Jafco Ventures becomes Icon Ventures, now that Icon Venture Partners is called Rally Ventures

Silicon Valley venture capital firm Jafco Ventures took a step forward last year with its latest fund, allowing investors other than Japan-based venture firm Jafco Co. Ltd. to pour in money.

Today Jafco is demonstrating its new, more independent stance by changing its name to Icon Ventures.

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Icon is a word that Joe Horowitz, the firm’s managing general partner, just loves. Many years ago, he had an advisory firm called Icon Venture Advisors. And he thinks the Icon word befits a firm like Jafco, because it works closely with some of the top firms in Silicon Valley, like Sequoia Capital, Kleiner Perkins Caufield Byers, and Benchmark — icons unto themselves. And a startup can even be thought of as an icon when it picks up an investment from the firm.

Trouble is, the Icon name was already taken, by Icon Venture Partners. So Horowitz and his team reached out.

“We had discussed with them the idea of our using that name and came to an amicable transition of that name,” Horowitz told VentureBeat in an interview.

Earlier this month, Icon Venture Partners announced a new name: Rally Ventures. And all involved parties appear to be happy with the arrangement.

Palo Alto, Calif.-based Jafco Ventures — er, make that Icon Ventures — started in 2003 and boasts of 23 exits out of 60-something investments, Horowitz said. It’s currently investing out of its fifth fund, which totals $260 million. Jafco tends to invests in startups’ Series B and Series C rounds, unlike venture firms that focus on seed-stage investments. And that strategy has paid off, with an aggregate exit value of more than $20 billion, Horowitz said.

“We’ve managed to have a significant amount of success,” he said. “The name change is kind of at a time we can celebrate that success and raise our profile a little bit to finally share all of that.”

Also today, the firm announced that former Sencha chief executive Michael Mullany has come onboard as a venture partner.

Disclosure: Rally Ventures is an investor in VentureBeat.

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