Best Startup
At Best Startup US we track over 1,000,000 US startups and over 3 million people who hold key positions in these companies. We use this directory of startups to highlight top employees, founders and board members we think deserve more appreciation than they are currently getting.
This list showcases the top California based Partner operating in the Software space. If you think a Partner is missing from this list, feel free to contact our editor on editor@beststartup.us.
The individuals on this list have been included because of exceptional performance in one of the following categories:
- Innovation – Operating as a key part in an extremely innovative business or startup.
- Growth – Operating as a key figure in the growth and upscale of a market leading business or startup.
- Management – Showing exceptional management skills.
- Societal impact – Putting their business on the map for their positive societal or environmental impact.
Our Data – We source our data from OSINT (open source intelligence) and public directories such as Crunchbase, SemRush and many more. The data from these sources should be treated with a degree of caution and verified yourself.
Marc Leibowitz
Global VP – Partnerships & Strategic Growth Initiatives of Adobe
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About Adobe: Adobe is a software company that provides its users with digital marketing and media solutions.
Bryan O’Neil Hughes
Director of Product Management & Partner Outreach, Creative Cloud of Adobe
Bryan O’Neil Hughes is the Director of Product Management & Partner Outreach, Creative Cloud at Adobe.
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About Adobe: Adobe is a software company that provides its users with digital marketing and media solutions.
Bryan Hughes
Director of Product Management & Partner Outreach, Creative Cloud of Adobe
Director of Product Management at Adobe.
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About Adobe: Adobe is a software company that provides its users with digital marketing and media solutions.
Bryan Hughes
Director of Product Management & Partner Outreach, Creative Cloud of Adobe
Director of Product Management at Adobe.
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About Adobe: Adobe is a software company that provides its users with digital marketing and media solutions.
Tim Draper
Founder and Managing Partner of Draper Associates
Timothy Draper is founding partner of leading venture capital firms Draper Associates and DFJ. Tim’s original suggestion to use “viral marketing” in web-based e-mail to geometrically spread an Internet product to its market was instrumental to the successes of Hotmail and other web-based email providers and has been adopted as a standard marketing technique by hundreds of businesses. Tim launched the DFJ Global Network, an international network of early-stage venture capital funds with offices in over 30 cities around the globe. Tim founded or co-founded DFJ ePlanet (global), Draper Fisher Jurvetson Gotham (NYC), Zone Ventures (LA), Epic Ventures (Salt Lake City), Draper Atlantic (Reston), Draper Triangle (Pittsburg), Timberline Ventures (Portland), Polaris Fund (Anchorage), DFJ Frontier (Sacramento and Santa Barbara), DFJ Vina Capital (Vietnam), Draper Nexus (Tokyo), and DFJ DragonFund (Shanghai). Tim recently launched “Six Californias,” a statewide initiative to create six new states and dissolve a failed one in California. Previously, Tim served on the California State Board of Education. In November of 2000, Tim launched a statewide cyber-initiative on school choice for the California General Election. Tim was a Member of Singapore’s International Economic Council and Ukraine’s Orange Circle. Tim was on the Board of U.C. Berkeley’s Haas School of Business. Tim was ranked 52 on the list of the 100 most influential Harvard Alumni, and seven on the Forbes Midas List. Tim was named Always-On #1 top venture capital deal maker. Tim was awarded the Commonwealth Club’s Distinguished Citizen Award for achievements in green and sustainable energy. To further encourage entrepreneurship, Tim started BizWorld.org, a non-profit for children to learn entrepreneurship, Draper University of Heroes, a school for entrepreneurs 18-28 and he leads SixCalifornias, an initiative to improve the governance of California. Tim has a B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
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About Bancor, DDF, DFJ DragonFund, DFJ VinaCapital, Draper Associates, Draper Athena, Draper Dragon, Draper University Ventures, ePlanet Capital, Gotham Ventures, SpeedUPAfrica, Threshold, VenturesLab, Zone Ventures: Draper Associates is an early-stage venture capital firm that invests in industry-transforming companies.
Andrew Tang
Partner of Draper Associates
Andrew Tang joined the Power Assure Board of Directors in 2011. He is a Managing Director of ABB Technology Ventures (ATV). Andrew has over 15 years of operating, R&D, investment banking and investing experience in the IT industry and focuses on clean technology and industrial applications. Prior to joining ATV, he was a founding Managing Director of the DFJ DragonFund China, Draper Fisher Jurvetson’s sole China affiliate venture capital fund. Andrew has led and managed investments in Miartech, Mobim, Yeepay, Broadbus (MOT), Imago Scientific, Zettacom (IDTI), Packet Video, NuTool (ASMI), Santur, and Corrent. Most recently, he was a partner and member of the investment committee at Infineon Ventures. Prior to Infineon Ventures, he was an investment banker with Credit Suisse First Boston’s technology group in Palo Alto. He worked on the Magma IPO (LAVA), as well as numerous M&A transactions. Before CSFB, Andrew was a senior engineer and marketing manager at Intel Corporation where he was responsible for chip design and market enablement for the Pentium and Itanium processors. He also holds one US patent for silicon germanium thin-film transistor applications. Andrew holds an MBA from the Wharton School, as well as MSEE and BSEE degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and University of Texas at Austin, respectively.
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About Draper Associates, Draper Dragon, Draper University, Draper University Ventures: Draper Associates is an early-stage venture capital firm that invests in industry-transforming companies.
Garry Tan
Managing Partner of Initialized Capital
Garry is a designer, engineer, and founder turned early stage investor, co-founding Initialized Capital in 2012. The firm has invested at the earliest stages of companies like Coinbase, Flexport, Instacart, and Cruise. Prior to Initialized, Garry spent nearly 5 years as a partner at Y Combinator, advising and funding more than 1,000 companies and founders. He was co-founder of YC-backed blog platform Posterous (acquired by Twitter in 2012) and previously worked at Palantir as a founding member of the engineering team. He also designed Palantir’s logo. Garry holds a BS in Computer Systems Engineering from Stanford University.
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About Initialized Capital, SapientNitro: Initialized Capital is an early-stage VC firm focused on helping software engineers and designers with their first seed checks.
Alda Leu Dennis
General Partner of Initialized Capital
Alda is a General Partner at Initialized Capital. She brings over a decade of investing and legal experience to both Initialized and our portfolio companies. Prior to joining Initialized, she was a managing partner at 137 Ventures where she led investments in Planet Labs, Wish, Coupang, CourseHero, and Work Market (acquired by ADP). Additionally, she made personal early-stage investments in companies such as Maven, Common Networks, Legalzoom (acquired by Permira), SpaceX, and Osaro. Previously she was COO at Airtime, General Counsel at Founders Fund, Assistant General Counsel at Peter Thiel’s Clarium Capital Management, and practiced as a litigator for IP disputes at WSGR. She graduated from Stanford with BAs in economics and political science, and a JD from UCLA.
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About Initialized Capital: Initialized Capital is an early-stage VC firm focused on helping software engineers and designers with their first seed checks.
Kim-Mai Cutler
Partner of Initialized Capital
Kim-Mai Cutler is a partner at Initialized Capital, an early-stage venture firm that has roughly $500M under management and has been a seed investor in companies including Coinbase, Instacart and Patreon. Before that, she was a journalist for more than 10 years, working at publications including TechCrunch, Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal.
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About Initialized Capital: Initialized Capital is an early-stage VC firm focused on helping software engineers and designers with their first seed checks.
Brett Gibson
General Partner of Initialized Capital
Brett brings a career of shipping software to venture. He co-founded the blog platforms Posthaven and Posterous (acquired by Twitter) and later wrote software for Y Combinator, building their essential internal software systems. He was also a founder of the social news platform Slinkset, which was funded by YC in Summer 2008, and DrawHere, a browser drawing startup acquired by DeviantArt in 2006. He graduated with a BA in philosophy from University of California, Santa Barbara.
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About Initialized Capital: Initialized Capital is an early-stage VC firm focused on helping software engineers and designers with their first seed checks.
Lisa Maki
Vice President, Strategic Partnerships, Health Next of Microsoft
Vice President, Strategic Partnerships, Health Next at Microsoft.
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About Microsoft: Microsoft is a software corporation that develops, manufactures, licenses, supports, and sells a range of software products and services.
Anila Baseel
Sr. Partner Programs Manager of Microsoft
Responsible for driving horizontal and industry scenarios through Partner-to-Partner (P2P) Go-to-Market engine, including P2P Collaborative Platform optimizing through existing and new partnerships. Over 15 years of specialized experience across multiple marketing organizations including Field Marketing, Lead Generation, Account Base Marketing, Strategic Account Management, Small Business Marketing, Channel Programs, User Groups and Alliances.
