First Star Ventures
Venture capitalCambridge · Pre-Seed–Seed · 5 people tracked
Investment thesis
First Star invests at pre-seed in visionary, technically deep founders riding emerging computing waves. Its thesis centers on the idea that computing continues to expand into more of the world: robots developing spatial intelligence for complex real-world tasks, the merging of software and biology through genomics, CRISPR, and generative AI, and AI enabling creative reasoning beyond simple automation. The firm backs engineers and researchers transforming large industries from the ground up, positioning itself as a hands-on partner from zero through Series A and beyond, offering network, expertise, and complementary skills.
Source: firm website, verified Aug 3, 2026.
Team · 5 people
from the firm's website & public directories
What they invest in
from 36 of 46 portfolio companiesAI & Machine Learning ×21Data & Infrastructure ×8Enterprise Software ×8Deep Tech ×7Biotech ×6Climate Tech ×5Developer Tools ×5Hardware ×5
HQs:United States×23Canada×2
Who they back
founder profiles across 17 portfolio companiesFounding team size:solo founder×82 founders×33 founders×24+ founders×4
Where their founders worked beforefrom 10 founders with career history
Stanford University ×2
Accelerator rootsportfolio companies that came through a program
Investments · 46 tracked
founders shown can be your intro pathBy year:2026 · 12025 · 12023 · 12022 · 22021 · 12018 · 22017 · 19 dated
Genialis is a precision oncology company that applies data analysis to help drug developers understand mechanisms of action, resistance, and patient stratification for cancer therapies.
AI & Machine LearningBiotechDigital HealthMedical DevicesBoston, US
Miha Štajdohar(Executive Officer, Director)inRafael Rosengarten(Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder)inLuka Ausec(Executive Officer)inHamzeh Abdul-Hadi(Director)Tjasa Krisper Kutin(Executive Officer)
Board seatDrew Volpe· per SEC Form D
Co-investorsAngelini VenturesTaiwania CapitalDebiopharm Innovation FundScaleX Venturesredalpine
Cisco provides networking, data center, and security technology for enterprises, including infrastructure to run traditional and AI workloads and tools to keep organizations running against cyberattacks and outages.
Cloud ComputingCybersecurityEnterprise SoftwareIoTSan Jose, US
John ChambersinChuck Robbinsin
Co-investorsAccess Venture PartnersAllegisCyber CapitalAviv Venture CapitalBantam GroupCastile VenturesCeltic House Venture Partners+31 more
Bedrock Energy develops drilling technology and data algorithms for designing and installing geothermal borehole fields used for building heating and cooling.
CleantechClimate TechEnergyLos Angeles, US
Silviu Livescu(Executive Officer)inJoselyn Lai(Executive Officer, Director)inJoel Wishkovsky(Executive Officer, Director)
BoardPaul Straub(Director)in
Co-investorsCantos VenturesEnergy Impact PartnersTitanium VenturesToba CapitalWireframe VenturesClimate Capital+4 more
Co-investorsConvective CapitalHumba VenturesOverture Climate
Bot Auto is an autonomous trucking company operating a self-driving truck fleet and offering Transportation as a Service (TaaS) to major third-party logistics providers, shippers, and freight brokers.
AI & Machine LearningLogistics & Supply ChainMobility & TransportationHouston, US
Co-investorsUpHonest CapitalLinear Capital
Brelle develops a modular energy platform for high-performance machines, combining battery hardware, embedded AI-enabled software, and automated manufacturing.
Deep TechEnergyHardwareLos Alamitos, US
Martin Hermez(Founder)Nachiket V(Founder)
Co-investorsRefactor Capital
Brink is a generalized intents protocol for Web3 that offers an Intent Engine accessible via API, letting developers integrate features such as gasless recurring token swaps.
