Science Inc., one of the largest venture capital accelerators in Los Angeles, has its first new general partner since its founding.

Priscilla Guevara was promoted from head of investor relations to the partner level, the firm announced on March 19.

“As general partner and a member of the Science Venture Investment Committee, she will make investment decisions unanimously across the general partnership,” the accelerator said. “She will also continue to unlock new partnerships across investor bases, corporates and capital markets, as well as oversee marketing and communications.”

Guevara joined Santa Monica-based Science in 2018 after two decades on Wall Street at firms including SMBC, Neuburger Berman and Moore Capital. Immediately prior to joining Science, Guevara worked for ZX Ventures, the venture arm of Anheuser Busch.

Guevara developed a network of investors across sovereign funds and corporations, and the names in her contact list happened to overlap with entities and individuals familiar to Science’s founder and managing director, Michael Jones. 

After an initial meeting with Jones at the SoHo House in Malibu, Guevara felt she could develop more investment structures for the young firm.

“I was really drawn to what Science was building,” Guevara said. “With Mike understanding my background, wanting to expand the business and build out relationships across the investor bases, I was thinking about different structures with him.”

Guevara says she covers three roles at Science: investor relations, commercial partnerships and marketing and events. She launched the firm’s investor day events, and in 2021 co-founded Science’s Rolling Fund, a newer investment vehicle operating on a subscription basis designed to let accredited investors commit capital on a quarterly basis. This kind of fund structure can democratize access to series B investments in the companies that Science incubates.

Notable investments from this vehicle include the newly crowned unicorn Liquid Death and the entertainment app Mammoth Media.

Guevara now hopes to step into more institutional investing, creating a more formalized structure as the firm’s portfolio grows.

“As we’re building out these partnerships and corporate relations, I think that just amplifies what we can do bigger and better,” Guevara said.

Science is currently invested in 60 companies. Since its founding in 2011, the firm’s venture portfolio exits have exceeded $5 billion. Dollar Shave Club, an early member of Science’s startup studio, put the firm on the map when it was acquired by Unilever for $1 billion in 2016. Other exits include Hello Society, which was an influencer-powered marketing operation acquired by The New York Times, and DogVacay, a dog sitter network bought by Rover.

Science delineates its accelerator and its venture business. The Science Studio focuses on mobile, marketplaces and e-commerce ideas and helps build them out into investable startups. Science Ventures focuses on consumer companies in seed and early-stage follow-on investments, but those companies don’t necessarily have to come from its own studio.

According to Guevara, Science’s typical entry point for companies is between $3.5 and $5 million pre-seed.

Jones co-founded Science with Peter Pham in 2011 after serving as chief executive of MySpace. Pham previously was involved in several ventures, including the media-sharing site Photobucket, which sold to Fox Interactive Media in 2007 for $250 million.

While Science doesn’t disclose total assets under management, the firm says it is still deploying from its $50 million Science Ventures fund raised in 2020