Founding partner Kavita Gupta is stepping down from ConsenSys Ventures

Startups • May 6, 2019, 3:39PM EDT
UPDATED: July 17, 2019, 7:08PM EDT
The Block

Quick Take

  • Kavita Gupta has left her role as head of ConsenSys Ventures, taking up an advisory position as well as teaching at Stanford
  • She has been with the firm since its inception in 2017
  • The VC firm launched with $50 million of ConsnSys founder Joe Lubin’s funds, but reportedly ran into resource issues

Kavita Gupta, head of ConsenSys Ventures, is stepping down, she has told The Block. 

Gupta was hired to lead ConsenSys Ventures when it launched in September 2017 in San Francisco, overseeing a $50 million budget financed by Joseph Lubin, the co-founder of the Ethereum Foundation and ConsenSys. With notable investments including crypto lending startup Blockfi and blockchain infrastructure company StarkWare, Gupta steered ConsenSys' VC arm into what is now one of the most esteemed venture firms in the blockchain ecosystem. In total, Gupta led investments and mentoring of 40 startups in more than 11 subcategories, from crypto trading platforms to gaming studio [see full list here]. 

In an interview with The Block in January, Gupta sidestepped the question of how long she expected her tenure to last. Nonetheless, sources say that she has known she was leaving since November. Gupta's departure coincides with parent company ConsenSys' plan to raise a $200 million round to finance its operation. It endured a difficult period after the 2018 price slide, laying off around 13% of its employees by the end of 2018 and generating only $21 million in revenue in the same year. Meanwhile, the firm also decided to integrate ConsenSys Ventures with ConsenSys Labs incubator under one investment arm, announced today in a press release.

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Gupta has previously worked at McKinsey and HSBC, as well as on the trading floor at the World Bank. She told The Block she will now be moving into an advisory role, but is transitioning to teach at Stanford University for two years.

"I will remain at ConsenSys as an advisor to various projects and will continue to help existing portfolio companies at Ventures and Tachyon to help them scale to the next level," she said. "I’m also making myself available to brainstorm great ideas with anyone in the mesh [and] will be open to connecting them to others in her network. I truly believe in the mission and vision of Joe [Lubin] and will always be open to help expand that."


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About Authors

Isabel is The Block's London and European reporter. She previously reported for Reuters in Madrid and London, following on from her time as a freelance journalist for the Guardian and the New York Times. She has a Bachelors in War Studies from King’s College London and a Master of Philosophy from the University of Oxford. Conflict of Interest: Edward Woodford, the CEO of SeedCX, is Isabel's brother. She does not report on any issues related to Seed or advise other authors in any regard.
Celia joined The Block as a reporter after earning her BA in the History of Science from the University of Chicago. Having spent years pondering over why 2+2 cannot equal 5, she is interested in the history and philosophy of mathematics, computation, and cryptography. She also had a very brief stint at Crunchbase News.