We closed 2025 with $9B in new funds. We're entering 2026 with a thesis: Healthcare AI isn't displacing doctors—it's filling important gaps:

Demand that labor supply can't meet. Baseline activities that are burning out doctors. Latent demand that automation's cost and convenience unlocks.

Here's what we're seeing—and where we're headed.

The 2H 2025 Story: From Thesis to Traction

In our 1H newsletter, we highlighted investments in Abridge, Neko Health, Neuralink, Tennr, and flagged two areas we were excited about: administrative voice AI and clinical AI in primary care. Since then, we put capital behind that conviction.

Assort Health ($76M Series B, led by Lightspeed): Patient engagement platform powered by agentic and voice AI now managing 90M+ patient interactions across 20+ specialties.

Doctronic ($20M Series A, led by Lightspeed): 20M+ medical conversations completed—and a historic milestone as the first AI doctor in US history to legally prescribe routine medication refills.

These aren't demos. They're deployed systems delivering what AI "abundance" actually looks like for patients: more access, faster answers, and care that scales.

The pattern we're seeing is that healthcare is one of the fastest sectors for AI adoption. But sometimes the opportunity is still grounded in existing businesses and relationships. For these instances, we have been pioneering a path forward through an AI roll-up strategy. That's the logic behind Gyde, the first AI-native health brokerage, where we're deploying a new playbook that meshes M&A with AI. (More on that approach in The Investment Memo podcast.)

And on the infrastructure layer: after leading Anthropic's Series E, we tripled down to co-lead their $13B Series F. The company is now pushing deep into healthcare with Claude for Life Sciences and Claude for Healthcare. If you're exploring enterprise AI partnerships in health, reach out—we're actively making connections.

2026: Five Vectors We’re Pursuing

Looking Ahead

The promise of healthcare AI is no longer theoretical. The question now is velocity—how fast we can move from deployed systems to scaled impact. That's the work for 2026.

We're optimistic. Let's build.

Lightspeed Healthcare
Brenton Fargnoli, Galym Imanbayev, Jonathan MacQuitty, Naveed Matinfar, Ravi Mhatre, Shaurya Aggarwal, Shelley Chu, and Will Kohler

Today, Lightspeed is excited to unveil the third edition of the Fortune Cyber 60, presented by AWS, which recognizes the top 60 cybersecurity startups in the market today. Get it here:

The 2025-26 Cyber 60, presented by AWS

Lightspeed has also published our third annual CISO Survey, exploring the intersection of AI and cybersecurity. We surveyed 200 CISOs at companies with $500M+ in revenue to understand the current threat landscape, investment priorities, and the critical skills gap reshaping the security market.

Get the full report here: The Cyber 60, presented by Fortune and Lightspeed

The data reveals a market at an inflection point:

1. AI attacks have moved from theoretical to operational:

2. The skills gap is the primary bottleneck:

3. Investment is urgent and universal:

To explore these findings and discover the five high-priority opportunity areas we've identified for builders in cybersecurity, please visit lsvp.com/cyber60.

Download and share the full report

We've created a PDF version of the Cyber 60 and CISO Survey you can download to share with colleagues, customers, and anyone you think will find value in this report.

You can also read our blog, which discusses these findings in more detail and discusses the solutions some of our winners are building to address the cybersecurity threat/opportunity driven by the emergence of AI.

Please also visit Fortune's presentation of the Cyber 60 report to learn more about the winning companies.

We're grateful to Fortune for their partnership in ensuring rigorous, objective research, and to AWS for presenting this work to the security community.

-Team Lightspeed

Welcome to the first edition of Lightspeed’s Healthtech Newsletter, a semi-annual look behind the curtain of what we’re building and where we’re headed in Healthtech. 

Recognizing the transformative impact AI is already having on healthcare, Lightspeed began the year by welcoming Brenton Fargnoli, MD, to lead our Healthtech efforts as we intentionally double down across all stages. So far in 2025, Lightspeed-backed healthcare companies have raised over $1.5B in funding.

Recent portfolio highlights include: 

• Abridge, an AI-powered clinical conversation platform led by Dr. Shiv Rao, closed its Series D in Q1 and Series E in Q2, while Neko Health, an AI health diagnostics company co-founded by Hjalmar Nilsonne and Spotify founder Daniel Ek was backed by Lightspeed in its Series B. Neko emerged alongside Abridge as the two largest new unicorns not only in healthcare but across all sectors in Q1.

