Accel

Overview

Accel is the American venture capital firm that Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz founded in 1983, and that placed one of the most lucrative single bets in venture capital history: $12.7 million into Facebook in 2005 (Computer History Museum; TechCrunch). Swartz had entered venture capital in 1972 after working as a management consultant, served as a vice president of Citicorp Venture Capital, and started Adler & Company with Fred Adler in 1978 before founding Accel Partners with Patterson (Computer History Museum). He went on to chair the National Venture Capital Association and receive its Lifetime Achievement Award in 2007, and to work with Accel’s London team as a founder and mentor of its European business (Computer History Museum).

Before Accel: Adler, Citicorp, and a London bridge

Swartz did not arrive at Accel as a first-time founder. He had entered the venture capital industry in 1972 after working as a management consultant, served as a vice president of Citicorp Venture Capital, and then started Adler & Company with Fred Adler in 1978, where he was its founding general partner (Computer History Museum). That apprenticeship — institutional venture capital at Citicorp, then a founder-led firm at Adler — is the background to the firm he built with Patterson five years later. Swartz went on to chair the National Venture Capital Association and to receive its Lifetime Achievement Award in 2007, and he continued to work with Accel’s London team as a founder and mentor of its European business, entering what the Computer History Museum’s catalogue describes as a fifth decade in venture capital (Computer History Museum). He was educated at Harvard University, with a concentration in engineering sciences and applied physics, and held a Master of Science in industrial administration from Carnegie Mellon University (Computer History Museum).

The Facebook bet

The investment that defines Accel came from its ninth fund. In 2005 Accel closed its $440 million Accel 9 Fund, a fund that TechCrunch later described as one to remember for Facebook, for the most part (TechCrunch). Accel invested a small part of that fund — just $12.7 million — in Facebook, in exchange for 11% of the company, and took derision around Silicon Valley for paying what looked like a ridiculously high valuation for the fledgling startup (TechCrunch). By 2010 the joke had reversed: the firm sold part of that investment, less than 20%, at a $35 billion valuation, bringing in half a billion dollars or so in cash and paying back the entire capital base of the fund in one transaction, with the remaining 8% or so worth around $3 billion at that valuation — all from a $12.7 million investment (TechCrunch).

Fund IX was not a one-company fund. It also invested in AdMob, sold to Google for $750 million, Xensource, acquired by Citrix for $500 million, and Zimbra, acquired by Yahoo for $350 million (TechCrunch). The next fund kept the pace: Fund X, a $520 million fund raised in 2007, invested in Groupon, Diapers.com, Etsy, Cloudera, Modcloth, Atlassian Software, SunRun, and Squarespace (TechCrunch). The through-line is early, concentrated conviction in companies that later defined their categories — the same pattern that made Accel, years later, a previous investor in AdRoll, joining its $15 million financing round led by Foundation Capital alongside Merus Capital (VC News Daily).

What this profile does not claim

This profile does not give Accel’s headquarters, office list, assets under management, or fund counts: none appear in the sources read in full. It uses TechCrunch’s 11% for the initial Facebook stake and flags that other summaries say 10%. It does not assert the Pasteur-derived “prepared mind” philosophy as the firm’s stated doctrine, because that origin was not read in a citable source in full. And it does not present the AdRoll funding report as independent evidence of Accel’s strategy — it is a trade republication of a financing announcement, used only for the AdRoll link.