Participated · Series A · Dec 2016

Suiteness is a YC-backed marketplace that makes it easy for groups to book hotel suites. Its core product lets families, corporate executives, and celebration groups reserve large suites instead of connecting rooms so guests can each have private sleeping rooms and shared common space. The company has begun offering concierge services — such as VIP restaurant and club reservations — and hotels have started asking Suiteness to promote on-property deals through that channel, which could become a substantial secondary revenue source. Suiteness says Las Vegas is its most popular city and that a new customer signs up every four minutes. The company raised $5M in a Series A and will use the capital to continue geographic expansion. It announced plans to enter ten new cities by the end of 2017, starting with Orlando and including Chicago, San Francisco, Honolulu, Washington DC, Dallas, Austin, Boston, Phoenix and San Diego, with rollout order driven by member demand. Suiteness is an Oakland, CA-based travel site founded in 2014 that enables travelers to discover and book luxury hotel suites online. The platform currently provides access to more than 10,000 suites in Las Vegas across over 30 hotels, including Caesars Palace, The Cromwell and Rio. About half of those suites are available for direct online booking exclusively through Suiteness. The company is led by Robbie Bhathal and Kyle Killion. Suiteness plans to secure additional hotel partnerships and expand geographically, beginning service in Miami before the end of the year, followed by Los Angeles and New York. The recent funding is intended to support those partnership and expansion efforts.

Participated · Series A · Jun 2015

Zymergen develops biomanufacturing technologies to create novel biologically‑based chemicals and materials, including its Hyaline film. The company says the new capital will accelerate manufacturing of Hyaline, which it expects to see in commercial products as soon as next year. Zymergen has partnerships with Sumitomo and FMC to bring its biologically‑based chemicals to market. CEO Josh Hoffman framed the company’s mission as producing high‑performance products that reduce environmental impacts from manufacturing and transportation. The articles note current investors are returning and that Zymergen expects to raise additional capital in Q4 as part of its Series D. Zymergen designs and engineers microbes (yeast and bacteria) to create molecules and materials for a wide array of industries, from pharmaceuticals to flexible OLEDs. The company uses advanced computing, machine learning and robotics to accelerate discovery and reduce human error. It charges customers a subscription fee plus a share of the value created, and reports its partners have sold roughly $500 million worth of products made with Zymergen microbes in the last couple of years. Zymergen occupies a 301,000-square-foot campus in Emeryville, Calif., and has grown to about 600 employees. Leadership says the company is starting to see meaningful revenue and plans to invest in producing new products untethered to petroleum-based manufacturing. The firm positions its data and automation as difficult for competitors to replicate and faces peers such as Ginkgo Bioworks. Zymergen engineers genetically altered microbes to create new materials and to develop improved yeast strains for foods and fragrances. The company previously invested in automation, buying robots to scale microbe production during its last funding round. CEO Josh Hoffman said the new funding will be used to hire staff, add customers, and invest for the long term. Zymergen works with Fortune 500 companies and says its platform can materially improve the economics of large, mature businesses. The company raised $130 million in a Series B led by SoftBank to continue growth. Zymergen operates in a competitive space alongside firms such as Ginkgo Bioworks and Novozymes. Zymergen programs microbes to manufacture high-value chemicals and novel materials using biology-driven processes. The company combines robotic automation, proprietary machine learning software, and computer analytics to advance industrial microbiology. It engineers microbes to produce commercial molecules and offers these to several Fortune 100 companies. Zymergen emphasizes creating essential chemicals and novel materials from clean, renewable sources. The company was founded in 2013 by CEO Joshua Hoffman and is based in Emeryville, California. In June 2015 it completed a $44m Series A financing.

Participated · Seed · May 2013

Affirm provides point‑of‑sale financing that lets consumers buy now and pay over time with no hidden fees or late penalties. The company offers monthly payment plans and has introduced an interest‑free biweekly payment product for transactions as low as $50. Consumers can check eligibility in seconds without impacting their credit score or entering a Social Security number, and merchants can integrate Affirm in as little as an hour. Affirm says it serves more than 5.6 million U.S. and Canadian consumers and partners with over 6,000 merchants. Merchants using Affirm reported historically higher average order values and repeat purchase rates. Recent product and distribution moves include a Shopify partnership to power Shop Pay Installments and the launch of Affirm Savings. Affirm was founded by Max Levchin to offer honest, transparent point-of-sale financing that lets consumers pay for purchases in simple monthly payments with no hidden fees. The company partners with over 2,000 merchants and offers loans up to $15,000, with loans originated in partnership with Cross River Bank. Affirm reports millions of U.S. customers and a net promoter score above 83, and it recorded more than $2 billion in loan volume in 2018. Merchants using Affirm include Walmart, Warby Parker, Verizon Visible, David Yurman, and Room and Board. The company has been expanding its footprint (including a flagship office in Pittsburgh) and plans to use new funding to continue hiring top talent and further scale operations. To date, Affirm has raised over $800 million in equity funding. Affirm is a San Francisco-based consumer finance fintech that offers transparent point-of-sale installment loans that don’t charge compounding interest or late fees. Its platform settles with merchants within three business days, guarantees payments, and assumes repayment and fraud risk while its bank partner Cross River Bank makes the loans. Affirm reports a merchant network of more than 1,200 partners including Wayfair, Expedia, Goodyear, Motorola, DJI, Casper, and Cole Haan, and in April processed over 1 million consumer installment loans. The company launched an Affirm mobile app in October (available on iOS and Android) and plans to introduce new products and services beyond point-of-sale credit to become a broader financial app. Affirm says the new capital will be used to increase credit distribution capacity and grow its merchant footprint. Affirm is a fintech startup offering consumer point-of-sale financing that lets customers purchase goods and spread payments over time. The company issues short-term loans, typically ranging from $50 to several thousand, in partnership with Cross River Bank. Affirm keeps all loans on its balance sheet to demonstrate alignment with investors and to bear risk. It has tripled its transaction volume over the last year and declined to disclose default rates while saying they are strong. Founded in 2012 and led by CEO Max Levchin, the company has raised $525 million to date. The recent $100 million credit line from Morgan Stanley will support its existing financial products, while new product expansion would require additional debt from diversified institutional investors. Affirm is an alternative lending site founded by PayPal co-founder Max Levchin that provides fixed-rate loans for point-of-sale purchases. Its loans carry no late fees, no compound interest, and no revolving balance; the company sells some loans to third-party banks while retaining others on its own balance sheet. Affirm aims to expand its merchant network into more everyday retail, potentially partnering with big-box stores, to increase loan frequency beyond occasional big-ticket purchases. The company plans to develop services outside traditional financing—examples mentioned include money-management, budgeting tools, or other personal-finance products—to drive daily user engagement. Affirm will begin reporting positive and negative repayment data to major credit bureaus to help successful repayments translate into better credit for underserved users. Financially, the company raised a $100M all-equity Series D and has raised $420M in combined debt and equity to date.