Greylock appoints Mor Chen as Israel partner

US venture capital fund Greylock, which over the years has invested in Facebook, Instagram and Palo Alto Networks, returns to Israel with local representation after more than a decade. As Globes previously reported, the fund has appointed Mor Chen, an Israeli who previously invested as a partner in the British fund Accel. According to Greylock’s press release on Wednesday, Chen will focus on investments in the Israeli market and will move to Israel next year from San Francisco to establish the fund’s Israeli branch.

In the early 2000s, the fund operated through Greylock Israel, which was run by Yoram Snir, Arnon Dinor, and Erez Ofer. Since 2011, the relationship with the US fund began to decline, and in 2015, the Greylock Israel team founded the venture capital fund 83North, without any connection to Greylock, along with British partner Laurel Bowden. After Greylock Israel closed, Greylock continued to engage in remote investments in Israeli cybersecurity companies, most notably Palo Alto Networks, Cato Networks, and Upwind, as well as Wiz and Dazz, which merged at the end of last year in a deal. Where Greylock was one of the matchmakers.

Chen, 34, until recently managed Accel’s investments in Israel, and among others invested in Cyara, Oasis, Commodore and Gloat. Prior to joining Accel, Chen was a consultant at Strategy&, where she contributed to high-profile projects, including Nvidia’s acquisition of Mellanox. She later served as Administrative Director of the 8200 EISP, the accelerator program of the 8200 Intelligence Unit Alumni Association, where she remains a member of the Board of Directors.

In recent years, Greylock’s investments in Israel have been almost exclusively in cybersecurity companies. The American fund also offers experienced Israeli entrepreneurs a special seed investment program, which allows them to come up with an idea for creating a company through meetings with potential clients, exchanging ideas and examining financing options. Such programs have become popular among cybersecurity investment funds such as Cyberstarts and YL to identify talented cybersecurity entrepreneurs, even if they have not yet found a suitable idea for starting a new company.

Veteran US venture capital funds Greylock and Sequoia are returning to Israel after a long period of investing in Israeli cybersecurity companies, mainly in partnership with Cyberstarts. They now want to identify these companies themselves from the seed stages and not just invest in them in more mature fundraising rounds.

Sequoia appointed Dean Meyer as its representative in Israel. Sequoia has a similar story – until the last decade, it also ran a capital fund dedicated to Israel under the name “Sequoia Israel”, which was managed by Shmil Levy, Haim Sadger and Gilly Raanan. When the fund ceased operations, Sadger left to found S-Capital, while Raanan founded Cyberstarts. Sequoia has continued to invest in Israel throughout, mainly through its long-time partner Douglas Lyons.

Published by Globes, Israel Business News – en.globes.co.il – on January 22, 2025.

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