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Why We Invested in Darwin Homes
Talks about Darwin Homes, Canvas Ventures and Series A funding
MG
Mike Ghaffary
General Partner at Canvas Ventures
MG
Mike Ghaffary
General Partner at Canvas Ventures
San Francisco, California
Overview
Mike Ghaffary is a General Partner at Canvas Ventures with a background as VP at Yelp, CEO at Eat24, and co-founder of Stitcher. He has made significant investments in various successful companies such as Float Health, PipeDreams, and Flyhomes, focusing on sectors like Marketplaces, Health IT, and FinTech in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Ghaffary's career highlights include leading successful companies like Yelp and Eat24, as well as making strategic investments in emerging startups like Flyhomes and ResQ, showcasing his expertise in venture capital and entrepreneurship.
Work Experience
General Partner
2019 - Current
Canvas is currently investing out of our third fund of $350 million in Series A and Series B stage companies. I focus in particular on marketplaces, commerce, proptech, and food tech. I serve on 5 boards at Canvas, including Flyhomes, Darwin Homes, and ResQ. Prior to Canvas, I invested in: Strava, Faire, CloudKitchens, Superhuman, Optimizely, and a dozen others. At Canvas, we are all former operators/founders, and I spent more than a decade building companies like Yelp, Eat24, Stitcher, TrialPay, and others.
Canvas Ventures is an early-growth fund focusing on AI transforming digital health and fintech.
Board Member and Investor
2021
OfferFit’s AI replaces manual A/B testing.
We are an automated experimentation platform that makes A/B testing obsolete.
Raised $39,000,000.00 from Capital One, Canvas Ventures, Ridge Ventures, Burst Capital, Carbide Ventures, Harmony Partners, Alumni Ventures, Menlo Ventures and Capital One Ventures.
Investor
2012
Strava is an online network where runners and cyclists can record their activities, compare performance, and compete with their community.
Raised $151,850,000.00 from TCV, Madrone Capital Partners, Dragoneer Investment Group, Sequoia Capital, Go4it Capital and Jackson Square Ventures.
Investor
2015
The fastest email experience ever made
Superhuman is a software platform that weaves social insights into a workflow.
Raised $108,000,000.00 from Drew Houston, Will Smith, Tiger Global Management, Jason Citron, Arianna Huffington, The Chainsmokers, Ashton Kutcher, Henrique Dubugras, Timothy Young and IVP.
Investor
2017
Investor in Faire’s seed round
Faire is a marketplace and wholesale platform that helps retailers find and buy wholesale merchandise for their stores.
Raised $1,708,162,662.00 from Shopify.
Board Member and Investor
2021
Restaurant software and marketplace for repairs
Board Member and Investor
2019
Reinventing the home buying experience
Flyhomes provides a real estate brokerage platform that helps clients through the entire home buying process.
Raised $310,000,000.00 from Canvas Ventures, Parker89, Vesta Ventures, Fifth Wall, BAM Elevate, Spencer Rascoff, Battery Ventures, Camber Creek, Balyasny Asset Management and Andreessen Horowitz.
Advisor and Angel Investor
2014 - 2020
Early angel investor and corporate development / business development advisor to Optimizely
Optimizely is a digital experience platform for unlocking digital potential, content, commerce, and optimization.
Raised $251,200,000.00 from Bridge Bank.
Board Member and Investor
2019 - 2020
Reimagining home and auto insurance shopping
Gabi monitors insurance rates from all carriers and provides unbiased advice on the optimal coverage.
Raised $39,100,000.00 from Mubadala Capital Ventures, Canvas Ventures, Securian Ventures, TruStage Ventures, Northwestern Mutual Future Ventures, Burst Capital, Project A Ventures, Correlation Ventures and A.Capital Ventures.
Angel Investor and Advisor
2014 - 2019
Angel investor and advisor to consumer and software companies including: Strava, Superhuman, Faire, Optimizely, Cambly, Padlet, Metromile, Pocket, Philz Coffee, and a handful of other Y Combinator companies.