alumni Ventures Group provides high-quality, diversified venture portfolios to individual investors who previously haven't had access to VC. It helps accredited alums from top entrepreneurial schools invest together in the ventures of fellow alums. The firm backs companies with an alumni connection and an institutional lead investor with expertise in the space. AVG also offers focused funds that allow any accredited investor access to a venture portfolio, diversified by type, sector, stage, and geography. Beth Obermiller, Michael Madden, and Mike Collins co-founded the firm in Manchester, New Hampshire in 2013.

Alumni Ventures

GingerBread Capital invests in the next generation of women founders and entrepreneurs leading high-growth businesses It helps women-led businesses gain access to the knowledge, networks, and capital they need to build and scale successful enterprises, and it encourages other women to do the same. Based in Menlo Park, California, GingerBread Capital was founded in 2017 by Linnea Roberts.

GingerBread Capital

PayPal Ventures is PayPal's venture capital arm, investing in PayPal's strategic interest fields for return. Leveraging PayPal Venture's expertise and experience, PayPal – and the companies in which it invests – are helping to bring innovative solutions to market more quickly, scale them faster, and build a global financial system that is more transparent, personalized, inclusive, and customer-focused. PayPal Venture's investments reinforce its commitment to leading the financial technology industry and supporting entrepreneurship.

PayPal Ventures

Pivotal Ventures is an incubation and investment company to pursue projects, potentially, and ideas investments. The company also focuses on the military community, people with disabilities, communities of color, LGBTQ, and those in small towns and cities. Their strategies are guided by experts, data, and those with lived experience in their focus areas. Pivotal Ventures use philanthropic and investment capital to people, fund transformational ideas, and organizations. They also encourage and identify the adoption of proven approaches to progress in their areas of interest. The company has three main priorities such as fast-tracking women in sectors like media, tech, and government, mobilizing shareholders into pressuring companies and removing barriers to women’s professional advancement to make reforms in support of gender equality. Pivotal Venture was founded in 2015 and is headquartered in Seattle, Washington, USA.

Pivotal Ventures

As an Independent Advisory solution, Ethos is a fiduciary partner for an exclusive group of clients, providing: Superior service empowered by client concentration. Customization empowered by authentic objectivity. Creativity empowered by the flexibility to seek unique solutions. Portfolio and risk management insights empowered by a seasoned institutional investment team

Ethos Family Office

Allianz Life who are uniquely positioned to leverage our financial strength and in-house expertise to help our partners succeed.

Allianz Life Ventures

BMO Capital Markets is a full-service financial services provider offering a complete range of investment and corporate banking products and services. Its portfolio of services includes equity and debt underwriting, corporate lending and project financing, merger and acquisitions advisory services, securitization, treasury management, market risk management, debt and equity research, and institutional sales and trading. BMO Capital Markets is a member of BMO Financial Group, a diversified financial services provider in North America with 529 billion U.S. dollars in total assets and more than 47,000 employees.

BMO Capital Markets

Envestnet, Inc. (NYSE: ENV) is an independent provider of technology-enabled, web-based investment solutions and services to financial advisors. By integrating a wide range of investment solutions and services, their technology platform provides financial advisors with the flexibility to address their client's needs. They work with financial advisors who are independent, as well as those who are associated with small or mid-sized financial advisory firms and larger financial institutions, which they refer to as enterprise clients. They focus their technology development efforts and their sales and marketing approach on addressing financial advisors’ front-, middle- and back-office needs. They believe that their investment solutions and services allow financial advisors to be more efficient and effective in the activities critical to their businesses by facilitating client interactions, supporting and enhancing portfolio management and analysis, and enabling reliable account support and administration.  Their centrally-hosted technology platform provides financial advisors with the flexibility to choose freely among a wide range of investment solutions, services, investment managers, and custodians to identify those that are most appropriate for their clients.

Envestnet

AME Cloud Ventures focuses on seed to later stage companies building infrastructure and value chains around data. It specializes in technology-heavy companies gathering or creating unique data at every stage of the data stack — from infrastructure all the way to applications, mobile, and sensors.  It strives to find, fund, and support true entrepreneurs. The firm provides a unique and genuine set of resources to our founding teams, from strong operational and business experience to networks of amazing mentors and international partners, particularly in China. AME Cloud Ventures is the venture fund led by Jerry Yang, co-founder of Yahoo!

AME Cloud Ventures

Allianz Life Insurance Company of North America (Allianz) is a provider of retirement solutions, including fixed and variable annuities and life insurance for individuals.   Allianz Life offers various products, including fixed and variable annuities and life insurance. These products are offered through a network of more than 100,000 agents nationwide.

