New venture firm announced in Utah

SkyLab Ventures makes its debut in Utah with its $30 million Fund I. The new Murray-based venture fund focuses on early-stage investments in direct-to-consumer, e-commerce and SaaS-based startups. The firm was based in October 2020 by Jesse Silva and Bensen Metcalf. Both are common companions and have in depth networks and backgrounds in funding, entrepreneurship, tech, and venture capital.

“I based SkyLab Ventures as a result of my enterprise was acquired by personal fairness, and the expertise was lower than splendid,” says Jesse Silva, co-founder, president, and a common associate of SkyLab Ventures. Silva beforehand based a towing firm that in the end bought for over $125 million. 

“I instructed myself that I actually wished to be part of a brand new fund that acquired belongings that we may implement into our portfolio firms and actually assist scale.” 

“We are actually searching for fast-growing firms that we predict have the potential for a 2-3 12 months journey towards exit,” says Benson Metcalf, co-founder, CEO, and a common associate of SkyLab Ventures. Metcalf beforehand labored as a guide at Bain & Company earlier than spending over three years in enterprise improvement, technique, and operations at Pluralsight.

The first three of Skylab’s portfolio firms are situated in Utah: Pestie in Lehi, Swell in Holladay, and The Gunbox in Murray. 

SkyLab announced Pestie’s seed spherical on March 3, 2021. Pestie is utilizing SkyLab’s funding to speed up gross sales of its direct to client pest management answer. Unlike different pest management providers involving door-to-door gross sales and scheduled appointments for technicians who spray for pests, Pestie ships customized DIY pest management kits on to shoppers.

“Pestie is an amazing funding for SkyLab Ventures,” says Metcalf. “We are impressed by the founders and their aggressive drive to ship one thing really disruptive to a stale business (door-to-door pest management) and we see a broader development of DIY throughout American households.” 

Holladay-based Swell, a SaaS firm centered on buyer suggestions and expertise for small companies, concluded its Series A spherical from SkyLab on March 17, 2021. The funding will enable the corporate to speed up advertising and marketing and product improvement. 

On March 9, 2021 SkyLab announced its acquisition of The Gunbox, an e-commerce enterprise that produces good handgun safety containers. SkyLab intends to organize the corporate for a future exit, reflecting its acknowledged goal for all investments.

In November 2020, SkyLab acquired Welling Media, a digital advertising and marketing and buyer acquisition technique firm based mostly in Nashville. Welling Media has generated over $1 billion in income to this point via its content material technique with direct-to-consumer manufacturers with income between $2 million and $200 million.

 Additionally, certainly one of SkyLab’s strategic funding companions is The Spacestation in Layton, Utah, which was based by social media influencer Shaun McBride and enterprise associate Sean Holladay. The Spacestation brings substantial influencer advertising and marketing capabilities to the SkyLab portfolio. McBride’s YouTube channel has over 3 million subscribers and a pair of.5 billion views. Another channel managed by McBride has 4 billion views. 

“We imagine our sensible and market-tested advertising and marketing engine is a real value-add to our portfolio,” says Silva.

SkyLab considers itself “a mix of an modern VC fund, a contemporary advertising and marketing company, and an influencer advertising and marketing community.” The venture fund’s focus is on equipping e-commerce, software program, and expertise leaders with growth and ‘transformative exits.’

New venture firm announced in Utah was initially printed on TechBuzz.information

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