The new fund of Brian Singerman has a turn and Peter Thiel as a big backer | Techcrunch

Former Foundation Fund GP Brian Singerman and co-founder and managing partner of Quiet Capital, Lee Linden, are looking for more than $ 500 million for a new fund called GPX, three people who are familiar with their strategy Techcrunch told. A significant part of the GPX fund, possibly no less than 50%, will come from co-founder Peter Thiel of Founders Fund, said these people.

GPX uses a dual strategy. The company will invest approximately 20% of the capital in funds managed by emerging VCs that focus on startups for pre-seed and seed phase; The remaining capital will be to collaborate with emerging managers in leading later investments (probably in series B) of their breakout companies.

It is a fairly different approach than how most venture companies work. Although typical VC companies invest all their capital directly into startups, GPX adopts elements of what is known as a fund-Funds model, a less common investment strategy in which a company invests part of its capital in a portfolio of other funds, instead of directly in underlying Activa, such as startups. Although a funds-of-funds offers limited partners a handy way to gain access to under the radar or difficult to access companies, a considerable disadvantage is the double layer of the low: which is charged by the fund of funds and those by the underlying managers.

While capital of Fonds-of-Funds companies reached a low of 16 years last year, According to pitchbookSingerman and Linden bet that their personal brands, unique networks and a strategy that is only partially a fund of funds encourage limited partners to open their checkbooks for GPX.

Singerman and Linden may be on something. While risk capital focuses in the biggest fundsSome of the best investors in those companies are no longer interested in being part of a large machine. They leave the colossus companies to launch their own investment outfits where they can be more agenda and specialized.

GPX bets that the next generation of VC investors will identify and support many strong companies at an early stage, so that Singerman and Linden’s company are able to lead later stage investments in the most successful portfolio companies of the emerging managers.

Here the strategy of GPX is particularly valuable: VCs at an early stage often try to exercise pro-Rata-rights in later financing rounds (Serie A, B and after), but their funds usually prevent them from retaining their percentage property in best performing companies. When they are confronted with such opportunities, small VCs often clamber to pick up special vehicles (SPVs) from their existing limited partners. Yet these processes are time -consuming, so that other investors can split coveted share places into the most sought after deals.

With the capital of GPX behind them, emerging funds get the chance to not only exercise their pro-rata rights, but also to lead a later round.

The information previously reported That Singerman and Linden launch GPX, but have not given any details about the target size of the fund and other strategy data.

Singerman and Linden did not respond to a request for comments.