AOL founder Steve Case launches second $150M Rise of the Rest fund with backing from Jeff Bezos and others to invest in entrepreneurs outside of Silicon Valley
it's not just for the coasts anymore! @BatteryVentures' @ChelsStoner discusses our firm's embrace of tech in the U.S. heartland with @Forbes' @alexrkonrad: https://www.forbes.com/... Steve Case / @stevecase : BREAKING: #RiseOfRest announces second $150 million fund, to back 100 entrepreneurs outside of Silicon Valley, at @ForbesUnder30 summit in #Detroit #ForbesUnder30 https://www.forbes.com/...
Context & Ripple Effects
This is fund two of a thesis Steve Case has been building for years. The first $150M Rise of the Rest fund, raised from Jeff Bezos, Eric Schmidt, and others in late 2017, established the model: marquee coastal tech money pointed at entrepreneurs outside Silicon Valley. Before that, Case had already shown he would build funds around non-obvious geographies and needs, with Revolution Growth's $525M Washington, D.C.-based vehicle targeting startups that need regulatory help.
First-order effects
- About 100 entrepreneurs outside Silicon Valley gain access to a $150M pool of capital that was previously unlikely to reach them at seed and early stages.
- Bezos and the returning investor base convert their passive endorsement of Case's heartland thesis into a repeatable investment vehicle, doubling down after the 2017 fund.
Second-order effects
- Coastal mega-funds like a16z, which just raised a $2B vehicle concentrated on deep, risky bets through its own staff, face a visible counter-narrative that deal flow is being sourced elsewhere.
- Other high-profile founders and executives are handed a template for reputational investing — putting their own capital behind geographic diversification rather than starting funds themselves.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, regional startup ecosystems stop depending on local angels and start drawing national brand-name capital, and later corporate programs — such as Amazon's $150M commitment to outside funds backing underrepresented founders — extend the model beyond geography to founder demographics.
- Case's own trajectory, from a D.C.-based regulatory-savvy growth fund to two heartland vehicles, suggests venture capital structurally reorganizing around policy and place-based niches rather than a single coastal hub.
The trend: Venture capital is gradually decentralizing beyond Silicon Valley, with brand-name tech fortunes funding regionally targeted vehicles as a hedge against coastal deal-flow concentration.