• Tennr raised its Series C to expand its healthcare operations automation platform. 

• Our deep-dive into brain-computer interfaces (BCI) culminated in an investment in Elon Musk’s Neuralink.

These companies encapsulate the broad opportunity for AI in healthcare, spanning clinical to administrative innovation, and the extraordinary teams that are meeting this moment head-on. 

Beyond healthcare, we wrote our largest check ever as a firm, leading Anthropic’s $3.5B Series E round, and adding to the ~$3.4B the firm has invested in over 120 AI companies. Meanwhile, Google announced its largest acquisition ever with Lighspeed-backed cybersecurity company, Wiz.

Building Community

The Lightspeed Healthtech Advisory Council

As Lightspeed continues to evolve, we’re dedicated to exploring opportunities that foster collaboration, share learnings, accelerate innovation, and most importantly, build community. 

That’s why we’re proud to unveil the launch of our Lightspeed Healthtech Advisory Council, bringing together top leaders and experts across payer, provider, policy, and AI.

Healthtech Events

We also recently gathered healthcare leaders in New York, Boston, and the SF Bay Area at several events, including: 

Next in Care

We’re particularly excited about several areas within healthtech. Administrative healthcare AI, which drives provider efficiency and patient experience, is seeing a landgrab moment. AI for scribing and revenue cycle management (RCM) has set the stage, with front-office applications, including voice AI, soon to follow. On the clinical side, persistent supply-demand gaps in primary care, nursing, and mental health are driving AI’s integration as a new member of the care team. 

If you share our passion for making an impact in healthcare with AI, broadly or in these focus areas, we would love to connect to share our perspective and resources. We’ll also be speaking at upcoming events like the AWS Healthcare Summit, Digital Health New York Summit, and HLTH. 

Best,

Lightspeed Healthcare
Brenton Fargnoli, Galym Imanbayev, Jonathan MacQuitty, Naveed Matinfar, Ravi Mhatre, Shaurya Aggarwal, Shelley Chu, and Will Kohler

Welcome to the March 2024 edition of the Lightspeed newsletter. It’s been a big month for AI, cybersecurity, marketplaces and frontier tech, in particular. We’re also proud that 14 members of our portfolio were honored in Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies in 2024 awards.

Read on for more.

In the world of AI, the GPU is king. Foundry makes this scarce computing resource more widely available at a lower cost and greater reliability. That’s why we’re proud to co-lead the investment into founder Jared Quincy Davis’s vision to democratize access to generative AI technology.

Michael Mignano (Partner, Lightspeed) and Jared Quincy Davis (Founder & CEO, Foundry) at Lightspeed’s Generative NYC event last fall.

There are 10 million+ GPUS already in the field, and most of them are severely underutilized. Foundry elegantly acts as air-traffic control, directing compute tasks to the most efficient available resources. It’s an incredibly simple idea that requires incredibly complex technology, which is why we’re so excited to back Davis and his founding team.

(Fun fact: Jared joins Kylan Gibbs of Inworld and Arthur Mensch of Mistral as the third Founder from Google DeepMind to join the Lightspeed portfolio.)

• Read more from Lightspeed here, and also check out this exclusive on Foundry from Fortune

Recently Lightspeed partner Alex Taussig sat down with Vinted CEO Thomas Plantenga and Harry Stebbings of 20VC to discuss how the largest C2C marketplace in Europe is defying the odds and battling fast fashion.

• Listen to learn more about Thomas’s reluctant journey to CEO, the biggest BS in startups, why Europe is emerging as a vibrant hub of innovation, and much more.

Lightspeed’s Generative AI meetups and podcast continues, with the latest Los Angeles event featuring Disney Accelerator’s Bonnie Rosen, Garden’s Stephen Bell, and Lightspeed partners Faraz Fatemi and Moritz Baier-Lentz.

The panel talked about how companies can navigate the AI opportunity, and how nimble, focused startups can use the technology to take on market incumbents. 

• Read the full recap with insights from speakers

On our Generative Now podcast, Lightspeed partner and host Michael Mignano talks with filmmaker Gary Hustwit, best known for his documentary, “Helvetica.” They discussed the uses of Generative AI in video, and much more.

• Listen to the episode

And don’t forget to subscribe on your favorite podcast service:

• Spotify

• YouTube

• Apple Podcasts

Are you in LA on April 3rd? Join us for an evening of networking and a discussion with leaders in the frontier tech spaces, including Brian Schimpf, CEO of Anduril, Dino Mavrookas, CEO of Saronic, and John Gedmark, CEO of Astranis.