Crypto & Web3Developer ToolsFintech
Co-investorsIOSG VenturesLemniscapIndicator Ventures
Gideon Lapidoth(Founder)in
Co-investorsKhosla VenturesNextLeap Ventures
Tomas van Stee(Founder)in
Co-investorsGolden VenturesInovia CapitalPanache Ventures
Co-investorsWaterloo Accelerator CentreInovia Capital
Extellis is developing satellite technology to deliver high-resolution (1 m) Earth imagery at industrial scale for remote monitoring applications.
Deep TechDefense TechHardwareSpace TechDurham, US
Jeffrey Ludwig(Executive Officer)Michael Boyarsky(Executive Officer, Director)
BoardJustin Wright-Eakes(Director)inDavid Smith(Director)in
Co-investorsDuke Capital PartnersOval Park CapitalShell Ventures
Fyto builds automated cropping systems that cultivate the aquatic plant lemna to recover farm nutrients and produce protein and starch, serving dairy and other farm operations.
AgTechClimate TechRobotics
Co-investorsCity LightBaukunstRefactor Capital
Gradient provides a hardware-rooted identity and access platform with two products: StealthMFA, a passwordless, phishing-resistant multi-factor authentication tool for workforces, and Tesseral, a control plane that assigns scoped, verified identities and permissions to AI agents.
AI & Machine LearningCybersecurityEnterprise Software
Infinite Analytics builds SherlockAI, an AI platform that generates consumer insights to support business decision-making.
AI & Machine LearningData & InfrastructureMarketing TechCambridge, US
Akash Bhatia(CRO & Cofounder)Purushotham Botla(Director)Puru Botla(CEO & Cofounder)Harish Bhatia(Director)
iOrganBio builds CellForge, an AI- and automation-driven platform for engineering and manufacturing human cells and organoids.
Co-investorsCape Fear BioCapitalHartmann Capital
Jellyfish provides software engineering intelligence and team management tools for engineering organizations.
AI & Machine LearningDeveloper ToolsEnterprise SoftwareFintechSaaS
David Gourley(Founder)in
Co-investorsAccelInsight PartnersWingTiger Global Management
Kanary is a digital privacy and security platform that finds where an individual's personal information is exposed across search engines, social media, and data brokers, then removes it and helps prevent future leaks.
ConsumerCybersecuritySaaSChicago, US
Rachel Vrabec(Founder)
Co-investorsY Combinator2048 Ventures
Native Voice operates an on-demand voice services library letting users reach branded voice assistants across audio devices.
Denver, US
John Goscha(Executive Officer, Director)
Co-investorsAlleyCorpBantam GroupMaccabee VenturesPJCTech Square VenturesValia Ventures+4 more
Nomic offers an end-to-end protein profiling service built on its nELISA technology, quantifying up to 1000 informative proteins with absolute quantification for research studies.
BiotechDeep TechHealthtechMedical DevicesMontreal, CA
Milad Dagher(Founder)inJeff Munzar(Founder)in
Co-investorsAvant BioFront Row VenturesRaptor GroupY CombinatorBoxOne VenturesLux Capital
Parallel Wireless develops open radio access network (RAN) software and solutions for telecommunications operators.
Cloud ComputingDeep TechEnterprise SoftwareHardwareBoston, US
Sridhar(Co-founder)Kaitki(Co-founder, Chief Product Officer)Steve Papa(Executive Officer, Director)Rajesh Mishra(Executive Officer, Director)
Co-investorsDN CapitalFloodgateG SquaredSIP Global PartnersEchoVC Partners
Plex is a scientific intelligence platform that combines a biomedical knowledge graph with large language models to query structured genomic, proteomic, clinical, and chemical datasets and deliver evidence-scored answers for drug discovery.
AI & Machine LearningBiotechData & InfrastructureCambridge, US
Douglas Selinger(Founder)
Co-investorsBoston Seed Capital
Plus One Robotics develops intelligent parcel handling robotics systems that combine computer vision, AI, and supervised autonomy for logistics and ecommerce organizations.