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About Microsoft: Microsoft is a software corporation that develops, manufactures, licenses, supports, and sells a range of software products and services.
Lauren Holland
WW Partner Marketing Advisor of Microsoft
Lauren Holland is a Partner Marketing Advisor in Worldwide OCP dedicated to driving Go-To-Market strategies with select global channel partners. Her current mission is to guide partners to differentiate with innovative “better together” solutions and launch offers in market in the GTM “fast lane.” With 7+ years in the technology industry and Microsoft partner ecosystem, Lauren has built and implemented global programs for accelerated growth and scale. Her experience spans across Microsoft’s three clouds- Modern Workplace, Azure, and Dynamics- with disciplines including Go-To-Market strategy, enablement, integrated digital, content, and creative ideation. Lauren is from Corona del Mar, CA, graduated from Duke University, and is currently working with global indirect provider partners around the world.
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About Microsoft: Microsoft is a software corporation that develops, manufactures, licenses, supports, and sells a range of software products and services.
Steve Sullivan
Partner & General Manager, Mixed Reality Capture Studios of Microsoft
Steve Sullivan serves as a Partner and General Manager of Mixed Reality Capture Studios at Microsoft.
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About Microsoft: Microsoft is a software corporation that develops, manufactures, licenses, supports, and sells a range of software products and services.
Steven Abrahams
Partnerships for Teams in Education, Healthcare, Financial Services and Government. of Microsoft
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About Microsoft: Microsoft is a software corporation that develops, manufactures, licenses, supports, and sells a range of software products and services.
Scott Mauvais
Director, AI and Global Partnerships, Microsoft Philanthropies of Microsoft
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About Microsoft: Microsoft is a software corporation that develops, manufactures, licenses, supports, and sells a range of software products and services.
Richard Borenstein
Senior Vice President of Strategic Partnerships of MURAL
Richard Borenstein is the SVP of Strategic Partnerships at MURAL, a digital workspace for visual collaboration. He has over 25 years of experience in technology and is responsible for accelerating MURAL’s revenue growth and market penetration, forming deep, integrated partnerships with enterprise brands, and leading a highly skilled sales team bringing visual collaboration to the enterprise collaboration toolkit. A SaaS veteran with a passion for recruiting and team building, Richard has built an extensive, worldwide executive network and has a proven track record of creating mutually beneficial, long-term partnerships. He recently served as Chief Revenue Officer at Highfive (acquired by Dialpad), where he led the sales, marketing, and customer success teams. Previously, he held sales management positions at RingCentral, Zong (acquired by PayPal), Baynote Inc., and Airborne Entertainment (acquired by Cybird). He is based in the San Francisco Bay Area and holds a bachelor’s degree from McGill University.
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About MURAL: MURAL is a digital workspace that provides a visual collaboration platform that enables teams to work remotely and efficiently.
Sherrick Murdoff
Vice President, Partner Investments of Salesforce
Sherrick Murdoff is the Board Observer of AllCloud.
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About Salesforce, Salesforce: Salesforce is a global cloud computing company that develops CRM solutions and provides business software on a subscription basis.
Elizabeth Maxson Martinet
Sr. Director, Strategic Technology Partnerships of Salesforce
Elizabeth Maxson is a Senior Director on the Strategic Technology Partnerships team at Salesforce. As a marketing veteran with over 13 years of experience, Elizabeth leads strategy for the top technology partners with specific focus on the Salesforce & Google relationship. Prior to joining the Strategic Technology Partnerships’ team, Elizabeth spent four years in Salesforce Corporate Marketing with focus ranging from strategic events to corporate messaging and content. Elizabeth is passionate about story telling and bringing technology to life through creating engaging experiences.
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About Salesforce: Salesforce is a global cloud computing company that develops CRM solutions and provides business software on a subscription basis.
Kegan Kinser
Business Development & Partnerships of Crunchbase
Kegan Kinser has been working in business development, partnerships, sales and customer success at Crunchbase since February 2019.
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About Crunchbase: Crunchbase provides intelligent prospecting software powered by live company data.
Karen Ding
Revenue Partner Manager of Crunchbase
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About Crunchbase: Crunchbase provides intelligent prospecting software powered by live company data.
Anna Kohnen
Strategy & Partnerships of Crunchbase
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About Crunchbase: Crunchbase provides intelligent prospecting software powered by live company data.
Steve Jang
Founder & Managing Partner of Kindred Ventures
Steve Jang is a venture capital investor and technology entrepreneur. Based in San Francisco, Steve serves as founder and a managing partner of Kindred Ventures. As a generalist early stage venture fund, Kindred’s mission is to invest in brilliant and dedicated founders at the earliest stages of building their startup and, ultimately, our collective future. Over the past 12 years, Steve has backed over 100 companies across different theme areas, including Uber, Coinbase, Postmates, Tonal, Color Health, Zymergen, and Blue Bottle Coffee. Since 2009 and up until IPO, Steve has also served as an Advisor to Uber since the founding of the company, up through initial product launch, global expansion, and then IPO. Steve also serves as an Advisor at Expa, a startup studio based in SF and NY, mentoring startup teams on product development, team building, and company growth. Most recently as an entrepreneur, Steve served as co-founder of Bitski, a digital wallet and storefront service for NFTs. Previously, he was co-founder/CEO of SoundTracking, a popular mobile music service that was Apple’s Best iPhone Music App of 2011 and was acquired by Rhapsody in 2014. Prior to these startups, in 2005, he was the co-creator and founding team member of the world’s first and largest on-demand music streaming service which reached over 100 million monthly unique users before its eventual acquisition by MySpace. //Investment Theme Areas of Interest// * Online Marketplaces * Decentralized Systems and Crypto * ClimateTech & Sustainable Systems * Digital Health and Wellness * FinTech * Social Consumer Media * Developer/Creator Tools * Future of Work * Software-enabled Hardware //Representative Portfolio Companies Include// Marketplaces/Market Networks: Uber (IPO), Postmates (acq. by Uber), Poshmark (IPO), StyleSeat, Italic, Reserve (acq. by Resy), Drip (acq. Kickstarter), GrandSt (acq. by Etsy), RangeMe (acq. by ECRM) Decentralized Systems & Crypto: Coinbase, dYdX, Zora, CoinTracker, Mina Protocol, Bitski, Computable, Nervos Network, Origin Protocol, Harbor, Radar Relay, Set Protocol, Messari, Rarebits Health & Wellness: Tonal, Color Health, Heartbeat Health, Forward, Enso, Breathometer Sustainable Systems/Climate Tech: Zymergen, Linear Labs, Replenysh, Mootral, Connora Systems FinTech & LegalTech: Atrium, Bloom Credit, Coinbase, Catch Benefits Developer/Creator Tools: Red Planet Labs, Northflank, Optic, Anjuna Future of Work: Bravado, Torch, Braintrust, Fountain, Catch Food Innovation & CPG: Taika, Blue Bottle Coffee, Fort Point Beer Consumer/Social Media: Clubhouse Frontier Tech: Humane
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About Bitski, Kindred Ventures: Kindred Ventures is a seed-stage venture capital fund that supports startup companies.
Kanyi Maqubela
Managing Partner of Kindred Ventures
Kanyi is a Managing Partner at Kindred Ventures, an early stage venture fund investing in mission-driven technology companies at the earliest stages. Previously, he served as a Partner at Collaborative Fund. Kanyi is a co-founder at Heartbeat Health, and previously ran growth at One Block Off the Grid (acquired by $NRG) and was an early employee at Doostang (acquired by Universum Global). Kanyi has also served as a Lecturer and Adjunct at New York University Tisch School of the Arts, a curriculum adapted from his time in undergrad at Stanford University, where he studied Philosophy.
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About Kindred Ventures: Kindred Ventures is a seed-stage venture capital fund that supports startup companies.
Carina Namih
Partner of Episode 1
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About Creative Destruction Lab (CDL), Episode 1: Episode1 Ventures is a venture capital fund set up to invest in early-stage technology companies based in London, UK.
Salil Deshpande
General Partner&Founder of Uncorrelated Ventures
Salil focuses on early-stage infrastructure software, open source, and crypto. Over the last 13 years he has invested $350M into 52 companies including MuleSoft, DynaTrace, DataStax, Tealium, Lending Club, Buddy Media, SpringSource, Redis Labs, SysDig, Frame, Basis, Compound, Jambool, Dropcam, Lightbend, Hazelcast, Groovy & Grails, Gradle, Sonatype, ZeroTurnaround, Chef, and Philz Coffee. Salil was on the Forbes Midas List of top 100 venture capitalists in 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018, and on the CB Insights list of The 100 Top Venture Capitalists in 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018.
