The Venture Codex

Participated · Series B · Jun 2026

Forage builds modern payment infrastructure to enable retailers and platforms to accept government benefits such as SNAP, WIC, HSA, and FSA, and operates a consumer app that lets low-income families check EBT balances, discover savings, and earn rewards. Its payments technology is live at over 100,000 stores across all 50 states and is used by national retailers like Dollar General, Gopuff, and Save A Lot, as well as online platforms including DoorDash and Uber Eats. The company says it has facilitated tens of millions of grocery orders for millions of American families and grew payments volume 13x over the last year. Forage launched its consumer app in late 2025, which has been downloaded over 100,000 times, and the company aims to reach one million low-income families via the app by the end of 2026. The firm positions itself as the only USDA-approved third-party payment processor that combines modern software with dedicated service to help retailers through authorization and launch. Forage is based in San Francisco.

Participated · Equity · Mar 2026

Cart.com provides an end-to-end commerce enablement platform that lets brands such as TOMS Shoes, PacSun, and Janie and Jack sell across digital and omnichannel channels while outsourcing fulfillment, supply-chain operations, and customer experience. Its offering blends enterprise software, predictive analytics, and agentic AI with a scaled U.S. warehouse and logistics infrastructure, giving merchants one system of record from checkout to delivery. The company plans to deepen workflow automation, expand its AI capabilities to autonomously route inventory and reduce shipping times, and continue building out its national fulfillment footprint. Fresh capital will also be directed toward advancing proprietary software and improving operational efficiency. Cart.com emphasizes a path to sustainable, profitable growth rather than purely top-line expansion. Although the company has not disclosed revenue or user metrics, management highlights demonstrable ROI for enterprise customers. Headquartered in Houston, Texas, Cart.com views itself as a category-defining commerce and fulfillment platform.

Participated · Series A · Feb 2026

Founded in 2021 and headquartered in Bengaluru, Xflow offers a payments infrastructure platform that lets exporters, SaaS firms, freelancers, and other businesses embed cross-border money movement into their own products through APIs. The startup allows customers to collect payments from more than 100 countries in over 25 currencies, manage FX conversion, and settle funds in India with greater transparency than traditional banks. In 2023, Xflow processed nearly $1 billion in annualized cross-border payment volume, a roughly 10-fold increase from the prior year. Its customer base has grown to about 15,000 businesses, ranging from global capability centers handling $1–2 million transactions to freelancers averaging $3,000. The company has introduced an AI-driven foreign-exchange tool that lets finance teams set limit-order–style targets and claims 92 % forecasting confidence over a three-day window. Xflow has received final RBI authorization for a Payment Aggregator–Cross Border license and already holds a payments license in Canada, with plans to secure further regulatory approvals in markets such as Singapore. The 65-person team intends to add import capabilities and build additional products on top of its core infrastructure.

Led · Seed · Feb 2026

EFEX offers a treasury and cross-border payments platform that lets mid-market businesses open multi-currency accounts, collect funds in local currency across 31 countries, and send transfers to more than 140 destinations. The service consolidates individual, bulk, and forward transfers under a single interface regulated by Mexico’s CNBV. In 2025 the company processed over US$1 billion in payment volume and achieved a six-fold increase in revenue, demonstrating strong traction ahead of its latest raise. Founded by Dimitri Zaninovich and Santiago Bustamante, EFEX maintains headquarters in both Mexico and the United States. The firm plans to channel new capital into integrating artificial intelligence across its operational infrastructure and accelerating growth along the high-volume Mexico-U.S. trade corridor. Near-term, EFEX aims to become Mexico’s default corporate treasury platform, while longer-term it intends to remove friction for internationally expanding firms in sectors such as automotive, manufacturing, and food and beverage.

Participated · Seed · Jan 2026

Pinch AI is an autonomous, AI-driven post-purchase intelligence platform built by former PayPal, Google, and Simility fraud leaders to give retailers a real-time defense against return abuse. The system evaluates shopper intent, detects emerging fraud patterns such as wardrobing and empty-boxing, and orchestrates dynamic return and refund decisions across checkout, return initiation, and warehouse operations. In early enterprise deployments, the software has reduced overall return rates by roughly 8%, lifted contribution margin by 10%, automated 80% of return reviews, and increased VIP customer retention by about 20%. These results convert returns from a cost center into a growth lever, helping apparel and luxury merchants combat return rates that often exceed 25%. With native Shopify integration and plans to broaden into OMS, RMS, WMS, and CX platforms, Pinch aims to serve as the retail industry’s definitive post-purchase risk operating system. The company will use its new capital to enhance abuse-prediction models, deepen warehouse intelligence, and expand go-to-market reach. Pinch AI is headquartered in San Francisco and operates with a team of seasoned risk and fraud professionals.