AI & Machine LearningLogistics & Supply ChainRoboticsSan Antonio, US
Erik Nieves(CEO & Co-founder)inShaun Edwards(CTO & Co-founder)Paul Hvass(Executive Officer, Director)
BoardWhitney Rockley(Director)inChris Girgenti(Director)inToshiya Otani(Director)
Co-investorsBMW i VenturesDynamo VenturesKensington Capital Partners LimitedLeonis CapitalMcRock CapitalPerot Jain+4 more
Robotics company (Plus One Robotics).
rENIAC builds a Data Engine that acts as a drop-in database accelerator using FPGA, CPU and tiered storage (DRAM+SSD) to lower latency and increase throughput for SQL, NoSQL and Graph databases.
Data & InfrastructureDeep TechHardware
Co-investorsBullpen CapitalIntel CapitalJ-Ventures
Resilinc provides agentic AI software for supply chain risk management that detects disruptions in real time and recommends mitigation actions.
AI & Machine LearningEnterprise SoftwareLogistics & Supply ChainMilpitas, US
Sumit Vakil(Executive Officer)Bindiya Vakil(Executive Officer, Director)inGregory Silich(Director)
BoardRavi Mohan(Director)inJohn Dougery(Director)in
Co-investorsEscalate Capital PartnersInventus Capital PartnersStreamlined VenturesSalesforce VenturesShasta VenturesVista Equity Partners
Robigo develops engineered microbial crop protection products for growers, including a biological solution targeting Sudden Death Syndrome in soybean.
AgTechBiotechFoodTech
Andee Wallace, PhD(Founder)in
Co-investorsCongruent VenturesEndeavor8Good Growth CapitalSUPPLY CHANGE CAPITALThe E14 FundAera VC+2 more
Romix Bio develops technology to generate deeper insights into disease biology and therapeutic activity.
AI & Machine LearningBiotech
Co-investors2048 Ventures
Salient produces AI-powered subseasonal-to-seasonal weather and climate forecasts spanning one day to one year, using deep neural networks trained on ocean, land-surface, and climate data.
AI & Machine LearningClimate TechDeep TechFalmouth, US
Matthew Stein(Executive Officer, Director)Raymond Schmitt(Executive Officer, Director)inRay Schmitt(Co-founder)Eric Schmitt(Co-founder)inStephen Schmitt(Co-founder)in
BoardPaul Straub(Director)in
Co-investorsBlindspot Ventures Management CoEndeavor8Wireframe VenturesMunich Re Ventures
SaolaAI is an autonomous software quality platform that analyzes real user sessions to automatically generate, run, and monitor end-to-end tests without manual scripting or maintenance.
AI & Machine LearningDeveloper ToolsSaaS
Scoot Science provides ocean intelligence for commercial fishing and aquaculture operations, offering real-time ocean forecasts, condition monitoring, and data logging tools.
AgTechClimate TechData & Infrastructure
Co-investorsHAWKTAILRackhouse Venture Management Lp
Sia is a decentralized, open-source cloud storage network that encrypts and splits files into shards distributed across a peer-to-peer network with no central access point.
Cloud ComputingCrypto & Web3Data & Infrastructure
Co-investorsDeepTech Ventures
Swiftly operates a retail media platform that integrates digital-out-of-home advertising and point-of-sale data to enable retailers and brands to target shoppers across physical and digital channels and measure real-world sales impact.
AdTechAI & Machine LearningMarketing TechRetail Tech
Sean Turner(CTO and Co-founder)in
Co-investorsAdit Ventures Management, LlcPROOFSilicon Ventures
TALLA is a video analytics platform that converts a site's existing security cameras into monitoring tools by letting operators write rules in plain English, then generating real-time alerts with attached evidence frames.
AI & Machine LearningCybersecurityEnterprise SoftwareBrookline, US
Robert C. May(Executive Officer, Director)
BoardRichard Levandov(Director)
Co-investorsKnockout CapitalLaunchCapitalGlasswing VenturesHyperplane Venture CapitalMAGIC FundPillar+1 more
Throne makes a smart sensor that clips onto a standard toilet bowl and automatically tracks gut health, hydration, and urinary function, delivering daily insights through an app.
