SmartGateVC
Venture capitalGlendale · Pre-Seed–Seed · 22 people tracked
Also known as SMARTGATEVC LLC
Investment thesis
SmartGateVC focuses on identifying industry-defining ideas at their earliest stage and supporting their growth from pre-seed to seed. The firm emphasizes investing ahead of the market in deep, frontier technologies including Physical AI, Secure Edge computing, and Brain-Computer Interfaces / Neurotech. Beyond capital, it provides founders with access to talent and industry connections to accelerate their development. Its investment activity spans Southern California, the wider United States, and Armenia.
Source: firm website, verified Sep 1, 2026.
Team · 22 people
from the firm's website & curatedWhat they invest in
from 49 of 65 portfolio companiesAI & Machine Learning ×31Deep Tech ×15Biotech ×10Enterprise Software ×10SaaS ×10Medical Devices ×9Data & Infrastructure ×7Healthtech ×7
HQs:United States×24Armenia×1China×1Germany×1United Kingdom×1
Who they back
founder profiles across 27 portfolio companiesFounding team size:solo founder×162 founders×53 founders×44+ founders×2
Where their founders studiedfrom 14 founders with education data
Yerevan State University ×3American University of Armenia ×2State Engineering University of Armenia ×2University of Maryland ×2
Where their founders worked beforefrom 15 founders with career history
BIGSTORY VC ×2PicsArt ×2
Accelerator rootsportfolio companies that came through a program
Investments · 65 tracked
founders shown can be your intro pathBy year:2025 · 12024 · 12022 · 13 dated
Intel designs and manufactures semiconductor processors for data center, consumer, and embedded applications, including Xeon server processors, Arc graphics processors, and mobile processors.
AI & Machine LearningHardwareSemiconductorsSanta Clara, US
April Miller Boise(Executive Vice President and Chief Legal Officer)inMichelle Johnston Holthaus(Chief Executive Officer of Intel Products)inChristoph Schell(Executive Officer)inDavid A. Zinsner(Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer)inLip-Bu Tan(Chief Executive Officer & Director)in
BoardJames J. Goetz(Director)
Co-investorsAccess Venture PartnersCeltic House Venture PartnersGen CapitalKluz VenturesNorwest Venture PartnersPlayground Global+5 more
Activeloop provides a data infrastructure platform that indexes, searches, and organizes multimodal data (documents, images, videos) for AI applications through its Deep Lake database and search capabilities.
AI & Machine LearningData & InfrastructureDeveloper ToolsEnterprise SoftwareSan Francisco, US
Davit Buniatyan(Founder)in
Co-investorsAiSprouts VCCM VenturesFounders.aiSamsung NextStreamlined VenturesY Combinator+4 more
Co-investors468 Capital
CB Insights provides a market intelligence platform that offers verified data, analytics, and predictive scoring on over 12 million private and public companies.
AI & Machine LearningData & InfrastructureSaaS
Co-investorsAlumni VenturesBasecamp FundCartaCRV (Charles River Ventures)One Way VenturesPilot Growth Equity+3 more
Boulder, US
Matt Lipscomb(Executive Officer, Director)Nathan Ratledge(Executive Officer, Director)
BoardBradley Sheftel(Director)Stephen Rodriguez(Director)inLeo Banchick(Director)Tom Baruch(Director)in
Co-investorsAdvance Venture PartnersBuilders FundDCVC (Data Collective)General Mediterranean HoldingsGranite HillJuniper+5 more
Amaros builds AmarosEngine, a precision intelligence platform that integrates ophthalmology clinics' EHR, practice management, and imaging systems to unify ophthalmic data and generate real-world evidence and insights.
AI & Machine LearningBiotechDigital Health
Ben Toker(President & Co-Founder)in
Amaros builds AmarosEngine, a precision intelligence platform that integrates ophthalmic clinics' EHR, practice management, and imaging systems to unify real-world data and generate insights for clinical trials, real-world evidence, and commercial growth.
AI & Machine LearningDigital HealthHealthtech
Ben Toker(President and Co-Founder)
Arnata provides AI agents for transportation and logistics companies that automate repetitive tasks by syncing with transportation management systems, load boards, and phone systems.