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About Uncorrelated Ventures: Uncorrelated Ventures invests in infrastructure software.
Matt Ocko
Co-Managing Partner and Co-Founder of DCVC
Matt has nearly three decades of experience as a technology entrepreneur, operating executive and venture capitalist, with over 20 patents granted or pending in areas as diverse as hardware systems and social games. He still reads C++ code but admits to occasional struggles with Erlang. Matt is a cofounder of Data Collective, a venture fund with a unique team of experienced venture capitalists, technology entrepreneurs and practicing engineers, investing together in seed and early stage Big Data and IT infrastructure companies. During his venture capital tenure, he has invested in and/or helped grow a variety of companies including XenSource (CTRX), Zynga (ZNGA), Impermium, Verisign (VRSN), Facebook (FB), Virtuata (CSCO), Akimbi Systems (VMW), Cotendo (AKAM), Tango.me, MetaWeb (GOOG), FlashSoft (SNDK), DataMirror (IBM), UltraDNS (NSR), Kenshoo, Metamarkets, Fortinet (FTNT), SupportSoft (SPRT), Alantro (TXN), CouchBase, Spool (FB), BranchOut, On-Ramp Wireless, and many others.
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About AngelList, Archimedes Capital, DCVC, Uber: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
James Hardiman
Partner of DCVC
James has more than five years of experience advising both Fortune 50 and pre-revenue healthcare and biotech companies on their sales and marketing strategy. Previously, he was a consultant at ZS Associates where he advised management teams using insights gained from the analysis of large amounts of healthcare data. Most recently, while at Booth, James worked with technology executives during a stint in The Blackstone Group’s M&A Advisory Practice. James holds a BS in Engineering Physics from the University Of California, Berkeley, and an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School Of Business.
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About DCVC: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
John Hamer
Managing Partner of DCVC
John is a Managing Partner at DCVC Bio. Prior to DCVC Bio, John was an Investment Director for Monsanto Growth Ventures. Monsanto is a leading global, agricultural company providing products to growers worldwide. Monsanto Growth Ventures, through investment and partnership encourages entrepreneurs, and innovative start-up companies, to take on the challenge of a more sustainable future for world food production. John Hamer’s career spans more than three decades of research, senior management and investment experience in the life sciences. Prior to joining Monsanto, he was Entrepreneur-in-Residence and later Managing Director and General Partner at Burrill & Company, a San Francisco-based life sciences merchant bank with activities in venture capital, merchant banking and media. John Hamer led investments in numerous of Ag-related start-ups in the U.S., Europe, Asia and the Middle East. Prior to joining Burrill, John Hamer was the CSO and later CEO of Paradigm Genetics/ICORIA, a leading genomics and ag-biotechnology company that completed its IPO on NASDAQ in 2000 and was later acquired by Monsanto. John Hamer received his Ph.D. in Microbiology from the University of California at Davis and was a Visiting Scientist in Dupont’s Central Research & Development Group. He later joined Purdue University and rose to the rank of full Professor and was the recipient of several national awards including the David Lucille Packard Award, and The National Science Foundation Presidential Faculty Fellowship. At Purdue, John Hamer’s research focused on crop diseases, where he pioneered molecular approaches to disease management and control and worked with numerous international agencies in China, the Philippines and South America. John Hamer lectures widely on innovation, agriculture and venture capital and is a member of the Board of Trustees for the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT), and serves on the Board of Directors for Golden Pine Ventures, a microVC fund in RTP, North Carolina. He is a passionate believer in new growth opportunities that are emerging in the agricultural value chain in food, health, energy, materials and chemicals.
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About DCVC: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
Alan Cohen
Partner of DCVC
Alan Cohen Is The Partner at DCVC.
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About DCVC, Evolv Technology: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
Bruno Bowden
Equity Partner of DCVC
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About DCVC, MUrgency: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
Michael Driscoll
Founding Partner of DCVC
Mike Driscoll founded Metamarkets in 2010 after spending more than a decade developing data analytics solutions for online retail, life sciences, digital media, insurance, and banking. Prior to Metamarkets, Mike successfully founded and sold two companies: Dataspora, a life science analytics company, and CustomInk, an early pioneer in customized apparel. He began his career as a software engineer for the Human Genome Project. Mike holds an A.B. in Government from Harvard and a Ph.D. in Bioinformatics from Boston University.
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About DCVC, Metamarkets, Rill Data: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
Armen A. Vidian
Partner of DCVC
For the entire length of his career, Armen has worked at the intersection of data and decision-making, primarily in Product Marketing roles. He has a long track record of successfully launching first-in-class products globally and accessing new markets. Armen has an M.S. in Management Science from Stanford University, and an S.B. in Applied Mechanical Engineering with a Minor in French Language and Literature from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He also advises numerous technology startups in the San Francisco Bay Area.
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About DCVC: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
Kiersten Stead
Managing Partner – DCVC Bio of DCVC
Kiersten is a Managing Partner at DCVC Bio. Prior to DCVC Bio, Kiersten was an Investment Director at Monsanto Growth Ventures (MGV), the Venture Capital arm of Monsanto, which was one of the most active investors globally in agriculture. Kiersten has over 15 years of experience in Biotechnology. Prior to joining MGV, Kiersten worked at Burrill & Company, which invested broadly in Life Sciences and Industrial Biotechnology. Kiersten is a co-founder and Director of Pairwise, is on the Board of Atomwise, Farmlead, Plant Response Biotech, VitalFields (acquired), Understory Weather and Blue River Technology (acquired). She is also a member of the Investment Committee of Genome Canada GAAP, The Keystone Symposia Scientific Advisory Board, and the EULC, a sport-not-for-profit.
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About DCVC: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
Zachary Bogue
Co-Managing Partner and Co-Founder of DCVC
Zack has over a decade of experience in Silicon Valley as an entrepreneur, lawyer, angel investor and advisor for big data startups. Zack is a cofounder of Data Collective, a venture fund with a unique team of experienced venture capitalists, technology entrepreneurs and practicing engineers, investing together in seed and early stage Big Data and IT infrastructure companies. Zack also is a cofounder and managing partner of Founders Den, a shared workspace for experienced technology entrepreneurs. He was previously an associate at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati and a law partner at Virtual Law Partners, where he worked with numerous start-ups and their founders, and developed expertise in technology law and Silicon Valley business practices.
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About aWhere, Cask, Citus Data, Cotendo, DCVC, Founders Den, Montara Capital Partners, Square, The World Economic Forum, Uber: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
Chris Boshuizen
Operating Partner of DCVC
Dr. Chris Boshuizen is an Operating Partner at DCVC.
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About DCVC: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
Gloria Lau
Equity Partner of DCVC
Gloria Lau joined Alpha Medical as Cofounder/CEO in 2017.Gloria Lau is the cofounder of Unity Medical, which brings AI to healthcare for improved clinical workflow. Previously, she headed up data products at Linkedin, and was VP of Data at Timeful which was acquired by Google. She is also a consulting faculty at Stanford.
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About Alpha Medical, AV8 Ventures, DCVC: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
Ali Tamaseb
Partner of DCVC
Ali Tamaseb is a partner at Data Collective (DCVC), a highly reputable early-stage venture capital firm in Silicon Valley with about $2 billion under management. He holds several leadership and board positions at companies across the U.S. and globally. Prior to becoming a venture capitalist, Ali was a successful entrepreneur. He holds a degree in Biomedical Engineering from Imperial College London and studied General Management at Stanford Graduate School of Business. Ali was an honoree of the British Alumni Award of 2018 by the British Council, and Imperial College President’s Medal for Outstanding Achievement. Ali and his work has been featured in BBC, Guardian, Forbes, The Telegraph, among others, and he has given talks and appeared on panels at major events and conferences, including two TEDx talks. He lives in San Francisco Bay Area.
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About DCVC: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
Kelly Chen
Partner of DCVC
Kelly’s interest has always been how to use data and optimization to push boundaries, faster. From her career running a fixed income trading desk to building out a new quant product line for a global investment bank, she has focused closely on building the best models, structuring, and sales teams to optimize outcomes. At DCVC, she enjoys working on problems arising from fundamental population and labor driven shifts. She spends the majority of her time in hardware, where she believes we will see a massive transformation in the next 5-10 years. She is especially excited about teams building revolutionary tech in AI, robotics, manufacturing, and future of work. Kelly received a joint BS/MS in Financial Engineering and Operations Research with honors from Columbia University and an MBA in Entrepreneurial Management from Wharton, where she served as President of the Entrepreneurship Club.
