Participated · Series C · Oct 2018

Handshake is the career network for the AI economy. 20 million knowledge workers, 1,600 educational institutions, 1 million employers (including 100% of the Fortune 500), and every foundational AI lab trust Handshake to power career discovery, hiring, and upskilling, from freelance AI training gigs to first internships to full-time careers and beyond.

Participated · Series A · May 2017

Abundant Robotics builds autonomous apple-harvesting machines that identify and pick apples using a vacuum-based end effector to avoid bruising. The company has tested units in orchards across the U.S. and Australia and engineers work seasonally with growers to refine the systems. Its machines are designed to operate around the clock, including at night, and the team began collaborating with the apple industry about four years ago. Abundant says its technology could eventually be adapted to harvest other fruits. The company spun out of SRI International via SRI Ventures and is led by CEO and co-founder Dan Steere. Commercial deployment of field units is an explicit near-term goal following the new funding round.

Led · Seed · Jan 2017

Voodoo Manufacturing builds a software-driven factory that links many desktop 3D printers into a single, co-located production cluster to produce high-volume plastic parts. The team uses in-house software to control a 160-printer cluster, which the company says is the largest cluster in the U.S. and possibly the world. Voodoo focuses on everyday plastic parts rather than low-volume, high-value prototypes or industrial components. The company reports roughly 1,200 customers, including Mattell, VH1, and Microsoft. Voodoo spun out from MakerBot work and has been independent since May 2015. The team plans to expand the product and build massive factories that they say can speed up manufacturing by about 90%. Voodoo Manufacturing operates a Brooklyn-based rapid manufacturing system that uses desktop MakerBot 3D printers to produce and ship parts on demand. The team—four ex‑MakerBot employees—built a centralized server to run roughly 125–127 printers in tandem, automating job intake, printing, and fulfillment. The company has printed over 25,000 pieces for clients including Universal, Viacom, and Chipotle. It raised $300,000 to build its 3D printing shop and is currently profitable. Voodoo positions itself as a bridge between desktop 3D printing and overseas factories, targeting designers, innovators, and entrepreneurs who need small-scale manufacturing. Typical pricing examples in the article include a $40 mask, an $8 Pikachu, and a $12.50 prep fee per object.

Participated · Seed · Aug 2016

Wave builds virtual concert experiences that have featured artists such as John Legend and The Weeknd, offering immersive live events for artists and fans. The company has struck a partnership with Tencent Music Entertainment Group (TME) under which Tencent takes a minority stake. As part of the deal, TME will air Wave experiences across QQ Music, Kugou Music, Kuwo Music and WeSing and collaborate to integrate Wave into TME Live production. Wave plans to use the partnership to bring Western artists on virtual tours in China and to extend its virtual environments into Tencent’s gaming ecosystem. The collaboration also aims to unlock alternative revenue streams for artists—such as in-stream tipping, gifting and merchandising—which are more established in Asian live-streaming markets. Wave’s CEO Adam Arrigo described the move as a step toward enabling global virtual tours and deeper artist monetization through new modalities. Wave develops software and hardware to enable live, virtual reality concerts. The company is based in Los Angeles and is led by CEO Adam Arrigo. On June 10, 2020, Wave said it raised $30 million in a Series B funding round. The Series B was led by Maveron Ventures and Griffin Gaming Partners. The round also included angel investors Alex Rodriguez and Scooter Braun. The article does not disclose operating metrics, past rounds, or a founding year. TheWaveVR builds a persistent, festival‑style virtual reality music app where DJs perform live sets and users teleport around large, stylized venues. Its Wave Builder feature lets users import 3D models, animations and made‑in‑VR content to craft visual experiences that accompany performances. The company has pursued high‑profile activations — including a major SXSW Ready Player One VR concert featuring Warner Brothers IP and a live DJ set — to showcase the format. Leadership says product focus for the year is on how content is created and shared across the platform. TheWaveVR is maintaining a lean cost structure and aims to preserve cash to weather several more years of VR market development amid slower headset sales. Financially, the company completed a $6M Series A and has raised $10M in total to date. TheWaveVR operates a social VR platform that lets users view, host and socialize in virtual music shows worldwide. Music creators can customize how audiences experience performances, while fans can enjoy DJs, musicians and festivals and socialize with friends in VR. The company released a beta on Steam Early Access for PC. Led by CEO Adam Arrigo, TheWaveVR is using its product to connect music fans and creators in novel, immersive ways. The recent financing will be applied to continue expanding the company’s technology platform and capabilities. TheWaveVR builds a social VR platform that lets users experience live music performances together in immersive, customizable virtual venues. The product emphasizes real-time interaction between audience avatars and onstage artists, including gestures like raising a digital lighter and artist reactions. The company positions itself as a “musical metaverse,” enabling creators to alter venues from realistic nightclubs to fantastical spaces and to stage elaborate digital light shows. Early product-market fit is expected in EDM due to the prominence of visual light shows in performances. TheWaveVR envisions private concerts, jam sessions among friends, and shared attendance at major artists’ shows across the globe. The company, led by CEO Adam Arrigo, is six months old and based in Austin, and has begun public testing with events such as a “silent rave” at the VRLA conference in Los Angeles.

Participated · Equity · Jun 2016

Final ships a consumer credit product that generates disposable card numbers and merchant‑locked card numbers so consumers can use single‑use or site‑specific cards. The company’s iOS app creates a new card number for a purchase that stops working after the transaction, and merchant‑locked cards allow recurring charges only from a designated website. CEO Aaron Frank said the product is two years in the making and that the team built a consumer brand and a full‑stack issuing company from scratch. Final began welcoming its earliest customers and is operating a waiting list because demand currently outpaces supply. The article notes the company raised $9 million from investors including Runa Capital, KPCB Edge, Digital Garage, DRW and Y Combinator. The piece also frames Final as addressing U.S. credit‑card security gaps with a consumer‑facing patch rather than changes from banks. Final issues EMV (chip-and-PIN) credit cards that let consumers generate multiple unique numbers for individual merchants or one-time transactions via a web app, browser plugin, or mobile app. Users can set dollar limits, cancel specific numbers, and track accounts and subscriptions to contain fraud and manage merchant relationships. The founders conceived the product after being affected by the 2013 Target data breach and built the company to re-envision consumer payment interactions. Final was founded a year ago and says it has 37,000 consumers signed up on its waitlist ahead of a 2015 pilot program. The company is in discussions with financial institutions to partner on the card and technology. Its stated business model is to take a share of transactions and, at scale, a portion of the debt, though specific fee structures have not been finalized.