Foundation Capital

From PhD student to 2x startup founder—Sanjit Biswas shares his journey building Meraki and Samsara on the B2BaCEO Podcast with General Partner Ashu Garg. Great insights on customer-centric product development, approaching sales as an engineer, and balancing short-term needs with long-term bets as you scale. 🎙️ Listen to the full episode: https://lnkd.in/dnzMqfxX

🚀 Thrilled to announce our latest investment in NEX, founded by the incredibly talented Darius, who has blown us away with his cutting-edge AI image generation technology. From our first meeting, it was clear to me and Steve Vassallo that Darius Lam is not only a brilliant technologist but also a relentless builder with a unique vision. NEX is pushing the boundaries of image synthesis with innovative approaches that offer unprecedented control and quality. At Foundation Capital, we’re excited to partner with visionaries like Darius who are shaping the future of AI. Check out our full announcement and learn more about why we’re so excited about NEX. https://lnkd.in/gZG4uwtj

As founders begin to deploy LLM-based applications at scale, they should look to leverage three innovations: 1️⃣ Multimodal models are moving beyond text, opening up new use cases. 2️⃣ Multi-agent systems transform our ability to automate complex tasks. 3️⃣ New model architectures address the limitations of transformers. General Partner Ashu Garg and Partner Jaya G. explore how all three will drive transformation across diverse sectors. Essential reading for founders building with AI. 📑 Read the full post: https://lnkd.in/ec_YpJ4K

Cerebras just redefined the speed of thought. Today they announced the fastest AI inference solution in the world—delivering responses 20x faster than GPU-based clouds at 1/5 the price. Yep, that translates to 100x price-performance. → 1,800 tokens/second for Llama 3.1 8B → 450 tokens/second for Llama 3.1 70B → 16-bit weights for highest accuracy → Open API access for developers Latency kills conversations. Slow AI is like waiting for a slow Internet connection. With Cerebras’ speed, AI-powered interactions feel blistering fast. The power behind this is a wafer-scale engine that bypasses the memory bottlenecks plaguing GPUs. With 44GB of on-chip memory and 21 petabytes/second of bandwidth, Cerebras is the only chip that offers petabyte-scale compute and memory on a single platform. For those of us who’ve seen AI’s potential held back by hardware, this leap forward is significant. It enables new levels of intelligence and interaction that were previously out of reach. I’m so proud to be an early investor in Cerebras Systems as they continue to push the perimeter of what’s possible. Developers: I strongly suggest exploring Cerebras’ API—it’s only twelve keystrokes away! See what you can build when speed is no longer a limitation.

Foundation Capital General Partner Ashu Garg and Partner Jaya G. stirred up more than just chai at our August "Chai & AI" happy hour. Over steaming cups and spicy conversation, 75+ attendees including CTOs, AI/ML PhDs, engineering leaders, and founders explored everything from the latest LLM developments to building AI-native apps. Thanks to all who participated. We're already brewing plans for the next one!

What's next after transformers? Foundation Capital General Partner Joanne Chen spoke with Eugene Cheah, founder of Recursal AI, about RWKV—a promising new AI architecture that aims to make AI more cost-effective, scalable, and accessible. Eugene explains the limitations of transformers and how RWKV overcomes them. 🎙️ Listen to the full episode for a fascinating look at where AI is headed: https://lnkd.in/ep6iuGX5

AI-powered Service-as-Software scales at a fraction of the cost. Here’s how: AI is transforming how devs build and maintain software and data systems. This tech alters the very nature of job execution, expanding the realm of what's possible in automation. As AI processes more data, it tackles increasingly complex cognitive tasks. This continuous improvement delivers compounding value to end users. But let's be clear: humans aren't being replaced. AI is reshaping work, enabling people to focus on higher-value, more rewarding tasks. The human-in-the-loop vs human-out-of-loop debate is ongoing. We'll likely end up with a spectrum of human involvement, varying by task. Even in highly automated operations, humans remain crucial. They design workflows, perform spot checks, and handle complex cases. This shift represents a massive opportunity. Jaya and I estimate it at $4.6 trillion. Read for what else we found: https://lnkd.in/ghiYK3a8 Foundation Capital

FOUR MORE DAYS to apply for our 3rd cohort of IIT Build! Our goal is to help more IIT grads start, build, and scale companies. If you're an IIT grad who has started a company in the last 6 months or is thinking of starting a company in the next 24 months, please apply. 🗓️ Applications are due by August 30th. Each cohort has 10 IIT builders. We have intimate in-person & virtual events, access to me and the rest of the Foundation Capital investment team, office space, cofounder matching, AWS/Azure/vendor offers, and a lot more. 🔗 Learn more and apply here: https://lnkd.in/gbfYQFFi

Education has the power to transform lives. My mom, Dr. Helen G. Vassallo, understood this better than anyone. I'm honored to announce that my wife Trae and I have established the Dr. Helen G. Vassallo Distinguished Presidential Professorship at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute. As I unpack in the latest edition of the WPI Journal, this gift aims to extend my mom's legacy of impact and excellence in academia. My mom was a trailblazer in every sense—clinical biologist, distinguished professor, mother of 10, grandmother of 12, two-time author, American Businesswoman of the Year, helicopter pilot, and patent holder. But her greatest pride came from seeing her students flourish. As WPI's first woman department head in Management, she brought a unique perspective bridging biology, biotechnology, and business. Her enthusiasm for learning was contagious. She often said, "It's not about what you know, it's about how enthusiastically you approach the things you don't." This professorship will support recently tenured faculty who embody my mother's pioneering spirit and demonstrate excellence across teaching, research, scholarship, service, leadership, and advising. It’s for those who nurture the urgent curiosity that drives both academia and entrepreneurship—seeing the world not as it is, but as it should be. To future Dr. Helen G. Vassallo Distinguished Presidential Professors: May you inspire the next generation with the same care, wisdom, and infectious enthusiasm that my mom brought to her students every day. And to my fellow WPI alumni: Remember that our education equipped us to solve real problems and shape the future. Consider how you might pay it forward and support the next generation of problem solvers and world changers. Read more about my Mom and the story behind our gift in the latest WPI Journal issue here: https://lnkd.in/g8mGdNG3

The data haystack is growing faster than our ability to find the needle—a useful piece of data. To keep up with skyrocketing data volumes, enterprises today find themselves trapped in an observability maze that’s extremely complex and costly. Traditional solutions have actually exacerbated the problem, creating new traps organizations struggle to escape. AI is driving us toward the brink of a new and necessary wave of observability: one that addresses data overload, high costs, human bottlenecks, and persistent downtime. Our path out of the observability maze is becoming clearer. Here’s how: https://lnkd.in/gyAnWarK