Comcast Ventures, the venture capital arm of Comcast Corp., said National Basketball Association player, author and entrepreneur Andre Iguodala has joined its Catalyst Fund as a venture partner.

Iguodala is a three-time NBA champion as a member of the Golden State Warriors and currently plays for the Miami Heat.  He has also served as first vice president of the NBA Players Association. The author of best seller “The Sixth Man,” Iguodala also is a successful entrepreneur and investor, funding more than 40 companies.As an investor and a member of the board of directors for Jumia Technologies, Iguodala helped the company grow and go public in April with a billion-dollar IPO.

The Catalyst Fund was formed in 2011 and has supported more than 70 startups with founders from diverse backgrounds through direct investments, and in partnership with leading accelerator programs. The Fund’s portfolio represents companies from multiple industries and sectors including gaming, DTC products, fintech, and enterprise applications.

“We are thrilled to welcome Andre to the Comcast Ventures team,“ said Comcast Ventures’ Head of Funds and Managing Director Amy Banse in a press release. “Andre’s investment experience and network, coupled with his passion for supporting entrepreneurs from diverse backgrounds, is a perfect fit for our Catalyst Fund. Together, we can offer early stage companies unique resources for growth, building on our vision of a startup ecosystem full of founders creating technologies for a diverse world.”

Iguodala joins principal Fatima Husain at the Catalyst Fund and will focus investments in companies founded by African American, Latinx, and female entrepreneurs. Husain joined Comcast Ventures in 2019 and was previously a Senior Growth Product Manager at Airbnb.

“I am excited to join the Catalyst and Comcast Ventures teams, which will provide me with the opportunity to advise and work with emerging entrepreneurs from diverse backgrounds,” Iguodala said in a press release. “I have admired Comcast NBCUniversal’s commitment to invest in startups with founders who are typically underrepresented in the venture world. Together, we have unique experiences and resources no other venture firm has to help founders grow their companies.”

Comcast Ventures, the VC arm of Comcast, said it has tapped Kai Bond as principal to lead Comcast Ventures Catalyst Fund, a $20 million fund established in 2011 as part of Comcast’s acquisition of NBCU that’s focused on investing in early stage technology startups led by minority entrepreneurs.

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Bond will be based out of New York and focus on investing in early-stage startups in NYC and other startups led by minority entrepreneurs across the country, Comcast Ventures said.

Bond previously served as the general manager of Samsung Accelerator, and was the founder of pixietv, a smart TV app acquired by Samsung, which led to Bond’s later role as director working on Samsung Extra, an interactive TV application. Bond also founded two gaming companies -- CashPlay Games and SwitchGames – and served as general manager at Hatch Labs, and worked in product, M&A, and strategy roles at IAC, Microsoft, and Gerson Lehrman Group.

Bond also serves as a mentor at Defy Ventures and Techstars. He earned his B.A. in international relations from Wesleyan University.

“I am delighted to welcome Kai Bond to Comcast Ventures Catalyst Fund,” Amy Banse, managing director and head of funds for Comcast Ventures, said in a statement. “His network, operational expertise and product knowledge will be an excellent addition to our team, helping us identify new types of investments for the growing Catalyst Fund.”

“Comcast Ventures Catalyst Fund’s mission of identifying and funding typically underrepresented groups is a strategy I’m excited to get behind,” Bond added. “I look forward to working with the existing portfolio as well as making new investments in 2017. As Comcast Ventures continues to expand its NYC footprint for seed deals, I am thrilled to work with entrepreneurs in this ecosystem.”

The Comcast Ventures Catalyst Fund, a unit focused on backing early stage startups led by minority entrepreneurs, has invested in LiveNinja, a company that builds unified communications tools that help businesses and brands improve how they serve and understand their customers.

“As businesses explore new ways of providing premium customer service, one trend has surfaced: messaging,”  William Crowder, managing director, DreamIt Ventures and lead advisor of the Catalyst Fund, said in this blog post. “But as companies from Facebook to WhatsApp provide tools for businesses to use their products to interact with customers, fragmentation emerges.”

Miami-based LiveNinja, he said, helps partners manage this array of communications channels. Its latest product, LiveNinja Messenger, allows brands and companies to start conversations on social media or their own websites and maintain and manage communication across multiple platforms via a link that consolidates a conversation on multiple platforms to one thread.

According to TechCrunch, LiveNinja recent raised a $2 million round of funding  that, in addition to Comcast Ventures Catalyst Fund, included Scout Ventures, Anzu Partners,  Citi Ventures, Accelerated Growth Partners and SeedInvest. 

Here’s a bit more about LiveNinja Messenger: