Earlier today Eva announced on Two Small Fish Ventures’ blog that she has raised $9 million in the first close of TSFV’s Fund II. It is exciting to see her transformation from an entrepreneur to an angel investor and now a VC.

TSFV’s investment thesis remains the same. Fund II will continue to invest globally in early-stage tech companies with strong network effects. The goal is to help nurture them into global tech giants. She has made investments from the new fund already, including Printify and several more about to close.

There is no doubt Canada’s tech ecosystem is thriving. Access to capital is no longer the biggest roadblock for startup successes as we now have a lot of great investors in Canada. That being said, there is still one big gap in the Canadian venture capital ecosystem: very few venture funds are actually co-founded by internet entrepreneurs and product creators who have massive successes. In contrast, in Silicon Valley, there are numerous successful internet entrepreneurs turned VCs. They can recycle their experience and knowledge of building and scaling a product to reach millions of users. This is exactly what we would like to do and why TSFV is special: we will recycle our unique knowledge in building and scaling internet-scale companies to help other entrepreneurs to be successful.

It is also worth noting that TSFV is not just providing capital. Through Creator Circle, a group of successful entrepreneurs and product creators who are investors in Fund II, we are providing a mini ecosystem of like-minded, entrepreneurial people who are also recycling their invaluable expertise to help TSFV portfolio companies achieve escape velocity. When TSFV invests in a company, all these creators are part of the team because the success of the company directly affects their investment. They have skin in the game.

Expect more announcements in the coming months as the final target for Fund II is $15 million. There will also be more investment announcements as TSFV can now write more cheques (and bigger cheques!) with follow on investments too.

P.S. You can read Eva’s announcement here.