teams that are forward-leaning across their organisations in various disciplines .
" Our LPs are often aware of these companies and technologies because they ' ve already been part of the evaluation process and have spoken with them . We also have the good fortune to have colleagues who are happy to lean in and really shape the future of this industry , working closely with these organisations .
" We ' re now raising our second fund , and welcoming capital from institutional partners beyond NFP . It ’ s exciting to build on the strategic muscle NFP has brought in a distribution context and layer in diverse , complementary contacts from insurance carrier partners , from other brokerage players in the industry and traditional institutional investors . We ' re really excited about our fund two and growing the innovation that we can accelerate in the market .
" We ' re growing our team as we raise our next fund , and excited about the next stable of portfolio companies we ' ll be working with and are already having conversations with a number of companies - so we ' ll have exciting news to share in the early days ."
EXECUTIVE BIO
SHAWN ELLIS
TITLE : MANAGING PARTNER INDUSTRY : VENTURE CAPITAL LOCATION : GREATER CHICAGO AREA
Shawn Ellis is the Managing
Partner of Distributed Ventures . He co-founded and manages the fund . Prior to Distributed Ventures , Shawn built and lead NFP Ventures , a captive early-stage venture fund sponsored by NFP Corp , the diversified insurance brokerage . He currently serves as director on the boards of Axio , Vivante Health , Relay , and Wingspan .
Shawn ’ s investment approach leverages diverse operational , strategic and investment experience . Previously , as President and founding team member of Zest Health , he led the company ’ s growth from concept to over half a million paid subscribers and partnerships with several health plans less than three years . Zest was eventually rebranded as Yaro and acquired by Virgin Pulse . Prior to Zest , Shawn focused on healthcare technology investments at 7wire Ventures . He was a management consultant at the Boston Consulting Group and began his career at Lazard Middle Market ’ s M & A practice . Shawn holds an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management and a BA in Economics from the University of Chicago . He is a member of the The Economic Club of Chicago and a board member of the Linden Foundation .