Jonathan Tower has left oil and gas producer Saudi Aramco’s Prosperity7 Ventures unit, where he headed US investments, to focus on building a new AI-native venture platform.
Prosperity7 hired Tower as managing director in 2022, three years after it was launched in Saudi Arabia, to establish its US business. It has a 14-strong investment team in the US, split between offices in Silicon Valley and New York.
The unit, which has a $3bn budget and $5bn in assets under management, has recently upped its investments in the US. Three of its four largest investments in that market – in chip designer SiFive, space infrastructure developer Axiom Space and AI agent provider Uniphore – have come in the past six months.
Tower said in a Medium post he plans to launch an as-yet unnamed VC fund to invest in AI-driven companies and infrastructure, alongside a digital media platform that will highlight research and insights from stakeholders seeking to use AI to transform existing industries.
“The timing feels right to build again,” he said. “Artificial intelligence is reshaping how companies are built, how work gets done and where value is created. It’s also reshaping venture itself.
“The characteristics that will define the best performing VC firms over the coming decade will be very different from the characteristics that defined the venture leaders from the last one.”
Tower spent five years as a general partner at venture capital platform Catapult VC before joining Prosperity7. He had previously logged a five-year stint as managing director at VC firm Triplepoint Capital.
See all Prosperity7 Ventures’ recent deals on the CVC Funding Round Database