They'll share their insights leading deeptech companies and how they approach AI, autonomy, and complex hardware systems.

• Event details and registration

We are grateful for your partnership and support, and welcome any feedback you have. We’ll see you next month with more news, insights, and updates.

–Team Lightspeed

P.S. Don’t forget to check out our Instagram to stay up to date with everything we’re doing, like our recently launched Advisory Council:

Instagram post

Welcome to the February 2024 edition of the Lightspeed newsletter where we cover everything from the current state of the global startup ecosystem, to big news from the portfolio, to our latest AI investments, and more. We’re also honored to introduce the Lightspeed Advisory Council, a group of luminaries with the brightest minds in technology and business.

Arthur Mensch (Mistral Co-Founder & CEO) and Paul Murphy (Lightspeed Europe Partner) on stage at Slush last year.

Our journey over the past twenty-plus years has been marked by profound partnerships with some of the world’s most visionary founders, CEOs, and operators. As we continue to evolve and expand, the Lightspeed Advisory Council embodies our dedication to fostering collaboration, shared learning, innovation, and building a vibrant community. This collective includes current and former CEOs, Board Chairs, and C-level executives from trailblazing companies such as Adobe, Airbnb, Calm, Etsy, Faire, HubSpot, Microsoft, Navan, Niantic, Roblox, Salesforce, Spotify, TikTok, Uber, and Zillow, among others.

• Learn more here.

Lightspeed Global Partner Bejul Somaia recently discussed why India should not be underestimated, the current state of the global startup ecosystem, and the lessons we’ve learned with CNBC.

We sat down with some of our Founders to hear about their challenges, successes, why they started their businesses, and why they chose to partner with Lightspeed. Here’s a glimpse into the latest conversation between Lightspeed Growth Partner Sebastian Duesterhoeft and Dr. Shiv Rao, MD, Co-Founder and CEO of Abridge. We share a deep conviction that Abridge’s multi-disciplinary team, expansive vision, and collaborative execution will help steward healthcare into the AI-empowered future, and we’re so proud to lead the company’s recently announced $150M Series C round.

Arvind Jain (Co-Founder & CEO of Glean) and Lisa Han (Lightspeed Enterprise Partner) at #GenSF earlier this month.

Lightspeed continues to gather together AI operators and visionaries for our in-person meetup series around the world. Check out the recaps of recent events featuring leaders and builders at Glean, Faire, Instacart, and Yelp:

• How to thrive in a crowded enterprise AI market

• Marketplaces in AI edition: How Instacart and Faire use AI to boost productivity and better serve their customers

• Four areas of AI opportunity, from Zefa Hakim of Yelp

When Lightspeed launched a Generative AI event series last year, we did so with a mission to serve the community of AI product builders, and provide a forum for exchanging ideas, sharing insights, and building connections. The appetite for these conversations is only growing as the generative AI space continues to explode. That’s why we launched Generative Now, a podcast about this moment in AI, featuring conversations between Lightspeed partner Michael Mignano and more of the same high caliber guests from our events that are shaping the future of AI.

In a recent episode, Michael and Gustav Söderström, Co-President, CPO & CTO of Spotify, discuss how AI for music is opening up a plethora of opportunities for musicians, podcasters, and authors.

 Subscribe on your favorite podcast service:

• Spotify

• YouTube

• Apple Podcasts

We are grateful for your partnership and support, and welcome any feedback you have. We’ll see you next month with more news, insights, and updates.

And if you happen to be in Los Angeles tonight (Thursday, 2/29), we’d love to see you at Strictly VC’s event sponsored by Lightspeed. Register here.

–Team Lightspeed

Last month, Lightspeed unveiled the first ever Cyber 60 – a new report created in partnership with FORTUNE to recognize the top 60 cybersecurity startups in the market today. Get it here:

• The Fortune Cyber 60, presented by Lightspeed

This month, the Cyber 60 made it to Times Square. Thank you to our partners at NYSE for celebrating the inaugural list.