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About Creative Destruction Lab (CDL), DCVC: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
Todd Papaioannou
Equity Partner of DCVC
Todd Papaioannou is one of the co-founders of portfolio company Continuuity, a result of his tenure as an Entrepreneur in Residence at Battery, where he worked alongside the Enterprise IT investment team to evaluate investments in Big Data, Analytics, and Cloud Computing infrastructure. Todd has more than 15 years of Internet and Enterprise software experience covering a variety of senior leadership roles in R&D, product and corporate strategy, marketing and professional services. Prior to joining Battery, Todd was most recently VP, Distinguished Fellow and Chief Cloud Architect for Yahoo!. There, he was responsible for driving the technical and strategic direction of the Yahoo! Cloud and Hadoop teams, and was identified as one of the Top 10 Cloud Computing Leaders of 2011 by TechTarget. Additionally, Todd was responsible for leading and defining the overall Yahoo! corporate technology strategy. Prior to Yahoo!, Todd held a series of increasingly senior leadership roles at Teradata including CTO, Client Software and VP, Architecture and Emerging Technologies. Over the course of five years he was responsible for transforming the Teradata client software portfolio, conceiving and launching the overall Teradata Enterprise Analytics Cloud computing program, and played an instrumental role in evolving Teradata’s corporate product and M&A strategy. Earlier in his career, Todd was an early employee at Greenplum Inc. (formerly Metapa Inc.) serving as Chief Architect and Director of Engineering, where he initially built and led the early Engineering team before running the Field Services group. Before that, Todd was Co-Founder and CEO of DALi, Inc, an early stage distributed social gaming company. Todd holds a PhD in artificial intelligence and distributed systems.
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About DCVC: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
Spencer Punter
Partner, COO and CFO of DCVC
Spencer has over two decades of experience in Silicon Valley, starting as an investment banker and then becoming a venture capitalist, an entrepreneur, a manager of a venture capital fund of funds, and eventually a CFO/COO of venture-backed enterprise SaaS companies. He brings this diverse skill set to Data Collective where, as COO, he works on the internal operations of the firm and, as an operating partner, he assists the current portfolio with fund raising, FP&A, and M&A. Immediately prior to joining Data Collective, he was COO/CFO of Appcelerator, the maker of the leading cross-platform mobile application development suite, which was acquired by Axway. He has worked in various roles from Associate to General Partner at firms such as Morgan Stanley, Integral Capital Partners, Bowman Capital, Bay Partners, and Capital Dynamics.
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About DCVC: DCVC backs entrepreneurs using Deep Tech to solve problems and multiply the benefits of capitalism for everyone while reducing its cost.
Andrew Gershfeld
General Partner of Flint Capital
Andrew Gershfeld is the General Partner at Flint Capital.
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About Flint Capital, Job Today, Kauffman Fellows: Flint Capital is an international venture capital fund investing in technology-driven companies.
Dmitry Smirnov
General Partner of Flint Capital
General Partner at Flint Capital investment fund
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About Flint Capital: Flint Capital is an international venture capital fund investing in technology-driven companies.
Jenny Lefcourt
General Partner of Freestyle
Jenny Lefcourt is a General Partner at Freestyle. Jenny earned her B.S. in economics from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, and attended the Stanford Graduate School of Business. In 1998 she left Stanford to found Wedding Channel.com (sold: XOXO). In 2003 she co-founded Bella Pictures (sold: CPI). In 2014 Jenny joined Freestyle, and was promoted to GP in 2015. Some of Jenny’s notable investments include BetterUp, Crexi, Daily.co, Embark, Ridwell, Narvar and WELL Health. She is also a founding member and board member of All Raise. Jenny is an angel investor in Discord, MainStreetHub and Minted.
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About All Raise, BetterUp, Crexi, Discord, Freestyle, Narvar, Well Health: Freestyle is a venture capital firm that focuses on early-stage technology companies.
David Samuel
Founding General Partner of Freestyle
David Samuel is an experienced executive, serial entrepreneur, and Internet pioneer in software & media. Today, Dave is co-founder of Freestyle Capital, an early-stage Internet & technology venture capital firm, with investments in over 66 companies. Prior to Freestyle, Dave co-founded Crackle.com in 2004 (acquired by Sony Pictures Entertainment for $65 million in 2006) and founded Spinner.com in 1996 (acquired by AOL for $320 million in 1999). Dave graduated from MIT with a degree in Electrical Engineering, is an SF Giants fan, enjoys both wake boarding and snowboarding, and lives in Marin with his 4 children.
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About Freestyle, Toi Labs: Freestyle is a venture capital firm that focuses on early-stage technology companies.
Adam D’Augelli
Partner of True Ventures
Adam is a partner at True Ventures. He previously worked with True portfolio company B-Stock, an online marketplace for liquidating excess inventory, and initially joined the True Ventures team as an analyst in 2010. Adam graduated magna cum laude from the University of Florida with a bachelor’s degree in science and a master’s degree in finance. As an undergraduate, he launched and ran an independent, donation-based record label and later created “Digital Frontiers,” a course exploring how the internet and technology are changing the global business landscape, which he taught at the University of Florida. He shares his thoughts on his blog, Life in Beta.
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About HashiCorp, True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Adam D’Augelli
Partner of True Ventures
Adam is a partner at True Ventures. He previously worked with True portfolio company B-Stock, an online marketplace for liquidating excess inventory, and initially joined the True Ventures team as an analyst in 2010. Adam graduated magna cum laude from the University of Florida with a bachelor’s degree in science and a master’s degree in finance. As an undergraduate, he launched and ran an independent, donation-based record label and later created “Digital Frontiers,” a course exploring how the internet and technology are changing the global business landscape, which he taught at the University of Florida. He shares his thoughts on his blog, Life in Beta.
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About HashiCorp, True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Toni Schneider
Partner of True Ventures
Toni is a partner at True Ventures. From 2006-2014, he was CEO of True portfolio company Automattic, where he helped WordPress.com become a top 10 global internet destination with close to a billion monthly visitors. His career in technology began during his software engineering days at Crystal River Engineering where he built 3D audio simulators for NASA. Later, he was the vice president of technology at Aureal Semiconductor (acquired by Creative Labs). He originally joined the startup ecosystem when he co-founded Uplister, a venture-backed music recommendation startup. However, it was his CEO role at Oddpost that impacted his career path most significantly. Yahoo acquired Oddpost in 2004, forming the basis of Yahoo Mail, which was then used by more than 250 million people around the world. When Toni joined Yahoo’s executive ranks, he created the Yahoo Developer Network. After joining True and while still leading the team at Automattic, he started blog search engine Sphere (acquired by AOL) with now fellow True partner Tony Conrad. Voted Startup CEO of the Year at the Crunchies, Toni’s leadership style is commended by many of those who have worked for and with him. When he’s not running a company or advising another, you can find him in his VW van exploring the U.S. with his family, coaching San Francisco Little League baseball, or tinkering with old cars.
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About True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Toni Schneider
Partner of True Ventures
Toni is a partner at True Ventures. From 2006-2014, he was CEO of True portfolio company Automattic, where he helped WordPress.com become a top 10 global internet destination with close to a billion monthly visitors. His career in technology began during his software engineering days at Crystal River Engineering where he built 3D audio simulators for NASA. Later, he was the vice president of technology at Aureal Semiconductor (acquired by Creative Labs). He originally joined the startup ecosystem when he co-founded Uplister, a venture-backed music recommendation startup. However, it was his CEO role at Oddpost that impacted his career path most significantly. Yahoo acquired Oddpost in 2004, forming the basis of Yahoo Mail, which was then used by more than 250 million people around the world. When Toni joined Yahoo’s executive ranks, he created the Yahoo Developer Network. After joining True and while still leading the team at Automattic, he started blog search engine Sphere (acquired by AOL) with now fellow True partner Tony Conrad. Voted Startup CEO of the Year at the Crunchies, Toni’s leadership style is commended by many of those who have worked for and with him. When he’s not running a company or advising another, you can find him in his VW van exploring the U.S. with his family, coaching San Francisco Little League baseball, or tinkering with old cars.
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About True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Om Malik
Partner of True Ventures
Journalist Om Malik founded technology blog Gigaom in 2001. With seed funding from True Ventures, he turned the one-man blog into a media company and research firm. Not long thereafter, Om became a venture partner at True Ventures. In 2014, he graduated to partner at True where he continues to invest in promising networking and internet infrastructure technologies. Om regularly writes for The New Yorker and provides commentary on tech trends to broadcast channels including Bloomberg West, NPR, and BBC television and radio. Om started writing about tech in the early 1990s at Quick Nikkei News before joining the founding team at Forbes.com. After a short stint at H&Q Asia Pacific as an investment manager, he then returned to the media world as a senior writer for Red Herring and later at Business 2.0. He published his first book, Broadbandits: Inside the $750 Billion Telecom Heist, in 2003. Born and raised in New Delhi, he is now happily situated in Northern California. He holds a bachelor’s degree from St. Stephen’s College where he graduated with honors. His grandfather once told him, “Do not bank money. Bank people.” This advice remains core to Om as he considers new opportunities.
