Venture with Grace

Shay Levi is Co-Founder and CEO of Unframe.~~~~~~~~~~~This episode is brought to you by Nebius — the ultimate cloud for AI innovators. Nebius provides AI infrastructure you can count on, combining reliability and speed with flexibility and engineering support unmatched by hyperscalers. AI leaders like Meta, Shopify, and Higgsfield already partner with Nebius to run their AI workloads. Plus, venture-backed startups can save up to $150,000 on compute costs when they apply for access. Visit nebius.com or nebius.com/startups to learn more~~~~~~~~~~~The enterprise AI platform delivering turnkey solutions for observability, data extraction, intelligent agents, and modernization—enabling Fortune 500s to deploy custom AI use cases in hours without data sharing, fine-tuning, or rigid vendor lock-in, achieving millions in ARR within year one. Serial entrepreneur fresh off co-founding Noname Security as CTO, scaling it to the first API security unicorn in 18 months ($40M ARR) before Akamai's $500M acquisition—backed by LSVP, Insight, Cyberstarts—Shay built on Unit 8200 elite engineering roots, Facebook senior engineering, ironSource R&D leadership, and early exits with Meme/Vidoplay (Somoto acquisition).Topics

• Engineering-driven GTM: bridging technical rigor with business scale
• Translating elite intelligence R&D into commercial cybersecurity solutions
• What serial founders learn about AI infrastructure after perfecting API security at scale

#Startups #Founder #AIAgents #Hypergrowth #UnicornExit

Fatimah Hussain is a powerhouse creator with 200M+ views, 200K followers, and 50M likes across TikTok and Instagram in the education and early-career space. She is the founder of Fatimah’s Guide, an all-in-one mentorship platform connecting top college students with ambitious high schoolers. Fatimah is an EECS student at the University of California, Berkeley and has partnered with F500s including Adobe, Notion, and Microsoft to deliver practical study, productivity, and career content.She’s currently building Finnie with Chloe Hughes, a tool that automates scholarship discovery by analyzing a user’s Common App PDF. Previously, she founded Workout Wizard, a computer-vision fitness app that won Contra Costa Shark Tank and was featured on FOX, KRON4, and AOL, as well as Perky 3D Prints, a customizable 3D-printed toys venture—demonstrating a repeat founder who builds, ships, and scales products for her generation. Her work sits at the intersection of creator-led growth, AI products, and education access at scale.Topics:

• Building a creator-led user acquisition engine that converts audience → product users
• Designing AI-powered mentorship platforms with strong supply-demand liquidity
• Balancing UC Berkeley EECS, content creation, and a startup while avoiding burnout

#GenZ #CreatorEconomy #Mentorship #Startups #WomenInSTEM

Deepak Prasad is a Director at Qualcomm Ventures, leading US investments across early- to growth-stage tech companies with expertise in sourcing, deal execution, and portfolio management, drawing on over five years of investment experience. As a founding team member at GPO Fund, he drove enterprise tech deals like MapAnything (acquired by Salesforce), built on prior roles at Unilazer Ventures investing in consumer successes such as Lenskart, and positions at The Carlyle Group and Soros Fund Management. A Columbia Business School MBA graduate with a Bachelor of Technology in Computer Engineering from VJTI Mumbai, Deepak combines technical depth with investing passion, while enjoying travel, hiking, snowboarding, and tennis outside work.Topics -

• Qualcomm Ventures' playbook for US early-stage tech deals
• What “long-term technical advantage” actually looks like in venture diligence
• Underwriting cloud-to-edge startups with long enterprise adoption cycles

#VentureCapital #QualcommVentures #DeepTechInvesting #CloudToEdge #EnterpriseTech

Sarah Klingman is Founder and CEO of Mostest, the New York-based platform reimagining event planning with AI-powered curation, professional-grade vendor matching, transparent pricing, and end-to-end execution support that eliminates research rabbit holes and vendor ghosting for hosts, while connecting vendors to serious clients and enabling brands to scale community events effortlessly. Drawing from nearly five years at adidas—rising to Sales Director, pioneering the SPEEDFACTORY-powered Lifestyle Exclusive Creation partnership with Foot Locker to let consumers drive footwear trends, and managing Foot Locker as Key Account Manager—plus Lifestyle Key Account Manager at Under Armour, Sarah applies retail partnership mastery to make unforgettable events accessible on any budget and timeline.Topics:

• Building a consumer-focused product strategy with AI-powered event curation and reliable vendors
• Lessons from adidas and Under Armour on turning partnerships into explosive community and brand growth

-Transitioning from corporate leadership to startup founder#ConsumerTech #BrandInnovation #ProductStrategy #StartupLeadership #Partnerships

Vineet Edupuganti is Co-Founder & CEO of Cogent Security, deploying generative AI to supercharge vulnerability management and risk reduction for global brands, after scaling Abnormal Security from early PM through Head of Multi-Product Platform where he grew his 30-person division 4X, launched Knowledge Base/Security Posture Management, rolled out RBAC platform capabilities, and drove PLG initiatives as ARR crossed $100M with 15X headcount growth. Ex-ML engineer at Meta (generative AI for Facebook Assistant), Stanford researcher (GANs/VAEs accelerating MRI 10X, 100+ citations at top ML conferences), New Relic (time-series forecasting), and Menlo Ventures (AI incubation), Vineet fuses hardcore AI systems with enterprise security product leadership giving him deep insight into scaling AI product strategy, engineering, and go-to-market execution.Topics:

• AI operational excellence: building data labeling, ML pipelines, and PM systems
• How Abnormal Security rocketed to $100M ARR with smart platform pivots and product-led growth
• Lessons from growing teams 4X during 15X company hypergrowth while launching new products

