Peter Fenton
VCGeneral Partner, Benchmark
Open source and enterprise software investing pioneer
Background
Peter Fenton is a General Partner at Benchmark, where he has invested since 2006 after seven years as a partner at Accel Partners. He holds a BA in philosophy and an MBA from Stanford University, where he was elected Phi Beta Kappa and an Arjay Miller Scholar. Fenton is known for backing Twitter at 25 employees, Yelp, Zendesk, New Relic, and a string of open-source enterprise companies including JBoss, SpringSource, and Docker. He has appeared on the Forbes Midas List continuously since 2007, reaching #2 in 2015, and was named TechCrunch Venture Capitalist of the Year in 2014. He has directed seven IPOs and currently serves on the boards of Airtable, Cockroach Labs, Sorare, and ClickHouse.
Investment Thesis
Seeks to invest just before the adoption curve meets the declining risk curve; champions open-source-first distribution and bottom-up enterprise adoption.
Investment Focus
Stages
Typical check: $1M–$15M
Sectors
Based in: San Francisco Bay Area, USA (North America)
Notable Investments
Backed at 25 employees; Benchmark led Series A
Yelp
Early backer; IPO 2012
Zendesk
Early stage investment; IPO 2014
New Relic
Observability platform; 12 years on board
Airtable
Current board seat; no-code data platform
Cockroach Labs
Current board seat; distributed SQL database
Docker
Board member; container platform
Sorare
Current board seat; digital sports collectibles platform