Industry Ventures makes two top-level promotions

The VC secondaries specialist has promoted Ira Simkhovitch and Amir Malayery to managing director.

Industry Ventures has bulked up its senior investment team with the promotion of two investment professionals.

The San Francisco-headquartered venture capital specialist promoted Ira Simkhovitch and Amir Malayery to managing director from principal, according to a statement.

The pair are key members of the firm’s investment team and have “continued to prove that they can source secondary venture investments from a variety of sellers that in turn have provided our funds exposure to some of the leading venture-backed businesses”, said chief executive and founder Hans Swildens.

Simkhovitch joined Industry Ventures in 2014 as a vice-president. Prior to that he was an associate at AlpInvest Partners and also spent three years at Commonfund Capital, according to his LinkedIn profile.

Malayery joined as a vice-president in 2016. He was the founder and chief executive of mobile commerce app Dapper Shopping, before which he spent four years as a technology-focused analyst at growth equity firm Summit Partners.

Industry Ventures’ last flagship secondaries fund Industry Ventures VIII raised $500 million, against a target of $425 million, by final close in 2016, according to Secondaries Investor data. Employees Retirement System of Texas, Los Angeles Water & Power Employees Retirement Plan and Ohio Public Employees Retirement System are among the investors in the fund.

The firm is also investing its $335 million fund of funds vehicle Industry Ventures Partnership Holdings V, which makes primary commitments and early secondaries purchases in smaller VC funds.

In April, Goldman Sachs Asset Management’s Petershill programme bought a minority equity stake in the business.

Venture capital accounted for 17 percent of secondaries transaction volumes in the first half of 2019 by fund count, according to Greenhill’s half-year report.