Get to know some of the winners, their origin stories, and how they got to where they are today:

Arctic Wolf President & CEO Nick Schneider

Arctic Wolf is now a global leader in mitigating cyber threats for organizations of all sizes – from large enterprises to small businesses, one of a handful of companies driving the Managed Detection and Response (MDR) market. But when the company first launched in 2012, it was more of a lone wolf. Go behind-the-scenes as the cybersecurity company shares their vision and trajectory towards becoming the leader of the pack: https://lsvp.com/how-arctic-wolf-became-leader-of-the-pack-cyber-60/ 

Cato Networks Co-Founder & CEO Shlomo Kramer

Shlomo Kramer, Cato Networks’ CEO, co-founded the company in 2015. But Cato is far from Kramer’s first stab at cybersecurity. His experience dates back to the earliest days of the public internet, when hacking was little understood but could immediately shut down a company’s computer system out of nowhere. Explore how the cybersecurity and networking company came to be: https://lsvp.com/cato-networks-is-always-fortifying-your-security-cyber-60/.

Netskope Founder & CEO Sanjay Beri

A lightbulb moment while working for Microsoft at the age of 16 put Sanjay Beri on the path to founding Netskope, a cloud security company with a valuation of $7.5 billion. Learn about Sanjay’s journey from Toronto to Stanford and Silicon Valley. Spoiler: it did not happen overnight and came with many twists and turns. https://lsvp.com/not-exactly-this-how-sanjay-beri-hatched-netskope-cyber-60/

Rubrik Co-Founder & CEO Bipul Sinha

In 2013, Bipul Sinha appeared well on his way to a stellar career as a venture capitalist (VC). As a partner at Lightspeed, he worked on investments in several promising startups, including Nutanix. And while he enjoyed identifying promising founders and helping them build generational success stories, there was one thing missing for Sinha: the chance to build his own. In 2014, he and a group of co-founders launched Rubrik, a data security company that recently surpassed $500 million in subscription annual recurring revenue (ARR) and celebrated acquiring its 5,000th customer. Sinha acknowledges that he and his co-founders knew that Rubrik’s original product wasn’t sufficient on its own to create a category-defining company. So, how did they do it? Read on: https://lsvp.com/how-rubrik-became-a-cybersecurity-headliner-cyber-60/

1Password CEO Jeff Shiner

When Jeff Shiner became the CEO of 1Password in 2012, one of his goals was to double the company’s size, from 20 employees to 40. Once that was achieved, he set out to double it again. Then again. And so on. By 2023, the company, which provides password management and other online security services, employed over 1,000 people. During this time, the only thing that grew faster was the need for the Toronto-based company’s products. With the largest venture financing in Canadian history and a valuation of $6.8 billion, there’s a lot to learn from Jeff Shiner. Here he shares insights into 1Password’s acute expansion and funding strategy: https://lsvp.com/how-1password-unlocked-a-new-market-cyber-60/

We’ll be back in February with more news and updates. In the meantime, check out Lightspeed Consumer team’s top 10 predictions for 2024:

1. We all win the “lottery of time” as consumer AI shifts towards utility ⏳

2. AR comes back into focus as the race for AI wearables heats up 😎 

3. AI adoption intensifies concerns around consumer data privacy 🔐 

4. AI ushers in a new standard for education 📚

5. “Crypto summer” arrives with another pop 🪙 

6. Renewable energy picks up steam 🔋 

7. Healthcare as we know it is completely transformed by AI 🩺 

8. AI usage booms for the Baby Boomer generation 🧓 

9. Early healthcare diagnosis goes mainstream 🩻 

10. A new US contender enters the fast fashion arena 🛍️

Deep-dives on all the predictions are linked here — if you're a founder building in any of these spaces, we would love to hear from you!

–Team Lightspeed

Today Lightspeed is proud to unveil the first ever Cyber 60 – a new report created in partnership with FORTUNE to recognize the top 60 cybersecurity startups in the market today. Get it here:

• The Fortune Cyber 60, presented by Lightspeed

Lightspeed has also published an accompanying CISO Survey, identifying top priorities in cybersecurity for the year ahead. We surveyed over 200 CISOs to understand the state of the market, areas of growth and opportunity, and the transformative impact of technologies like cloud and AI. 

Lightspeed has identified three major trends that are creating a once in a generation moment to build in the cybersecurity space:

1. Security spending is outpacing overall IT spend and still accelerating:

2. Consolidation has created a new market opportunity for emergent innovation:

3. AI and cloud have made defending systems from attack more complex than ever:

To unpack these points and also read about the eight areas of opportunity we’ve identified for builders in cybersecurity, please visit lsvp.com/cyber60.

We’ve also created a PDF version of the Cyber 60 and CISO Survey you can download to share with colleagues, customers, and anyone you think will find value in this report.