Allianz Life Insurance

New York Ventures is dedicated to encouraging innovation and fueling economic growth in communities across the State. This venture capital investment arm of Empire State Development is one of New York State's business resources and innovation investments, including the Governor's START-UP NY program, Innovation Hot Spots, the Regional Economic Development Councils, the Centers of Advanced Technology and Centers of Excellence networks, and the SUNY 2020 Initiative.

New York Ventures

Gaingels is a venture investment syndicate in service of the LGBT+ community and its allies, investing in companies with LGBT+ founders and C-suite leaders at all stages of growth, as well as in more established companies resolved on building more inclusive teams, with a global portfolio of 130+ companies and $70M in deployed investment capital to date.  The Gaingels network also actively supports its portfolio in identifying and recruiting diverse talent to their C-suite and board leadership teams and fosters a vibrant global community of industry leaders, investors, operators, and entrepreneurs who share a common goal for positive social change through business and successful investments.

Gaingels

Astia focuses on sourcing and investing in women-led companies through its various investment vehicles, including Astia Fund and Astia Angels. Utilizing a data-driven methodology, Astia aims to eliminate bias in the investment process while supporting entrepreneurs with diverse backgrounds. The organization is committed to leveling the investment playing field and fostering inclusive teams that drive impactful growth.

Astia

Halogen Ventures is a Los Angeles, California-based Venture Capital fund focused on investing in early-stage consumer technology startups with a female on the founding team. Halogen Ventures invests in pre-seed, seed, and series A companies creating groundbreaking technologies and products in the consumer space. It is hands-on and supports founders through their full lifecycle. The firm helps them build their networks, get brand exposure, hire great talent, raise follow-on rounds and find their path to acquisition or IPO.

Halogen Ventures

Cleo Capital is a venture capital company. The company focuses on making investments in early-stage and expanding start-up businesses.

Cleo Capital

TVC is a transformational, early-stage venture firm backed by world class entrepreneurs and business leaders. Led by a seasoned team of venture investors, ex-founders, and investment management executives, we invest our capital, time, and network into highly defensible, fast-growing companies with the potential to solve the world’s largest problems. Our strategy is grounded on writing high conviction checks at Pre-Seed and Seed with healthy follow-on reserves through Series A; demonstrating deep value to enable increased ownership over time. Our experienced team is headquartered in New York City and London, but we are excited to meet founders from around the world with a strong preference for diverse founding teams. At its core, we believe that diversity is not only good for business, but great for financial returns.

The Venture Collective

Diverse Angels is an angel group for current & aspiring investors from underrepresented and diverse backgrounds (People of Color, Women, LGBTQ+) to come together and share access to opportunities for ownership in early-stage tech companies. The mission to increase representation of diverse investors as a means to address the systemic wealth gaps, notably the racial wealth gap in the US. With a focus on bridging wealth gaps & disparities, Diverse Angels is a B-Corporation that is supported 100% by volunteers and charges no fees to the community though its 0/00 model.  This innovative 0/00 model (0% management fees are charged and 0% of carried interest - i.e. profit) was put into place to remove barriers and costs that could prevent diverse angels (especially first-timers) from participating in deals. The 0/00 model also ensures that the angels’ maximum amount of capital is deployed to allow for the maximum amount of upside. In search of the best founders, Diverse Angels leverages the size, strength, and diversity of its member base to maintain high standards of investment rigor. There are intentional efforts to source & meet founders from all backgrounds and it is a priority that the majority of Diverse Angels’ investments are made into Diverse Founders (People of Color, Women, LGBTQ+).

Diverse Angels

Stardust Equity is a mission-oriented investment fund putting capital to work for competitive returns and positive social and environmental impact. The firm partners with fund managers and entrepreneurs who intentionally seek commercial, sustainable solutions.

Stardust Equity

Ellevest

Ellevest provides an engaging investing experience to help women meet their financial goals in life. Ellevest offers a modern, engaging user experience. The same care, thoughtfulness, and attention to detail that is reflected in its beautiful, easy-to-use interface are applied to the construction of its portfolios, its selection of investments, and the development of the algorithms that drive its forecasts and recommendations.

Ellevest is a hybrid investment management platform that specifically targets women, with an algorithm that takes into account gender-specific factors such as career breaks, longer life expectancy, and income differences.

Retail investors demanding sophisticated passive investment strategies are looking for an edge.

