A VC firm made up of early Facebook employees just closed a $145 million fund - and added another Facebooker to the team

When Kevin Colleran, Dave Morin, and Sam Lessin decided to form Slow Ventures, they had one mission: to give the founders in their portfolio time to build sound companies with a strong foundation.

More than five years later, the firm has raised its third fund, hired two more investing partners, and made more than 200 investments in some of the hottest startups of the moment, including Allbirds, Casper, and Slack.

On Thursday, Slow Ventures is announcing that it's closed Slow Ventures III, a $145 million fund that brings the firm's total capital under management to about $250 million. The firm raised the fund from more than 100 CEOs, tech founders, executives, VCs, university endowments, and foundations.

Slow Ventures differs from other VC firms because of how active its LPs are, the firm says. LPs help with sourcing and doing due diligence on startups, along with mentoring the founders within Slow Ventures' portfolio.

All three of Slow Venture's founding partners were Facebook employees before forming the fund: Colleran was one of Facebook's first 10 employees, serving as the company's first ad executive; Morin is the co-creator of Facebook's platform and went on to found his own startup, Path; and Sam Lessin served as Facebook's former vice president of product management until 2014.

Will Quist joined Slow Ventures in November 2015 after spending about eight years at Industry Ventures.

Now, Slow Ventures is adding a fifth investing partner and the firm's fourth former Facebooker with the hiring of Scott Marlette. Marlette is an LP and has been an advisor to Slow Ventures since its first fund. He is also an early Facebook employee: Marlette was one of Facebook's first product managers in 2005 up until 2010.

"As friends and colleagues, we've known each other for a long time and respect one another's ideas and instincts," the firm wrote in a blog post. "Our willingness to debate and disagree has benefited our work and our community tremendously by giving everyone the permission to think differently and pursue their individual passions and interests. There are very few rules we won't consider breaking or sectors we won't explore. When we see signs of innovation and opportunity on the edges of science, society and culture, we dive in. As entrepreneurs and network thinkers ourselves, we believe in supporting incredible people and brilliant minds, no matter which unconventional ideas they may pursue."