Edition #3: 24 New Funds, State of VC Fundraising Q1-Q2 2025, Yale's Private Portfolio
Hey folks,
This is Pavel and welcome to the 3rd edition (July, 2025) of Murph Capital newsletter.
This is my monthly brain-dump of the most useful stuff I’ve come across as an operator in the GP/LP world.
Follow me on X and LinkedIn for more frequent insights.
5 Best Tweets
“How do institutional LPs choose which VC funds to back?”
By Pavel Prata from R136 Ventures
“LPs backing emerging managers market map“.
By Alex Klein from Nucleus Talent
“How startup inflated valuation issues affect VCs and LPs”.
By Dan Gray from Equidam / Dave McClure from Practical VC
“How to create an LPA for your VC fund? A complete breakdown with template”.
By Pavel Prata from R136 Ventures
“How to underwrite angel track records in less than 2500 words?“
By David Zhou from Superclusters / Ben Ehrlich from First Momentum Capital
5 Best Linkedin Posts
“How to construct a Pre-Seed VC fund in 2025?”
By Pavel Prata from R136 Ventures
“When do VCs distribute >1X DPI to LPs?”
By Peter Walker from Carta
“Optimized venture portfolio and capital deployment strategy“.
By David Clark from VenCap / Joe Milam from AngelSpan
“State of VC fundraising Q1-Q2 2025“.
By Pavel Prata from R136 Ventures
“8 years in: are small VC funds or big(ger) VC funds performing better?”
By Peter Walker from Carta
5 Best Reports / Stories
“OBBBA, QSBS 2.0. What it means for VCs and LPs”.
By Chris Harvey from Harvey Esquire
“The Big Book of Venture Capital: Q2 Edition, July 2025”.
By Rohit Yadav from 3pt ventures
By Rex Woodbury from Daybreak
“Seed VC is Facing an Existential Crisis. What Comes Next?”
By Rob Go from NextView
“Q2 2025 PitchBook-NVCA Venture Monitor Report”.
By Pitchbook / NVCA
24 New VC Funds
View all other funds by clicking the button below…
Fund Chronicles
Fund Chronicles #1: Founders Fund
How Peter Thiel's contrarian philosophy built $17B AUM and 252x returns by betting against consensus
Fund Chronicles #2: Benchmark Capital
How "communist capital" became Silicon Valley's most successful equal partnership with $60B+ in exits
Fund Chronicles #3: General Catalyst
How two Boston entrepreneurs built a $32B "investment company" that owns hospitals and might go public
14 GP/LP Events
August 4–5 – Women in Private Wealth Retreat (Nashville, TN)
August 5–6 – 4th Private Equity Chicago Forum (Chicago, IL)
August 7 – The Emerging Managers Webinar (Online)
August 7 – VC Platform: London Dinner (London, UK)
August 7–8 – Global Leadership Summit (Online)
August 12 – VC Lab: Panel of women VCs on fund launch and success (Online)
August 12–15 – CU Leadership Convention (Las Vegas, NV)
August 13 – 9th Annual Private Wealth Midwest Forum (Chicago, IL)
August 13 – VC Platform: Chicago Member Social (Chicago, IL)
August 14 – Carta: Q2 Venture Capital Review: Startup Rebound? (Online)
August 14–15 – VC Fast Pitch: Pitch, Connect, Fund! (Online)
August 21 – VC Lab: Venture Studios with JT Benton (Online)
August 25–27 – Asia Pacific Investors Retreat (Bangkok, TH)
August 26 – GCV LP/GP Summit 2025 (San Francisco, CA)
August 27 – VC Lab: AI for VCs (Online)
August 27–28 – TechBBQ 2025 (Copenhagen, Denmark)
August 28 – VC Lab: Meet Emerging Managers (Online)
3 Best Podcasts
First up, a rare long-form chat with Tim Sullivan, Yale’s former private markets lead, on Capital Allocators with Ted Seides. Tim reflects on building Yale’s venture and buyout programs with David Swensen, the evolution of private markets, and why Yale’s past success isn’t easily repeated today.
Another great listen: a lively chat with the Screendoor team – Lisa Cawley, Layne Johnson, and Jamie Rhode on El Pack with host David Zhou. They dig into why LPs back emerging managers over established funds, the challenges and opacity in venture fundraising, and how the team helps new VC funds scale and align incentives for long-term success.
And finally, a deep dive with Jason Lemkin and Rory O’Driscoll on 20VC with Harry Stebbings into the Windsurf x Google x Cognition saga. They cover the OpenAI deal fallout, Cognition’s $220M Windsurf acquisition, AI safety, the coding war among Lovable, Cursor, and Replit, plus debates on AI SaaS valuations
Personal Notes
AI in finance webinar. At R136 Ventures, we recently hosted a webinar on “AI in Finance and Banking”, covering the most compelling use cases of GenAI and Agentic AI, adoption trends across banks, fintechs, and funds, valuation impacts, and more. If you’d like access to the deck prepared by our investment team, feel free to DM me on LinkedIn.
A quick product update. While we’re still building the MVP of our AI engine for sourcing and evaluating fund managers, we’re planning to launch a subscription that tracks all VC funds currently raising or recently closed, with verified data, plus early access to our core engine (including auto-generated memos and due diligence tools). Let us know in the comments what else you’d like included in the subscription!
Looking for a co-builder. I’m looking to team up with someone equally passionate about emerging VC managers and LP allocation. Whether you’re a content nerd, research wizard, or an experienced allocator – if you’re excited about building something meaningful in this space, drop me a line on LinkedIn.
Still soaking up summer in Chicago: rooftop sunrises, matcha + sushi combos, and slow scooter rides through the city. That’s the current vibe :)
Previous Editions
Edition #2: 26 New Funds Launched, Q1 Fund Performance Benchmark, Endowment VC Sales
Edition #1: 27+ New Funds Launched, Concentrated vs Diversified VC, Anchor LP Analysis
What would you like to see in the next episodes? I'd love to hear your ideas – just hit reply and let me know what would be most valuable to you.