Longtime venture capitalist Howard Morgan is stepping down as a partner with First Round Capital, the early-stage VC firm he co-founded back in 2004 with Josh Kopelman.
The move will become official at year-end ― when First Round begins investing a new $175 million fund it just quietly raised ― with Morgan expected to remain active in the startup world as an angel investor, while also maintaining some of his existing First Round board seats. And, yes, Morgan will still cameo in the firm’s next holiday video.
“He was my first angel investor and has backed every project I’ve worked on since,” writes First Round co-founder Josh Kopelman, in a Medium post scheduled to go live later this morning. “I know I speak for everyone here at First Round when I say we’re deeply indebted to him — for his wisdom, humor, and helping build this special place we get to work at every day.”
First Round also will announce the promotion of Brett Berson, current VP of platform, to the firm’s partnership. He actually began with the firm as an intern out of NYU (working on, among other things, the initial holiday video), and now will have a vote on new deals (he’ll also have the opportunity to lead deals, but his primary day job remains leading platform).
As an aside, Howard was the first venture capitalist I ever saw speak at an industry conference. It was just before the dotcom bust), and I’m pretty sure he was discussing Idealab and an online car retailer before a packed New York City hotel ballroom. A VC rock star before there really were VC rock stars….