Carolina Huaranca Mendoza is a General Partner at First Close Partners and a Managing Partner at 1504 Ventures. She began her investing career as a Principal at Kapor Capital, where in addition to investing in startups, she also designed Kapor’s first formal LP strategy into diverse fund managers.

Upon graduating Cornell University, Carolina worked in M&A investment banking as well as in sales and marketing roles in edtech. She launched her own startup, Spriggle, a marketplace for STEM education products, before serving as Founding Director of the Clubs Division of Girls Who Code. Carolina has been featured in TechCrunch, CNN Money, SF Chronicle, and USA Today.

Before co-founding First Close Partners, Betsy was a partner at GrapeArbor Ventures, which has invested in more than 125 startups and as an LP in over 100 venture capital and growth equity funds in the US, Europe and Africa.

Betsy began her career in global asset management, where she held a variety of roles including as a buy-side equity research analyst as well as in corporate M&A, analyzing and recommending strategic initiatives including mergers, acquisitions, and divestitures.

Betsy received her MBA from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business and her BA from Haverford College (Phi Beta Kappa).

Ed Zimmerman co-founded First Close Partners. He co-founded and chairs the Emerging Companies & Venture Capital at Lowenstein Sandler, where he is a growth company, startup, and venture lawyer. Chambers ranked Ed among the 22 best lawyers in Startups & Emerging Companies–USA–Nationwide. Best Lawyers in America named Ed NYC VC Lawyer of the Year (2017).

Ed serves as Adjunct Professor of VC at Columbia; on WSJ’s Panel of Experts; founder/Chair of VentureCrush; Vice Chair of the Board of Center for Policing Equity; Board member at Fisk University and at Black Women Talk Tech. He has been an advisor on VC matters to the President of France.

Theresia is a co-founder of Acrew, a leading venture firm. Previously, she served as Managing Partner at Accel and Aspect. Acrew has both early-stage funds (Acrew LTV) and a growth-stage fund (Acrew DCF).

Theresia’s worked with many companies through IPOs or acquisitions including Forescout (FSCT), Imperva (IMPV), Trulia (TRLA), Hotel Tonight (ABNB), Astro (WORK), and LearnVest (Northwestern Mutual).

Sample investments include Cato, Deserve, Exabeam, Ketch, Observable and Solv.

Theresia was named to Forbes’ 100 Most Powerful Women, Midas List (9x), Time’s 40 Most Influential Minds in Tech, and Carnegie’s Distinguished Immigrants List.

Josh has been an active entrepreneur and investor in the Internet industry since its commercialization.

Josh co-founded First Round Capital in 2004 to reinvent seed-stage investing. Since that time, the firm has invested in over 300 emerging technology startups–becoming one of the most active venture capital firms in the country. Josh has frequently made the Forbes “Midas List” which ranks the top 100 tech investors.

Before becoming a venture capitalist, Josh co-founded Infonautics Corporation (taking it public on the NASDAQ stock exchange), Half.com (which was acquired by eBay) and TurnTide (which was acquired by Symantec). Josh is an inventor on 13 U.S. Patents and earned a Bachelor of Science degree from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

A family physician who is Founder and CEO of BayouClinic, Inc., Dr. Benjamin was the 18th United States Surgeon General (2009-2013) where as Vice Admiral she oversaw the operational command of 6500 uniformed public health officers around the world. She released multiple Surgeon General’s Reports including the first-ever National Prevention Strategy.

Dr. Benjamin is a First Round Capital Healthcare Expert in Residence and a director on the boards of the Kaiser Foundation Hospitals and Health Plan; Ascension; ConvaTec (Lon:CTEC); Computer Technology Systems Inc (CPSI); Doximity (DOX); Oak Street Health (OSH); Professional Disposables International; and the American Heart Association.

Dr. Benjamin has a B.S. from Xavier University, New Orleans; MD from the University of Alabama at Birmingham; MBA from Tulane University, and 30+ honorary degrees.

Pär-Jörgen Pärson has been a general partner at Northzone since 2004. At Northzone, his primary areas of focus are disruptive businesses in consumer internet, health, and fintech.

His portfolio includes multi-billion dollar exits in market-defining companies such as Spotify, iZettle, and Avito, as well as Pricerunner, Jasper, Videoplaza, and current companies like fuboTV, Hopin, Spring Health, Stockeld Dreamery. He has appeared several times on the Forbes Midas List.

In 2021, Pär-Jörgen and his wife, Annika, founded The Inner Foundation, which focuses on averting the unfolding global mental health crisis and improving inner well-being, championing inclusion and diversity through supporting social entrepreneurs and change makers that contribute to real and sustainable change.

Annika Sten Pärson has a broad portfolio of activities within social impact and commercial enterprises as a mentor, board member, and investor. In 2019, Annika co-founded the Young Solidarity Foundation (YSF), a Stockholm-based nonprofit in the mental health sector. YSF operates 1825, a clinic serving vulnerable young adults with therapeutic support. She currently serves on the boards of the World Childhood Foundation and Strong Minds, a nonprofit delivering mental health services at scale in East Africa.

In 2021, Annika and her husband, Pär-Jörgen, founded The Inner Foundation, which focuses on averting the unfolding global mental health crisis and improving inner well-being, championing inclusion and diversity through supporting social entrepreneurs and change makers that contribute to real and sustainable change.