Venture with Grace

Walter Kortschak is the Founder of Kortschak Investments and a Senior Advisor at Summit Partners, where he spent 26 years and helped establish the firm’s West Coast investment presence, growing assets under management from $100 million to more than $20 billion. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~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~~~~~~~~~~~~~Across more than three decades of investing, he has worked with entrepreneurs as an advisor, board member, and lead investor. His portfolio includes 23 companies that completed successful IPOs and 29 that were acquired, returning more than $7.8 billion of value to investors. Walter also helped launch SignalFire in 2013 as its founding investor, serving as Executive Chairman and CIO before becoming Chairman Emeritus and Founding Investor. He has been named to the Forbes Midas List and serves as a trustee at Caltech.Topics

• Building enduring companies through long-term venture investing and close work with founders
• What decades of investing reveal about identifying exceptional entrepreneurs and emerging technology
• The evolution of data-driven venture capital, AI, and how technology is reshaping investing

#VentureCapital #ArtificialIntelligence #Startups #Investing #Entrepreneurship

Jenny Xiao is a Partner at Leonis Capital, a research-driven venture capital firm backing technical founders and emerging talent at the earliest stages of AI. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~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~~~~~~~~~~~~~She brings a rare combination of AI research, economics, and investing experience, having previously worked as an early researcher at OpenAI and as a researcher at Epoch AI. Jenny holds a Ph.D. in AI and economics from Columbia University, where her research explored the intersection of technology, economics, and artificial intelligence. Before joining Leonis, she was an early employee at OpenAI and left shortly after ChatGPT’s rapid rise to build a research-driven investment platform with her partner, Jay Zhao. At Leonis, she focuses on identifying and supporting AI-native companies at the seed and pre-seed stages, including investments in companies such as Viktor AI, MaintainX, Motion, Spline, and Bud. Her research has been featured in Nature, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Bloomberg, and she has been recognized as a Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree. She also serves as an independent trustee of the Corgi ETF Trust.Topics

• How Jenny’s experience at OpenAI and in AI research shapes the way she evaluates technical founders and emerging AI companies
• What the next generation of AI-native companies is building at the seed and pre-seed stages.
• Lessons from building a research-driven venture firm focused on identifying exceptional technical talent

#ArtificialIntelligence #VentureCapital #AIInvesting #Startups #FutureOfAI

Paul Tatum is Executive Vice President of Solution Engineering for Global Public Sector at Salesforce, where he leads teams helping governments around the world modernize their missions and operations with Salesforce’s PaaS and SaaS offerings. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~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~~~~~~~~~~~~~He has spent more than 12 years at Salesforce, previously serving as SVP and VP of Solution Engineering across public sector and broader markets. Before Salesforce, Paul held more than four years of leadership roles at Oracle and more than 14 years at Sun Microsystems, where he served as Director of Sun Federal Systems Engineering. His work focuses on helping governments, nonprofits, and educational institutions become more responsive and efficient through cloud technology, data, and agentic AI.Topics

• How governments are adopting agentic AI to modernize services and improve operational efficiency
• Building trusted AI systems for citizens, employees, and public-sector organizations
• The evolution of enterprise technology from cloud platforms to AI-powered government

#ArtificialIntelligence #AgenticAI #GovTech #EnterpriseAI #Salesforce

Ashley Kramer is the Chief Revenue Officer at ElevenLabs, where she leads the company’s global revenue function and partnership ecosystem as it expands AI-powered voice and agent technology across the enterprise.~~~~~~~~~~~~~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~~~~~~~~~~~~~She previously served as Vice President of Enterprise at OpenAI from 2025 to 2026, leading enterprise sales during a period when enterprise revenue surpassed consumer revenue and OpenAI’s technology saw broad adoption among Fortune 100 companies. Before OpenAI, Ashley spent more than three years at GitLab in executive leadership roles spanning revenue, strategy, marketing, technology, and product. She also held senior roles at Alteryx and Tableau. At ElevenLabs, AI agents now handle more than 15 million conversations each week, while enterprise customers account for 55% of the company’s revenue.Topics

• Scaling enterprise AI adoption from early experimentation to business-critical use cases
• Building AI agents for natural, personalized interactions across customers, languages, and industries
• Lessons from leading enterprise growth at OpenAI, GitLab, and ElevenLabs

#ArtificialIntelligence #AI #EnterpriseAI #AIAgents #VoiceAI

Ryan Gibson is a Partner and VP of Finance at Eclipse Capital, where he invests at the formation, Seed, and Series A stages in companies reinventing physical industries through hardware, software, and AI. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~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~~~~~~~~~~~~~He previously co-founded Kojo, a construction supply chain SaaS company that has served more than $4 billion in construction material volume and raised more than $90 million. As CTO, he built products used by hundreds of contractors across the U.S. Earlier, he worked as an investor at 8VC and built hardware at world-class organizations. At Eclipse, he has helped launch companies including Bedrock Robotics, focused on autonomous systems for heavy construction machinery.Topics