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About Gigaom, True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Om Malik
Partner of True Ventures
Journalist Om Malik founded technology blog Gigaom in 2001. With seed funding from True Ventures, he turned the one-man blog into a media company and research firm. Not long thereafter, Om became a venture partner at True Ventures. In 2014, he graduated to partner at True where he continues to invest in promising networking and internet infrastructure technologies. Om regularly writes for The New Yorker and provides commentary on tech trends to broadcast channels including Bloomberg West, NPR, and BBC television and radio. Om started writing about tech in the early 1990s at Quick Nikkei News before joining the founding team at Forbes.com. After a short stint at H&Q Asia Pacific as an investment manager, he then returned to the media world as a senior writer for Red Herring and later at Business 2.0. He published his first book, Broadbandits: Inside the $750 Billion Telecom Heist, in 2003. Born and raised in New Delhi, he is now happily situated in Northern California. He holds a bachelor’s degree from St. Stephen’s College where he graduated with honors. His grandfather once told him, “Do not bank money. Bank people.” This advice remains core to Om as he considers new opportunities.
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About Gigaom, True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Jon Callaghan
Co-Founder and Managing Partner of True Ventures
Jon is an early stage venture capitalist and co-founder of True Ventures. He has been in the venture capital business since 1991 and built three companies of his own. His first was Mountain Bike Outfitters, Inc., which he created at age 18. Jon started his venture career as an associate at Summit Partners and then joined Greenhouse, AOL’s venture capital investment group and incubator. He entered the internet market early by joining CMGI’s @Ventures group in 1996. Before founding True, Jon was a managing director at Globespan Capital Partners. First as a founder and now as an investor in early-stage technology companies, Jon’s direct startup experience has allowed him to see the world through an entrepreneur’s eyes. Jon’s career has been driven by a deep belief in the power of human creativity to improve our world. Jon received a bachelor’s degree in government from Dartmouth College and an MBA, with distinction, from Harvard Business School. He was recently the Chairman of the National Venture Capital Association. When he is not empowering the entrepreneurs of tomorrow, you can find him talking about airplanes or hanging out with his wife and four boys.
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About NexPrise Corporation, True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Jon Callaghan
Co-Founder and Managing Partner of True Ventures
Jon is an early stage venture capitalist and co-founder of True Ventures. He has been in the venture capital business since 1991 and built three companies of his own. His first was Mountain Bike Outfitters, Inc., which he created at age 18. Jon started his venture career as an associate at Summit Partners and then joined Greenhouse, AOL’s venture capital investment group and incubator. He entered the internet market early by joining CMGI’s @Ventures group in 1996. Before founding True, Jon was a managing director at Globespan Capital Partners. First as a founder and now as an investor in early-stage technology companies, Jon’s direct startup experience has allowed him to see the world through an entrepreneur’s eyes. Jon’s career has been driven by a deep belief in the power of human creativity to improve our world. Jon received a bachelor’s degree in government from Dartmouth College and an MBA, with distinction, from Harvard Business School. He was recently the Chairman of the National Venture Capital Association. When he is not empowering the entrepreneurs of tomorrow, you can find him talking about airplanes or hanging out with his wife and four boys.
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About NexPrise Corporation, True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Jeffrey Veen
Design Partner and Head of Platform of True Ventures
In Jeff’s role as design partner, he helps the True portfolio create better products and advises early stage founders on how to leverage design thinking as they lay the groundwork for their companies. Jeff was the vice president of design at Adobe after they acquired Typekit, the company he co-founded and ran as CEO. Jeff was one of the founding partners of the user experience consulting group Adaptive Path. While there, he led Measure Map, which was acquired by Google. During his time at Google, he redesigned Google Analytics and led the UX team for Google’s apps. Much earlier, Jeff was part of the founding web team at Wired Magazine, where he helped build HotWired, Web Monkey, Wired News, and more. He’s authored two books, HotWired Style and The Art and Science of Web Design. When not working with the True team or recording his design-focused podcast, Presentable, Jeff enjoys time with his partner and three energetic children.
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About True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Jeffrey Veen
Design Partner and Head of Platform of True Ventures
In Jeff’s role as design partner, he helps the True portfolio create better products and advises early stage founders on how to leverage design thinking as they lay the groundwork for their companies. Jeff was the vice president of design at Adobe after they acquired Typekit, the company he co-founded and ran as CEO. Jeff was one of the founding partners of the user experience consulting group Adaptive Path. While there, he led Measure Map, which was acquired by Google. During his time at Google, he redesigned Google Analytics and led the UX team for Google’s apps. Much earlier, Jeff was part of the founding web team at Wired Magazine, where he helped build HotWired, Web Monkey, Wired News, and more. He’s authored two books, HotWired Style and The Art and Science of Web Design. When not working with the True team or recording his design-focused podcast, Presentable, Jeff enjoys time with his partner and three energetic children.
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About True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Puneet Agarwal
Partner of True Ventures
Puneet Agarwal is a Partner at True Ventures.
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About True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Puneet Agarwal
Partner of True Ventures
Puneet Agarwal is a Partner at True Ventures.
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About True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Tony Conrad
Partner of True Ventures
Having founded about.me and Sphere (both acquired by AOL), Tony brings founder and startup leadership expertise to his partner role at True. Early in his career, Tony spent a decade abroad in India, France, and Indonesia with Groupe Danone where he focused on brand extension opportunities through mergers and acquisitions in North America, Europe, and Southeast Asia. Tony grew up in a small Indiana farming community. He’s worked a lot of jobs not listed on his resume, including short stints as a baseball umpire, basketball camp counselor, pharmacy stock person, high school sports reporter, book bindery glue machine operator, janitor, college newspaper ad salesman, and yogurt merchandiser, to name a few. When he is not seeking out new opportunities for investment, you can find him communicating en français, making drip coffee, traveling, or getting lucky with his enviable good parking karma. He holds a bachelor’s degree in telecommunications and a minor in business from Indiana University. He is also a proud board member of the Tony Hawk Foundation.
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About about.me, HODINKEE, PullString, Quarterly, True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Tony Conrad
Partner of True Ventures
Having founded about.me and Sphere (both acquired by AOL), Tony brings founder and startup leadership expertise to his partner role at True. Early in his career, Tony spent a decade abroad in India, France, and Indonesia with Groupe Danone where he focused on brand extension opportunities through mergers and acquisitions in North America, Europe, and Southeast Asia. Tony grew up in a small Indiana farming community. He’s worked a lot of jobs not listed on his resume, including short stints as a baseball umpire, basketball camp counselor, pharmacy stock person, high school sports reporter, book bindery glue machine operator, janitor, college newspaper ad salesman, and yogurt merchandiser, to name a few. When he is not seeking out new opportunities for investment, you can find him communicating en français, making drip coffee, traveling, or getting lucky with his enviable good parking karma. He holds a bachelor’s degree in telecommunications and a minor in business from Indiana University. He is also a proud board member of the Tony Hawk Foundation.
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About about.me, HODINKEE, PullString, Quarterly, True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Rohit Sharma
Partner of True Ventures
Rohit Sharma is a partner at True Ventures. He began his career as founder and CTO of ONI Systems, which pioneered the use of optical switching and real-time signal processing technologies in optical networks. ONI Systems was acquired by Ciena, where Rohit served as SVP and CTO of Metro Networks Group. Rohit holds a bachelor’s degree in electronics and communications engineering from India’s National Institute of Technology, Kurukshetra. He also holds Master of Science and Doctor of Philosophy degrees in electrical engineering from University of Alberta, Canada, where he endowed a professorship in digital communications in 2004. In 2013, he was awarded an honorary Doctorate of Science by the President of India at NITK’s 50th anniversary convocation. Rohit is fascinated by many aspects of innovation and technology. He believes all rabbit holes, especially across technology and society, are worth exploring. He is also a keen student of the many ways in which startups evolve into thriving companies. Rohit firmly believes that the “people part” of a startup is just as, if not more, critical to a company’s success than the technology piece of the business.
