Irving Investors Announces Launch Of Its First Venture Focused Secondaries Fund

Investing In Top Tier Late Stage Tech Companies

NEW YORK, Aug. 4, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Irving Investors, a leading investment firm founded by Jeremy Abelson, is thrilled to announce the launch of its latest advised fund, the Irving Investors OSC Secondaries Fund I. This marks Irving's foray into secondaries, with the intent of capitalizing on the uniquely opportunistic market correction in high growth tech. The fund is a partnership between Irving Investors and Oak Street Capital.

"We are excited to be bringing this new fund vehicle to market," said Jeremy Abelson, the founder of Irving Investors. "This fund is in essence the 'anti-venture' venture fund. We are IRR obsessed and maniacally focused on underwriting for outcome."

In seeking to generate its best in class returns, Abelson says "the fund will target only what are believed to be the absolute highest quality late stage companies and we will acquire positions by offering motivated individual shareholders an opportunity for liquidity." The fund plans to accumulate positions in its target companies over the next 1-3 years. "This strategy should produce a highly concentrated portfolio as the fund has met 600+ public market hopeful companies over the last 18 months and we have narrowed down our target list to a group of less than 20 high conviction companies" said Abelson.  

Irving's head of tech and consumer, Jacob Sonnenberg, in tandem with Oak Street Capital, will implement an excessively rigid underwriting process to ensure that the fund only invests in companies with the characteristics to become great public market assets in the long term. The fund will also incorporate a public equities portfolio which, in addition to investing in existing public companies, allows the fund to remain shareholders of its private portfolio companies once they become public companies.

"The fund's strategy is to take advantage of the current market setup, with a significant correction in high growth tech valuations and a stalled IPO engine since 2021," noted Jacob Sonnenberg. "This delay in shareholder liquidity has created a compelling buyer's market dynamic, presenting the fund with a very unique and timely opportunity to build a portfolio of what it believes to be top-tier companies at attractive valuations."

The Irving Investors OSC Secondaries Fund I experienced an oversubscribed fundraise, prompting managers to cap the fund's size due to projected supply constraints and limited time for deployment. With a concentrated portfolio, the fund prioritizes company quality and focuses on category leaders that exhibit strong unit economics, size and scale, profitability or viable path to profitability, strong cash position with no additional need to raise capital and public-ready management. 

Irving Investors, founded in 2009 by Jeremy Abelson, employs a crossover strategy - Irving initially invested in the public markets before crossing over into late-stage venture capital in 2017. The launch of the Irving Investors OSC Secondaries Fund I represents an expansion of the firm's offerings and commitment to delivering exceptional performance. 

For media inquiries or further information, please contact:

Mason Yeager
Irving Investors
Head of Investor Relations
[email protected]
212.671.1100
Website: www.irvinginvestors.com

SOURCE Irving Investors