Investor J.D. Vance, who wrote “Hillbilly Elegy” has raised $93 million to start a venture capital firm, Narya Capital, based in Cincinnati, according to a SEC filing. Along with co-founder Colin Greenspon, Columbus’ Falon Donahue has been named as a partner after leaving VentureOhio where she was the first CEO.
The fund — which SEC paperwork lists as having and plans to raise another $32 million — has backing from major names including Peter Thiel, Marc Andreessen, Eric Schmidt and Scott Dorsey, Axios reports.
Its website states that “Narya is a thesis-driven, early-stage venture capital firm based in Ohio. Our LPs include some of the most successful investors, entrepreneurs, innovators and institutions in the world. We invest long-term capital in people who use technology to solve significant challenges.”
Vance has been the managing partner of the first Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, a $150 million early-stage fund that is part of AOL Co-Founder Steve Case’s Revolution LLC, a Washington, D.C., VC firm. He also worked for Thiel’s fund Mithril Capital in San Francisco.
