Madrona, the Seattle-founded venture capital firm, marked 30 years in 2025 with a $770 million fundraise and a strategy that still centers on the Pacific Northwest while reaching into other markets. The funds—early-stage Fund X and acceleration-stage Fund IV—were reported as supporting around 40 investments. Those figures describe Madrona’s 2025 plans, not a recurring annual budget or a market-wide measure.
What is Madrona?
Madrona is a venture capital firm founded in Seattle in 1995 by Tom Alberg, Paul Goodrich, Jerry Grinstein and Bill Ruckelshaus. It invests in companies at seed, early and acceleration stages, according to its About page. GeekWire describes it as the largest and oldest venture firm in the Pacific Northwest; that is the publication’s characterization, not a quantified independent ranking.
The firm’s 30th-anniversary event took place in Seattle in March 2025. In a retrospective published March 31, 2025, managing director Matt McIlwain noted that when Madrona was founded, “the internet browser was just emerging.” That perspective frames the firm’s history as one spanning successive technology shifts, rather than a single investment category.
What did Madrona raise in 2025?
Madrona said it raised $770 million across two funds: early-stage Fund X and acceleration-stage Fund IV. GeekWire reported that the funds were intended to support around 40 investments. The $770 million figure is the total for those two funds, and the investment count is a reported plan—not a guarantee that exactly 40 companies will receive funding.
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Madrona describes the capital as entrusted to its team. Its 2025 anniversary retrospective positions the firm’s opportunity across the Pacific Northwest, Silicon Valley and beyond. These are firm-reported figures and perspectives, not an independent market statistic.
Is Madrona still focused on Seattle and the Pacific Northwest?
Yes. Seattle remains central to the firm, while its investing extends beyond the region. GeekWire reported in 2025 that Madrona continued to allocate a majority of its capital to Pacific Northwest startups. It did not provide an exact percentage, so “majority” should not be read as a specific allocation or as proof that every fund follows the same geographic split.
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Madrona also invests nationally and has a Palo Alto office, which the firm says opened in 2022. Managing director Tim Porter told GeekWire, “Seattle is our home market.” The firm’s own description of the region points to Microsoft, Amazon and the University of Washington as ecosystem anchors. That local base and a Bay Area presence are compatible: a Seattle-centered firm can maintain regional roots while backing companies elsewhere.
How do the funds and investment stages differ?
| Fund | Stage | What the reporting establishes |
|---|---|---|
| Fund X | Early stage | Madrona identifies it as an early-stage fund; the 2025 fundraise announcement does not state its individual size. |
| Fund IV | Acceleration stage | Madrona identifies it as an acceleration-stage fund. The firm says it expanded into Series B or C investments under this stage; the 2025 announcement does not state Fund IV’s individual size. |
The $770 million applies to the two funds together, not to either fund individually. The available reporting does not establish a precise allocation between them. The distinction matters because early-stage investing and later acceleration investments address different points in a company’s development.
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What is Madrona investing in?
Applied AI was a prominent part of Madrona’s stated 2025 investment thesis. GeekWire described interest in enterprise software, travel, life sciences and health technology, and cited Spangle and Gradial as recent examples. This reflects areas the firm was interested in pursuing; it does not establish that AI investments will succeed or that these sectors account for a defined share of the new funds.
Porter told GeekWire, “AI has been talked about so much, but the opportunity is so real.” Managing director Hope Cochran described the expected impact as “an enormous gain of efficiency and change in society over the next couple years.” These are comments reported by GeekWire, not independently confirmed transcript quotations.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How has Madrona’s role in the region changed?
Madrona’s anniversary account presents the Pacific Northwest startup ecosystem as a network of companies and founders whose influence has widened over time. It traces a “family tree” through businesses including Amazon, Microsoft, Concur, Smartsheet, Redfin, Rover and Snowflake, as well as AI2. That is the firm’s account of the ecosystem and its history, rather than an independent measure of Madrona’s contribution to each company.
GeekWire also names Amazon, Redfin and Smartsheet among Madrona’s past investments and describes relationships with Microsoft and Amazon as connections that can help startups in Seattle and elsewhere. The firm’s stated approach is to build that ecosystem rather than divide a fixed pool of opportunity: McIlwain told GeekWire that Madrona was “not focusing on how we divide the pie, but how we build the pie.”
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In its own retrospective, Madrona characterizes its founder relationships as multi-decade partnerships and describes its investing history as spanning SaaS, cloud, mobile, intelligent applications and agentic AI. Those descriptions show how the firm sees its evolution; they are not a promise of outcomes for future investments.
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