Private Equity News & Analysis

Lightspeed hires Israel partner

California-based early-stage investor Lightspeed Venture Partners has hired partner Yoni Cheifetez to focus on opportunities in the Israeli technology market.

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Yoni Cheifetez, formerly at Israeli venture capital firm Star Ventures, has taken on the role of partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners.
 
While Lightspeed is headquartered in California, Cheifetez will be based in Herzliya, Israel, and will focus on early-stage investment opportunities in Israel in the internet and media, communications, software and semiconductors sectors.
 

Cheifetez: Israel-based partner at Lightspeed

Cheifetez spent four years as a partner at Star Ventures, where he worked on investments including wi-fi business Aeroscout, switching software company Kabira, and Sheet Networks, a Californian provider of network and service management products that was acquired by Cisco in July 2005.
 
Lightspeed’s previous investments in Israeli technology businesses include Galileo Technology, Optier, ScaleMP and Skybox Security.
 
Earlier this month, Lightspeed hired Ron Cao, previously managing director of KLM Capital and marketing executive at Intel, as a partner based in Shanghai focused on technology investments in China. Lightspeed has made three investments in the country to date.
 
Lightspeed has $1.3 billion (€1 billion) of capital under management, having recently closed its Lightspeed VII fund on $475 million, more than its original target of $400 million.