• How AI, robotics, and automation are reshaping construction and other physical industries
• Building and investing in physical technology companies from formation through early-stage growth
• Lessons from scaling Kojo and applying an operator’s perspective to venture investing

#ArtificialIntelligence #PhysicalAI #Robotics #ConstructionTech #VentureCapital

Barr Moses is the CEO & co-founder of Monte Carlo, the agent trust platform. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~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~~~~~~~~~~~~~Under Barr’s leadership, Monte Carlo has empowered the world’s most innovative organizations to accelerate their AI transformation, from piloting human-guided agents to deploying fully autonomous operations at enterprise scale. The company is backed by leading Silicon Valley investors, including Accel, GGV Capital, ICONIQ Growth, and Redpoint Ventures. She has been named a Top 25 Data Management & Analytics Executive of 2025, a 2024 top Woman in AI by VentureBeat, and a 2023 Datanami Person to Watch.

• Building Monte Carlo’s agent trust platform and the infrastructure enterprises needs
• The emerging challenges of agent observability, reliability, and trust across business-critical workflows
• Lessons from building emerging AI infrastructure, data, and application companies

#ArtificialIntelligence #AgenticAI #AIInfrastructure #DataEngineering #EnterpriseAI

Alex Ratner is the co-founder and CEO at Snorkel AI, and an affiliate assistant professor of computer science at the University of Washington. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~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~~~~~~~~~~~~~Prior to Snorkel AI and UW, he completed his Ph.D. in computer science advised by Christopher Ré at Stanford, where he started and led the Snorkel open source project. His research focused on data-centric AI, applying data management and statistical learning techniques to AI data development and curation.Topics

• How data-centric AI is changing the way enterprises build and improve AI systems
• The role of synthetic data, data curation, and labeling in developing reliable AI models
• Building Snorkel AI from an open-source research project into an enterprise AI company

#ArtificialIntelligence #DataCentricAI #MachineLearning #GenerativeAI #EnterpriseAI

Hari Kolam is Co-Founder and CEO of Findem, an AI-powered people intelligence and talent acquisition platform that helps companies source, manage, and analyze talent using 3D data. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~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~~~~~~~~~~~~~He co-founded Findem in 2019 after serving as Founder and CTO of Instart, where he helped build an application delivery platform combining machine learning, virtualization, APIs, and CDN technology. Hari has co-authored more than 50 technology patents. Under his leadership, Findem launched Findem Studio, exposing real-time talent graphs as MCP tools for autonomous AI agents, and expanded its platform through integrations with Glider AI and Getro. Findem brings sourcing, talent CRM, and analytics together in a single platform for talent teams.Topics:

• How AI agents are transforming talent acquisition and the future of recruiting
• Why real-time people intelligence could replace traditional resumes and fragmented talent data
• What it takes to build reliable AI systems for sourcing, evaluating, and engaging talent

#Findem #AI #TalentAcquisition #AIAgents #FutureOfWork

Fabiola Quinzanos is a Partner at Monashees, where she focuses on fintech, climate tech, and consumer-oriented companies across Latin America and the U.S. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~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~~~~~~~~~~~~~She joined Monashees in 2021 and works closely with portfolio companies including Yuno, Slope, Gigi, Latu, Gaus, Felix, Fintoc, Spot2, and Nowports. Fabiola launched Monashees’ operations in Mexico and now leads the firm’s presence in San Francisco. Prior to Monashees, she worked in private equity in the United States, focusing on technology and sustainability investments, and in Mexico with a generalist mandate. She has been recognized by LAVCA as a Top Woman Investor in Latin America in 2024 and 2025 and as an Emerging Woman Investor in Latin America in 2023. Fabiola holds an MBA and an MS in Environmental Resources from Stanford University, where she was an Arbuckle Fellow and co-president of the Latin American Student Association.Topics:

• How fintech is evolving across Latin America and where the next major opportunities are emerging
• What makes climate tech companies compelling investments as sustainability markets mature
• How consumer startups in Latin America can build defensible businesses at the seed and Series A stages

#Monashees #Fintech #ClimateTech #ConsumerTech #VentureCapital

George Hu is President of Fireworks AI, an enterprise AI inference platform enabling companies to build, fine-tune, and deploy specialized AI models at production scale. He joined Fireworks AI after more than a decade in leadership roles at Salesforce and Twilio, where he helped scale products, teams, and revenue. Fireworks AI, founded by engineers from Meta’s PyTorch team, serves more than 10,000 enterprise customers including Uber, Shopify, Samsung, GitLab, Cursor, Harvey, and MongoDB, processing more than 40 trillion tokens daily. The company raised $1.505 billion in Series D funding in July 2026 at a $17.5 billion valuation. Hu also serves as a Venture Partner at Benchmark and sits on the boards of Airtable and World Relief.Topics:

• Why specialized AI models and inference are becoming critical to enterprise AI
• How Fireworks AI is building an enterprise platform for 40+ trillion tokens of daily inference
• Lessons from scaling Salesforce and Twilio that applies to building AI companies at hypergrowth

#FireworksAI #AIInference #EnterpriseAI #AIAgents #ArtificialIntelligence