Family Offices Are Reshaping Venture Capital
And GEX Is Proof
When my cousin and I started GEX in 2015, we didn’t set out to build a traditional venture capital firm. We were a family office, rooted in multigenerational values, backed by family capital, and driven by a simple conviction: that the best way to participate in innovation was through relationships, not transactions.
A decade later, the data has caught up with what we experienced firsthand. Family offices are no longer passive allocators sitting on the sidelines of venture capital. They are becoming its most consequential participants.
The Numbers Tell the Story
According to PwC’s Global Family Office Deals Study 2025, venture capital and private equity now account for half of all family office deal activity. Club deals — families co-investing alongside other investors — represent nearly 69% of transactions. J.P. Morgan’s 2026 Global Family Office Report shows that high-return-targeting family offices allocate over 40% of their portfolios to alternatives. And the average single-family office deploying capital into venture now manages close to $1 billion in assets.
These aren’t marginal shifts. Family offices collectively control more than $14 trillion — exceeding the combined assets of the global private equity and venture capital industries. When that much capital changes its behavior, markets move.
Why Now?
Three forces are converging:
Companies are staying private longer. I’ve written about this before — 87% of U.S. companies with revenues over $100 million are not publicly traded. If you want access to the fastest-growing companies in the world, you have to go private. Family offices understand this intuitively. They’ve been making long-duration, illiquid bets for generations.
The next generation is showing up differently. Most family offices today were established after 2001. Three-quarters benefit from the entrepreneurial involvement of their founders, and only 12% are run primarily by heirs. This is not old money sitting still. UBS reports that 31% of U.S. entrepreneurs plan to create their own family office. The line between founder and family investor is disappearing.
Traditional fund structures aren’t enough. Family offices are increasingly favoring direct investments, co-investments, and custom structures over blind pool fund commitments. They want control, alignment, and the ability to invest according to their values — not just a slot in someone else’s portfolio construction.
GEX: A Case Study in the Shift
Our evolution tracks this macro trend almost perfectly. We started as a family office making angel investments and supporting Persian entrepreneurs between London and Silicon Valley. Over time, we refined our approach — moving from direct deals to a fund-of-funds strategy, partnering with leading and emerging VC managers, and co-investing alongside them at the early growth stage.
In 2025, we crossed an important threshold. With the support of trusted limited partners, we officially transitioned from a family office investor to an independent venture capital firm. We didn’t abandon our family roots — we institutionalized them.
Today, GEX invests in top-performing VC managers while securing co-investment rights into their breakout companies. We screen hundreds of opportunities each quarter. We invested in a tiny fraction of the managers we reviewed in our last fund cycle and we did it all while building a community of values-aligned families and investors who believe that how you invest matters as much as what you invest in.
Looking Ahead
The family office boom is not slowing down. PwC projects continued growth in club deals, direct investments, and innovation-led sectors like AI, SaaS, and healthcare. As more families make this transition, we’ll see a new generation of venture firms — firms built on family values, community trust, and multigenerational thinking. GEX was built on these principles before they became a trend. We plan to keep it that way.
This is an educational post about GEX Ventures investments. It is for informational purposes only and may not be relied on as legal, tax, securities or investment advice and does not constitute an offer to buy or sell interest in any products offered by us or others. Email me at mk@gex.vc or leave a comment if you’d like to exchange ideas.