Pear VC closes a $333M Fund V, smaller than its $432M Fund IV, and promotes three partners to GP

Pear VC has closed its fifth flagship fund at $333 million, a deliberate step down from the $432 million it raised for Fund IV. The Silicon Valley seed firm, an early backer of DoorDash, Gusto and Vanta, now manages more than $1.1 billion.

Pear invests at pre-seed and seed across enterprise and B2B software, AI infrastructure, fintech, consumer, healthcare, robotics and vertical AI, and frames the smaller fund as a way to stay selective and keep ownership targets and cheque sizes from drifting up with seed valuations.

Alongside the close, three long-tenured investors, Arash Afrakhteh, Ajay Kamat and Shravan Reddy, were promoted to general partner. Recent portfolio marks cited by the firm include Listen Labs' acquisition by Salesforce and Gravis Robotics' $200 million Series A at about a $1 billion valuation.

The read: in a market where the ten largest US funds took nearly a third of 2025's $67 billion, a seed firm raising less than last time is making an argument, not a concession.