Jennifer Fonstad


Jennifer Fonstad is an American venture capital investor and entrepreneur. She co-founded Aspect Ventures, a female-led venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology companies. She is also co-founder of angel investing network Broadway Angels. Fonstad has been recognized as a top 100 tech investor on Forbes’ Midas List twice and was named 2016 Venture Capitalist of the Year by Deloitte.

Education

Fonstad earned a Bachelor of Science in International Economics from Georgetown University and an MBA with Distinction from Harvard Business School. While a student at Harvard, Fonstad co-founded the New Venture Competition, an annual competition for HBS student entrepreneurs.

Career

Fonstad began her career at Bain & Company after spending a year teaching high school math in sub-Saharan Africa. She joined venture capital firm Draper Fisher Jurvetson as a Kauffman Fellow in 1997 and became a partner in 1998. Fonstad spent 17 years with DFJ, helping to grow the firm from $150MM to $3.5Billion under management. Her investments included Athenahealth, NanoString Technologies, NetZero, Flurry, Lumenos, and others.
In 2010, Fonstad and Sonja Hoel Perkins were among the founders of Broadway Angels, an angel investing network of senior women from the fields of technology and venture investing. In 2014, Fonstad left DFJ to co-found Aspect Ventures with fellow investor and former Bain & Company colleague, Theresia Gouw. With Aspect, Fonstad has made investments in Vida Health, Grokker, FollowAnalytics, OhmConnect and Stem.io.

Board member and advisor

Fonstad serves on the board of directors of FollowAnalytics, OhmConnect, Grokker, Stem.io and Vida Health. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Recognition and awards

At the Catalyst Conference 2017, she spoke at the Fireside Chat.
Fonstad is a frequent media contributor on issues pertaining to women in tech, cyber-security, the future of healthcare and the venture capital industry. Her commentary appears in Fortune, Fast Company, Entrepreneur, Re/code, Yahoo Finance, Forbes, Bloomberg, and CNBC.