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Learn which startups Wave Capital invests in, what size check sizes they write, and who their partners are (e.g. Sara (Tillim) Adler).
Key people at Wave Capital.
Wave Capital operates as a highly selective seed fund based in San Francisco, concentrating its efforts on leading investments in no more than four companies annually. The firm's core offering extends beyond capital, providing deep operational expertise gleaned from building teams at prominent technology companies. This focused approach aims to align Wave Capital's success directly with the achievements of its portfolio companies, acting as engaged, hands-on partners.
The fund was established and is currently run by its two equal partners, Riley Newman and Sara Tillim. Their founding insight stemmed from extensive operating backgrounds at companies such as Airbnb, Dropbox, and Facebook, recognizing an opportunity to leverage this practical experience. They started the firm as their own entrepreneurial venture, driven by a commitment to work closely with founders they admire and in businesses with compelling missions.
Wave Capital primarily serves early-stage founders and their nascent companies, seeking to become integral members of their portfolio teams rather than just investors. The firm’s vision is to foster the growth of these businesses by contributing their significant operational knowledge, effectively acting as an extension of the founding team. They focus on identifying and supporting ventures that meet their high standards for innovation and leadership.
Key people at Wave Capital.
# Wave Capital: The Marketplace-Focused Seed Fund Built by Airbnb Veterans
Wave Capital is a seed-stage venture capital firm based in San Francisco that has carved out a distinctive niche by focusing exclusively on marketplace businesses.[1][2] Founded in 2017, the firm operates with a deliberately lean structure—just two equal partners and no staff—maintaining a highly concentrated portfolio of no more than four investments per year.[4] The firm's mission centers on backing founders building two-sided marketplaces with clear missions, leveraging the operational expertise of its founders who previously built teams at Airbnb, Dropbox, and Facebook.[4]
The investment philosophy is fundamentally hands-on and selective. Rather than deploying capital passively, Wave Capital positions itself as an extension of the founding team, offering operational guidance, network access, and strategic mentorship alongside capital.[1][4] This approach reflects a conviction that the best returns come not from volume but from deep partnership with exceptional founders tackling marketplace problems—a thesis born directly from the founders' experiences scaling one of the most successful marketplace platforms in history.
Wave Capital was explicitly conceived as the "Airbnb mafia" fund, founded by early Airbnb employees who recognized an opportunity to systematize their marketplace expertise.[3] The firm was co-founded by Riley Newman, Sara Adler, and David Rosenthal, each bringing deep operational credentials from their time at companies like Airbnb and Madrona Venture Group.[1] The founding moment reflected a clear insight: the founders had lived through the challenges of building a two-sided marketplace at scale and believed they could apply those hard-won lessons to accelerate the next generation of marketplace startups.
Rather than building a traditional venture firm with layers of partners and analysts, the founders chose to keep Wave Capital intentionally small and focused. This structure wasn't a constraint but a deliberate design choice—a reflection of their belief that quality of partnership matters more than quantity of capital deployed. The firm launched with a thesis that would prove prescient: marketplace businesses were becoming increasingly important to the digital economy, yet few investors had the operational depth to truly guide founders through the unique challenges of building two-sided networks.
Wave Capital invests in no more than four companies per year, maintaining a highly selective approach that allows for deep engagement with each portfolio company.[4] This stands in stark contrast to most venture firms, which deploy capital across dozens or hundreds of companies annually. The concentrated model signals confidence in founder quality and conviction in the marketplace thesis.
The firm's founders bring direct experience building teams at category-defining companies—Airbnb, Dropbox, and Facebook.[4] This isn't theoretical knowledge but lived experience navigating the specific challenges of scaling consumer marketplaces. Founders can think of Wave Capital partners as "members of the early team," not distant capital providers.[4] This hands-on model extends from team building to product-market fit discovery, offering mentorship that early-stage founders typically cannot access elsewhere.
While many venture firms claim sector expertise, Wave Capital has built its entire thesis around marketplaces.[1][2] This vertical focus creates compounding advantages: the partners understand the unit economics, the network effects, the chicken-and-egg problems, and the regulatory challenges unique to two-sided platforms. Portfolio companies benefit from pattern recognition across multiple marketplace attempts.
With only two equal partners and no staff, Wave Capital operates as a startup itself.[4] This structure keeps the firm nimble, aligned with founder interests, and free from the bureaucratic overhead that can plague larger firms. It also signals that the founders are genuinely committed to the thesis rather than building an empire.
The firm has completed 27 investments with several successful exits, including Steady Health and Darwin Homes, demonstrating the ability to guide companies from seed through to meaningful outcomes.[1] Notable portfolio companies include Locale (food and grocery delivery) and Camus Energy (renewable energy management systems), showing breadth across marketplace verticals.[1]
Wave Capital operates at an inflection point in venture capital history where specialization and operational value are increasingly prized over generalist capital. The firm rides several powerful trends:
Marketplaces have evolved from novelty to infrastructure. Airbnb, Uber, DoorDash, and others proved the model works at massive scale. Wave Capital benefits from this validation—founders are increasingly confident in the marketplace thesis, and LPs understand the category. The firm is positioned to back the next wave of vertical-specific and geography-specific marketplace applications.
Early-stage founders increasingly seek investors who can offer more than capital. The rise of founder-friendly venture capital and the emphasis on founder experience means that firms like Wave Capital—which explicitly position themselves as operational partners—have a structural advantage in deal flow and founder satisfaction.
The success of Airbnb alumni in founding and scaling companies has created a halo effect around the "Airbnb mafia" brand. Wave Capital benefits from this network effect: founders want to work with people who built Airbnb, and other Airbnb alumni are more likely to pitch to a fund run by their former colleagues. This creates a virtuous cycle of deal flow and pattern recognition.
As mega-funds have grown larger and more diffuse, concentrated portfolios have become a differentiator. Wave Capital's four-company-per-year model appeals to founders who want genuine partnership and to LPs seeking concentrated bets with higher conviction.
Wave Capital represents a thesis about the future of venture capital itself: that in an era of abundant capital, the scarcest resource is genuine operational expertise and founder partnership. The firm's lean structure, marketplace focus, and hands-on model position it well for the next decade of marketplace innovation.
Looking ahead, Wave Capital will likely benefit from several tailwinds. First, the marketplace category continues to expand into new verticals—B2B marketplaces, specialized services, niche consumer categories—creating a long runway of investment opportunities. Second, the firm's Airbnb pedigree becomes more valuable as the company's alumni network matures and produces successful founders. Third, as founder expectations around investor involvement continue to rise, Wave Capital's operational model becomes increasingly competitive.
The main challenge Wave Capital faces is scaling its impact without compromising its model. With only two partners and four investments per year, the firm's total capital deployed is modest compared to mega-funds. This limits its ability to follow on in later rounds or to build a large LP base. However, this constraint may be intentional—the firm's success is measured not by AUM but by the success of its portfolio companies, a metric that aligns perfectly with founder interests.
Wave Capital exemplifies a broader shift in venture capital toward specialization, operational depth, and founder-centric partnership. In a crowded venture landscape, the firm's willingness to do fewer deals with more conviction, backed by genuine expertise, has proven to be a sustainable and compelling model. As marketplaces continue to reshape how commerce and services are delivered, Wave Capital's positioning as the "Airbnb mafia" fund—staffed by people who have actually built one of the world's most successful marketplaces—gives it a durable competitive advantage.
