Betaworks
Betaworks is a startup studio and seed stage venture capital that invests in network-focused, consumer-facing media businesses. Part startup factory and part venture capital firm, Betaworks creates, operates and invests in companies with a primary focus on real-time web and social distribution. The firm wants to root its new identity in tech history, thus focusing on conversational interfaces such as words, bots, verbal computing and AI. It invests, incubates, and builds from scratch in areas of thematic interest, and also runs an IRL Club for founders and funders paired with a virtual online community. Its hybrid investor/builder model has led to both investments in fast-growing startups like Tumblr, Airbnb, Groupon and Twitter as well as more exclusive stakes in internally built startups such as Chartbeat, Bitly and SocialFlow. Betawork’s investment portfolio includes big players like Tumblr, Twitter, and Kickstarter, as well as up-and-comers like RapGenius, Grand St., Branch and IFTTT.
ABOUT BETAWORKS
The company has built products for the social web since 2007. Recent successes include GIPHY, the search engine for gifs; and Dots, the beautiful mobile gaming franchise.
Some of their earlier products included Bitly, Chartbeat, and Tweetdeck, the latter of which was sold to Twitter.
In 2012, Betaworks also acquired and relaunched Digg and Instapaper, which was sold to Pinterest in 2016.
Launched in 2016, Betaworks Camp became a thematic residency and investment program for early-stage companies.
Betalab is an investment program catalyzing startups around Fixing The Internet.
In 2018, Betaworks Studios was launched, an IRL social club and virtual community for founders and funders in the NY tech space.
BETAWORK VENTURES
Betawork Ventures' investment ranges from $250K to $500K, typically among the first to invest.
It works closely with companies around thematic areas including in our Camp programs around Voice, Conversational Software, Synthetic Media, and “Fixing The Internet”.