Facebook VP Chamath Palihapitiya, who joined the social networking giant in 2007 and was instrumental in launching the Facebook Platform, announced he is leaving the company to launch a new venture: The Social+Capital Partnership, a venture fund backed by some of the most important business and technology leaders in the world.

Palihapitiya apologized for not telling everyone in person about his plans before hand, and explained that while he has had a great run at Facebook, and worked with many amazing people, “it’s now time to take the next step: take more risk, try not to get complacent, take myself out of my comfort zone again, help build the next great ideas and keep swing for the fences.”

Palihapitiya has been using Embarcadero Ventures to invest in Pure Storage, Playdom, Peixe, Urbano, Yammer, and other companies over the last few years.

The Social+Capital Partnership fund, which will have between $200 million and $400 million to start, is being backed by “fifteen of the most important technology and business leaders in the world”, Palihapitiya said.  Facebook and Palihapitiya are also investing in the fund, and Palihapitiya is the biggest single limited partner.  The identity of the other investors has not been disclosed.

Social+Capital Partnership will invest in technology, education, financial services and healthcare, and use the Facebook Platform to leverage them. Palihapitiya said traditional risk models for lending money are inefficient and can be written to leverage social data.

More details about Social+Capital Partnership will be revealed over the next few weeks Palihapitiya said.
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