Correlation Ventures
1 known investors
This is the personal/about page of Seth Levine, a venture capitalist and author, rather than a portfolio company website. It describes his role as a partner at Foundry (a Boulder, CO venture firm he cofounded), his co-founding of the small business lending platform GoodBread, and his community, philanthropic, and educational activities.
Also known as Correlation · Correlation Ventures LP
Investors · 1
Company profile
researched Aug 2026Correlation Ventures is a United States venture capital firm that co-invests in privately held, US-headquartered venture-backed companies. Rather than leading rounds, the firm participates alongside at least one other outside VC, positioning itself as a source of additional capital to complete a financing. It invests across all industry sectors — including biotech, healthcare, fintech, consumer, media, food-agtech and proptech — and across stages from pre-seed and seed through growth. Initial checks range from $100,000 to $4 million, with up to $10 million committed over the life of an investment.
The firm's central approach is a quantitative, extensively validated predictive model that has been refined since 2010. The model weighs factors related to the company, the financing round and the syndicate's investors, and it allows Correlation to reach investment decisions typically within days and always in under two weeks. Alongside capital, the firm offers portfolio companies access to its venture deal database and investor network, including a VC Matching Tool that algorithmically identifies partners and firms most likely to lead a company's next round.
Correlation was co-founded by Managing Directors David Coats and Trevor Kienzle. Anu Pathria serves as Managing Director leading analytics; Moiz Saifee (who joined in 2012 from Info Edge/Naukri.com) and Wesley Barrow (who joined in 2020 as a Venture Partner leading the New York office after roles at Buddy Media, Nomi and Yext) were both promoted to Partner in 2023.
Business model
Correlation operates as a closed-end venture fund manager, raising capital from institutional limited partners — endowments, pensions, funds of funds and family offices — and deploying it as minority co-investments in VC-led financing rounds. It does not lead rounds or take on traditional lead-investor governance, instead relying on an existing outside VC in the syndicate.
As a venture capital fund manager, the firm's economics derive from managing limited partner capital and from returns on its portfolio investments; approximately $500 million was under management as of 2023.
Traction
The firm invested in 121 companies in its first fund and had backed over 400 companies overall by 2023. Cited outcomes include Synthorx (IPO, then acquired by Sanofi for $2.5B), Upstart (IPO), IonQ (IPO), MosaicML (acquired by Databricks for $1.3B), Personal Capital (acquired by Empower for up to $1B), Janux (IPO), Lemonaid Health (acquired by 23andMe for $400M), Gabi (acquired by Experian for $320M), Virsto Software (acquired by VMware), InstaEDU (acquired by Chegg) and AirXpanders (public in 2015). Other named holdings include AlienVault, BlueVine, Casper, Crossbar, Distil, Earnest, Sun Basket, Spirox, Compass, Neon, Dizzion, Carewell and Galera Therapeutics.
Latest developments
Correlation closed Correlation III at $130 million in June 2023 and promoted Wesley Barrow and Moiz Saifee to Partner at the same time. A third-party investor profile reports the firm deploying Fund III, an exit of Bubble announced in April 2025, and 77 total exits since founding.
▸Full profile — market position, technology, go-to-market, geography, history
Market position
Correlation describes itself as the US venture industry's predictive-analytics pioneer and a leading co-investor, and is among the most active venture firms by deal count, typically making about one new investment per week. It had invested in more than 400 companies across all sectors as of 2023.
The firm distinguishes itself through data-driven underwriting rather than partner-led diligence, an explicit commitment to decision speed, willingness to write small checks, and a deliberately non-lead role that avoids adding governance overhead for founders. Its deal database and investor network are used to make introductions to future investors, partners and advisors.
Technology
The firm built and continuously optimizes an objective quantitative model, in development since 2010, that predicts investment outcomes using factors tied to the company, the financing round and the co-investing syndicate. It maintains a large proprietary database of venture financings and outcomes, which also supports a VC Matching Tool that identifies likely lead investors for a portfolio company's next round.
Go-to-market
Correlation markets itself to founders and to other venture firms as a fast, low-friction co-investor: decisions in days and never more than two weeks, flexibility on check size, and predictability in follow-on rounds. Inbound pitches are directed to the co-founder's email address, and warm introductions are helpful but not required.
Privately held, US-headquartered venture-backed companies raising rounds led by another outside VC, at stages from pre-seed through growth, plus the lead VC firms seeking additional capital to complete those rounds. On the capital-raising side, its customers are institutional LPs including endowments, pensions, funds of funds, family offices and roughly 30 individual VCs.
Geography
The firm invests across US geographies. Offices were listed as Palo Alto, San Diego and New York City in 2017 and as San Diego, San Francisco and New York City in 2023.
History
Correlation was co-founded by David Coats and Trevor Kienzle and has been optimizing its quantitative investment model since 2010. It deployed a first fund across 121 companies, closed an oversubscribed $200 million second fund in January 2017 that brought assets under management to $366 million, and closed a $130 million third fund, Correlation III, in June 2023, taking AUM to approximately $500 million. Moiz Saifee joined in 2012 and Wesley Barrow in 2020; both were promoted to Partner in 2023.
Compiled by commissioned research from 8 cited public sources — announcements, filings, and press listed under research sources below.
Key figures
latest reportedCompany-reported or press-reported figures, each dated to when it was claimed — not independently audited.
Timeline · 6
launches, deals, and filingsAn investor profile reports that Correlation Ventures announced the exit of portfolio company Bubble in April 2025.
The firm closed Correlation III, a $130 million US venture capital fund, bringing assets under management to approximately $500 million. Investors included endowments, pensions, funds of funds and family offices.
$130M source ↗
Alongside the close of Correlation III, the firm promoted Moiz Saifee (joined 2012, analytics) and Wesley Barrow (joined 2020 as Venture Partner leading the New York City office) to Partner.
The firm re-ran its venture outcomes data, showing that despite strong markets, almost two-thirds of financings in the past decade lost money and fewer than 4% produced returns of 10x or greater.
The firm announced it had raised an additional $200 million and closed its oversubscribed second fund, bringing assets under management to $366 million. Limited partners included endowments, pensions, funds of funds and family offices.
$200M source ↗
The firm released a study covering the distribution of outcomes across more than 21,000 financings from 2004-2013, finding that 65% of financings failed to return 1x capital, about 10% returned 5x or more, and about 4% returned 10x or more.
Dated company events from announcements, filings, and press; legal rows summarize public dockets and regulator releases.
▸Research sources · 8
primary sources listed
- Correlation Venturessethlevine.com · web
8 public sources were cited for this profile; the first-party ones are listed here.
Frequently asked questions
- What does Correlation Ventures do?
- US venture capital firm that uses predictive analytics to make rapid co-investment decisions alongside lead VCs.
- Who are Correlation Ventures's investors?
- Correlation Ventures's investors include Moonfire Ventures.