Since 1996, Birchmere has built a committed professional and support staff by attracting capable people, providing appropriate training and economic incentives, and creating a shared culture of performance and success. Our team approach and fund management philosophy has created a strong culture based on shared responsibility and ownership for almost two decades. Our management team has over 80 years of collective experience in engineering, entrepreneurship, technology commercialization, and organizational development, including over 25 years of venture capital investing.
Birchmere has invested in many dozens of private companies, resulting in numerous IPOs and M&A transactions representing over $14b in value. Our partners’ industry experience and expertise in engineering, operations, strategic planning, marketing, and capital markets have contributed immeasurably to this value creation.
Seán Sebastian
Partner
Seán is Birchmere’s founding partner. He has made multiple successful investments resulting in IPOs and M&A exits, among them FreeMarkets (FMKT, acquired by Ariba), Neolinear (acquired by Cadence Design Systems), CyOptics (acquired by Avago), Safeguard Interactive (acquired by Storage Technologies), and Knova Software (SVCW). Seán is actively involved in the development and growth of numerous companies, also serving as a past or current director of Idelic, Encentiv Energy, Senic, iRestify, Lightningcast, LogicLibrary, MediaSite, and ATRP Solutions.
Seán has over 25 years of experience in technology commercialization, management consulting, systems integration, and financial services. He previously founded The Telford Group, a technology consulting firm to financial services clients. At General Electric Information Services, Seán directed advanced technology commercialization activities. At American Management Systems, he consulted on applied artificial intelligence systems for various public and private sector clients. Seán also served on active duty in the U.S. Air Force.
Seán served on the Pittsburgh Technology Council’s executive committee and is past President of the Pittsburgh Venture Capital Association. He is a frequent guest lecturer on entrepreneurship and venture capital at Carnegie Mellon University and University of Pittsburgh.
Seán holds a BS in Mechanical Engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and an MBA from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
Ned Renzi
Partner
Ned is a founding Birchmere partner, focused primarily on seed SaaS and marketplace investments. He led Birchmere’s investment in Cvent [CVT], serving on its board for 11 years. His other notable investments include TenMarks (acquired by Amazon), Neolinear (acquired by Cadence Design Systems), Aspinity, EyeLevel, Peloton Technology, PresenceLearning, Identified Technologies, Modsy, Gem, Paper (fka Gradeslam), Mapper.ai, 101 Edu, Ikos, Metricstory, Sleeper, and Treatspace.
Ned was previously a senior leader at Concurrent Technologies and the U.S. Department of Defense. He is on the board of the Pittsburgh Venture Capital Association. Ned is also a frequent lecturer on start-ups and venture capital at Carnegie Mellon University.
He holds an MBA from the University of Pittsburgh, a Master’s in Engineering Management from George Washington University, and a BS in Electrical Engineering from Penn State.
Sean Ammirati
Partner
Sean is lead partner of Birchmere Labs, a seed and studio fund focused on community driven commerce startups. He heads our investments in NoWait, Admiral, Altru, Healthies, Crystal, JazzHR, PhoneWagon, SIEMonster, SPIDR Tech, LegalSifter, and The Zebra.
Sean has over 12 years experience founding, building, and selling businesses in the media and software industries. He was previously COO of ReadWriteWeb (acquired by SAY Media), one of the most influential sites about the future of technology and innovation. Sean was also co-founder and CEO of mSpoke (personalized recommendation engine; LinkedIn’s first acquisition) and director of business development at Peak Strategy (quantitative alpha modeling tool; acquired by Morgan Stanley).
Sean is an Adjunct Professor of Entrepreneurship at Carnegie Mellon University’s Tepper School. Based on his CMU coursework, he authored The Science of Growth, to be published by St. Martin’s Press in 2016. Sean was also a founding advisor to Innovation Works’ AlphaLab accelerator.
Sean holds a BS in Computer Information Systems from Grove City College. He was also a research fellow at Carnegie Mellon’s Sloan Software Industry Center.