AI & Machine LearningEnterprise SoftwareLogistics & Supply ChainSan Francisco, US
Georgy Melkonyan(Founder)in
Co-investorsCathexis VenturesFundersClubStreamlined VenturesY Combinator
Async is an AI-powered video editor that allows users to create, edit, and repurpose videos through conversational prompts rather than traditional editing interfaces.
AI & Machine LearningCreator EconomyMedia & Entertainment
Arto Yeritsyan(Founder)in
Co-investorsDiaspora VenturesMosaic VenturesPoint Nine
Base10 is a venture capital firm that invests in automation technology for what it calls the "real economy," backing companies serving the broader population, and it states it donates 50% of its proceeds to support future technology founders.
Sector Agnostic
Co-investorsInvariantes FundNexus BayStage 2 Capital
Britive provides identity access management for cloud environments, offering a cloud-native privileged access management platform that centralizes visibility and controls across cloud and SaaS applications.
Cloud ComputingCybersecurityEnterprise Software
Art Poghosyan(Co-Founder & CEO)Alex Gudanis(Co-Founder & CTO)inSameer Hiremath(Co-Founder, SVP of Product & GM)in
Co-investorsCrosslink CapitalOne Way VenturesUpfront VenturesBlumberg CapitalFoundersX VenturesGradient Ventures+1 more
Cloudchipr is a FinOps platform that helps engineering, finance, and leadership teams reduce cloud and AI infrastructure costs through cost attribution, anomaly detection, and automated workflows across multi-cloud environments.
Cloud ComputingDeveloper ToolsEnterprise SoftwareFintechSaaSBerlin, DE
Ashot Ayvazyan(Founder)inSuren Marashlyan(Founder)in
Co-investorsBegin CapitalFlyer One VenturesY Combinator
CM Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in B2B and B2C companies from post-seed to Series B, using an internal data platform to benchmark companies across industries and support portfolio founders.
Sector Agnostic
Coherence develops neurotechnology systems that measure and modulate brain activity to treat cancer and other neurological diseases.
AI & Machine LearningBiotechMedical DevicesSan Francisco, US
Ben Woodington(Co-founder & CEO)inElise Jenkins(Co-founder & CTO)in
Co-investorsArtesianBlackbird VenturesPossible VenturesXEIA Venture PartnersDivergent CapitalTopology Ventures
Cordance Medical develops medical technology focused on diagnosing and treating patients with brain diseases, drawing on expertise from neurosurgery, neuroimaging, and biomedical engineering.
AI & Machine LearningBiotechDeep TechDigital HealthHealthtechMedical DevicesMountain View, US
Ryan Dittamore(CEO)in
Co-investorsAngel Physicians FundBeresford VenturesCreative Destruction Lab (CDL)Shanda GroupSonder Capital
Crosslink Capital is a venture capital and investment firm managing portfolios across multiple sectors.
Sector AgnosticSan Francisco, US
Co-investorsUnion Grove Venture Partners
Deep Origin develops a physics-based simulation platform for drug discovery that models biological systems across scales from quantum to cellular level with explainable physics rather than black-box AI.
AI & Machine LearningBiotechDeep TechWoodbury, US
Michael Antonov(Executive Officer, Director)inDmitriy Matthew Shlosberg(Executive Officer, Director)
BoardGaregin Papoian(Director)in
Diginomica is an enterprise technology news and analysis publication covering digital transformation, cloud computing, and IT trends for business decision-makers.
AI & Machine LearningEnterprise SoftwareMedia & EntertainmentUS and Europe, US
Enkrypt AI provides a platform for security and compliance of AI systems, offering real-time threat detection, guardrails, monitoring, and policy compliance automation for enterprises deploying generative AI applications.
AI & Machine LearningCybersecurityEnterprise Software
Prashanth Harshangi(Co-founder)inSahil Agarwal(Co-founder)in
Co-investorsArka Venture Labs
Expper Technologies builds Robin, a research-backed therapeutic robot that provides emotional support, engagement, and care alongside clinicians in healthcare settings such as pediatrics and geriatrics.
Digital HealthHealthtechRobotics
Co-investorsAiSprouts VCFormula VC
Feedback Intelligence provides AI user observability and feedback-loop tooling grounded in real product usage.
