Venture with Grace

Marty Kausas is the CEO and Co-Founder of Pylon, one of the fastest-growing platforms modernizing B2B customer support. With prior engineering experience at Airbnb, Marty blends deep technical chops with a market-first mindset to tackle one of the most overlooked segments in enterprise software: post-sales support. Since launching, Pylon has become the go-to support infrastructure for high-growth B2B companies, backed by leading investors like Andreessen Horowitz, General Catalyst, and Y Combinator. Under Marty’s leadership, the company is pioneering an AI-native approach to customer success—replacing outdated ticketing systems with a platform purpose-built for tools like Slack and Teams. He’s part of a new generation of founders scaling category-defining companies by staying close to the customer and building in public.Topics: Reimagining B2B Support with AI-Native, Workflow-First ToolsSkipping technical screenings for your first engineers - unconventional hiring philosophyBuilding for the "chat-first" generation of B2B buyers and sellers #VCPodcast #B2BStartups #CustomerSupport #Pylon #StartupFunding

John Zeratsky (JZ) is a Co-Founder and General Partner at Character Capital, where he supports startup founders with capital and sprints. He’s a bestselling author of Sprint and Make Time, and has reached millions with articles in The Wall Street Journal, TIME, Harvard Business Review, Wired, Fast Company, and other outlets. JZ is a former Design Partner at GV (Google Ventures), where he developed the Sprint method and supported many of GV’s most successful investments, including Slack, One Medical Group, Flatiron Health, Blue Bottle Coffee, and Gusto. Previously, JZ was a design leader for YouTube, Google Ads, and FeedBurner, which was acquired by Google in 2007.Topics: How VCs can use sprint principles to make faster, better investment decisionsCommon traits across successful investments like Slack, One Medical, and Blue BottleIndustries where AI will create the most venture-scale opportunities#VentureCapital #AI #StartupInvesting #DesignSprint #ProductMarketFit

Lisa Xu is a partner at Threshold. Based in New York, she is responsible for leading new investments and supporting Threshold’s portfolio companies. She serves on the board of directors of Suger and is actively involved with Threshold's investments in Motion, Numa, and VideaHealth. Before joining Threshold, Lisa was a principal at FirstMark Capital, where she focused on early-stage investments in B2B software companies with a focus on vertical software and commerce infrastructure. She helped lead and support investments in twenty different companies, including Loop Returns, EvolutionIQ (acquired by CCC), Justworks, Pigment, Alloy Automation, Archive Resale, and TextIQ (acquired by Relativity). Prior to venture capital, Lisa was a product manager at venture-backed startups Peloton (NASDAQ: PTON) and Handy (acquired by ANGI Homeservices). Previously, she was a senior associate consultant at Bain & Company, where she performed investment due diligence for private equity and growth equity firms. Lisa graduated summa cum laude from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania with a BS in finance and management. She was named to the EVC (Emerging VC) list in 2022 and 2023, which recognizes the top rising stars in venture capital.Topics: How AI is fundamentally rewiring commerceWhich AI companies will survive and thrive vs. which are riding the hype waveLessons learned from successful exits#VentureCapital #AI #VerticalAI #CommerceAI #VoiceAI #StartupPodcast

Jon Carr-Harris is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of CRED, which he founded and initially seeded. Previously, Jon was the Co-Founder and CEO of Swish Labs & Ventures, a technology consulting firm and venture group specializing in financial services and marketplace innovations. Under his leadership, Swish developed groundbreaking technology solutions for industry-leading organizations including Prudential, Nasdaq, Gatorade, and HSBC.Topics: Unifying fragmented enterprise dataBalance proprietary data generation with client data privacy and securityHow enterprises should think about their "data readiness" for AI transformation#VCPodcast #PredictiveAI #EnterpriseAI #DataIntelligence #AIOperatingSystem

C.C. is a principal at Menlo Ventures focused on early-stage consumer tech and SaaS investments. Drawing on her extensive experience as a product leader and team builder, C.C. goes all in on supporting founders who optimize for impact. She believes that personalized AI will revolutionize the next generation of human-computer interaction and how humans live, work, and play. C.C. started her career at Microsoft, where she worked in product at Bing Ads and HoloLens, and ran an incubation team that shipped novel consumer experiences in mixed reality. At Meta, she led teams building the future of search and ranking in its suite of messaging apps. Guided by her passion for mission-driven impact, she left big tech when she was selected as one of 20 top technologists in the nation to serve as a White House Presidential Innovation Fellow, during which she used design thinking to advance service delivery at the United States Department of Veterans Affairs. Following her stint in public service, C.C. joined Bain Capital Ventures, then became NFX’s first Venture Fellow. She also helped run one of AngelList’s most prolific syndicates and scouted for multiple funds, including Menlo and Wing VC. She proceeded to delve deeper into the startup world, leading product and growth at multiple early-stage companies from seed to Series A, as well as launching her own company in the AI video editing space. She knows firsthand how hard it is for founders to get from zero to one, so she created a community and resources for entrepreneurs and hosted five AI hackathons in 2023. C.C. received her bachelor’s degree from Harvard University and her MBA from Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business. In her free time, she loves performing standup comedy, dancing salsa, and hosting poker nights. She grew up in Anaheim, CA next to Disneyland, and went to Disney Elementary School, so theme parks have a special space in her heart. An adventure aficionado, she’s traveled to 80+ countries and has infinite travel hacks to share.Topics: The intersection of AI and consumer productsWhat sectors within SaaS are still undervalued or overlookedHow consumer behavior changes are creating new SaaS categories#VCPodcast #MenloVentures #AIInvesting #SaaSInvesting #consumertech