Please also visit Fortune’s presentation of the Cyber 60 report to learn more.

From everyone here at Lightspeed to you and your loved ones, we wish you a happy and healthy holiday season. We thank you for all your support in 2023 as we look forward to a prosperous 2024.

We’ll be back in January with more news and updates!

–Team Lightspeed

Welcome to the November 2023 edition of the Lightspeed newsletter. Get your headphones on and let’s go:

In this issue, we’re spotlighting the latest episode of our Generative Now podcast, just released today.

Kylan Gibbs got his start in social sciences, but after stumbling into startups via a winning pitch at a Singaporean business competition, he never looked back. He spent time as co-founder of FlowX, a consultant at Bain & Company, and Product Manager at Google.  Kylan talked with Lightspeed Partner and Host Michael Mignano about where he’s at today, and how Inworld AI is leveling up is changing the way people interact with games through AI powered NPCs.

Listen or watch on your favorite service:

• Spotify

• Apple Podcasts

• YouTube

And read more about Lightspeed’s investment in Inworld AI, which we announced in August.

For over twenty years Lightspeed has been the first investor and an early backer of some of the most innovative companies in the world. In service of bold founders with big ideas, we stand behind our companies with high conviction, from Seed to Series F and beyond.

This month we announced investments with three startups we couldn’t be more excited about. Read more about them here:

• Pika’s Imagination Engine

• Building With Keychain — Unlocking CPG Manufacturing For Modern Brands

• Building with Langfuse – Observability & Analytics for LLM Applications

And check out Pika’s incredible video which exploded online this week, showing how the startup is making professional-quality video creation accessible to the masses with the power of AI:

Lightspeed continues to gather together AI operators and visionaries for our wildly popular in-person meetup series. Check out these recaps of recent events featuring speakers from Google, Wayfair, Langfuse, and more:

• Taking LLMs From Proof-of-Concept to Production (Berlin)

• Optimizing LLMs For Real World Applications (London)

More Generative meetups are coming this year — to get notified about them, sign up here.

We sat down with some of our Founders to hear about their challenges, successes, why they started their businesses, and why they chose to partner with Lightspeed. In this edition, meet Laura Spiekerman, Co-Founder and CRO of Alloy.

Alloy solves the identity risk problem for companies that offer financial products. Today, nearly 500 banks and fintechs turn to Alloy’s end-to-end identity risk management platform to take control of fraud, credit, and compliance risk, and grow with confidence. Founded in 2015, Alloy is powering the delivery of great financial products to more customers around the world.

We are grateful for your partnership and support, and welcome any feedback you have. We’ll see you next month with more news, insights, and updates!

In the meantime, can you help grow our reach by sharing this newsletter with even just one colleague or friend?

Thank you!

–Team Lightspeed

Listen to the latest episode of
Generative Now

Friends—

We wanted to share with you the latest episode of the Generative Now podcast, featuring a conversation with Edo Liberty, the founder and CEO of Pinecone.

Pinecone is one of the preeminent companies building in the generative AI space. Pinecone is able to integrate AI models and vector search databases to ensure that AI applications are getting the most relevant and up to date information as quickly as possible.

Lightspeed Partner Michael Mignano spoke with Pinecone Founder and CEO Edo Liberty at a Generative NYC meetup in early 2023.

Please give it a listen, and remember to subscribe on your favorite podcast service:

• Spotify

• Apple Podcasts

• YouTube

Have an idea for a future episode or guest, or other feedback? Just hit reply.

Thanks for listening!

Welcome to the October 2023 edition of the Lightspeed newsletter. Our theme for this edition is Game Changers and Legends, as we release our first-ever annual list celebrating and accelerating extraordinary startups in gaming & interactive technology.

• Check out the Game Changers announcement and winners list.

We’ve also launched a new podcast series – Generative Now – featuring AI visionaries, hosted more Generative AI meetups in new locations, including across Europe, and welcomed the newest Founders Lightspeed is building with – one of whom is already a Legend, and all of whom are Game Changers in their own fields. Let’s go:

Founders Mike Rosenthal and John Legend

For over twenty years Lightspeed has been the first investor and an early backer of some of the most innovative companies in the world. In service of bold founders with big ideas, we stand behind our companies with high conviction, from Seed to Series F and beyond.