#AI #Cybersecurity #Startups #VulnerabilityManagement #ML

Kristina Simmons has built, advised, and invested in leading brands, establishing herself as a trusted partner with proven venture and operational experience. At lululemon, she was an early member of the “web team,” playing a pivotal role in launching e-commerce and managing social media and digital channels, making lululemon a pioneer in these spaces. She later led Emerging Products and Concepts, focusing on innovative initiatives such as digital products, strategic partnerships, and international expansion. Kristina then joined Andreessen Horowitz as a partner, where she supported market development, helping portfolio companies evolve into renowned brands and connecting them with global leaders. Her career path then led her to an early-stage food startup, transitioning later to advising and angel investing. At Khosla Ventures, she served as Chief of Staff and investment partner, serving on boards from Seed to Series D. Recognizing the need for a more founder-centric approach in venture capital, Kristina founded Overwater Ventures to create more value and support for early-stage companies.Topics:

• a16z GTM acceleration: Portfolio hacks turning raw tech into household brand names
• Architectural decisions that determine brand defensibility, Platform vs. product
• Seed→D boardroom playbook: Scaling deep-tech and consumer companies through clinical and regulatory gates

#FounderLed #BrandBuilding #DeepTech #HealthTech #ConsumerTech

Travis Skelly is a Partner at Pruven Capital, where he invests across fintech, proptech, ecommerce, and enterprise software at multi-stage scale. Prior to Pruven, he was a Director at Citi Ventures, leading more than 15 investments including Socure, Betterment, SmartAsset, HighRadius, and Clarity Money. Earlier, Travis was a founding team member at FinTech Collective, backing category-defining companies like Plaid/Quovo, MoneyLion, Octane Lending, and NextCapital. Before venture, he worked in banking at Nomura and HSBC and as a strategy consultant at Accenture, giving him a rare operator-investor lens across financial services innovation.Topics:

• How to engineer MoneyLion, Clarity, Boom & Bucket acquisitions from seed to payout—full timelines and triggers
• How enterprise fintech complements banks with data and compliance at scale
• Underwriting AI in fintech: data moats, model decay, and regulatory failure modes

#Fintech #EnterpriseSoftware #StartupInvesting #VCInsights #FounderLessons

Jeff Tatarchuk is Co-Founder & Chief Growth Officer at TensorWave, building next-generation AI compute infrastructure powered by best-in-class AMD GPUs for training and inference at hyperscale, following his exit as Co-Founder of VMAccel (FPGA cloud/edge leader) and Lets Rolo (acquired by LifeKey) where he drove business development. A 10-year startup advisor and angel investor via Fruition Lab, Jeff specializes in scaling compute-heavy AI infrastructure from prototype to production, helping AI companies access cost-effective GPU clusters without Nvidia lock-in while navigating the white-hot demand for inference capacity in 2026's model wars.Topics:

• AI Compute Gold Rush: Securing GPU & FPGA capacity, beating hyperscalers on price and speed.
• Deep-Tech Infra Lessons: Building capital-intensive AI/cloud companies from VMAccel to TensorWave.
• Hardware Exit Strategies: Spotting quick flips and fast-growth opportunities in AI infrastructure.

#AIInfrastructure #AICompute #GPUs #CloudAI #DeepTech

Cecilia Ziniti is CEO and Co-Founder of GC AI, the AI platform trusted by in-house legal teams at 1,200+ companies. A three-time General Counsel and Chief Legal Officer, Cecilia has helped bring to market every major tech shift of the last 20 years. Her career began at Yahoo during the early internet boom, she launched Alexa at Amazon as a founding member of the team, she advised on autonomous vehicles at Cruise, robotics and AI at Anki, AI-powered software development at Replit, and now leads one of the fastest growing startups in legal AI. A former big-firm associate, she has closed $425M+ in venture financing, served on boards for 25+ quarters, and negotiated hundreds of strategic transactions. Cecilia is also an angel investor, named AI patent inventor, media commentator, and host of the CZ & Friends podcast.Topics:$425M VC closes: Negotiation hacks + board secretary moves surviving 9 roundsAI patents payoff: Inventor secrets turning legal pain into unicorn softwareScaling legal expertise with AI: Smarter counsel for teams#AIinEnterprise #GCStack #AIForLaw #VentureScale #WomenInTech #EnterpriseAI #GCAI

Deepak Agarwal is Chief AI Officer at LinkedIn, where he leads company‑wide AI strategy, long‑horizon innovation, and the Core AI teams that power intelligence, personalization, and agents across a platform serving hundreds of millions of members. Previously, as Chief AI Officer and VP of Consumer and Trust Engineering at Pinterest, he scaled his organization from about 200 to roughly 1,000 engineers, unifying AI Foundations, Consumer Engineering, Trust & Safety, and AI Product to deliver AI‑first personalized discovery, commerce, and creator products that generated billions of predictions per day. Earlier in his career at Yahoo! and AT&T Labs, he became a leading expert in large‑scale recommender systems, publishing extensively (including a book) and eventually being elected a Fellow of the American Statistical Association; today he also serves as a Distinguished Fellow and Venture Partner at Fellows Fund, advising and investing in AI startups.Topics -

• From Pinterest to LinkedIn: Building AI-First Consumer Platforms at Scale
• Scaling from 200 to 1,000+ Engineers: Org Design for AI Platforms
• Architecting Durable AI Stacks for Hundreds of Millions of Users

#AILeadership #AIAgents #TrustAndSafety #PlatformEngineering #ConsumerTech