AI & Machine LearningData & InfrastructureSaaS
Co-investorsArgonautic Ventures
Fleak builds a data normalization and quality platform that automatically structures fragmented data inputs for use in AI systems and analytics pipelines.
AI & Machine LearningData & InfrastructureDeveloper ToolsEnterprise Software
Bo LeiYichen Jin
Co-investorsHivemind Capital PartnersOakseed VenturesRain CapitalSAV (Scale Asia Ventures)
Flexy is a full-service product design and development agency that builds custom digital products and extends in-house teams for clients worldwide.
Developer ToolsFuture of WorkSaaSArmenia, AM
Grovf is a datacenter fabric company providing high-performance networking solutions for 400/800Gbps scale-out and scale-up architectures serving semiconductor, OEM, and hyperscale customers.
AI & Machine LearningData & InfrastructureDeep TechHardwareSemiconductorsUS, US
Co-investorsGranatus Ventures
HarborSite develops a targeted gene insertion platform that engineers site-specific recombinase enzymes to integrate therapeutic genes into safe genomic sites.
BiotechDeep TechLongevity
Erik Aznauryan, PhD(Founder)in
Co-investorsFifty YearsSciFounders
Krisp builds real-time voice AI products that enhance communication through noise cancellation, accent conversion, voice translation, transcription, and summarization across audio hardware and applications.
AI & Machine LearningFuture of WorkSaaSBerkeley, US
Arto Minasyan(Founder)inDavit Baghdasaryan(Founder)in
Co-investorsBerkeley SkyDeck FundCM VenturesFormula VCGranatus VenturesRTP GlobalSierra Ventures+1 more
Ladder Bio (formerly ThirdLaw Molecular) develops Spiroligomer molecules, a class of synthetic, modular fused-ring compounds designed for highly selective binding to target proteins, along with computational design tools for targeted drug discovery.
BiotechDeep TechMedical DevicesBlue Bell, US
Christian Schafmeister(Founder)inEric Heil(Chief Executive Officer)in
Co-investorsMedical Excellence Capital
Outbrain, operating as Outbrain Direct Response, runs a performance marketing and advertising platform for the Open Internet, helping advertisers achieve measurable outcomes at scale.
AdTechMarketing Tech
Yaron Galai(Founder)in
Co-investorsGapMinderSTS Ventures GmbHSusquehanna Growth EquityVintage Investment Partners
This article covers the Chapter 11 bankruptcy auction process for Oceanwide Plaza, a $1.2 billion mixed-use development in downtown Los Angeles comprising residential towers, a hotel, and retail space that has remained incomplete since 2018.
Construction TechHealthtechLongevityMedia & EntertainmentPropTechRoboticsSanta Clarita, US
Tom Stevens(Founder and Chief Executive)
Co-investorsCaduceus Capital PartnersAvestria VenturesDay One VenturesTaurus Ventures
Co-investorsCRV (Charles River Ventures)General CatalystJMI EquityS Ventures
ModelFront builds AI that verifies and improves machine translations, automating quality control while maintaining human standards for large-scale translation buyers.
AI & Machine LearningEnterprise SoftwareSaaS
Co-investorsMerus Capital468 Capital
Modicus Prime provides an AI Management System (AIMS) for pharmaceutical companies and contract development and manufacturing organizations (CDMOs) to validate, audit, and govern AI systems across their operations in compliance with FDA and other regulatory requirements.
AI & Machine LearningBiotechHealthtechSaaSLa Porte, US
Taylor Chartier(Founder & CEO)inDavit Vardanyan(Director)
BoardRoger Chen(Director)in
Co-investorsSilverton PartnersTechstarsFrist Cressey VenturesOncology VenturesPlug and Play Ventures
Netris provides a network automation and multi-tenancy platform purpose-built for AI cloud operators, delivering cloud-provider-grade automation, abstraction, and hardware-level isolation across Ethernet, InfiniBand, NVLink, DPUs, and edge networking.
AI & Machine LearningCloud ComputingData & Infrastructure
Co-investorsAndreessen Horowitz
Neuraworx Medical Technologies is a medical device company developing Intelligent Cerebrovascular Pacing, a bioelectronic technology intended to enhance the brain's glymphatic system function and cerebral fluid clearance.