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About True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Rohit Sharma
Partner of True Ventures
Rohit Sharma is a partner at True Ventures. He began his career as founder and CTO of ONI Systems, which pioneered the use of optical switching and real-time signal processing technologies in optical networks. ONI Systems was acquired by Ciena, where Rohit served as SVP and CTO of Metro Networks Group. Rohit holds a bachelor’s degree in electronics and communications engineering from India’s National Institute of Technology, Kurukshetra. He also holds Master of Science and Doctor of Philosophy degrees in electrical engineering from University of Alberta, Canada, where he endowed a professorship in digital communications in 2004. In 2013, he was awarded an honorary Doctorate of Science by the President of India at NITK’s 50th anniversary convocation. Rohit is fascinated by many aspects of innovation and technology. He believes all rabbit holes, especially across technology and society, are worth exploring. He is also a keen student of the many ways in which startups evolve into thriving companies. Rohit firmly believes that the “people part” of a startup is just as, if not more, critical to a company’s success than the technology piece of the business.
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About True Ventures: True Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups.
Bobby Yazdani
Founder & Partner of Cota Capital
Bobby Yazdani is a Founder and Managing Partner at Cota Capital. Bobby works full-time on the development and support of entrepreneurs through Cota Capital and was ranked #1 out of 2000 angel investors for successful follow-on funding by CB Insights in 2014. Bobby founded Saba in 1997, taking the company public in 2000. Saba was the pioneer in learning management and talent management systems addressing all aspects of acquiring, developing, and retaining talent serving over 30 million users within 2,000 enterprise customers across 195 countries and in 37 languages worldwide. Prior to Saba, Bobby served in various R&D roles at Oracle. Since making his first investment in Masimo Corporation (NASDAQ: MASI) in 1989, Bobby has successfully mentored entrepreneurs and invested in more than 100 early-stage companies, including: Aardvark (acquired by Google), AddThis (acquired by Oracle), Addepar, Atheer Labs, Baarzo (acquired by Google), Berkeley Lights, Bina Technologies (acquired by Roche), Bioniz, Blueprint Genetics (acquired by Quest Diagnostics), Bonobos (acquired by Walmart), Bossa Nova, Clear Labs, CleverSense (acquired by Google), CloudLending (acquired by Q2 Holdings), Dropbox (NASDAQ: DBX), FundersClub, Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), Greensmith Energy (acquired by Wartsila (HEL: WRT1V)), Guardant Health (NASDAQ: GH), Gusto (formerly ZenPayroll), InstaEdu (acquired by Chegg), Klout (acquired by Lithium Technologies), Mission Bio, Movandi, NextBio (acquired by Illumina), OpenGov, PassBan (acquired by EMC/RSA), Purigen Biosystems, Qwiki (acquired by Yahoo!), RecVue, Rollbar, Roostify, Salesforce (NYSE: CRM), Smartfrog Canary Group, SoundHound, SweetGreen, ThinkBig Analytics (acquired by Teradata), Tubi (acquired by Fox Corp), Uber (NYSE: UBER), Webs.com (acquired by VistaPrint), Zymergen, and more. Bobby has a B.A. in Applied Mathematics from the University of California, Berkeley.
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About Compliance.ai, Cota Capital, Signatures Capital, Signatures Capital: Cota Capital is an SEC-registered multi-stage investment firm focused on private and public enterprise technology companies.
Albert Azout
Partner of Cota Capital
Albert Azout is a Partner at Cota Capital and a Managing Director in Cota Ventures II. Albert is responsible for sourcing and managing Cota’s private portfolio with a specific focus on infrastructure, workflow automation, software developer life cycle, and big data/analytics. Prior to Cota, Albert served as a Senior Product Manager for data science and ad optimization at AOL. Out of his family office, Patagonia Capital, Albert has made several direct investments, including unicorns such as Hippo Insurance and Oak North. His direct investments include several exits, such as: Qwiki (acquired by Yahoo!), Uber (NYSE: UBER), Bina Technologies (acquired by Roche), and DeepScale (acquired by Tesla). Previously, Albert sold his company, Velos, to AOL/Verizon in 2015. Prior to Velos, Albert founded StyleCaster Media Group, a premier style destination that delivers a daily forecast of need-to-know fashion, beauty, entertainment, and lifestyle intel for millions of consumers on web and mobile. StyleCaster was purchased by Great Hill Partners and rolled into SheKnows Media, and subsequently acquired by Penske Media Corporation. Prior to StyleCaster, Albert co-founded Sub Rosa, a brand strategy and design agency based in New York. Albert started his career in 2001 at Lehman Brothers in New York, where he was a software engineer in the analytics group within private client services. Albert has a B.A. in Finance and Economics from Babson College.
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About Cota Capital, Hii Def Inc., Level Ventures, Level Ventures, velos: Cota Capital is an SEC-registered multi-stage investment firm focused on private and public enterprise technology companies.
Ashkan Marsh
Partner & Director of Research of Cota Capital
Ashkan Marsh joined Cota in 2019 as a Principal, where he focuses on sourcing, evaluating, and monitoring of public investments. Prior to Cota, Ashkan was an Investment Partner at Crimson Investment Partners making private equity investments in founder-led companies to accelerate growth through digital transformation and corporate processes. Prior to CIP, Ashkan was a public equity Investment Analyst at Newbrook Capital, a $1+ billion long/short equity fund. Previously, Ashkan was an Investment Analyst and Investment Associate at Goldman Sachs in private equity at the firm’s Special Situations Group, a $25 billion proprietary investment fund. Ashkan was Founder and CEO of SilverIP Communications, which became the leading gigabit internet service provider in Illinois and exited to private equity. Ashkan received a B.S. in Finance from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and is a graduate of Harvard Business School.
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About Cota Capital: Cota Capital is an SEC-registered multi-stage investment firm focused on private and public enterprise technology companies.
Babak Poushanchi
Founder & Managing Partner of Cota Capital
Babak Poushanchi is a Founder and Managing Partner at Cota Capital. Babak is responsible for leading public investing activities across the Firm’s funds. As Portfolio Manager of the Cota Growth Fund, he is directly responsible for the management of the investment team covering sourcing, evaluation, and portfolio/risk management of the Firm’s public investments. Babak also serves on the Firm’s Investment Committee, overseeing investments across its private and public portfolios. Babak and Bobby Yazdani founded Cota Capital in 2015. Leveraging Bobby’s early stage investing and operational expertise, and Babak’s late stage and public investing expertise, Cota was designed to invest across all the stages of the lifecycle of a company. Their investment platform is built around the desire to create a research and knowledge platform, and to deploy their own capital into the multi-decade theme of the digital transformation of the enterprise technology stack. Prior to Cota, Babak served as Co-Founder and Co-Portfolio Manager of Newbrook Capital, a global equity long/short fund focused on public investments across the technology, media, consumer, and industrial sectors. Babak was also a Venture Partner at Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator, a leading technology accelerator based in New York. Previously, Babak was on the investment teams at Karsch Capital, a global equity long/short fund focused on public investments across all sectors, and Indosuez Capital, a leading middle market merchant banking group focused on equity and debt private investments across the capital structure and a broad range of sectors. Babak has a B.A. in Economics from Northwestern University.
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About Cota Capital, Fanatic Sports Corp.: Cota Capital is an SEC-registered multi-stage investment firm focused on private and public enterprise technology companies.
Pete Williams
Partner & COO of Cota Capital
Pete Williams is a Partner, COO, and CCO at Cota Capital. Pete is responsible for overseeing the Firm’s operations, finance, legal, and compliance matters. Pete also serves on the Firm’s Investment Committee. Leveraging his operational, financial, and legal experience from serving as a public SaaS company CFO and as a Corporate Finance Partner at a preeminent law firm, Pete is involved in structuring and negotiating the Firm’s private company investments as well as providing operating support to portfolio company executive teams. Prior to Cota, Pete served in a number of executive positions at Saba, including CFO, EVP of Corporate Development, and General Counsel. Previously, Pete was a Partner at Morrison & Foerster LLP, a leading international law firm. Pete has extensive experience representing entrepreneurs and technology companies as well as venture capital and investment banking firms on venture financings, public offerings, and M&A transactions. In addition to private and public financings and acquisitions, Pete specialized in intellectual property development, licensing, and distribution transactions. During his tenure at Morrison & Foerster LLP, Pete was recognized as one of the top 20 lawyers under 40 in the state of California. Pete has a B.A. in Economics and Psychology from the University of California, Los Angeles and a J.D. from Santa Clara University.
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About Cota Capital: Cota Capital is an SEC-registered multi-stage investment firm focused on private and public enterprise technology companies.
