Startup Studio Madrona Venture Labs Raises $8 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● May 29, 2021
  • Seattle-based startup studio Madrona Venture Labs (MVL) announced recently that it raised $8 million in a new round of funding. These are the details.

Seattle-based startup studio Madrona Venture Labs (MVL) announced recently that it raised $8 million in a new round of funding. MVL is known for operating as a venture studio model and it adds successful operators as investors and co-founders of spinout companies. This enables founders to co-found companies with creators of companies like Zillow, DocuSign, Tableau, Concur, Qualtrics, Tinder, and several others.

MVL is partnered with operating executive investors like Spencer Rascoff, former Zillow CEO; Elie Seidman, former Tinder CEO; Court Lorenzini, co-founder DocuSign; Elena Donio, former Axiom CEO; Elissa Fink, former Tableau CMO; Julie Larson-Green, former Qualtrics CXO; Erik Blachford, former Expedia CEO; Mike McSherry, Xealth CEO; Jon Gelsey, former Auth0 CEO; Chad Cohen, Adaptive Biotech CFO; and Ralph Pascualy, former Swedish Medical Group CEO.

MVL is going to continue and build upon its close partnership with the investment team at Madrona. For example, MVL worked closely with Hope Cochran, former King Digital CFO, who partnered to co-build Strike Graph and Steve Singh, former Concur CEO, who is the co-founder and executive chairman of Stratify.

Data shows that studio-built startups (compared to traditional non-studio) have 3x faster path to seed, 2x faster path to Series A, and 30% better likelihood of achieving Series A. And for founders, by working with exceptional executive chairpersons, board members, and advisors at the formation stage, MVL further stacks the deck in their favor–lowering their real and opportunity costs and de-risking their path to an outsized outcome.

KEY QUOTES:

“I’m excited about this opportunity because we are never done innovating. MVL gives us a chance to think critically about what’s next and to partner with fantastic leaders, entrepreneurs, and investors to make vision reality.”

— Elena Donio, former Axiom CEO

“Our obsessive focus on building founder value has made MVL the obvious choice for founders building a company in the PNW. Our next group of founders will benefit from a 100% operator-led team with a proven company building process; successful operators as co-founders and partners; and funding and support from Madrona, the leading VC in the PNW.“

— Mike Fridgen, MVL CEO and Managing Director

“As a founder you’re challenged to be an expert in almost everything. That is impossible. While I have strengths, the team at Madrona Venture Labs filled in my gaps. Strike Graph’s successful launch is due to their expertise, their support and their camaraderie.”

— Justin Beals, Strike Graph CEO