Retail Trading Infrastructure

Ellevest Review 2024: Pros, Cons and Alternatives

Ellevest is a hybrid investment management platform that specifically targets women, with an algorithm that takes into account gender-specific factors such as career breaks, longer life expectancy, and income differences.Ellevest currently offers services under three categories: Ellevest Essential (at a monthly fee of USD 1), Ellevest Plus (USD 5 per month), and Ellevest Executive (USD 9 per month). All three offerings include portfolio customization, banking services (spending and savings accounts), access to human advisors, and on-demand learning for subjects such as investing, career, and money. Ellevest Plus is more costly because it handles retirement accounts for clients. Meanwhile, Ellevest Executive handles both retirement accounts and investment management for multiple goals. The company also offers private wealth management services for clients who wish to invest USD 1 million or more through the platform. A dedicated advisor will work together with clients to create investment plans to meet their goals.Ellevest reported assets under management (AUM) of USD 1.4 billion as of December 2021, growing 44% during the year.In April 2022, Ellevest raised USD 53 million in Series B <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/9622?industryIds=28">funding </a>co-led by BMO and Contour Venture Partners. The company planned to use the funds to expand its product offering and provide personalized coaching.

ComposedPro is a digital investment advisor that handles clients’ investment accounts at their employers (such as employer-sponsored accounts) as well as private investment accounts, focusing on low cost Employer-Coordinated Portfolios. The company oversees USD 25 million in total assets over 181 customer accounts as of the company’s Q2 2020 filing. ComposedPro manages half of the company’s accounts on a discretionary basis, meaning an investment advisor has the discretion to make buy and sell decisions for a client’s account. ComposedPro also has 46 non-discretionary accounts totalling USD 7.9 million in assets. The average investment account size is USD 138,222 placed across exchangeable assets such as exchange-traded funds (ETFs), equities, bonds, and options.

ComposedPro

Guideline provides automated investment management services for employer-sponsored retirement accounts. The services also include plan set-up and administration, enrollment and education, recordkeeping, compliance with Retirement Income Security Act, and reporting.As of July 2023, Guideline had assets under management (AUM) of over USD 9 billion and over 350 employees. The company stated that it is the only provider that does not charge plan participants (i.e. employees) with any fees. Guideline charges the employers with a straightforward pricing of one flat fee per participant, in contrast to the asset-based fee model predominant in the industry (i.e. fee is charged on account balances). The standard service has a base fee of USD 49 per month and an additional USD 8 per participant. The standard service includes unlimited phone/email support to both plan participants and employers. For prime service, access to a dedicated account manager is available at a higher base fee of USD 129 and an additional fee of USD 8 per participant. In addition, the company stated that it has a low mutual fund expense ratio, at 0.08%. It purchases mutual funds from Vanguard and other fund providers.Funding and financialsIn June 2021, Guideline raised USD 200 million in funding led by General Atlantic. The company intends to utilize the funding to broaden its 401(k) offerings and introduce new retirement plan solutions.

Guideline

Based in Plano, Texas, AssetBuilder is a robo-advisory company that develops investment portfolios based on the Fama/French school of thought, using low-cost active index funds. It has Dimensional Fund Advisors (the eighth largest fund company in the world as of September 2019) as its funding partner. Human advisors are available to provide investing guidance. As of April 2019, the firm’s assets under management (AUM) amounted to USD 765.9 million. The firm’s business model relies on a fee-only structure, meaning a customer solely pays AssetBuilder to create and manage investments (the company does not receive product-specific commission). The minimum investment for AssetBuilder is USD 50,000 with an asset management fee ranging from 0.24% to 0.45%; the higher the investment, the lower the fee. Though the firm does not have a setup fee, it requires a custodial cost for setting up a portfolio of USD 11.95 per trade for each recommended mutual fund. Most of the platform’s portfolios require about 11 to 14 mutual funds, costing about USD 131.45 to USD 167.30 to open an account.

AssetBuilder

Based in Canada, Smart Money Invest provides portfolio management services to individual clients, advisors, and employers (such as group saving plans for retirement). Human advisors are available to serve individual investors.The company provides financial tools to develop a long-term financial strategy by calculating net worth, setting a budget, managing investment accounts, and planning for retirement.

Smart Money Invest

Robo advisory startups that offer automated investment services directly to individuals solely via digital platforms.

Robo advisory startups that offer automated investment services to individuals via both digital platforms and human financial advisors.

Provide solutions for financial advisors/asset managers to automate wealth management and administration functions.

Robo advisory startups that offer automated investment services to businesses via both digital platforms and human financial advisors.

Provides solutions for financial institutions to set up their own robo-advisory function and offer services to clients.

Startups that offer online platforms for investors to trade various securities such as stocks, ETFs, and options directly via the platform

Leverages AI/ML to automate allocation and management of investment funds to cater to retail investors

Operates a B2B SaaS model to support financial institution in offering various investment related services

Ellevest

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