The sale of Leonardo AI to Canva has seen its founders be part of a number of others in reinvesting their success within the second fund of stage VC Side Stage Ventures.
The expertise be behind Linktree, Airwallex, Canva, Airtasker and Aconex have additionally backed the primary shut, at $40 million, in SSV’s $50m Fund II – greater than double the dimensions of the primary fund. Leonardo AI, which was acquired by Canva in mid-2024, was amongst SSV’s investments, and its founders at the moment are recycling that windfall in a brand new technology.
One other Canva acquisition, MagicBrief, delivered a second exit for Aspect Stage in 2025, placing it within the high decile of VC funds globally.
The Sydney VC sometimes invests $500,000 to $1.5 million in pre-Seed and Seed rounds and stays sector-agnostic, in addition to offering entry to a worldwide community because the startups scale.
Buyers return
Founding companion Ben Grabiner stated round 90% of the traders of their debut fund have invested in Fund 11
“AI is a once-in-a-generation reshuffle – the subsequent decade’s category-defining firms will look nothing just like the final decade’s, and most of them haven’t been based but,” he stated.
“Aspect Stage Ventures exists to seek out and again the founders constructing these rocketships. We’re delighted that so many founders & LPs are becoming a member of us once more on this mission. We’re nonetheless simply getting began”
Canadian-born Elli Hanson, who joined the VC two years in the past as principal, having been a founder in New York and world director of design technique at legendary advert company Ogilvy, has been promoted to companion.
“Aspect Stage has been house from day one as a result of it’s constructed round one easy thought: backing founders means bringing way more than capital to the desk – lived expertise, sound judgement, distinctive sources and a bias to motion,” she stated.
“We’re founders ourselves, and that shapes how we function. I’m extremely excited to step into the partnership and maintain backing the subsequent technology of nice Australian founders.”
Hanson has already made her first investments from Fund II and shall be asserting them shortly.