Rick is Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Equal Ventures. Rick invests across Equal’s four verticals and serves on the boards of Threeflow, Leap, Smarthop, Ghost, Starday, David Energy, MVMNT, Odyssey Energy Solutions, vQuip and several others yet to be announced. Prior to co-founding Equal Ventures, Rick was an investor at Lightbank, an early-stage venture fund based in Chicago, where he led investments in companies like Riskmatch (acquired by Vertafore), Vettery (acquired by Adecco), Neumob (acquired by CloudFlare), Expel and Catalytic amongst others. In addition to those investments, Rick served on the boards of Snapsheet and Benchprep and angel invested in several industry-leading companies like Rigup, Clearcover, and Project44.Prior to Lightbank, Rick worked with investment firms Foundation Capital, Bowery Capital, and Lightview Capital, investing in technology companies across the capital spectrum from seed-stage to buy-out and began his career as a strategy consultant at Deloitte Consulting. Rick received an MBA with Honors from Columbia Business School and graduated from the University of Richmond where he studied Economics and Leadership Studies. Topics: How to Be an “N of 1” Investor in a Crowded Venture LandscapeFinding Alpha in Climate, Retail, and Insurance at the Earliest StageWhy Traction Can Be Overrated When Backing Great Founders#VentureCapital #SeedInvesting #StartupStrategy #EqualVentures

Gaurav Bhogale is a Principal at Mantis Venture Capital. Mantis VC, the venture capital firm co-founded by Alex Pall and Drew Taggart of the electronic DJ group The Chainsmokers, has raised $100 million in commitments for its third fund. Mantis VC is an early stage technology investment firm supporting the most innovative companies across enterprise software, AI / ML, cloud and data infrastructure, healthtech, cybersecurity, gaming and other emerging technologies. Prior to that he was a VP at Galaxy Interactive and Managing partner of Chakra Capital. Notable Private Investments at Chakra Capital including Shield AI (Series F), Machina Labs (Series B), Saronic (Series A), Anthropic (Series B), Modern Intelligence (Series A), Bastille Networks (Series B), Uniswap Labs (Series B), D-Graph Labs (Seed), Qunnect (Seed), Anduin (Series B), and Humanly (Seed).Topics: Backing the Builders of AI, Infra, and Cyber from Day ZeroBetting on the Infrastructure Behind the AI RevolutionFrom Gaming to Generative AI: Lessons from Galaxy to Mantis#VentureCapital #AI #DeepTech #Startups #Cybersecurity

Mason Lender is the CEO of Vantager. Disclosure: Grace is an investor in Vantager.Vantager is an AI-powered platform that supports LPs representing $100B+ in AUM internationally with their pre-trade diligence, analysis, and reporting processes. Vantager has processed thousands of private funds, and over 50,000 underlying investments.Topics: How AI is transforming LP due diligence workflowsHow to build trust with institutional clients who are naturally risk-aversePredictions for how private markets infrastructure will evolve over the next decade#VCPodcast #PrivateMarkets #LimitedPartners #AIinFinance #DueDiligence

Arpit Mittal is a partner at Threshold. Based in the Bay Area, he is responsible for leading new investments in enterprise SaaS and B2B software companies and supporting Threshold’s existing portfolio. Arpit was named a 2024 Rising Star by the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA). Previously, Arpit was a principal with Google’s Gradient Ventures, where he helped lead investments in Gigs, Mural, and Writer, contributing to both their go-to-market and long-term business strategies. Arpit was also an associate at IDG Ventures India Advisors (Chiratae Ventures). Prior to working in a venture firm, Arpit co-founded a tech-enabled B2B marketplace startup serving the auto industry in Bangalore, India. He began his career as a Quant at Goldman Sachs. Arpit holds a Bachelor of Engineering degree from Delhi University and an MBA from the Wharton School. Topics: The evolution of enterprise SaaS investingGo-to-market strategy evolution in B2B softwareAI's impact on B2B software investing#VC #Investing #Startups #Tech #SaaS #B2B #Venture #Funding

Tanay Jaipuria is a partner at Wing VC where he focuses on investments in AI-powered applications and data and AI infrastructure. He is passionate about supporting highly technical teams in the earliest stages building delightful experiences to tackle challenging problems. Prior to Wing, Tanay was a product manager at Meta, where he led teams building products to improve newsfeed ranking and ad experiences on Facebook and to help creators make a living on Instagram. Before that, he was a consultant at McKinsey & Company, where he served clients across the financial services, media, and technology industries. Tanay brings a wealth of experiential knowledge to Wing, and shares his thoughts on startups, technology, and business in his popular weekly newsletter. Tanay holds a BS in computer science from Columbia University and an MBA from Harvard Business School, where he graduated as a Baker Scholar.Topics:AI Apps and Infrastructure Investment ThesisRed flags versus green flags in AI startup pitchesThe make-vs-buy decision process for AI companies choosing partners#vc #ai #startup #tech #investing #entrepreneur