BiotechDeep TechMedical Devices
Chris Minar(Founder)in
Co-investorsVerge HealthTech FundFoothill Ventures
Neurosoft Bio develops soft, elastic brain-computer interfaces that reduce mechanical mismatch with neural tissue for safer, longer-term implantation, and applies AI to analyze brain recordings for biomarker detection, neuromodulation, and decoding of motor and speech intentions.
AI & Machine LearningDeep TechMedical Devices
Nicolas Vachicouras(CEO & Co-Founder)inLudovic Serex(CTO & Co-Founder)inFlorian Fallegger(Co-Founder & CSO Advisor)inStéphanie Lacour(Co-Founder, Full Professor & VP for Support to Strategic Initiatives (EPFL))in
Co-investorsConnecticut InnovationsKickfund
NVIDIA designs GPUs, AI computing hardware, and software platforms for AI development, data centers, autonomous vehicles, and robotics, serving developers, researchers, and enterprises.
AI & Machine LearningCybersecurityHardwareSemiconductorsSanta Clara, US
Jensen Huang(CEO)inNader Khalilin
Co-investorsDigerati InvestmentsFirestreak VenturesNVenturesPRIMEPULSE SESequoia CapitalSoftBank Vision Fund+5 more
Tive provides real-time location and condition tracking for shipments, helping supply chain teams monitor temperature, humidity, light, and shock throughout transit.
AI & Machine LearningEdTechIoTLogistics & Supply ChainSector AgnosticSiberia, US
Semyon DukachIvan Crewkov(CEO and co-founder)Krenar Komoni
Co-investorsBITKRAFT VenturesEducapitalFifth WallGoodwater CapitalPoint72 VenturesQualcomm Ventures+7 more
Perceptron develops foundation models for physical intelligence, processing multimodal data (video, audio, text, sensors) in real-time to enable AI systems that perceive, reason, and act in physical environments.
AI & Machine LearningDeep TechRobotics
Armen Aghajanyan(Co-founder)inAkshat Shrivastava(Co-founder)
Co-investorsPlay Time Ventures
Podcastle (Async) is an AI video and audio editing platform that lets users create, edit, and repurpose videos through chat-based prompts, including generating video, cleaning up audio, creating voiceovers, adding subtitles, dubbing, and turning long content into short-form social clips.
AI & Machine LearningCreator EconomyMedia & Entertainment
Arto Yeritsyan(Founder)in
Co-investorsRTP GlobalSierra VenturesAI FundMosaic VenturesPoint Nine
Co-investorsRuna Capital
Expper Technologies builds Robin, a research-backed therapeutic robot that provides emotional support and patient engagement in clinical settings such as pediatrics and geriatrics.
Digital HealthHealthtechRobotics
Co-investorsFormula VC
RTP Global is a venture capital firm that invests in startups and growth-stage companies across multiple regions including Asia, US, and Europe.
Leonid Boguslavsky(Partner & Founder)in
Runa Capital is a global venture capital firm founded by serial entrepreneurs that invests in early-stage software and deep tech startups worldwide, focusing on deeptech, enterprise software, and fintech infrastructure.
Deep TechEnterprise SoftwareFintech
Shanda Investment is an investment arm of Shanda Group that manages capital across public markets, venture capital, and incubator programs.
Crypto & Web3FintechSector Agnostic
Tianqiao Chen(Chairman)in
Sierra Ventures is an early-stage venture capital firm that invests from Inception through Series A in enterprise and frontier technologies, with particular focus on AI infrastructure, vertical AI applications, physical intelligence, and deep tech innovations.
AI & Machine LearningDeep TechEnterprise Software
Co-investorsKensington Capital Partners LimitedKluz VenturesRenaissance Venture CapitalSun Mountain CapitalSierra Ventures
Storm Ventures is an early-stage venture capital firm that invests in B2B enterprise software startups, with a focus on areas such as enterprise infrastructure, cybersecurity, and artificial intelligence.
Tae Hea Nahm(Founder)in
Co-investorsPeakSamsung Catalyst FundStorm Ventures
SuperAnnotate is a data platform used to build, manage, and refine training data for AI and machine learning models.
