Sancus Ventures
Venture capitalActively deployingSan Francisco · Pre-Seed–Seed · 8 people tracked
Also known as SANCUS VENTURES MANAGEMENT, LLC
Investment thesis
Sancus Ventures backs founders building the core building blocks of software infrastructure. Founded and staffed by former founders, technologists, and community builders, the firm positions itself as the kind of VC it wished existed when its team was raising capital. It leverages a 500+ member community of software infrastructure experts and decision-makers from major public and high-growth tech companies to help portfolio companies find product-market fit, access top technical talent, and recruit advisors, board members, and hires. The firm emphasizes deep technical understanding of building companies from the ground up.
Source: firm website, verified Aug 25, 2026.
Team · 8 people
from the firm's website
What they invest in
from 26 of 33 portfolio companiesAI & Machine Learning ×20Developer Tools ×10Enterprise Software ×7SaaS ×7Crypto & Web3 ×5Data & Infrastructure ×4Fintech ×4Cybersecurity ×3
HQs:United States×13
Who they back
founder profiles across 12 portfolio companiesFounding team size:solo founder×32 founders×33 founders×44+ founders×2
Where their founders studiedfrom 15 founders with education data
Massachusetts Institute of Technology ×2University of California, Berkeley ×2
Where their founders worked beforefrom 14 founders with career history
Reducto ×3Browserbase ×2Google ×2
Accelerator rootsportfolio companies that came through a program
Investments · 33 tracked
founders shown can be your intro pathBy year:2025 · 22019 · 12011 · 14 dated
Cased uses AI to automate cloud infrastructure management, letting developers describe what they want to deploy and where while the tool handles tools like Terraform, Kubernetes, Docker, and AWS.
AI & Machine LearningCloud ComputingDeveloper ToolsSan Francisco, US
Benjamin Bleikamp(Director, Promoter)Garrett Bjerkhoel(Director, Promoter)Ben BleikampBryan Byrne(Executive Officer, Director, Promoter)
BoardTed Nyman
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsAbstraction CapitalFounders FundAscend Venture Capital
Monterey AI builds an AI-powered product analytics platform designed to extract insights from qualitative user data and feedback.
AI & Machine LearningData & InfrastructureDeveloper ToolsEnterprise SoftwareSaaSSan Francisco, US
Chun Jiang(Founder)inBen Kramer(Co-founder, CTO)
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsY CombinatorExceptional CapitalSoma Capital
Achievego provides human-in-the-loop evaluation for voice agents and LLM-based systems by pairing automated scores with calibrated human review to identify failure gaps and root causes in production interactions.
AI & Machine LearningDeveloper ToolsEnterprise Software
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
ALIGNMT AI provides AI governance infrastructure, including governance frameworks, risk monitoring, and certification support for enterprises in regulated industries.
AI & Machine LearningEnterprise SoftwareSaaS
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsAIX Ventures
Anyscale provides a platform for building and deploying machine learning and AI applications at scale, enabling developers to run applications from laptops to data centers without managing underlying infrastructure.
AI & Machine LearningCloud ComputingData & InfrastructureDeveloper ToolsSan Francisco, US
Robert Nishihara(Executive Officer, Director)inPhilipp Moritz(Executive Officer, Director)in
BoardBen Horowitz(Director)inIon Stoica(Executive Officer, Director)
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investors11.2 CapitalAmplify PartnersAndreessen HorowitzFoundation CapitalIntel CapitalNew Enterprise Associates (NEA)+2 more
Aomni provides AI agents that automate account research and go-to-market work for B2B sales and revenue teams, aggregating data from 20+ sources to build account plans, personalized outreach sequences, and value propositions.
AI & Machine LearningSaaSSales Tech
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investors57Blocks CapitalDecibel Partners
Arena.ai is a platform for exploring and interacting with frontier AI models; user conversations may be shared with AI providers for research purposes.
AI & Machine Learning
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsAndreessen HorowitzAtacama VenturesFelicis VenturesKleiner PerkinsLaude VenturesLightspeed Venture Partners
Artie provides a data replication platform built on change data capture (CDC) technology, enabling real-time data movement with sub-minute latency and zero data loss.
