October SEC filings: Benchmark, 8VC, Trust Ventures and a record fund from ex-Benchmark partners

Big October filings

October was a busy month for venture funds, judging by the SEC filings analyzed by TechCrunch: established brands are raising money from limited partners at high marks, especially with a specialized focus. Texas-based Trust Ventures, founded in 2017 by Salen Churi to invest in founders in highly regulated industries, filed on Monday for a $400 million Fund V. The firm's debut fund in 2018 included Koch Disruptive Technologies; in 2023, Trust Ventures was raising a $225 million Fund IV, but whether and when it closed is unknown. Another $400 million for Fund II is being raised by deep tech fund Interlagos Capital.

Diffusion ONE more than doubled its target

Victor Lazarte and Kris Fredrickson, two former Benchmark venture investors, raised $1.252 billion for their debut AI fund Diffusion ONE. Back in May, Forbes reported, that the partners (after each had run their own small funds) joined forces to launch a fund with an $800 million target — meaning the actual raise significantly exceeded the plan. The fund has already made major investments: it co-invested with Lightspeed Ventures in Harvey's $550 million Series H round and participated in Etched's $300 million Series C, announced in July.

Benchmark and 8VC

Benchmark filed for four new partner-only funds at once — Benchmark Partners Founders' Fund T1, Fund 2, Fund 2-A and Fund T1-A — for $220 million, $132 million, $4.5 million and $7.5 million respectively. All the filings list Jack Altman, who recently left his own firm to join Benchmark. Meanwhile, Joe Lonsdale's 8VC appears to be preparing new vehicles: the $400 million 8VC DSS III fund, 8VC COSC at $30.35 million, 8VC BRSC at $20.35 million, and 8VC AI Fund XI, which has already raised $13.5 million, including from 8VC itself. This follows July's news that 8VC raised $1.5 billion for Fund VII.

Betting on Anthropic and the secondaries market

In early October, Notable Capital, an investor in Anthropic, Airbnb and Square, filed for its fifth fund, and Neil Mehta's Greenoaks, which co-invested in Anthropic's Series H round at a $65 billion valuation, filed for the Greenoaks 7 fund. According to PitchBook, Greenoaks also backed Ramp and Anthropic. The timing is favorable: Anthropic has just taken another step toward going public, and funds can already position themselves against potentially high returns. Separately, Industry Ventures raised at least $1.7 billion for a secondaries fund, opened in late July — the scale of the vehicle reflects the growth of the market for buying stakes in hot private companies ahead of exits. As TechCrunch noted, citing a family office advisor, secondaries have become extremely popular, and PitchBook senior analyst Emily Zheng called stakes in Anthropic and OpenAI 'the most contested asset in venture.'