Venture with Grace

Andrew Brown, founder and CEO of Check, has built a career transforming industries through technology. After co-founding Oyster, the "Netflix for books" acquired by Google, Andrew turned his focus to solving payroll complexities for businesses. With Check, he created a payroll-as-a-service API that enables software platforms to integrate payroll seamlessly. Backed by investors like Stripe and Index Ventures, Andrew is redefining how businesses manage payroll while sharing insights from his entrepreneurial journey and expertise in building scalable platforms.Topics: Integrate payroll functionality directly into their existing softwarePerform all payroll-related tasks through the APIBuild custom user interfaces on top of Check's API#PayrollInnovation #FintechSolutions #EmbeddedPayroll #FutureOfWork

Jae Lee is the Co-Founder and CEO of Twelve Labs, a leading AI research and product company headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area with a significant presence in APAC, based in Seoul, South Korea. Under Jae’s leadership, Twelve Labs has pioneered groundbreaking advancements in multimodal neural network architecture, establishing itself as the world’s leader in video understanding AI. The company’s proprietary technology empowers enterprises and developers globally with transformative capabilities in video intelligence, powering critical video understanding use cases in industries like Media, Entertainment, Sports, Surveillance, and Government.Recognized for its innovation and impact, Twelve Labs has been featured on the prestigious CB Insights AI100 List for three consecutive years (2022-2024) and was named one of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies in 2023. Since its inception in 2021, Twelve Labs has secured $100 million in funding from a select group of top-tier investors, including New Enterprise Associates, Index Ventures, Nvidia, Intel, Samsung, Databricks, and Snowflake.Jae also serves on the board of the Republic of Korea Foundation Model Association, collaborating with influential leaders from South Korea's largest conglomerates, including Samsung, SK, and LG, to shape the future of AI. He holds a BSc in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from UC Berkeley.Topics: The future of video intelligenceMultimodal AI breakthroughsEnterprise video AI use cases#AI #VideoUnderstanding #TwelveLabs #Innovation #ArtificialIntelligence

Reed McGinley-Stempel is the co-founder and CEO of Stytch, an all-in-one platform for modern authentication, authorization, and fraud prevention. Their mission is to eliminate friction on the internet -- without compromising security. They offer solutions that are purpose-built for the needs of both consumer and B2B apps, including features like Google One-Tap & Biometrics to optimize conversions for B2C, and SSO, RBAC, and SCIM to meet the demands of enterprise customers for B2B SaaS. Before Stytch, Reed worked at Plaid, where he met his co-founder Julianna Lamb. They witnessed firsthand the endless frustration experienced by teams — engineers wasting valuable time building authentication solutions instead of focusing on their own product and users suffering the pain of clunky authentication experiences. He is also a proud Duke alum - go blue devils!Topics: The evolution of authenticationThe future of identity management and fraud preventionImpact of AI and machine learning on authentication and fraud prevention#Stytch #Authentication #Passwordless #FraudPrevention #CyberSecurity

Sam Toole is a Partner at Primary, where he spearheads new enterprise and healthcare investments. The Nantucket native and Hamilton alum was previously the GM of Physician Marketplace for Nomad Health, where he helped lead the company’s sales team from seed through a Series B. Sam’s entrepreneurial career started as the founder of ACK Surf, a surf school on the island of Nantucket, then continued with the creation of a DTC lifestyle clothing brand. Outside of work, Sam enjoys golfing, surfing, and snowboarding, and he hopes to one day live by the beach again.Topics:The evolution of digital healthEvaluating healthcare startupsThe role of AI in healthcare innovation#VentureCapital #HealthcareInvestments #DigitalHealth #HealthcareInnovation

9Alex Bangash is the Co-founder/ Managing Director of Transpose Platform. Transpose Platform investing in the future of venture—backing founders, funds, and platforms that shape the next generation of market leader. Topics: The Evolution of Venture CapitalThe Future of Fund StructuresBuilding Successful Venture Funds#venturecapital #ventureinvesting #transposeplatform #futureofvc

David Blumberg is the founder and managing partner of Blumberg Capital, which he established in 1991. Prior to Blumberg Capital, David managed international investments with the Bronfman Family Office (Claridge), Adler & Co. Venture Capital APAX Partners and at T. Rowe Price. He also launched business development for Check Point Software Technologies as one of its top four executives.David earned his A.B. in Government, cum laude, from Harvard College and his MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business and INSEAD. David speaks French and is proficient in Hebrew and Spanish. David serves as a member or observer on the boards of DataHeroes, Jassby, Kloudfuse, Mytaverse, Trulioo and Wunder Mobility.Topics:Enterprise Software EvolutionThe Art of Spotting IPO-Worthy CompaniesBuilding a Durable VC Firm#VentureCapital #DurableInvesting #BlumbergCapital #FounderSuccess #ExitStrategy

Jon Turow joined Madrona in 2022. As part of the investment team, Jon partners with founders who build products that customers love. He is interested in applied AI/ML, data infrastructure, financial infrastructure, and open-source business models.Jon is an experienced product leader with over a decade of experience in cloud computing. Most recently, Jon led the product teams for AWS Computer Vision AI services including Amazon Textract (AI for intelligent document processing) and before that Amazon Rekognition (highly accurate image and video analysis). He also wrote the original product and business plans for AWS IoT and AWS Greengrass, which extends AWS services to run locally on edge devices. Jon has launched more than 5 new services and countless features in the areas of AIML, edge computing, IoT, and messaging during his time at Amazon. Jon cofounded and led a cloud telephony startup prior to Amazon.Topics: The Evolution of Applied AIEdge AI & Computing's FutureOpen Source AI Business Models#AppliedAI #VentureCapital #ProductLeadership #CloudComputing #AIInfrastructure

Yujian Tang is the CEO of OSS4AI. OSS4AI is an organization aimed at providing all developers access to the resources to understand, use, and contribute to the direction and development of AI. He is also a Venture Partner at Banyan Ventures, a New York City-based pre-seed, first-money-in, venture capital firm born in the AI era.We will be in person going live at AWS in SF! Topics: Open source AI projects AI infrastructure and development AI-native applications and infrastructure#VCPodcast #AI #VentureCapital #AIStartups #OpenSourceAI

Jay Reno is the Co-founder and CEO of Pointhound. Pointhound is helping people find and book free flights, for free, to amazing destinations using credit card points and miles. 🛫🏝️ 💳 He also leads seed and series A investments with 645 Ventures where he's a Venture Partner. Investment areas include consumer, fintech, climate tech and AI. Previously founded Feather, raised $76m, built a world-class team of 150 people, and sold the company in 2022.Topics: The Role of AI in Fintech Consumer AI Trends Insights from Being a Second-Time Founder#SecondTimeFounder #FintechTrends #ConsumerTech #TravelTech

Lauren Kolodny is a Founding Partner of Acrew Capital. Lauren leads the fintech thesis area at Acrew. She has made investments in companies including Chime, Clara, Divvy, Gusto, Klar, Papaya, Pie, & Plaid. Prior to co-founding Acrew, Lauren was a partner at Aspect Ventures. Previously, Lauren worked in product marketing at Google, where she led a number of launches for Workspace, including Google Drive.Topics: How AI is Transforming the Future of Financial Services The Evolution of Payments Technology Cross-Border Financial Solutions in a Global Economy#FintechFuture #VCInsights #AIBanking #StartupGrowth #DigitalFinance