North First Ventures

North First Ventures (N1V) is an Israeli early-stage venture capital fund founded in 2017 by Founder and Managing Partner Ronen Smooha. The firm is headquartered in the Midtown TLV Office Tower at 144 Menachem Begin Road in Tel Aviv. N1V partners with Israeli seed and Series A stage companies that harness innovative technologies to solve real-world problems within large existing markets or to create entirely new ones. The team draws on a mix of seasoned entrepreneurs, mentors, global business and marketing strategists, and deep technologists who have personally navigated the non-linear journey of building startups across multiple stages and industries. N1V has invested in approximately 12 companies across AI, SaaS, healthcare, cybersecurity, consumer, and commerce. Portfolio highlights include NoTraffic, a real-time traffic management platform using smart sensors to prepare road infrastructure for connected and autonomous vehicles; Cervello, a cybersecurity solution for railways and metro operational networks covering threat detection, asset management, and continuous monitoring; Octopai, an ML-based metadata discovery SaaS platform acquired by Cloudera in 2024; Veego; and Home365. The fund has produced two acquisitions to date — Octopai and Model 9, which was acquired by BMC. The firm's most recent first-time investment was Gaviti, and the most recent follow-on was NoTraffic. N1V positions its involvement as more than financial: the team works hands-on with founders to build business engines that scale, bringing the direct experience of investors who have lived through company-building at multiple stages. The fund is explicit that great technology must be paired with a strong go-to-market and organizational capability to create durable value.