We’re newly building with three startups that share a key principle for Lightspeed: meeting customers where they are, with exactly what they want. Read more about Yaysay, Farther, and why Grammy-winning artist John Legend wants to share two words with you: It’s Good.

• Yaysay—A Personalized, Online, Off-price Channel For Consumers of Fashion Globally

• Farther—Modern Full-Stack Wealth Management

• It’s Good—The Social Travel App Founded by Mike Rosenthal and John Legend  

The most daring companies are not the industry giants—they're the startups that are advancing the next stages of technology, and by extension, bringing to life previously impossible user experiences. That's why we partnered with GamesBeat to honor a new breed of gaming companies. Our first list of 25 winners was announced on October 24th at the GamesBeat Next event in San Francisco. Read more about them, including the winners recognized in five individual categories.

When Lightspeed launched the Generative AI event series, we did so with a mission to serve the community of AI product builders, and provide a forum for exchanging ideas, sharing insights, and building connections.

The appetite for these conversations is only growing as the generative AI space continues its Cambrian moment of explosion. That’s why we’re proud to announce the launch of Generative Now, a podcast about this moment in AI, featuring conversations between Lightspeed partner Michael Mignano and more of the same high caliber guests that are shaping the future of AI, like Victor Riparbelli, Connor Zwick, Scott Belsky, and more to come. Subscribe on your favorite podcast service:

• Spotify

• YouTube

• Apple Podcasts

Partner Alex Kayyal leads Lightspeed’s focus on SaaS investments, and knows how “insanely difficult” it is to build in the space. Lately he’s been focused on understanding how generative AI will transform enterprise software platforms, which we believe will mark a new era: SaaS 4.0. Alex has expanded on his first post with five key concepts for founders to focus on right now. Read more:

• Expanding The SaaS 4.0 Framework And The Importance of First Principles

We’re pleased to announce that Aaron Frank has joined our team as a Venture Partner, helping drive our Fintech investment strategies. Aaron is a former operator who founded Final, a next generation credit card acquired by Goldman Sachs that went on to become the foundation of the Apple Card. Read about his mission with Lightspeed here:

• Aaron Frank Joins Lightspeed as Venture Partner in Fintech

Generative Paris with Thomas Scialom, Guillaume Lample, and Antoine Moyroud.

Lightspeed continues to gather together AI operators and visionaries for our in-person meetup series. Check out these recaps of recent events featuring leaders and builders at Snowflake, LLaMa 2, Mistral, and Tome:

• How Tome Is Transforming Business Communication

• The Challenge of Building LLMs

• Five Areas of AI Opportunity, According to Snowflake’s Ahmad Khan

The Generative series’ European expansion continues, with a meetup in Berlin on October 7th, where partner Alex Schmitt will be in conversation with Ting Wang, Director of ML & AI at Wayfair, and Marc Klingen, Co-Founder of Langfuse. Learn more and sign up here.

We sat down with some of our Founders to hear about their challenges, successes, why they started their businesses, and why they chose to partner with Lightspeed. In this edition, meet Shlomo Kramer, CEO of Cato Networks.

We are grateful for your partnership and support, and welcome any feedback you have. We’ll see you next month with more news, insights, and updates!

–Team Lightspeed

The meetup is now a podcast

When Lightspeed launched our Generative AI event series in New York City in April, we did so with a mission to serve the community of AI product builders, and provide a forum for exchanging ideas, sharing insights, and building connections.

The events have been a runaway success – we’ve since expanded the series to San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Paris, with plans for even more meetups across the world in the months to come. We’ve had thousands of registrations for events featuring conversations with luminaries like Scott Belsky of Adobe, Edo Liberty of Pinecone, Nikhila Ravi of Meta, Harrison Chase of LangChain, and many more.

The appetite for these conversations is only growing as the generative AI space continues its Cambrian moment of explosion. That’s why we’re proud to announce the launch of Generative Now, a podcast about this moment in AI, featuring conversations between Lightspeed partner Michael Mignano and more of the same high caliber guests that are shaping the future of AI.

Our first episode drops today, with Mike in conversation with Victor Riparbelli, Co-founder and CEO of Synthesia, the company making it 1,000x easier to generate video through AI powered avatars and voice.

Please give it a listen. You can subscribe to the podcast below to get new episodes, which will be released weekly:

Spotify
YouTube
Apple Podcasts

And if you like what we’re doing, be sure to recommend and share it with your friends and colleagues.

