Participated · Equity · Oct 2024

Daze is a freestyle messaging app that lets users craft multi-colored, social-media-style chats with photos, graphics, stickers, GIFs, drawings and decorated backgrounds. The product is already using AI to power some creative tools and the team plans to integrate deeper AI-based technology in the future. Built in React Native to launch simultaneously on iOS and Android, Daze aims to be feature‑complete and competitive with iMessage and WhatsApp while offering more creative expression. The app is prelaunch but has strong engagement signals: roughly 156,000 waitlist signups, about 48 million combined views across TikTok and Instagram (its top TikTok video has 8 million views), and ~1,400 invite-only beta users. A source familiar with tests said 60-day retention for people who have sent a message is over 50%. The small team (seven full-time, one part-time) is largely based in New York.

Participated · Seed · Aug 2024

Bee is a San Francisco-based startup led by Maria de Lourdes Zollo that is developing a life-admin wearable assistant. Its core product is a Bluetooth device about the size of an AirTag with a microphone that captures users’ daily life to perform tasks and make personalized suggestions. Bee also offers Apple Watch recording functionality and a cloud-based phone that can act across popular apps to perform actions with minimal guidance. The device learns preferences, habits, and priorities over time and Bees can communicate with each other to help manage relationships on users’ behalf. Bee uses signals such as location, time use, and voice characteristics to generate personalized reminders, appointments, and activity suggestions. The company plans a Fall 2024 launch and will use the funding to expand operations and development efforts. It raised $7M in seed funding to support those plans.

Participated · Seed · Jul 2024

Sekai is a French startup studio that creates interactive consumer entertainment experiences using official anime licenses, starting with Naruto. The company secured a global license (excluding Japan and China) from TV Tokyo/Shueisha to develop Naruto-branded mobile apps, digital collectibles, and real-life events or fan conventions. Sekai is actively developing and experimenting with its first mobile app, aiming for social, interactive experiences rather than a direct Pokémon Go clone. The team emphasizes hands-on control and validation with the IP holder while partnering with external experts for specific tasks. Sekai plans to roll out a new IP every year and does not want to be known solely for Naruto. The company has raised €10 million (≈$10.9M) from investors to fund its work.

Participated · Series A · Mar 2024

Lago provides a self-hosted, scalable and modular open-source billing platform designed for metering and usage-based billing across the lifecycle of SaaS and subscription companies. Its billing product includes an API for engineers and a user interface for business teams to automate subscriptions, usage computations, billing cycles, dates, currencies and more. The company raised $15M in a Series A round to expand operations and broaden its business reach. The Series A was led by FirstMark, with participation from Y Combinator, New Wave, Addition, Script and industry veterans Meghan Gill, Romain Huet, and Clément Delangue. FirstMark General Partner Matt Turck joined Lago’s board as part of the round. Lago previously raised a $7M round led by SignalFire.

Participated · Series A · Dec 2023

Mistral AI develops AI models and is expanding into infrastructure by building large-scale data centers for training and running advanced models. The company is constructing a facility in Bruyères-le-Châtel near Paris slated to be operational in Q2 2026 and has announced a second planned site in Sweden. Mistral aims to assemble a European compute network targeting 200 MW of capacity by the end of 2027. It will purchase roughly 13,800 advanced Nvidia chips with the recent financing. The company also supplies AI models and solutions to the French armed forces, positioning itself beyond pure model development into infrastructure and defense-related work. Financially, Mistral recently secured a €750M+ loan from a seven-bank consortium, its first significant borrowing from debt markets.