In Benchmark’s New Era, Expect More of the Same

The Benchmark of today is nothing like the Benchmark of 1995, the year the storied venture capital firm behind Uber, Twitter and Snap was founded. At least that’s what its five partners maintain in a new letter to limited partners, which details its plan to raise another $425 million fund. 

To underscore the change, Benchmark is calling its next fund, the firm’s 11th, Benchmark 1 and will follow this sequence until “the odometer resets again,” says the letter, which I’ve included below. 

One wonders why Benchmark’s partners bothered to craft this narrative for LPs. Unlike many VC firms during the zero-interest rate era, the Silicon Valley firm held fast to its strategy of keeping fund sizes relatively small and investing in just a few new companies a year. This low-volume strategy, which was at odds with the go-go days of the pandemic boom, now looks wise.