Endeavor Catalyst 已关闭其第五支基金，获得 3.2 亿美元的资本承诺，使该公司管理的总资产超过 8.5 亿美元。对于湾区以外的创始人而言，这笔融资是个好消息，因为随着更多基金将目光完全投向硅谷的人工智能公司，他们被忽视的风险正在增加。
Endeavor Catalyst has closed its fifth fund with $320 million in capital commitments, bringing the firm’s total assets under management to more than $850 million. The raise is good news for founders outside the Bay Area who risk getting overlooked as more funds focus squarely on AI companies in Silicon Valley.
Endeavor Catalyst 是 Endeavor 的风险投资部门。Endeavor 是一家总部位于纽约的全球性非营利组织，过去 30 年一直致力于支持那些不在主要科技中心地区的创始人。（在其所有营销材料中，该组织都将这些地方称为“其他地方”）。这支基金由管理合伙人 Allen Taylor 和董事总经理 Jackie Carmel 共同管理。
Endeavor Catalyst is the venture arm of Endeavor, a New York-based global nonprofit that has spent 30 years supporting founders outside major tech hubs. (It calls all those other places “elsewhere” throughout its marketing materials.) The fund is run by managing partner Allen Taylor, a 20-year veteran of the organization, and managing director Jackie Carmel, who joined Endeavor Catalyst 12 years ago, along with a 16-person team.
Allen 在该组织拥有 20 年的经验，Jackie 则于 12 年前加入 Endeavor Catalyst。此外，基金还拥有一支 16 人的团队。不过，其正式的普通合伙人仍是 Endeavor 本身。Endeavor 的联合创始人之一 Linda Rottenberg 表示，这意味着“基金利润的一半将返还给 Endeavor，因此每一项投资都在帮助‘其他地方’正在创业的新一代创始人”。
The official general partner, though, is Endeavor itself. What that means, says Linda Rottenberg, who co-founded Endeavor and helped start Endeavor Catalyst in 2012, is that “half of the fund’s profits go back to Endeavor, so every investment helps the next generation of founders who are building elsewhere.”
而这些创始人的门槛相当高。首先，他们必须进入 Endeavor 的网络，从而获得其导师指导和广泛的人脉资源，而这并不容易。该组织称，去年他们筛选了超过 1 万名候选人，最终选出了 88 人。目前，该网络已覆盖超过 50 个国家/地区的 3100 多名企业家。
The bar for those founders is pretty high. A person first has to get into Endeavor’s network, where he or she can access Endeavor’s mentoring and extensive network, and that’s hard. Last year, the group says it screened more than 10,000 candidates and picked 88. The network now has more than 3,100 entrepreneurs in over 50 countries.
当这些创始人中的某一位的公司在一轮融资中从其他机构投资者处获得至少 500 万美元投资时，Endeavor Catalyst 也可以以与领投方相同的条款参与投资。该团队告诉 TechCrunch，每笔投资金额通常在 100 万至 300 万美元之间，但不得超过该轮融资总额的 10%。
When one of those founders’ companies raises at least $5 million in a round led by another institutional investor, Endeavor Catalyst can join in on the same terms as that lead. The team tells TechCrunch that checks usually run $1 million to $3 million but can’t exceed 10% of the round.
他们表示，在未来几年，计划每年进行 40 到 50 笔投资，并通过这支新基金总共投资最多 150 家公司。
Over the next few years, they plan to make 40 to 50 investments annually, investing in up to 150 companies altogether with this new fund, they say.
泰勒通过电子邮件往来表示，不愿透露其早期基金相关的现金回报率数据，但他确实提到了一些听起来相当可观的数字。他表示，在全部五支基金中，Endeavor Catalyst 已在 44 个市场投资了 437 家公司。他说，其中 83 家初创公司的当前估值达到或超过 10 亿美元，该机构已完成 39 次退出和 11 次 IPO。
Taylor, via an email exchange, wouldn’t share numbers on cash-on-cash returns tied to its earlier funds, but he did point to some impressive-sounding numbers. Across all five funds, he says, Endeavor Catalyst has backed 437 companies in 44 markets. Eighty-three of those startups are currently valued at $1 billion or more, he says, and the unit has seen 39 exits and 11 IPOs.
目前，这家风险投资部门最值钱的资产中，包括成立四年的 ElevenLabs——这家 AI 语音工具开发商最近在一轮二级交易中估值达到 220 亿美元（该公司最初在波兰成立）；以及成立 13 年、总部位于意大利的 Bending Spoons 集团，该公司于 7 月上市，目前市值为 260 亿美元。
Some of the venture arm’s most valuable holdings right now include four-year-old ElevenLabs, the maker of AI voice tools that was recently valued at $22 billion in a secondary sale (it was founded in Poland originally), and Bending Spoons, the 13-year-old Italy-based conglomerate that went public in July and that currently boasts a $26 billion market cap.