Dovi Frances
Founding Partner of Group 11
Dovi Frances is a financial services entrepreneur and the founding partner of Group 11 (f.k.a. SGVC), a venture capital firm based in Los Angeles, California. Over the course of his career, Dovi has invested over $500 million in some of Silicon Valley’s most prominent and disruptive financial technology companies, including TripActions, Next Insurance, Papaya Global, Addepar, Tipalti, Homelight, Sunbit, EquityBee, and Lili to name a few. Prior to launching Group 11 in 2012, Frances worked for nearly a decade in the financial services industry; having managed an independent financial advisory firm, as well as having served as Vice President at Deutsche Bank AG Private Bank (NYSE: DB). Frances currently serves on the Board of Tipalti, Homelight, Papaya Global, Sunbit, EquityBee, Lili, Venn, Masterschool, Sorbet, SMBX, Insurights, and Fintastic. He is also an Advisor to TripActions and Addepar, a member of the Advisory Council of Leumi Bank U.S., and serves on the Steering Committee of the Israel Collaboration Network (ICON). Frances earned an MBA from UCLA Anderson School of Business and a BA in Management and Psychology from Ben-Gurion University.
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About Group 11: Group 11 is a venture capital firm focused on financial technology companies.
Devon Morris
Partner of Group 11
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About Group 11: Group 11 is a venture capital firm focused on financial technology companies.
Alex Salazar
Partner of Neotribe Ventures
Alex Salazar Before starting Stormpath, Alex was a senior sales executive at IBM where he managed $30M+ accounts at ESPN, Viacom, Bloomberg, NBC/Universal, and Government. Prior to IBM, Alex was an enterprise software developer. He has a BS in Computer Science from Georgia Tech and an MBA from Stanford.
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About Neotribe Ventures: Neotribe Ventures is an early stage-venture capital firm which invests in breakthrough technologies that stretch the imagination.
Tarek Waked
Founding Partner of Type One Ventures
Founding Partner @ Type One Ventures. Investing in Anything progressing humanity towards a Type One Civlization. Searching for Humanity’s Longevity Escape Velocity. Space Enthusiast and Futurist. History Buff. Obsessed with improving each new iteration of myself.
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About Type One Ventures: Type One Ventures invests in anything progressing humanity towards a Type One Civilization. Space, robotics, fin-tech, and frontier tech.
Mike DeLaet
Senior Vice President, Strategic Partnerships of Scopely
Mike DeLaet is currently the SVP of Strategic Partnerships at Scopely. Prior to Scopely, Mike was the Founder & CEO of Rogue Games, Inc. based in Los Angeles. Prior to Rogue, he was the SVP of WW BD & Licensing at Kabam and SVP of Global Publishing at Glu Mobile.
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About Scopely: Scopely is a global leader in interactive entertainment and mobile-first video games.
Sangeeta Walsh
Director of Partner/Platform and Analytics Product Marketing of RingCentral
Sangeeta Walsh is the director of partner and platform and analytics product marketing at RingCentral.
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About RingCentral: RingCentral, a global distributor of cloud-unified communications and collaboration solutions, offers its users with technology services.
David Silverman
Partner of Crosslink Capital
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About Crosslink Capital: Crosslink Capital partners with founders that are market disrupters and category creators typically at the Seed-Series A stage.
Eric Chin
Partner of Crosslink Capital
Eric joined Crosslink Capital in 2010. He focuses on Internet, Software, and Cloud Infrastructure companies. In addition, Eric leads the Crosslink Capital Seed Program. Eric brings over 20 years of experience as a successful entrepreneur and venture investor. Prior to Crosslink, Eric was a Partner at Artiman Ventures and Bay Partners focusing on Internet & Software investments, some of which include Opsource (NTT), Invensense (INVN), InterAct and Dropcam. Eric’s startup experience includes co-founding the Internet server software company WebSpective (INKT), and co-founding TelASIC Communications (MTI). In addition, his operating experience includes business development at Mainspring (IBM) and at MILCOM (Military Commercial Technologies) where he focused on finding and commercializing next generation technologies out of the military, aerospace and Defense Labs. Eric is co-founder and president of alpha, the entrepreneurial networking club for more than 500 Founders and CEOs. Eric Chin holds a Bachelor of Arts from Dartmouth College and an MBA degree from Harvard Business School.
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About Crosslink Capital: Crosslink Capital partners with founders that are market disrupters and category creators typically at the Seed-Series A stage.
Phil Boyer
Partner of Crosslink Capital
Phil joined Crosslink in 2014 and focuses on investments in enterprise applications, infrastructure, vertical software, and frontier technology. Phil brings over a decade of experience as a technology investor with deep sector expertise within enterprise and vertical software (AI, cloud, developer tools, SaaS, security). He is passionate about serving as a partner with early-stage founding teams, with an eye towards helping strong technical teams build category-defining companies. At Crosslink, Phil’s investments include Armory, Descartes Labs, Iron Ox, Molekule, Verodin (FEYE), Weave, and Yotascale, among other companies. Prior to Crosslink, Phil was an investor with NYC-based venture capital firm Tenfore Holdings, with early investments in Optoro and Trulioo during his tenure. Before beginning his venture capital career, Phil wrote and published research on the technology sector at Credit Suisse and RBC, where he covered companies such as Google, Amazon, LinkedIn, eBay, Priceline, Yelp, and many others.
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About Crosslink Capital: Crosslink Capital partners with founders that are market disrupters and category creators typically at the Seed-Series A stage.
Matt Bigge
Partner of Crosslink Capital
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About Aliro Technologies, Crosslink Capital, Strategic Social, Yotascale: Crosslink Capital partners with founders that are market disrupters and category creators typically at the Seed-Series A stage.
Michael Stark
Founder & General Partner of Crosslink Capital
Michael co-founded Crosslink Capital. He oversees all the Firm’s investment activities. Michael also serves as Portfolio Manager for the Partners and Emerging Growth Long/Short funds and all of the Firm’s Crossover Funds. Michael joined Robertson Stephens in 1983 where he served as Director of Research and equity analyst covering the semiconductor and software industries. Prior to that he was at Intel Corporation.
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About Crosslink Capital, Northwestern University, University of Michigan: Crosslink Capital partners with founders that are market disrupters and category creators typically at the Seed-Series A stage.
McLain Southworth
Partner of Crosslink Capital
McLain joined Crosslink in 2017 and focuses on Internet, Financial Technology, and Software as a Service. McLain has 12 years of experience working with early stage technology companies as an entrepreneur, leader and investor. Prior to Crosslink, McLain was an early employee at Currenex which was acquired by State Street Bank (STT) in 2007. After the acquisition, McLain worked in State Street’s e-Exchange group, which oversaw all financial technology-related innovations and initiatives within the bank.
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About Crosslink Capital: Crosslink Capital partners with founders that are market disrupters and category creators typically at the Seed-Series A stage.
Gary Hromadko
Venture Partner of Crosslink Capital
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About Crosslink Capital, Crosslink Capital: Crosslink Capital partners with founders that are market disrupters and category creators typically at the Seed-Series A stage.
Maureen Offer
Partner and Chief Financial Officer of Crosslink Capital
Maureen has been with Crosslink since 2005. As Controller Maureen is responsible for the preparation of both fund and investment level financial statements, performance reporting and Crosslink Capital, Inc. accounting. Maureen joined Crosslink as a Venture Fund Accountant. In her years at Crosslink, Maureen has acquired in-depth knowledge of Crosslink’s public and private funds and investors. Prior to joining Crosslink, Maureen was a Finance Associate with Wells Fargo Financial.
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About Crosslink Capital, Wells Fargo Financial: Crosslink Capital partners with founders that are market disrupters and category creators typically at the Seed-Series A stage.
Tom Bliska
General Partner of Crosslink Capital
Tom is a portfolio manager for the Firm’s public equity investing activities. In addition, he focuses on investments in the Communication Services & Infrastructure sector. Tom joined Crosslink in 1999. From 1992-98, Tom was a technology portfolio manager at West Highland Capital, a $700 million Bay Area hedge fund. Prior to that, he was with Emerging Growth Management, a small-cap hedge fund manager. He spent two years in investment banking with Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette and five years in equity research and institutional sales at Robertson Stephens.
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About Crosslink Capital: Crosslink Capital partners with founders that are market disrupters and category creators typically at the Seed-Series A stage.
Tetsuya Nakamura
Partner Solutions Architect of Amazon Web Services
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About Amazon Web Services: Amazon Web Services provides information technology infrastructure services to businesses in the form of web services.
Scott Irwin
Founder, Partner of Camber Partners
Scott Irwin is the General Partner at Rembrandt Venture Partners.
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About Camber Partners, Rembrandt Venture Partners: Camber Partners believes modern software companies should be architected for mass distribution.