Digital HealthHardwareWellness & FitnessAustin, US
Randall Scott Hickle II(Executive Officer, Director)Scott Hickle(Co-founder)inTim(Co-founder)John Capodilupo(Co-founder & Chief Product Officer)
BoardBen Gardner(Director)inTimothy Blumberg(Director)
Co-investorsLong Journey VenturesMoxxie VenturesMyelin VCNight CapitalV1 VCAccomplice+6 more
Tranquil Data helps businesses manage the complexity of their data — including the rights, obligations, quality, and applicability tied to different data — so it can be used correctly for AI initiatives, new products, market expansion, and analysis.
AI & Machine LearningData & InfrastructureEnterprise SoftwareArlington, US
Seth Proctor(Executive Officer, Director)inPeter Shah(Director)
BoardVivjan Myrto(Director)in
Co-investorsHyperplane Venture Capital
Turso is a database engine built as a Rust rewrite of SQLite, adding concurrent writes, native vector search, cloud-native replication, and browser/on-device support via WebAssembly.
AI & Machine LearningData & InfrastructureDeveloper ToolsLondon, CA
Glauber Costa(Founder)in
Co-investorsMango CapitalNorwest Venture PartnersPreston-Werner VenturesEssence Venture Capital
Vistapath develops technology solutions to modernize pathology lab operations, helping pathology laboratories improve quality, efficiency, and consistency in critical lab processes.
AI & Machine LearningHealthtechMedical DevicesCambridge, US
Timothy Spong(CEO & Founder)Ben Burley(COO & Founder)inBurley Benjamin(Executive Officer, Director)Spong Timothy(Executive Officer, Director)Jacob Guggenheim(CTO)in
Co-investorsCota CapitalMoxxie VenturesNextGen Venture PartnersScribble VenturesSpero VenturesValuestream Ventures
Winterlight Labs develops a tablet-based, speech analysis platform that extracts digital biomarkers from short speech samples to detect and monitor cognitive impairment linked to dementia and mental illness.
AI & Machine LearningDigital HealthHealthtech
Co-investorsDG Daiwa VenturesHikma Ventures
Zanskar develops geothermal energy projects using AI and advanced geoscience to map subsurface resources and deliver utility-scale, carbon-free power.
AI & Machine LearningDeep TechEnergy
Carl Hoiland(Founder & CEO)inJoel Edwards(Founder)
Co-investorsAzolla VenturesClearvision VenturesGVP ClimateLOWERCARBONLowercarbon CapitalObvious Ventures+6 more
Zanskar uses geoscience, AI, and advanced drilling methods to map the Earth's subsurface and identify geothermal resources that have been overlooked or considered too risky.
AI & Machine LearningClimate TechEnergy
Carl Hoiland(Founder)inJoel Edwards(Founder)in
Co-investorsAzolla VenturesPrime Impact FundSafar PartnersBessemer Venture PartnersLowercarbon CapitalObvious Ventures+3 more
Zep provides infrastructure that manages and governs agent memory at scale across multiple data sources including chat, documents, events, and business data.
AI & Machine LearningData & InfrastructureDeveloper ToolsEnterprise SoftwareSan Francisco, US
Daniel Chalef(Founder)in
Co-investorsY Combinator
Portfolio news
latest coverage across their companiesZanskar · x.com · Aug 6, 2026
Throne · finsmes.com · Jul 29, 2026
Bot · techcrunch.com · Jul 28, 2026
Extellis · axios.com · Jul 23, 2026
Jellyfish · timesnownews.com · Jun 23, 2026
Turso · turso.tech · May 11, 2026
Zanskar · ipoplatform.com · Apr 7, 2026
Romix Biosciences · news.cornell.edu · Apr 7, 2026
Frequently asked questions
- How many investments has First Star Ventures made?
- First Star Ventures has 37 tracked investments, including 2 dated in the last 24 months.
