Darwinian Ventures

What Does a Tech Event Look Like That’s Truly Diverse, Fun, and Empowering? Last Friday, we hosted our most EPIC event yet — the Founders Bay Holiday Party — to celebrate our partnership with TheAgentic and bring our incredible community of founders and investors together. This event was made possible through collaborations with Tesla, Darwinian Ventures, Women Founders Bay, Vently, and the The Hult AI Society Here’s what made it unforgettable: 🚗 180 Cybertruck test drives 💃 3 hours of dancing to beats by Dan L, Neil Gehani, Bisi Obateru, @Barrio Manouche, Arun Saigal 🤝 Lifelong connections between 400 founders, 100 investors, and family offices 🌟 A milestone in diversity: 50%+ of attendees were women Big News: We also launched our partnership with TheAgentic, where we’re offering free AI engineering resources to help founders build their AI products. ➡ Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gxmjYhBb ➡ Book time to discuss: https://lnkd.in/gVBsRp9R This was more than a party — it was a celebration of innovation, diversity, and community. To everyone who joined us: thank you for making it unforgettable! If you missed it, don’t worry—we’ll see you at the next one: https://lu.ma/6vnjgwag 🚀 A huge thank you to Hans Sandhu, Akash Saraf, Gargi Kand, Kristopher Floyd, Aaron Jimenez , Elif Yıldrım, Rafael Martínez Quiles, Nicolas Khonaysser, MBA, Tesla, Kevin Mei & Steven Echtman for the pictures and all the volunteers for partnering with us to make this event unforgettable. --- Want to keep up with all our workshops and events? Subscribe to my newsletter: newsletter.foundersbay.com and our lu.ma calendar: https://lu.ma/foundersbay

Last week, I wrapped up the 500 Global Founders Retreat program! It was the most rewarding learning experience I’ve had in recent months. When I first arrived in SF, I wasn’t great at pitching, and pitching to VCs felt like a high-stakes game with limited chances. The 500 Korea team changed that. Every time I made eye contact, they made me pitch 😂. Beyond that, they offered targeted feedback from a VC’s perspective and worked with me to improve. It’s rare to find such a supportive, high-caliber environment to sharpen your skills. Beyond networking and insights, the retreat helped shift my mentality towards to founder's mindset, outreach, and myself. Huge thanks to Sol E., Keeyong Han, and Kristopher Floyd for sharing priceless real-world examples, decision-making frameworks, and insights into the mindset needed to navigate tough challenges. Kudos to Sean K. and Peter Shin for organizing such an incredible program!

Excited to be speaking today at "How to Market Your Company - A VC Perspective" hosted by Global Entrepreneurs Hub 🏝️! I'll be sharing insights on scaling startups, building fundable brands, and driving growth through strategic marketing. At Darwinian Ventures, we help founders build and execute GTM strategies to thrive in competitive markets. Whether you're a founder looking to capture investor attention or a marketer refining your approach, this panel is packed with actionable advice. 🚀 See you there!

Monday night I was lucky enough to moderate an amazing panel of founders in the go-to-market space, with Kristopher Floyd from Darwinian Ventures, Mada Seghete from Upside, and Nishit Asnani from Sybill. They all shared fantastic stories about the inside of growing a company from the ground floor: ▶️Nishit shared stories about how the technical skills of his founding team has helped Sybill stay ahead of the curve in a crowded space ▶️Kris talked about how sometimes it's the low tech growth marketing tactics that helped him scale Tumble ▶️Mada emphasized the importance of developing a community and thought leadership within a space, both from her time at Branch and now at Upside. It was a fantastic kick off to TECH WEEK by a16z. Shout out to ★Komal Ahmad for helping with the event, and the Scoop Analytics team, including Brad Peters and Byron Scott for making sure the event went off without a hitch, and Ridge Ventures for providing the space (including AC, necessary in the recent heatwave!).

20 VCs, Fund Managers, and Family Offices get together for dinner at a penthouse in SF! Austin Yu Bill Barry Chris Messina Doreen Xu Edoardo Mainella Halyna Vasylevska Henry Shi Jeremiah Owyang Jessica Kobilova Kristopher Floyd Lisa Yu Mayuran Yogarajah Michelle Ma Pankaj Kedia Paulina Szyzdek Ray Dargham Ryan Cunningham Sean Sang Sub Lee Vladislav Polikarpov Yiwen Li