- Mercato Partners announced the final close of Traverse Fund IV, a $400 million growth fund. These are the details.
Mercato Partners has announced the final close of Traverse Fund IV, a $400 million growth fund that will be deployed for high-growth/mature technology and branded consumer companies. Mercato Partners’ growth-stage fund, Traverse is led by seasoned investors, operators, and managing directors Ryan Sanders, Joe Kaiser, and Greg Warnock, co-founder of Mercato Partners.
Launched in 2007, Mercato Partners has principally invested in growth companies outside of the traditional coastal geographies.
The Traverse Fund IV raise was led by commitments from institutional allocators, including public pension funds, university endowments, charitable foundations, health care systems, and insurance companies. In addition to this traditional mix of long-term investors, Mercato Partners had reserved a portion of Fund IV for accomplished service affiliates, executives, and business leaders that bring mission-critical access, resources and networking opportunities to the fund’s portfolio companies.
Mercato Partners already added five key investments to the Traverse Fund IV portfolio, including: Atomic, a payroll API that powers banks, credit unions, and fintech; Klover, a permissioned commerce data platform; Lambda, a deep learning AI infrastructure company; Paytient, a category creator that built the Health Payment Account; and Prime Trust, a fintech and digital assets infrastructure provider. These five companies join the 65 other investments Mercato Partners has completed since 2007.
Since being founded, Mercato Partners has raised over $1 billion combined across their venture, growth, and buyout practices—Prelude, Traverse, and Savory, respectively—and has an active portfolio of 43 investments.
The Traverse Fund is led by seasoned investors, operators, and managing directors Ryan Sanders, Joe Kaiser, and Greg Warnock, co-founder of Mercato Partners.
KEY QUOTES:
“Dedicated to investing in the next generation of great American entrepreneurs, Fund IV will prioritize those companies being built in cities and states that have historically been overlooked and under-appreciated by growth capital. This raise provides us the opportunity to go all-in on our core belief that great businesses can be built anywhere.”
— Joe Kaiser, Managing Director
“We understand that one of the fundamental needs of our portfolio companies is access to the right resources at the right time to fuel growth. This strategic CXO partnership is the perfect value-add channel to enable that growth support.”
— Managing Director Ryan Sanders
“As we look forward across the investing landscape, we are energized by the explosion of disruptive entrepreneurs building industry-changing companies. In conjunction with the significant investment potential presented by today’s economic climate, we are confident that our fourth growth fund will be the best yet.”
Co-founder Greg Warnock