- What stage does First Star Ventures invest at?
- First Star Ventures invests at the Pre-Seed, Seed stages.
- What is First Star Ventures's typical check size?
- First Star Ventures typically writes checks of $100K – $1M.
- What sectors does First Star Ventures focus on?
- First Star Ventures focuses on AI & Machine Learning, Biotech, Cybersecurity, Deep Tech, Energy, Robotics.
- Where is First Star Ventures located?
- First Star Ventures is headquartered in Cambridge, US.
- Does First Star Ventures lead rounds?
- Yes, First Star Ventures leads investment rounds.
- Who does First Star Ventures co-invest with?
- First Star Ventures most often shares deals with 2048 Ventures, Moxxie Ventures, Norwest Venture Partners, among 118 tracked co-investors.
Media · Podcasts & interviews
featuring the teamDrew Volpe, Founder & Managing Partner at First Star Ventures
MGMT Boston - The Lantern · Drew Volpe
Co-investors · 27
2048 Ventures is a thesis-driven early-stage venture capital firm based in New York and Boston that backs founders building future technologies.
Bessemer Venture Partners is a global venture capital firm that partners with entrepreneurs across enterprise, consumer, and healthcare sectors from early stages through growth.
Accel is a venture capital firm that partners with exceptional teams, positioning itself as a first partner to founders globally.
Techstars is a startup accelerator and early-stage investor that funds ambitious founders and provides capital, mentorship, and access to a global network of investors, operators, and corporate partners.
UpHonest Capital is a Silicon Valley-based investment firm founded in 2017 that supports cross-border entrepreneurship and investment between China and the United States, and runs media, scout, and incubation programs.
Preston-Werner Ventures is a venture capital firm associated with Tom Preston-Werner, cofounder of GitHub, who has moved into venture investing.
Indicator Ventures is an early-stage venture capital firm that backs founders at the idea and pre-Series A stage, deliberately investing in a small number of companies to provide hands-on support.
Congruent Ventures is an early-stage venture firm backing North American teams innovating across hardware, software, and business models, with a focus on climate and sustainability.
Founder Collective is a seed and pre-seed stage venture capital firm that invests across sectors, describing itself as sector agnostic and anti-thematic.
First Round Capital is an early-stage venture firm that backs companies at their earliest moments, often before they are named, across enterprise, AI, consumer, healthcare, fintech and hardware sectors.
Uber is a technology company operating multisided platforms that connect consumers with ride services, transit, delivery of food and groceries, and freight shipping across more than 70 countries and 15,000+ cities.
SOSV is a deep tech venture capital firm that makes first-check pre-seed investments and follow-on rounds in startups focused on human and planetary health, providing lab space and hands-on support at its US locations.
▶15 more co-investors
Caffeinated CapitalFlybridge Capital PartnersStellar CapitalHustle FundUncorrelated VenturesLocus VenturesOyster VenturesLocalGlobecLabsNeu Venture CapitalPillar VCNKM CapitalSeventure PartnersInnospark VenturesInBlockchain
Firms observed investing alongside First Star Ventures, from public investor directories. Shared companies are the overlap with First Star Ventures's recorded portfolio.
Similar investors
Amadeus Capital Partners is a technology investment firm that backs founders building complex, science-led and deep tech businesses, supporting them over the long term as they scale internationally.
DCVC (Data Collective) is a deep tech venture capital firm that backs entrepreneurs using computational approaches to solve large-scale real-world problems across many industries.
Fly Ventures is an early-stage venture firm that backs founders at the zero-to-one stage, with portfolio companies going on to raise substantial follow-on funding from top US and European VCs.
Khosla Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage companies focused on technology, mobile, and clean energy sectors, including biotechnology applications. The firm provides capital and strategic support to entrepreneurs developing breakthrough technologies across multiple markets.
.jpeg){kind=logo}
IQ Capital is a European deep tech venture capital firm that backs founders building breakthrough frontier technologies across large global markets.