Generative Now wouldn’t be possible without the success of the meetup series, so we’re especially grateful for your support. We hope you’ll give us a listen, and we hope to see you at a future Generative meetup in person.

Thank you!

Welcome to the September 2023 edition of the Lightspeed newsletter. Our theme for this edition is Unwavering Conviction – in the Founders we back, in the opportunities they identify, and in our partnership on their journeys.

At our recent Generative: LA Meetup, AI In Gaming,
with Ken Wee of Activision Blizzard and Ankur Bulsara of Scopely.

In this issue: Learn about the growth and European expansion of our popular Generative AI meetup series, an interview with Ariel Cohen, founder of Navan, our new Sales Benchmark Report, our Game Changers Partnership with GamesBeat, and much more.

At Lightspeed, we’ve been fortunate to have participated in the rise of multiple transformative technologies over the last 25 years – from the internet to the rise of mobile, and now the rise of generative AI. Learn more about our over $1 billion in AI investments, and the 57-and-counting AI companies in our portfolio – with many more to be announced.

This month, we partnered with two AI-powered startups that are building the future, and re-imagining what is possible:

• Inworld—The Character Engine For AI NPCs

• Patronus—Automated AI Evaluation

Visit Stories and Companies for more about the startups that we build with.

We sat down with some of our Founders to hear about their challenges, successes, their startup beginnings, and why they chose to partner with Lightspeed. In this edition, meet Ariel Cohen, Co-Founder and CEO of Navan.

Our partners regularly share their insights and deep understanding of the market online. We work with our founders by first building a mastery of the areas where we share a passion to invent the next great business. Here are some insights we’ve recently published:

• Securing AI Is The Next Big Platform Opportunity

• Will Enterprise AI Models Be “Winner Take All?”

• Fintech in AI: Five Lessons Four Founders

• Four Ways Generative AI Will Transform Gaming

In an ever-changing sales landscape marked by economic uncertainties and rapid technological advancements, new trends are shaping how businesses approach their GTM strategies. In order to shed light on what companies are seeing out in the field, we surveyed 143 startups and aggregated benchmark data around sales representative performance, revenue goal attainment, and the adoption rate of AI-driven sales applications.

• Get the full report here

Together with GamesBeat and industry-leading judges, we are excited to announce an annual list to celebrate and accelerate extraordinary startups in gaming & interactive technology. The deadline to apply is Sunday, October 1. Winners will be announced later in October and highlighted at the GamesBeat Summit Next conference on October 24 – 25 in San Francisco.

• Learn more and apply here

We’re expanding our popular Generative series of AI meetups to Europe! First up: Paris, featuring Guillaume Lample, co-founder and Chief Science Officer at Mistral.ai, and Thomas Scialom, Research Scientist at Meta AI leading the Large Language Models team, in conversation with partner Antoine Moyroud.

Generative Paris will be held on September 26. Apply to attend, or learn more about this event and future Generative Europe events.

Back in the US, Lightspeed is hosting a Generative: NYC event on September 18 with Keith Peiris of Tome, as part of the Fast Company Innovation Festival. Limited spots are still available.

Lightspeed is also hosting a Generative: NYC AI x Blockchain meetup, featuring Illia Polosukhin, co-founder of NEAR Protocol, and Alex Atallah co-founder of OpenSea. They’ll be in conversation with venture partner Anand Iyer on September 21. Request an invitation to attend here.

We’re announcing new Generative meetups all the time. To stay up to date, fill out our notification form.

Generative Recaps

• Fintech in AI: Five Lessons For Founders

• Four Ways Generative AI Will Transform Gaming

Follow us! We’re on LinkedIn, Threads, X (fka Twitter), and Instagram. See what our Founders are up to, catch up on events you may have missed, like our recent Generative: SF meetup, and read about what Lightspeed’s partners are doing around the world.

We are grateful for your partnership and support, and welcome any feedback you have. We’ll see you next month with more news, insights, and updates!

–Team Lightspeed

Welcome to the August 2023 edition of the Lightspeed newsletter. Too often, VC only scratches the surface. Lightspeed takes a different approach.

On a monthly basis, we’ll keep you informed with in-depth reports about how we build and maintain a mastery that enables unwavering conviction in the companies we back. And how we go deep to build something impactful, together. Because possibility grows the deeper you go.

