Acrew Capital

Huge congrats to Christina Cacioppo and the entire Vanta team on their $150M Series C! Their customer base that has doubled to over 8,000 is a testament to their customer-first approach, and we look forward to their next milestone.

These are the top four things you need to know about hiring top technical talent. 1. Your candidates may not be on traditional job sites so consider more dev-focused channels to source talent. 2. Soft skills matter. Replace coding questions with questions on problem solving to understand a candidate's process for tackling challenges. 3. Address their most pressing needs: salary, work-life balance, and remote work. 4. Don't view AI as a negative in the interview process. Top candidates are likely using the technology to become more efficient. Check out the full guide alongside critical considerations to differentiate your hiring strategy from CoderPad CEO Amanda Richardson in the comments.

Congrats to Shlomo Kramer and the entire Cato Networks team for being recognized as a SASE leader by Gartner! This recognition serves as a testament to the way their customers and partners have embraced their pioneering SASE platform, helping drive growth 2x as fast as the market and a near-perfect rating on Gartner Peer Insights.

Incredibly proud to announce that we’ve led NALA Money’s $40M round! With their mission to build the global payment rails for the next billion in Africa, Nala has already attracted tens of thousands of users who remit tens of millions of USD into the continent each month. Their rapid growth and profitability is a testament to the visionary leadership of Benjamin Fernandes and his team, whom we've proudly backed since their Y-Combinator days. We're honored to be joined by an incredible group of co-investors, including existing investor and board member Sheel Tyle from Amplo, Ryan King Co-Founder of Chime, Lexi Novitske, CFA from Norrsken22, Sterling Snow from Pelion Venture Partners, HOF Capital, Nyca Partners, DFS Lab, and DST Global, alongside many other enthusiastic supporters. As our Founding Partner Lauren Kolodny told TechCrunch, “We believe Nala will be the leader in remittances for the next generation of Africans who are expected to account for 35% of all the world’s youth by 2050. The team has deep local knowledge, fintech expertise, and unique community building know-how to build the cross-border payment rails for the next billion.” CC: John Gardner, CFA, Tom Porter, Charlie Liao

If you want to differentiate your hiring strategy, there's two key elements you can’t afford to overlook. We asked Amanda Richardson, CEO at CoderPad, and member of our executive community, Crew of Leaders, what founders need to know about hiring top technical talent. Use this guide to learn how to structure interview questions, source potential candidates, and get up to speed on key considerations.

My co-founding partner at Acrew Capital, Lauren Kolodny, premiered on the Midas List last year as number 100. This year, she found herself at number 68. We don’t put great stock in these types of accolades — but I’d be remiss if I didn’t take a moment to say a few things. When I first appeared on the Midas List, I was one of two women. This year has the most female representation in the history of the list. Out of 100 investors, 13 are women. Appearing on The Midas List is a good feeling. Having your once-mentee turned partner appear on The Midas List might be a better feeling. I founded Acrew with Lauren for a lot of reasons. I’d seen her in action and I admired her guts. Even as an early career investor, Lauren stood up for companies that she believed in. We led a Series A in Chime because of her thesis work and her conviction — even when most others turned it down. That experience and others like it cemented for me the importance of generational diversity — Lauren, a millennial, grew up in a different world than I did and she could spot things that I might have missed. Our fund now boasts gen x-ers, millennials and zoomers — and we’re better for it. We practice VC as a team sport and Lauren’s achievement reflects not just her success but the tenacious, innovative and decisive nature of our entire crew. On average, the venture firms represented on the Midas List this year were founded 33 years ago. Only 10% were founded in the last decade. I think it’s safe to say that our five-year-old fund is far out-punching its weight. Congratulations, Lauren. There are big things in our rear view mirror but even bigger things ahead. 

The Forbes Midas List celebrates top investors globally, however, it's also indicative of the hard work of the founders we're lucky enough to partner with. Congratulations to our Co-Founding Partner Lauren Kolodny on this back-to-back recognition and to the teams who made this milestone possible.

The Forbes Midas List celebrates top investors globally, however, it's also indicative of the hard work of the founders we're lucky enough to partner with. Congratulations to our Co-Founding Partner Lauren Kolodny on this back-to-back recognition and to the teams who made this milestone possible.

We are excited to have announced our Series A lead investment in Abett. Founded by Mike Hanlon, the company provides a data layer that enables any self-insured employer in the US to receive a regular and consistent feed of their claims data so they can actually understand healthcare costs, the efficacy of their employee benefits, and how to better serve their employees (to whom they have a fiduciary responsibility). While this sounds like table stakes, it's far from the norm. After payroll, healthcare is the biggest cost consideration for American employers. A majority of Americans receive employer-based health insurance. A majority of those Americans receive insurance from a fully or partially self-funded plan (i.e., the employer is taking risk instead of the insurance company). Abett brings transparency and alignment to a thorny data problem to empower benefits leaders & CFOs. More to come on Acrew Capital's focus on the investing at the intersection of healthcare & data. cc: Mark Kraynak and Kwabena "KB" Nimo for their partnership on this investment.

Incredibly proud to see our Co-Founding Partner Lauren Kolodny make her second consecutive appearance on the 2024 Forbes Midas List! The recognition is exemplary of Lauren’s thesis-driven investing approach that led her to back fintech startups such as Chime at its earliest stages, among many others. Link in comments for the full list honoring the world’s top 100 investors.