Telecom Lead America: ATP Capital, manager of JLA
Ventures, Clairmont Capital and BlackBerry Partners Fund, has announced that it
is re-branding as Relay Ventures.
The re-branding initiative is part of the company’s
strategy to unify the three brands. The name Relay Ventures epitomizes the idea
that creating a sustainable business requires focus, cooperation, persistence
and teamwork.
Simultaneously, the company also commenced the BlackBerry
Partners Fund II, a new $150MM mobile fund. The new fund will continue to be an
independently managed, platform agnostic, early stage venture fund with a
singular focus on mobile computing.
The new fund’s lead investor is Northleaf Capital
Partners, one of Canada’s largest institutional investors, along with corporate
limited partners including Corus Entertainment, Thomson
Reuters and Research In Motion.
“We are one of the most active investors in mobile
computing, with over 32 investments of which six have already been
acquired,” said John Albright, co-managing partner of Relay Ventures.
“Our continued specialization and focus on the rapidly growing and
advancing mobile industry has been well received by our LPs, almost all of
which returned for this new fund.”
“This re-branding initiative finally unifies the
three brands that we’ve been operating under and the more than $800MM in
capital that we’ve raised,” said Kevin Talbot, co-managing partner of
Relay Ventures. “Our new brand brings unity and clarity to our mandate as
an early stage venture investor.”
Relay Ventures has also opened an office in Silicon
Valley. The selection of the office is significant as almost half of the firm’s
investment have been in the San Francisco Bay Area. With this the company can
better support the entrepreneurs it works with, throughout North America, from
a permanent office in Menlo Park.
Kevin Talbot, who has been an active investor in Silicon
Valley since 2001, recently relocated to the Bay Area from Toronto.
