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Julie Sandler. (PSL Photo)
Longtime tech startup investor Julie Sandler plans to transition away from her role as managing director at Pioneer Square Labs, the Seattle venture firm that runs an investment fund and startup studio.
Sandler joined PSL in 2017 as its fourth managing director after a 6-year stint with Madrona. She helps oversee PSL’s venture fund, which invests in early stage tech startups across the Pacific Northwest.
Sandler will move into a venture partner role at PSL starting later next year, before the firm goes out for its next venture fund. In an email to GeekWire, she said she will continue working closely with the PSL team, partners and portfolio companies, but also explore “some new adventures.”
Next year, Sandler will also serve as chair of the Washington Roundtable, a nonprofit that represents the state’s largest private sector companies and focuses on legislative issues.
Sandler called her years at PSL “the most rewarding of my life and career.”
“We have built and invested in some of the most exciting companies in the region, launched a leading next-gen Pacific Northwest venture capital firm, raised several funds across our venture and studio arms, grown into the largest venture studio by every metric, and have the privilege of working everyday with the world’s most inspiring entrepreneurs,” she said.
PSL raised $100 million for its venture fund in 2021.
“Julie is a uniquely gifted leader and tremendous partner to all of us at PSL, local founders, and the Pacific Northwest innovation ecosystem more broadly,” said PSL co-founder Greg Gottesman. “Her contributions over the past eight years have helped build PSL into what it is today, and we are thrilled for that to continue.”
Gottesman spent years at Madrona before co-founding PSL in 2015 with Geoff Entress, Mike Galgon, and Ben Gilbert.
Galgon became a venture partner in 2021 and stepped away from that role this year.
Gilbert also shifted to a venture partner role last year to focus on Acquired, the popular business podcast he co-hosts.
Other managing directors include Seattle startup vet T.A. McCann and Vivek Ladsariya, who joined this year after moving from Silicon Valley.
