Participated · Seed · Oct 2025

PINC Technologies, a 2023 Caltech spin-out headquartered in Pasadena, CA, is building an integrated nonlinear photonics platform that makes high-performance light-based computing and communications practical at scale. Its chips and circuits target demanding use cases such as quantum information processing, next-generation data networks, biomedical sensing, and other industrial photonics systems. The company leverages research breakthroughs from the Caltech Nonlinear Photonics Laboratory to overcome long-standing scalability limits in nonlinear optics. Management plans to expand the engineering team, accelerate product development, and forge industrial collaborations to move the technology from lab prototypes to commercial deployment. PINC has raised a cumulative $6.8 million to fund these efforts, positioning the company to deliver critical enabling components for the emerging quantum and photonic ecosystems.

Participated · Seed · Mar 2025

Tera AI develops a spatial reasoning AI platform that provides visual navigation for robots using a pure-software, platform-agnostic approach. Its zero-shot navigation system is delivered via over-the-air software updates and works with any robot that has a pre-existing camera and a GPU. The technology targets applications including robotic manipulation, mobile robotics, and automated driving and emphasizes cognition-inspired spatial reasoning that generalizes to novel scenarios. Tera positions its product as a lower-cost alternative to expensive sensor suites (lidar, high-precision GPS, IMUs) by enabling existing cameras to handle positioning and navigation. The company has been testing its solution with key U.S. robotics players and sells primarily to robotic manufacturers seeking to expand autonomy across platforms and environments. Tera plans to deploy its initial solution on embedded devices this year and expand its technical team.

Participated · Seed · Nov 2024

Persperity Health develops a sweat-sensing technology platform aimed at improving continuous health monitoring with a focus on women's health. The platform is designed to deliver real-time, actionable insights into hormonal health, fertility, and menopause. The technology is exclusively licensed from Caltech and was developed by Dr. Wei Gao and Dr. Cui Ye. The company is led by co-founders CEO Shiv Shukla, Dr. Wei Gao, and Dr. Heather Lukas, with clinical collaborator Dr. Pauline Maki. Persperity intends to use the newly raised funds to accelerate development of its sweat-sensing technology. The company is based in Los Angeles, CA.