Karen Pajarillo has more than two decades of experience as an investor, team leader and board member. She is a founding L.P. and Investment Council Member for How Women Invest, a venture fund providing seed and Series A capital to women-led, technology-enabled companies in the U.S. In addition, she has been an advisor to social impact funds investing in emerging markets, including Unreasonable Capital and GMC co-LABS.

Preciously, she spent 24 years as a private equity investor at The Riverside Company (www.riversidecompany.com), a global firm with more than $8 billion of AUM.  As a Partner in the Riverside Capital Appreciation Fund (“RCAF”), Karen led leveraged buyouts of North American-headquartered middle market companies with up to $35 million of EBITDA.  She was involved in all aspects of the investment process, including deal sourcing, valuation, due diligence, financing, contract negotiations, executive recruitment, post-closing oversight, investment realizations and investor reporting. As a board member, she worked closely with management teams to set strategic direction and drive value enhancement initiatives. In 1998, she co-founded Riverside’s San Francisco office.. She was particularly focused on cultivating a collaborative and inclusive office culture with prominent representation of women and people of color. 

 

Ms. Pajarillo serves on the board of the URI Foundation and Marin Country Day School and is on the Leadership Council for RiseUp. She lives in SF with her husband and daughter.