AI & Machine LearningData & InfrastructureDeveloper ToolsEnterprise SoftwareSaaSSan Francisco, US
Jacqueline Cheong(Founder)inRobin Tang(Founder)inRobin(Co-Founder & CTO)
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsStandard CapitalCalano VenturesCanaan PartnersFJ LabsGeneral CatalystIA Seed Ventures+6 more
Bastion provides stablecoin issuance infrastructure with compliance and security features, enabling institutions to launch USD-backed stablecoins with customizable issuer models.
Crypto & Web3Fintech
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsa16z cryptoAndreessen HorowitzCoinbase VenturesSamsung NextSony Ventures CorporationHashed+1 more
Brix connects companies with vetted remote software engineers sourced from outside their home market, handling sourcing, vetting, deployment, and ongoing management through its WorkViz platform.
AI & Machine LearningFuture of WorkHR TechMarketplaces
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsMento vc
CipherOwl provides AI-powered security and compliance infrastructure for institutional stablecoins and digital assets, automating screening, investigation, and regulatory reporting across blockchain networks.
AI & Machine LearningCrypto & Web3CybersecuritySan Francisco, US
Leo Liang(Founder)Ming Jiang(Founder)in
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investors57Blocks CapitalCoinbase VenturesPredictive VCFlourish Ventures
CodeLock provides software supply chain security solutions.
CybersecurityDeveloper ToolsGovTechSaaS
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsOakseed VenturesSoundboard Venture Fund
Dinari provides tokenized stocks and ETFs (dShares) that combine traditional equity securities with blockchain-based digital assets, serving financial institutions like neobanks, fintechs, brokerages, and institutional traders across 85+ jurisdictions.
Crypto & Web3FintechPalo Alto, US
Gabriel Otte(Executive Officer, Director)inAltay MalazgirtJake Timothy
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investors500 GlobalAlliance DAO (ex DeFi Alliance)F-Prime CapitalHack VCSilvermine Capital
Dyna develops general-purpose robots powered by foundation models that adapt across environments and learn new skills rapidly, with deployment across a fleet that continuously improves.
AI & Machine LearningDeep TechRobotics
Lindon Gao(Founder)Jason Ma(Founder)inYork Yang(Founder)in
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsBig Brain HoldingsCRV (Charles River Ventures)HCVCINCE CapitalLG Technology VenturesSamsung Next+4 more
Exceeds provides an agent intelligence layer that tracks and attributes AI-generated prompts to merged pull requests across the software development lifecycle, measuring token efficiency and return metrics for engineering teams.
AI & Machine LearningDeveloper ToolsEnterprise Software
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsSemperVirens Venture Capital
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Napkin Labs provides an AI agent platform designed to support hardware engineering and manufacturing processes.
Advanced ManufacturingAI & Machine LearningHardwareBoulder, US
Warren Ng(Executive Officer, Director)Riley Gibson(Executive Officer, Director)
BoardWendi Burkhardt(Director)
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Opennote is an AI-powered learning platform that consolidates lecture materials, notes, and readings in one place and provides contextual explanations, practice tools, and video tutorials to help students understand course content.
AI & Machine LearningConsumerEdTechSaaSSan Francisco, US
Rishi Srihari(Founder)inAbhi Arya(Co-Founder and CTO)inVedant Vyas(Founder)in
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsAfore CapitalY CombinatorAndreessen HorowitzScript Capital
Pax AI provides AI-powered compliance infrastructure for global trade, helping enterprises manage duty drawback and trade compliance across fragmented systems.
AI & Machine LearningEnterprise SoftwareFintechLogistics & Supply ChainSaaSSan Francisco, US
Penny Chen(Founder & CEO)inChris Le(Founder)in
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsBasis Set VenturesGeneral CatalystInitialized CapitalSoma CapitalTranspose Platform ManagementY Combinator+2 more
The developer platform for fine-tuning and serving open-source LLMs
Developer ToolsEnterprise SoftwareSan Francisco, US
Devvret Rishi(Co-Founder & CEO)Piero Molino(Co-Founder & CSO (Chief Scientist))Travis Addair(Co-Founder & CTO)inChris Ré(Co-Founder)
BoardSaam Motamedi(Board Member / Investor (Greylock Partners))Jason Risch(Investor (Greylock Partners))
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsFelicis VenturesGreylock Partners
Rare Bits is a San Francisco peer-to-peer marketplace for buying, selling and auctioning Ethereum-based crypto-collectibles (NFTs).
