Vera Equity Launches $20 Million Fund Focused on Early-Stage FinTechs

Vera Equity has launched with a $20 million fund focused on early-stage FinTech companies.

The new venture capital (VC) firm has invested in 20 FinTech startups to date, Vera Equity said in a Monday (May 1) press release.

The firm was co-founded by Michael Vaughan, former chief operating officer at Venmo; Jonathan Pomeranz, partner at True and co-head of its Financial Services Practice; and Joe Riggione and Brad Stadler, co-CEOs and co-founders at True, the talent management and executive search platform that is Vera Equity’s anchor investor, according to the release.

“Our team’s backgrounds and networks allow Vera to provide founders with differentiated and highly valuable talent introductions and operational guidance,” Vaughan said in the release.

With its first fund, the firm is focused on backing FinTech entrepreneurs at the pre-seed and seed stages, according to the press release.

Among the 20 it has backed so far are StellarFi, which aims to simplify consumer credit building, and Tandym, which focuses on private label card programs for online small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), the release said.

“The key to success in early-stage entrepreneurship is having the right team in place to craft and execute on the vision,” Stadler said in the release. “With our first fund we have been able to leverage True’s existing networks in the global technology, financial services and FinTech spaces to prove out a playbook that we hope will be repeatable across other sectors where True has a presence.”

In other recent news around venture capital, Vesey Ventures announced April 20 that it has launched a $78 million debut fund focused on early-stage FinTech companies.

The Vesey Ventures founders — former Amex Ventures managing directors Dana Eli-Lorch, Lindsay Fitzgerald and Julia Huang — have nearly a decade of experience investing together and establishing partnerships between FinTech companies and financial services institutions.

About a week earlier, it was reported that British VC firm Albion Capital raised £80 million (about $99.8 million) for its portfolio companies.

Albion will deploy the funds across its portfolio of six venture capital trusts (VCTs). It invests mainly in software and healthcare and HealthTech firms, and holds $736 million in assets, UK Tech News reported April 12.