AI & Machine LearningData & InfrastructureSaaSSan Francisco, US
Tigran Petrosyan(Co-founder)inVahan Petrosyan(Co-founder)inDavit Badalyan(Founder)inRussell Mathias(Executive Officer)in
BoardTJ Nahigian(Director)inLouis Coppey(Director)in
Co-investorsArgonautic VenturesFormula VCGlynn Capital ManagementGranatus VenturesPlay Time VenturesPoint Nine+4 more
Therab Medical is developing SnugLit, a wearable phototherapy device for treating neonatal jaundice in infants, delivering light therapy in a portable form for use in hospital and home settings.
Digital HealthHardwareMedical Devices
Alexa Jones(Founder)in
Co-investorsExpert DOJOID VenturesMichigan Rise
Ladder Bio (formerly ThirdLaw Molecular) develops Spiroligomer molecules, a class of synthetic, modular fused-ring compounds designed for highly selective binding to target proteins.
BiotechDeep TechMedical DevicesBlue Bell, US
Christian Schafmeister(Founder)Eric Heil(Chief Executive Officer)in
Co-investorsMedical Excellence Capital
Toxometris provides AI-powered in silico toxicity predictions for pharmaceutical compounds, combining mechanistic interpretability with predictive accuracy.
AI & Machine LearningBiotechMedical DevicesSaaS
Tribe Capital is a sector- and stage-agnostic venture capital firm that invests in seed to growth-stage technology companies, focusing on identifying and amplifying early product-market fit.
FintechSector AgnosticSan Francisco, US
Arjun Sethi(Chairman & Co-founder)inJonathan Hsu(Co-founder)Ted Maidenberg(Co-founder)Alex Chee(Co-founding Partner & CEO of Termina)Jake Ellowitz(Co-founding Partner & CTO of Termina)Brendan Moore(Co-founding Partner)
Co-investorsEvolution VC PartnersKensington Capital Partners LimitedNimble PartnersYildiz VenturesYolo InvestmentsTribe Capital
Vonova develops the Cerebro Platform, a minimally invasive neurovascular system that uses the body's venous system to access the brain, guided by real-time imaging to deliver diagnostic and therapeutic treatments without drilling through the skull.
Deep TechHealthtechMedical Devices
José Morales(Dr.)
Co-investorsXEIA Venture Partners
Waveye builds imaging radars for multi-modal AI applications, aimed at enabling safe interaction between humans and machines.
AI & Machine LearningDeep TechHardwarePalo Alto, US
Gor Hakobyan(Founder)in
Co-investorsFormula VCGranatus Ventures
Zerobroker is a freight and logistics platform that connects shippers directly with truckers, eliminating brokerage fees, and handles full truckload shipping (dry van, reefer, flatbed), spot and contract RFPs, load tracking, billing, and carrier vetting.
B2B MarketplacesLogistics & Supply ChainSaaS
Exits · 1
IPOs and acquisitions across the tracked portfolioIntel,NASDAQ: INTC
Portfolio news
latest coverage across their companiesNVIDIA · eu-startups.com · Sep 4, 2026
Base10 Partners · pulse2.com · Aug 12, 2026

Storm Ventures · thecyberwire.com · Aug 12, 2026
Podcastle · techcrunch.com · Jul 28, 2026
Britive · fortuneindia.com · Jul 17, 2026
Super Annotate · tipranks.com · Jul 17, 2026
Tribe Capital · markets.businessinsider.com · Jul 7, 2026
Coherence Neuro · massdevice.com · Jun 25, 2026
Frequently asked questions
- How many investments has SmartGateVC made?
- SmartGateVC has 62 tracked investments, including 1 dated in the last 24 months.
- What stage does SmartGateVC invest at?
- SmartGateVC invests at the Pre-Seed, Seed stages.
- What is SmartGateVC's typical check size?
- SmartGateVC typically writes checks of $250K – $10M.
- What sectors does SmartGateVC focus on?
- SmartGateVC focuses on AI & Machine Learning, Cybersecurity, Deep Tech, Hardware, Healthtech.
- Where is SmartGateVC located?
- SmartGateVC is headquartered in Glendale, US.
- Does SmartGateVC lead rounds?
- SmartGateVC typically participates in rounds rather than leading them.
- Who does SmartGateVC co-invest with?
- SmartGateVC most often shares deals with Advance Venture Partners, Formula VC, Granatus Ventures, among 136 tracked co-investors.
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