What investors backed Narya Capital and what investments did the firm make before 2022?
Executive summary
Narya Capital launched in 2020 with a roughly $93 million first fund and high‑profile backers from Silicon Valley and beyond; public reporting names Peter Thiel, Marc Andreessen, Eric Schmidt, Scott Dorsey, Battelle, Ram Shriram and Vivek Ramaswamy among the fund’s early limited partners or supporters [1]. Before 2022 the firm assembled a small but diverse early‑stage portfolio that included agtech and media bets such as AppHarvest and Rumble, alongside deployments in proptech, aerospace and biotech that appear in industry databases [2] [3] [4].
1. Who wrote the checks — the investors publicly tied to Narya Capital
Narya’s SEC filing and contemporaneous reporting when the fund launched list heavyweight individuals and institutions as limited partners or supporters: Peter Thiel, Marc Andreessen, Eric Schmidt and Scott Dorsey were named among the major backers in Axios’ coverage of the fund’s 2020 raise, and the report also singled out Battelle, tech investor Ram Shriram and biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy as LPs [1]. Other provider databases and profiles echo that Narya drew a network of established investors and institutions to its first fund, with Tracxn noting that many well‑known venture funds and angels have co‑invested across Narya’s portfolio companies [5].
2. The political and personnel context around those backers
Narya was formed by J.D. Vance with partner Colin Greenspon in 2020 after prior roles in VC firms, and reporting highlights that Thiel has been a visible supporter of ventures associated with Vance; CB Insights and other outlets frame Thiel’s backing as both financial and reputational for the new firm [6] [7]. Public records and later disclosures show Vance stepped back from active management when he entered the U.S. Senate in December 2022, while retaining financial ties disclosed in filings [8] [2].
3. What Narya invested in before 2022 — the visible portfolio
Industry trackers list several of Narya’s pre‑2022 investments and early portfolio companies: AppHarvest (an agtech company that went public in 2021) and Rumble (the conservative‑leaning video platform that went public in 2022) are cited as exits linked to Narya’s early activity [2]. PitchBook’s Fund I page and other databases show Narya participating in deals in proptech and aerospace — for example ValueBase and True Anomaly appear on Fund I and firm investment lists — and Crunchbase and vc‑profiles also record investments in companies such as AcreTrader, Kriya Therapeutics and Realm Alliance among Narya’s early rounds [3] [9] [4].
4. Limits of the public record and important caveats
Public business‑media and database coverage provide overlapping but incomplete snapshots: PitchBook restricts full lists behind a paywall so only portions of Narya’s 15+ Fund I investments are viewable without subscription [3], and databases like Tracxn, Crunchbase and Unicorn Nest compile portfolios but sometimes differ on counts and timing [5] [10] [11]. Where a source lists portfolio companies without precise transaction dates, it is not always possible from the provided reporting to definitively say which deals closed before 2022 versus later follow‑on activity; for instance several companies attributed to Narya were active across 2020–2024, and the sources do not uniformly timestamp every entry [3] [2].
5. Bottom line — who backed the fund and the firm’s early bets
The best documented picture shows Narya Capital raised its debut fund in 2020 with reported backing from prominent tech investors and institutions including Peter Thiel, Marc Andreessen, Eric Schmidt, Scott Dorsey, Battelle, Ram Shriram and Vivek Ramaswamy [1], and deployed capital across roughly a dozen‑plus early‑stage deals that, before 2022, included visible investments and exits such as AppHarvest and Rumble as well as participations in startups like ValueBase, True Anomaly, AcreTrader, Kriya Therapeutics and Realm Alliance as recorded in PitchBook, Business Insider, Crunchbase and other trackers [3] [2] [9] [4]. Available public sources corroborate the roster of high‑profile LPs and the general contours of Narya’s sector focus, but databases differ on counts and many deal dates are only partially disclosed in the records cited above [5] [11].