Webinar
The Yard Ventures Perspectives on Today's Investing Trends

Watch our on-demand, 40-minute discussion where we will share our perspective on some of the most exciting investment themes we are seeing in the market. Venture investing is an opaque asset class and having a framework to assess investment opportunities and identify long-term value creation is key.
The session is led by The Yard Ventures’ Managing Partner Michael Madden, Partner Ron Levin, and Senior Associate Grant Demeter. This presentation is open to all alumni and friends of Harvard.
During the session, we will discuss:
- HomeImportant investment trends driving significant venture activity over the next 5+ years
- HomeThe Yard Ventures’ framework for evaluating early and growth stage companies
- HomeSome examples of current portfolio companies
Note: You must be accredited to invest in venture capital. Important disclosure information can be found at av-funds.com/disclosures.
The webinar recording does not feature our live Q&A, please make sure to join webinars live to participate in the discussion.
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About your presenters
Michael is a Co-Founder of Alumni Ventures and has been the Managing Partner of The Yard Ventures since inception. Working alongside a great team, Michael has invested in over 120 companies on the way to building large, diversified venture capital portfolios for our Yard investors. Prior to joining the early team at Alumni Ventures, Michael had been a venture investor, board member, and advisor while at firms such as Summit Partners, Polaris Venture Partners, Edison Partners, and Square One. He earned an AB from Harvard University, where he was a four-year letter winner in both Varsity Football and Varsity Baseball. Michael later received an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.
Ron has spent his career in a variety of entrepreneurial, leadership, and business development roles. He has been an angel investor and advisor to over a dozen technology startups. Ron was Co-Founder and CEO of TravelPerk, a VC-backed travel management platform that is now a “unicorn” company with thousands of employees and customers across the globe. Prior to TravelPerk, he started the B2B division of Booking.com and before that was a consultant with McKinsey & Co. Ron began his career at Lycos, one of the web’s pioneer search engine and web portals. Ron graduated from Babson College and received his MBA from Harvard Business School. He is the author of the impact-focused Higher Purpose Venture Capital Blog.

Principal, Yard Ventures
Prior to joining The Yard Ventures, Grant was an entrepreneur, management consultant, product manager, and VC investor. He was a founding member and editor-in-chief of the Morning Brew, a successful media startup which exited to Business Insider. As a senior consultant with Deloitte, he led projects focused on tech strategy. Within Deloitte, he incubated and managed a people analytics product, and co-chaired a new strategy practice focused on the future of work. As an active contributor to innovation within Harvard’s venture ecosystem, he has helped to operationalize a new tech-enabled, democratized investing platform, as well as a new venture debt firm — and has had the privilege to advise, support, and learn from many startups within the community. Grant earned his MBA from Harvard Business School, and his BA, Phi Beta Kappa, from the University of Michigan.