VC Spotlight: Activate Venture Partners
In a world chasing moonshots and torching burn rates, Activate Venture Partners runs a different offense. Precision over pageantry. Discipline over delusion. They don’t just write checks, they write chapters in companies that change lives, balance sheets, and entire sectors. And they’ve been doing it longer than most founders have had a Gmail address.
The firm officially activated in 2017, but its DNA reaches back four decades. Glen Bressner had been building Originate Growth Fund since 1985, bringing IPOs like Tabula Rasa HealthCare and Access Healthcare across the finish line. Todd Pietri helped launch Milestone Venture Partners in 1999 and co-headed tech and comms investment banking before LinkedIn was even a pitch deck. Together, they formed Activate, fusing legacy with focus, and turning capital efficiency into a competitive weapon.
Activate Venture Partners targets early-stage, capital-efficient companies across digital health and applied technology, spaces where $5 million can tilt the axis. They’ve backed over 100 companies, led 45+ exits, and fueled 10 IPOs with more than $10 billion in enterprise value at the point of exit. This is not momentum investing, it’s muscle memory, market timing, and methodical conviction.
It starts with founders, operators fluent in their industries, not just fluent in buzzwords. Activate moves early, often pre-product, when the data room is empty but the vision is vivid. Think KAID Health’s AI for clinical data. Ride Health’s logistics for non-emergency transport. CrowdHealth’s people-first alternative to insurance. These aren’t gambles. They’re ground games that scale.
Activate keeps the support simple: when founders call, they answer. No platform fluff, no ego tax. Just strategy, network, and execution, on the founder’s terms. They’ve processed $29 billion in premiums for 279,000 small businesses. Brought medical products to 60 million consumers. Powered 9 million annual medical procedures. If it sounds like real impact, that’s because it is.
The bench runs deep. Edwin Goodman has touched everything from Apple’s final private round to biomedical IPOs. Jeff Davison co-founded two firms and backed 50+ boards. Michael Thompson’s been through Wall Street and startup warzones alike. And while Don Yount Jr. passed this year, his legacy in finance and leadership still resonates inside every decision they make.
Activate’s portfolio companies are hiring. From AI diagnostics to next-gen EHR, the work isn’t just meaningful, it’s measurable.
Ride Health – https://www.ridehealth.com/career/opportunities-at-ride-health
CrowdHealth – https://www.joincrowdhealth.com/resources/careers
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