San Francisco, US
Amitt Mahajan(Executive Officer, Director)David Pekar(Executive Officer, Director)
BoardNabeel Hyatt(Director)in
Co-investorsHanabi CapitalSpark Capital
Powerful APIs for NFT buying, selling & data
Danny Bernstein(Founder)in
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsNascentUnion Square Ventures (USV)ArchetypeAsymmetric Capital PartnersFounder CollectiveSevenX Ventures+1 more
Silicon Data provides real-time price transparency and GPU performance data, along with GPU rental indices and forward curves, treating AI compute as a tradable commodity.
AI & Machine LearningData & InfrastructureFintechNew York, US
Carmen Li(Founder and CEO)
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Softmax builds AI systems based on organic alignment principles—the concept that agents remaining aligned with human values also maintain alignment with each other.
AI & Machine LearningDeep TechSector Agnostic
Emmett Shear(CEO & Founder)inDavid Bloomin(Founder)inYatharth Agarwal(Cofounder)inAdam Goldstein(Board Member and Founder Emeritus)in
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsJuniper Ventures Management, LlcLifelike CapitalLIONHEART VENTURESMythos Ventures Management, LlcNight CapitalSummit Peak Investments+2 more
Decentralized Ethereum-equivalent ZK-rollup aiming to scale Ethereum while maintaining security and decentralization
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsL2 Iterative Ventures (L2IV)Mapleblock Capital
Taiko is an open, community-driven project focused on scaling Ethereum.
Crypto & Web3Developer Tools
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsBollinger Investment GroupFactionGenerative VenturesIOSG VenturesMapleblock CapitalToken Bay Capital+7 more
Zero-Knowledge Proof as a Service provider for Polkadot offering privacy and scalability tools.
PartnerLake Dai· solo GP
Co-investorsAdvanced BlockchainDigital Finance GroupIOSG Ventures
Exits · 1
IPOs and acquisitions across the tracked portfolioOpennoteacq. by Reducto
Portfolio news
latest coverage across their companies
Pax · manilatimes.net · Jul 18, 2026
Bastion · marketbeat.com · Jul 17, 2026
Arena · blazersedge.com · Jul 17, 2026
Dyna Robotics · citybiz.co · Jul 15, 2026
Artie · ycombinator.com · Jun 9, 2026
Opennote · betakit.com · May 12, 2026
Predibase · Business Wire · Jun 25, 2025
Frequently asked questions
- How many investments has Sancus Ventures made?
- Sancus Ventures has 31 tracked investments, 2 of which have exited via acquisition or IPO, including 2 dated in the last 24 months.
- What stage does Sancus Ventures invest at?
- Sancus Ventures invests at the Pre-Seed, Seed stages.
- What sectors does Sancus Ventures focus on?
- Sancus Ventures focuses on AI & Machine Learning, Cloud Computing, Crypto & Web3, Data & Infrastructure, Deep Tech, Developer Tools, Enterprise Software, SaaS.
- Where is Sancus Ventures located?
- Sancus Ventures is headquartered in San Francisco, US.
- Who does Sancus Ventures co-invest with?
- Sancus Ventures most often shares deals with Andreessen Horowitz, Y Combinator, Felicis Ventures, among 65 tracked co-investors.
Images
Co-investors · 5
New Enterprise Associates (NEA) is a venture capital firm that invests in and provides long-term support to founders building new companies.
AIX Ventures is an AI-focused venture fund that backs founders building companies in artificial intelligence.
The General Partnership (thegp) is a venture firm that supports founders with hiring, product execution, and go-to-market help to close the execution gaps that can undermine growing companies.
Alpha JWC Ventures is a Southeast Asia-focused venture capital firm that, over its first decade, has backed founders in building transformative businesses across the region.
Firms observed investing alongside Sancus Ventures, from public investor directories. Shared companies are the overlap with Sancus Ventures's recorded portfolio.
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