Bethany George Joins JumpStart Ventures Team as Newest Investing Partner

2.6 minute read

JumpStart Ventures has hired Bethany George, former Managing Director at Rev1 Ventures, to serve as its newest investing partner. In her role, Bethany will work across JumpStart Ventures’ four existing funds, sourcing investment opportunities, executing due diligence and partnering with startup founders to help them scale.

JumpStart Ventures was recently announced as a division of JumpStart to advance the organization’s venture investing activity. Since its launch in March, Bethany George is the first new hire to join the JumpStart Ventures team. With experience across sectors from life sciences to enterprise software to tech-enabled services and consumer technologies, she will work with the Ventures team to make Pre-seed through Series A investments in early-stage technology startups throughout Ohio.

Bethany has deep expertise in entrepreneurship, hailing from a family of business owners and working over the past decade to build Ohio’s thriving early-stage investment ecosystem. Bethany has partnered with hundreds of founders, entrepreneurs, principal investigators and investors to put high-impact startup companies and Ohio on the map.

“Bethany brings a tremendous amount of experience and dedication to this role,” said CEO Ray Leach. “She has been in Ohio’s venture investing scene for a long time and has a proven track record for generating returns and, probably more importantly, for helping Midwest innovators build high-growth technology startups.”

Passionate about helping founders, she led Rev1’s advisory team. In addition to her investing and leadership responsibilities at Rev1, she served on the boards of multiple startups, participated in investment committees and helped integrate cross-functional teams.

Bethany earned a master’s degree at Ohio University while helping to form TechGROWTH Ohio and teaching MBA students how to advise early-stage entrepreneurs. She is also the founding Executive Chair of VentureNext, a group of 150+ rising investment professionals across 100+ funds throughout the Midwest. She recently co-led the creation of the group’s mentorship program and currently serves on the executive committee in the Mentorship Chair role.


About JumpStart Ventures
JumpStart Ventures is a division of JumpStart Inc. focused on venture capital investing. JumpStart Ventures deploys Pre-seed, Seed and Series A funding to early-stage technology startups in Ohio. With more than $140M under management across four funds—Evergreen, NEXT, Focus and the Healthcare Collaboration Fund—JumpStart Ventures provides a continuum of capital across stages and sectors so tech founders can start and scale in the region.