Matter Venture Partners said it has closed its second fund at $450 million, according to a press release issued by the firm. The fund is earmarked for early-stage HardTech startups across semiconductors, robotics and Physical AI, AI infrastructure, quantum computing, advanced manufacturing, energy building blocks, and AI for the advancement of science.
The announcement did not specify a schedule for investing the fund, the size of Matter's first fund, or how much of the new capital has already been committed.
Matter was established in 2023 to address what it describes as the specific challenges of building HardTech companies. The firm was founded by Wen Hsieh, Haomiao Huang, and Mel Tang. Hsieh spent 17 years at Kleiner Perkins, where he led the firm's HardTech practice as a General Partner; Huang is a repeat tech entrepreneur and engineer who invested alongside Hsieh at Kleiner Perkins; and Tang previously served as CFO of Ring and Demand Media.
"The operator perspective is at the heart of how we work with founders at Matter," said Mel Tang, Founding Operating Partner and CFO. "As prior founders and startup executives who have built and scaled HardTech companies, we bring our learnings to help founders anticipate challenges and scale with greater speed and discipline."
The fund's limited-partner base is central to the firm's approach. Matter's strategic LPs include ASML, TSMC, the Development Bank of Japan, Kleiner Perkins, Nitto Denko, Quanta Computer, Resonac, and Sojitz. According to the firm, these LPs work closely with portfolio companies as technology collaborators, early customers, co-investors, manufacturing partners, suppliers, and entry points into specific industry ecosystems.
That support is aimed at parts of company building that capital alone does not solve. HardTech innovations can be capital-intensive, requiring substantial investment to develop, commercialize, and scale, and their founders have to navigate technical development, manufacturing, supply chains, commercialization, and customer delivery at the same time.
"HardTech is global from day one," said Wen Hsieh, Founding Managing Partner. "Scaling HardTech startups requires navigating complex supply chains, manufacturing scaleup, technology partnerships, talent management, and customer relationships around the world." Hsieh said the firm has built a network spanning the U.S., Taiwan, Japan, Europe, Singapore, the Middle East, South Korea, and Mexico.
Since its founding, Matter has invested in companies including Q.ai, Rhoda AI, Eridu, Path Robotics, Volta, and ChipAgents. The firm did not specify which of these were funded from its first fund or whether any money from the second fund has been deployed.
The fund close comes amid what investors describe as rapidly growing interest in HardTech, driven by AI demand for faster chips, more efficient computing, greater data-center capacity, and intelligent machines that can operate in complex real-world environments. Others in the venture industry have pointed to a broader "hard tech renaissance," with accelerators including Y Combinator and Plug and Play spotlighting opportunities in the sector.
What is confirmed: Matter Venture Partners closed its second fund at $450 million; the fund targets early-stage HardTech startups across the sectors described above; and the firm named strategic limited partners including ASML, TSMC, the Development Bank of Japan, Kleiner Perkins, Nitto Denko, Quanta Computer, Resonac, and Sojitz. What remains unknown: which companies Fund II will back first, how quickly the capital will be deployed, and the size of Matter's first fund.
Sources: Matter Venture Partners Closes $450 Million Fund II — The AI Insider; What's hard tech — Pangaea Ventures