The Founders Fund Closes $50 Million Fund

SAN FRANCISCO, CA. – July 11, 2005 – The founders of PayPal and other successful startups announced today that they have launched a venture fund, with initial subscriptions of $50 million. The Founders Fund focuses on emerging companies in the consumer Internet sector. Unlike traditional venture capital funds, The Founders Fund is managed exclusively by entrepreneurs who have successfully developed their own companies, which provides the fund with unmatched depth of knowledge and real-world expertise for building companies from the ground up. Fund managers also have significant prior experience in venture capital and are early investors in some of the most prominent consumer Internet and enterprise start-ups of the past few years, including Facebook, Friendster, LinkedIn and IronPort.

The Founders Fund will concentrate on seed and early round investments, where the unique experience of the fund's managers can provide a distinctive advantage for companies that traditional funding sources cannot offer. Investment size will typically range from $500,000 to $1 million.

The fund currently has two partners, Peter Thiel, co-founder and former CEO and Chairman of PayPal and PayPal co-founder Ken Howery. Luke Nosek, PayPal co-founder and founder of several other Internet companies, is the fund's venture partner. The Founders Fund has already identified several extraordinary companies and made investments, the first of which will be announced the week of July 11.

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