Sanjay Katyal
Global Vice President, Business Development and Partner Sales, Integrated Systems Business Unit of VMware
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About Druva, VMware: VMware is a software company providing cloud and virtualization services that powers complex digital infrastructure.
Matthew Weiner
Director, Technology Partner Engagement Services of VMware
Matthew Weiner is an 8 year veteran at VMware and the leader of the Technology Alliance Partner program (TAP), the VMware PKS Solution Competency and the Master Services Competency – Cloud Native.
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About VMware: VMware is a software company providing cloud and virtualization services that powers complex digital infrastructure.
Marcus Phipps
Director, Partner Go-to-Market and Sales Acceleration of VMware
Marcus Phipps serves as director of partner sales acceleration at VMware.
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About VMware: VMware is a software company providing cloud and virtualization services that powers complex digital infrastructure.
Alain Debost
Director, Global Partner Development Funds of VMware
Alain Debost is the Director of World-Wide Development Funds at VMware. He is a seasoned technology leader with over 25 years of experience in global IT companies in Finance, Marketing, Go-To-Market, Partner Sales roles to bring disruptive products and solutions, both hardware and software, and Programs to market.
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About VMware: VMware is a software company providing cloud and virtualization services that powers complex digital infrastructure.
Frances Wong
Cloud Partner Solution Architect of VMware
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About VMware: VMware is a software company providing cloud and virtualization services that powers complex digital infrastructure.
Kendra DeCoste
Director, Global Partner Marketing of VMware
Kendra DeCoste serves as director of global partner marketing at VMware.
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About VMware: VMware is a software company providing cloud and virtualization services that powers complex digital infrastructure.
Kendra DeCoste
Director, Global Partner Marketing of VMware
Kendra DeCoste serves as director of global partner marketing at VMware.
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About VMware: VMware is a software company providing cloud and virtualization services that powers complex digital infrastructure.
Bob Goldsand
Senior Staff Partner Enterprise Architect of VMware
Bob Goldsand is a senior staff partner enterprise architect at VMware.
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About VMware: VMware is a software company providing cloud and virtualization services that powers complex digital infrastructure.
Sri Chandrasekar
Partner of Point72 Ventures
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About Point72 Ventures: Point72 Ventures is an every-stage global VC fund focused on fintech, deep tech, and enterprise investments led by Steven A. Cohen.
Scott Barclay
Partner of Point72 Ventures
Scott Barclay joined Point72 Ventures as Partner in 2020. Scott is a Silicon Valley innovator and angel investor with a passion for clinical analytics to power the next generation of healthcare tools and service models that drive better outcomes and lower costs. Scott is a hypothesis-driven innovator with an interest in new service models of care, new forms of interoperability, the acceleration of “omics” to the front-lines of care, and opportunities to better address elder care and all forms of mental and behavioral health. Recently, Scott lead strategy, innovation, and product for Surescripts, the nation’s e-Prescribing network, and before that led eHealth for CVS Caremark where he also ran iScribe, a successful mobile e-Prescribing company. Previously, Scott worked for the Boston Consulting Group, Banc of America Securities, and graduated with an MBA from Insead and a bachelor of arts in history from the University of Virginia.
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About Point72 Ventures, StartX (Stanford-StartX Fund): Point72 Ventures is an every-stage global VC fund focused on fintech, deep tech, and enterprise investments led by Steven A. Cohen.
Adam Carson
Operating Partner of Point72 Ventures
As part of the Global Technology Strategy & Partnerships Team, Adam is focused on assisting with digital strategy and facilitating strategic and emerging technology relationships. Areas where he is currently focused include digital customer experience, digital marketing, digital payments, partnerships with Digital companies and engagement with the FinTech ecosystem. Adam joined JPMC in 2012 from eBay, where he led strategy and business development on the Global Shipping Team. Prior to eBay, Adam worked with Bain & Company as a Consultant focused on the internet and ecommerce sector. Adam started his career as an investment banker with Morgan Stanley and transitioned into a technology role leading the firm’s internet strategy. Adam has an MBA from Tuck School of Business where he was a Tuck Scholar and a Center for Digital Strategies Fellow, and a B.S.E. in mechanical engineering from Duke University.
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About Point72 Ventures: Point72 Ventures is an every-stage global VC fund focused on fintech, deep tech, and enterprise investments led by Steven A. Cohen.
Daniel Gwak
Partner of Point72 Ventures
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About Point72 Ventures: Point72 Ventures is an every-stage global VC fund focused on fintech, deep tech, and enterprise investments led by Steven A. Cohen.
Dave Matter
Operating Partner, FinTech Ventures of Point72 Ventures
Dave Matter is an Operating Partner on Point72 Ventures’ FinTech team, supporting investment activities and portfolio companies in financial services technology. He is based in San Francisco. Prior to joining Point72 Ventures, Dave was the Chief Product Officer at Marqeta, a global payment card issuing platform, where he helped lead the product and business as it grew into a multi-billion dollar company serving some of the best brands in the world. Previously, Dave held product and technology leadership roles in investments and mortgages with Citadel Investment Group and Quicken Loans as well as digital banking pioneer ING Direct. Dave is originally from Minneapolis, Minnesota and enjoys snowboarding, golfing, and cooking. He studied Business Computer Information Systems at St. Cloud State University.
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About Point72 Ventures: Point72 Ventures is an every-stage global VC fund focused on fintech, deep tech, and enterprise investments led by Steven A. Cohen.
Kevin Berardinelli
Operating Partner of Point72 Ventures
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About Point72 Ventures: Point72 Ventures is an every-stage global VC fund focused on fintech, deep tech, and enterprise investments led by Steven A. Cohen.
Noah Carr
Partner of Point72 Ventures
Noah joined Bain Capital Ventures in 2013 and focuses on venture and growth-stage opportunities in software. He enjoys working with passionate entrepreneurs to help grow their companies. Prior to joining Bain Capital Ventures, Noah was an analyst in the Technology Investment Banking Group at Deutsche Bank focused on helping software companies raise capital and explore strategic alternatives. During Noah’s time at Deutsche Bank he worked closely with the Eloqua, Bazaarvoice and Tangoe management teams on their IPOs. Noah graduated from Hamilton College with degrees in Computer Science and Economics. While at Hamilton, he was an active leader for the campus outing club and competed in C4 canoe races in the Adirondacks. Noah also spent a semester backpacking on New Zealand’s South Island. An avid hiker and photographer, Noah has brought back thousands of photographs from multi-week backpacking trips in Alaska, Norway, New Zealand, Costa Rica, and on Baffin Island.
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About Point72 Ventures: Point72 Ventures is an every-stage global VC fund focused on fintech, deep tech, and enterprise investments led by Steven A. Cohen.
Bobby Lent
Managing General Partner of Hillsven Capital
Bobby Lent is the Managing Partner at Hillsven.
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About Cyhawk Ventures, Hillsven Capital, Livefyre, Threadbox: Hillsven Capital is a seed-stage venture capital firm focused on startups based in Silicon Valley and Israel.
Boris Putanec
Managing Partner of Hillsven Capital
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About Hillsven Capital: Hillsven Capital is a seed-stage venture capital firm focused on startups based in Silicon Valley and Israel.
Scott Coleman
Partner of Ignition Partners
Scott joined Ignition as Business Development Partner to help our portfolio companies identify and win customers and partners on a global scale. Scott has spent 20 years working at the intersection of technology and finance and has worked with startups and large companies on partnerships, go-to-market, acquisitions, and investments. Scott’s prior roles have placed him at the forefront of how software-defined infrastructure, devops, advanced analytics, cyber, and digital transformation are changing our notion of the tech stack and how enterprises source and consumer solutions. Prior to joining Ignition, Scott led Microsoft Startup Growth Partners, was responsible for Microsoft’s global accelerator program and brought together colleagues across the company to drive engagement and partnership with the start-up and venture capital ecosystem. Before Microsoft, Scott led the Technology Innovation Portfolio team at Bank of America. The team’s mission was finding innovative solutions to emerging business and technology opportunities by partnering with the technology community, including venture capital firms, and their portfolio companies. Prior to Bank of America, Scott ran Technology Business Development at Morgan Stanley where his responsibilities included technology strategy and partnering with the banking and equities businesses to drive revenue for the Firm. In this role, Scott created a structured innovation practice that cultivated relationships with VCs, technology entrepreneurs, CEOs, CTOs and other leaders at both large and small technology companies. Prior to his role in Technology Business Development, Scott spent 10 years in equity research at Morgan Stanley, covering the networking and communications equipment sector, and before that Scott ran finance at Covista, a publicly-traded telecom company.
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About Ignition Partners: Ignition Partners is a venture capital firm dedicated to helping the best entrepreneurs seize opportunity.
