- Striker Venture Partners raised a $165M first fund and plans to deploy up to 50% into Israeli AI and cybersecurity startups.
- The firm will make about 10 concentrated, inception-stage/pre-revenue investments with $5M–$30M checks, with roughly half expected to be in Israel.
- Ex-CRV partner Max Gazor leads the fund, while former Unit 8200 officer and ex-CRV investor Matan Lamdan leads Israel and cyber dealmaking.
- The strategy is a high-conviction bet on Israels cyber/AI talent with amplified risk from a small, early-stage portfolio.
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Striker Venture Partners has launched with a highly focused, high-conviction strategy: one fund, ten investments, strong tilt toward Israel (up to half of deployed capital), and exclusively pre-revenue teams in cyber & AI. This differs materially from many VCs globally that typically spread risk over dozens if not hundreds of companies.
The appointment of Matan Lamdan as partner heading Israeli and cyber investments is strategically significant. His multiple careers—including a decade in Israel’s Unit 8200 and Military Intelligence, investigative media, and time at CRV—give the capacity to source, assess, and support early-stage tech deep in Israel’s strong engineering & security ecosystems.
Financial and deal-cycle implications stem from the fund’s concentrated risk profile: with only ~10 companies, each failure weighs heavily on overall returns. However, individual check sizes (US$5-30M) allow for significant initial stake. Moreover, working with pre-revenue/inception stage companies—many before product-market fit—requires specialized diligence, especially for market, technical feasibility, and team execution.
For Israeli startups, Striker’s strategy presents an important capital inflow with structural alignment (local partner, early-stage capital of scale) at a time when global LP confidence is rising—despite macro/regional headwinds. U.S./global LPs appear comfortable with this risk-eyed, concentrated fund model given the pedigree of CRV alumni involved.
Strategically, Striker’s concentrated model could produce outsized returns if its “0 to 1” thesis plays out, but draws sharp contrast to typical VC screens: fewer but larger early bets, heavier founder engagement, steep risk, and amplified return potential per success. Israel remains a logical target region due to dense innovation in cybersecurity and AI, lower initial valuations, and technical talent.
Open questions include: What sectors within AI/cyber (e.g., model infrastructure vs defense-oriented security vs enterprise offerings) will see Striker allocate most of the Israeli capital? How will Striker manage geopolitical/regulatory risk in Israel? How will they support companies pre-revenue with talent, product, sales, and global go-to-market when often competing with larger funds? What is their reserve strategy for follow-on rounds given limited portfolio size?
Supporting Notes
- Striker raised US$165 million in October 2025 and plans to deploy up to half of it into Israeli startups.
- The fund will make only about ten investments in total over its lifecycle, all at the pre-revenue or inception stage; check sizes will range between US$5-30 million.
- Five of the ten investments are expected to be in Israel, aligning with the “up to half” capital allocation.
- Matan Lamdan is leading Israeli cyber & AI deals; he spent ~10 years in Israeli intelligence and moved through CRV where he backed companies including Vega Security, Kela, Astrix, SevenAI, Trail Security (acquired by Cyera).
- Max Gazor is co-leading the fund, previously a longtime partner at CRV, famous for early investments in Airtable, Cribl, DYNA Robotics, etc., focusing on inception-stage, pre-revenue companies.
- Lamdan emphasized that the “AI and cyber market have become more crowded than ever, making the 0 to 1 stage even more important,” indicating timing is critical and competitive differentiation stems from earliest-stage support.