SERVING THE BOLD BUILDERS OF THE FUTURE 🔮

For over twenty years Lightspeed has been the first investor and an early backer of some of the most innovative companies in the world. In service of bold founders with big ideas, we stand behind our companies with high conviction from Seed to Series F and beyond. Meet some of the most recent companies and Founders we are building with:

• Resilience — Securing a Digital World

• Endor Labs — Application Security For All

• Redpanda — Taking Data Streaming Mainstream

• Gardens — Indie Gaming Innovation, AAA Ambition

• Berry Health — Full Stack Healthcare

• Supercritical — Pioneering the Climate Battle

• beehiiv — Finding the Queen Bee 🐝

Visit our Stories and Companies pages for more.

FOUNDER SPOTLIGHT 🌠

We sat down with some of our Founders to hear about their challenges, successes, why they started their businesses, and why they chose to partner with Lightspeed. In this edition, meet Bipul Sinha, Co-Founder and CEO of cybersecurity company Rubrik.

PARTNER PERSPECTIVES: AI 🤖

Our partners aren’t just investors – they’re big picture thinkers. They pair a deep understanding of the market with insights generated by Lightspeed’s data team to stay ahead of the curve. For example, Lightspeed has invested over $850 million in AI-powered startups over the last eight years. Here are some recent AI insights from our team:

• Eight AI Startups WInning The Race For Tech Talent — AI-native startups are in a race to attract the best and brightest to their startups. We crunched the numbers to identify the eight generative AI companies winning the race, and the Next Gen of companies building the future.

• Startups vs. Incumbents: The Battle for AI’s Application Layer — If your AI product is going head to head with an incumbent, you’ll probably lose…unless you fight back with a different game.

• Gaming x AI Market Map: The Infinite Power of Play — An (inevitably incomplete) overview of the emerging landscape of artificial intelligence and procedural generation in interactive media

• Fintech x AI: The Lightspeed View — Not all AI is created equal. How can LLMs work in highly regulated settings? Our Fintech team mapped the market to identify both the incumbent players and the emergent opportunities.

• SaaS 4.0: Say Hello to The Era of Cognition — Generative AI will eventually be a native part of every enterprise software company. Here’s how we see the winners emerging.

• What Lightspeed Is Reading, Listening To, And Thinking About AI — We’re sharing some foundational texts, recent reads, and great resources to stay on top of this world changing technology.

EVENTS 🎟️

We love meeting new people, spotlighting our Founders, and making valuable connections for those in our network.

• Generative NYC: Fintech in AI — The latest in Lightspeed’s Generative meetup series takes place on August 15 at our New York office. (Sign up to be notified about future Generative meetups in NYC, SF, LA, and London.)

• Scott Belsky on Creativity in Generative AI — At our recent Generative NYC summer edition, Scott Belsky, Chief Strategy Officer at Adobe spoke with Michael Mignano, partner, about the influence of generative AI on creativity, work, startups, and healthcare.

• Building Tomorrow’s Boardroom, Today — Our recent gathering addressed the empowerment of under-represented groups in the boardroom. Featuring a conversation with Celia Edwards Karam, Anita Lynch, Baron Davis, and Tammy K. Jones moderated by Lightspeed Partner Sydney Sykes, co-founder of BLCK VC, and Lightspeed’s partner for Executive Talent, Nicole North.

LAUNCH — FOR SEED STAGE FOUNDERS 🚀

Lightspeed is thrilled to announce our new program for Seed-stage founders: Launch. Launch is the culmination of 20+ years of hard-won expertise as Seed investors, partnering with founders who have the drive and irrational optimism to build generational companies.

• Learn more about Launch

LIGHTSPEED RADIO 🎙️

We love talking about the Founders we’re working with and how we think about building Lightspeed to be a great partner to the companies we back. Here are some recent conversations on notable podcasts:

• Staying Global — Bejul Somaia and Eric Newcomer

• Venture Capital Gravitational Physics — Ravi Mhatre and Eric Newcomer

• VC & The Future of Commerce — Sydney Sykes on DTC Pod

• Is the business of podcasting sustainable? — Michael Mignano on Money Talks from The Economist

• Welcome to the Machine — Guarav Gupta on Full Disclosure from NPR

WE’RE SOCIAL ❤️

Follow us! We’re on LinkedIn, Threads, X (fka Twitter), and Instagram. See what our Founders are up to, get notified about events, like our recent Generative NYC meetup with Adobe’s Scott Belsky, and read about what Lightspeed’s partners are doing around the world.

THANKS FOR READING 🙏

We welcome any feedback you have, and we’ll see you soon.

–Team Lightspeed