European venture capital fund Dawn Capital has made three new appointments to its 20-strong team – Avalon Lee-Bacon joins as Head of Talent, Julie Kainz as Vice President and Alix Fawcett as Marketing Associate.
As Head of Talent, Lee-Bacon will be responsible for building out Dawn’s talent platform and supporting portfolio companies with senior hires, sharing best practices and developing top talent. The newly created position formalises Dawn’s in-house offering and the importance Dawn places on the role of exceptional talent in building category-defining, global companies. Avalon will also focus on nurturing and leveraging Dawn’s valued network of founders, business leaders and advisers on behalf of its portfolio companies.
Lee-Bacon joins from Executive Search specialist Russell Reynolds Associates, where she worked within the technology team to place senior level executives across leading enterprise software and fintech businesses. Prior to this Lee-Bacon worked for a boutique executive search company, supporting high growth tech start-ups and scale-ups.
Lee-Bacon’s appointment follows Kainz joining as Vice President at the end of 2020, to cover early-stage SaaS investments across DACH and France. Kainz was previously at Salesforce Ventures, the strategic Venture Capital arm of Salesforce, where she was involved in investing in enterprise software companies from Series A to pre-IPO. Before Salesforce Ventures, Kainz was one of Founders Factory’s first employees and built out the firm’s sourcing strategy and corporate engagement program.
Within Dawn’s marketing team, Fawcett will focus on delivering communications and activities to support brand development and relationship building with founders, investors and Dawn’s network. Fawcett joins from Founders Forum, a global network of entrepreneurial founders, leaders and senior investors. In her most recent Community and Investor Relations role, she was responsible for bringing in sponsorship from the Venture Capital and Private Equity community and developing both content and event series.
The appointments of Avalon, Julie and Fawcett follow an exceptional year for Dawn’s team. During 2020, Dawn welcomed nine new joiners to its team, raised its fourth flagship fund, Dawn IV, Europe’s largest early-stage B2B fund to date, and made five new investments. Dawn is committed to deriving the true benefits of diversity and its latest joiners maintain its 50:50 gender balance across both its investment committee, investment team and firm.
Norman Fiore, General Partner at Dawn Capital, says: “We’ve always placed great emphasis, alongside our talented founders, on hiring and developing best-in-class teams, recognising the vital role they play in the enduring success of an organisation. So we are delighted to formalise our talent offering for our portfolio companies. As Head of Talent, Avalon brings a wealth of experience, best practices, as well as a strong network to support the growth and success of our portfolio companies teams. The combined experience of Avalon, Julie and Alix will be invaluable to Dawn and represents a new milestone. We are all thrilled to welcome them to our team.”
Source: Private Equity Wire