其他资产还包括总部位于纽约的 Reflection AI（由两位前 Google DeepMind 研究员创立，其中一人出生于希腊），其当前估值为 250 亿美元；创始人来自瑞士、去年估值为 120 亿美元的 Checkoum；今年夏天估值为 32 亿美元的非洲支付基础设施公司 Flutterwave；以及由巴勒斯坦-约旦裔的阿姆贾德·马萨德共同创立的 AI 编程初创公司 Replit。Replit 今年早些时候获得了 90 亿美元的估值。
Other holdings include New York-based Reflection AI (founded by two former Google DeepMind researchers — one of whom was born in Greece), which is now valued at $25 billion; Checkoum, whose founder is Swiss and which was valued last year at $12 billion; the African payments infrastructure company Flutterwave, valued this summer at $3.2 billion; and AI coding startup Replit, co-founded by Amjad Masad, who is Palestinian-Jordanian. Replit snagged a $9 billion valuation earlier this year.
这家非营利组织 Endeavor 还拥有一些人脉资源极为丰富的人物，包括董事会成员里德·霍夫曼；职业生涯一直从事风险投资的尼克·拜姆，他过去 25 年一直在 Matrix Partners 和 Venrock 工作；以及曾担任华纳音乐和 Seagram 首席执行官的埃德加·布龙夫曼二世，他现任 Endeavor Global 的董事会主席。
Endeavor, the nonprofit, has especially well-connected people associated with it, including board members Reid Hoffman; Nick Beim, a career VC who has spent the last 25 years at Matrix Partners, then Venrock; and Edgar Bronfman Jr., the former head of Warner Music and Seagram, who chairs Endeavor Global’s board.
希腊总理基里亚科斯·米佐塔基斯也是Endeavor的长期朋友，他曾与罗滕伯格一同就读于哈佛大学。（上个月末，在旧金山，我与他进行了一次会面。当时他正进行着一次由Endeavor组织的、对湾区的罕见访问，这让他得以与科技创始人及希腊侨民会面。）总体而言，Endeavor Catalyst的最新基金共有400名有限合伙人，其中包括霍夫曼、著名对冲基金管理人比尔·阿克曼，以及荷兰投资集团Prosus。
Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis is a longtime friend of Endeavor, too, having gone to Harvard with Rottenberg. (Late last month in San Francisco, I sat down with him during a rare visit to the Bay Area that was organized by Endeavor, enabling him to meet with tech founders and Greek expatriates.) Altogether, Endeavor Catalyst’s newest fund includes 400 limited partners, including Hoffman; famed hedge fund manager Bill Ackman; and the Dutch investment group Prosus.
据泰勒称，这些投资者中约有30%是Endeavor的创始人本人，其中包括Nubank、Revolut和Checkoum的创始人。
According to Taylor, roughly 30% of those backers are Endeavor founders themselves, including founders of Nubank, Revolut, and Checkoum.
尽管目前人们将大量关注点放在旧金山及其周边地区正在发生的事情上，但Endeavor Catalyst的投资方向或许揭示了其他投资者可能忽略的机遇。而Endeavor在数十个国家都设有本地团队和导师，因此似乎尤其具备发现这些机遇的优势。
While so much attention is paid to what’s happening in San Francisco and its immediate environs right now, the bets of Endeavor Catalyst suggest what other investors may be missing, and Endeavor, with local teams and mentors in dozens of countries, seems particularly well-positioned to see it.
事实上，该风投部门表示，其约90%的投资都位于美国境外。欧洲是其增长最快的地区，2026年上半年共完成了12笔新投资，而去年全年则为14笔；不过拉丁美洲目前仍是最大的投资区域。
Indeed, about 90% of the venture arm’s investments are outside the U.S., it says. Europe is its fastest-growing region, with 12 new investments in the first half of 2026 compared with 14 in all of last year, though Latin America is still the largest.
重复投资的创始人也在其中扮演着越来越重要的角色。泰勒告诉TechCrunch，Endeavor Catalyst第四期基金中约有14%投向了由Endeavor创始人在种子轮或A轮融资阶段创立的第二家公司。随着这支新基金的成立，团队预计这一比例将提升至20%。
Repeat founders are also becoming a bigger part of the mix. Taylor tells TechCrunch that roughly 14% of Endeavor Catalyst’s fourth fund went to second companies started by Endeavor founders at the seed or Series A stage. With this new fund, the team expects that number will reach 20%.