Lightspeed

Today we're announcing over $9B in capital for a new family of funds — our largest raise in 25 years. AI is rewriting the rules. We're backing the founders building what comes next.

@CNBC Check out the full 2026 CNBC Disruptor 50 List here: cnbc.com/2026/05/19/202…

The 14th annual @CNBC Disruptor 50 List is a snapshot of the future’s shape. This year’s list showcases the strength of AI in Silicon Valley, as 43 of the 50 companies said AI is “essential to their disruptive business models.” Congratulations to the Lightspeed portfolio companies on the list: @AbridgeHQ, @anduriltech, @AnthropicAI, @cyera_io, @databricks, @glean, @MistralAI, @tryramp, @Ripple, @Rippling, @Saronic, and @Whatnot.

Check out the full list here: businessinsider.com/seed-100-best-…

Congratulations to @ravi_lsvp, @ravirajjain, and @buckymoore on their recognition in the Seed 100 List! The Seed 100 List from @businessinsider highlights early-stage investors with a unique ability to scout the tech stars of tomorrow. Amid the AI boom, the competitiveness and speed of investors getting in before the “seed stage” as we know it have been reinforced. This is the Seed 100’s sixth year, and it is an honor to have 3 Lightspeed team members acknowledged on the list. Early-stage investing has been wired into our team’s DNA for over 26 years. And we are incredibly proud to have backed many teams from their Seed rounds and beyond. As Ravi puts it: "The founders Lightspeed backs don't extrapolate from the present; they derive from first principles and arrive at futures others haven't thought to look for.”

Learn more about Exa here: lsvp.com/stories/tripli…

AI is only as useful as the knowledge it can access. Lightspeed has backed @exaailabs since the early days, leading their Series A in 2024. Today, we are excited to continue this journey by participating in their $250M Series C, raised at a $2.2B valuation. @WilliamBryk and @jeffzwang are building an API-first search engine working to enable AI systems to retrieve higher-quality knowledge and context in real time. Congratulations to the entire team. We are thrilled to help back the future of AI-powered discovery. CC: Lightspeed partners @guruchahal and @whoisnnamdi

@ExaAILabs Congratulations! 👏

We raised $250M in Series C funding at a $2.2B valuation, led by a16z. Exa is a search lab organizing the web's data for agents.

Read more about Amca here: lsvp.com/stories/a-gold…

America’s industrial base is at the precipice of a tune-up. @AmcaInc is building a new industrial platform that integrates engineering, testing, certification, and manufacturing into a single streamlined process. Through their growing nationwide factory network, the team aims to dramatically reduce the time it takes to move production-grade hardware from development to deployment. Amca is dedicated to transforming the American industrial era. That commitment is why we’re excited to participate in their $300M Series B at a $1B total valuation. We can’t wait to see how this raise continues to strengthen their development. Congrats to co-founders @jaimalik, Eli Giovanetti, and the entire team at Amca. CC: Lightspeed Partner @ConnorLoveCA

Read more about the raise here: techcrunch.com/2026/05/19/fro…

Learn more about Ocean in this video:

90% of successful cyberattacks start with phishing. As AI programs have evolved, email remains the primary entry point for enterprise attacks. And these advanced, AI-powered attacks continue to contribute to the high volume of phishing scams. Founders Shay Shwartz and Oran Moyal were tired of the rapid influx of scams and the shortcomings of current tech defense platforms, so they built Ocean. The company uses AI agents that aim to quickly and accurately comb through every email and identify fraud, scams, and phishing attempts. Ocean aims to do just that. And today, they’re emerging from stealth with $28M in total funding. They understand the need for agentic-based defense strategies for enterprises, and we can’t wait to see how they continue growing their company and fortifying their infrastructure. CC: David Gussarsky, @TalMorgenstern

@AxoniusInc Read more about Axonius here: axonius.com/blog/axonius-s…

The future of cybersecurity starts with visibility. As enterprise infrastructure has scaled, keeping track of what actually exists has become one of cybersecurity’s greatest bottlenecks. @AxoniusInc built the platform to help organizations see and act across that complexity from one place. Today, Axonius announced $200M ARR and appointed Joe Diamond as CEO. Joe first served as Axonius’ CMO in May 2024, moved to the role of President in August 2025, and has been interim CEO since February 2026. We’ve been proud to partner with the team since their Series C in 2020. Huge congratulations to Joe and the entire Axonius team on the momentum.

Learn more in our blog here: lsvp.com/stories/our-in…

Read more about Luel here: luel.ai/resources/blog…

What started as two teenagers bonding over their love for digital gigs evolved into two founders turning their passion into a platform. @luelcompany co-founders @williamnamgyal and @Lenderking built their digital marketplace to strengthen infrastructure for human data. Luel invites AI labs and enterprises to submit dataset requests, match contributors to the task, and quality check each submission. Contributors are paid for their contributions, and AI companies gain valuable, real-world data that improves their software. The embodiment of a symbiotic relationship. That’s why we’re excited to announce that we co-led their recent $31.2M Seed round alongside @generalcatalyst. There’s only so much data to be scraped online. The next AI models will need high-quality, human-led data based in reality, and Luel is among those leading the charge.

On May 6 at the Lightspeed SF office, @ravi_lsvp sat down with @scmallaby to discuss The Infinity Machine, the latter's new book that explores the brilliance of Demis, his time at DeepMind, and the quest for superintelligence. Here were some of the topics Sebastian and Ravi explored last week: 1. In 1993, as a teenage chess prodigy who used to code until 4 AM and rejected a million-dollar offer to skip his education at Cambridge, Demis Hassabis decided his life would be devoted to building general intelligence. 2. What then set Demis apart was his insatiable curiosity and range, drawing from a vast career in neuroscience, gaming, philosophy, and physics. Sebastian made a compelling case for why Demis is one of the defining figures of modern AI. 3. Demis developed a “fluidity test” as a metric for competitiveness and longevity - part of the leader's job is to know the difference between ideas with potential to grow (those ideas being “fluid” and able to push forward) vs. those that lead to dead ends. He learned from his experience pushing a team too hard early in his career and ended up burning them out. Oversized ambition, lacking in delivery, was a recipe for disappointment. 4. What actually makes a frontier lab work: the toggle. Through trial and error, it became clear that the best labs aren’t operating in one constant mode. They just know how to balance patient, open-ended research and disciplined, tightly focused execution. 5. Build for the AI that exists in 6-12 months, not today. Ravi referenced a recent Dario Amodei quote about AI overtaking software engineering in 6-12 months, and asserted that it remains the most important mental model for founders building on top of AI. It should seem broken right now. The exponential improvement in model capability is deeply counterintuitive - it's invisible until it isn't. 6. The race that matters isn't models - it's deployment. Through his travels and research, Sebastian concluded that the real competition isn't who has the smartest model. Instead, those founders who embed AI most deeply into the real world may have the lasting edge. Deployment is the moat. 7. A bold idea that Demis has believed for years: information — not matter, not energy, not quantum states — may be the most fundamental primitive of the universe. Intelligence may ultimately come down to information processing. If so, the gap between biological and artificial minds may be smaller than we think. This was a fascinating discussion about where AI is actually headed. We are so grateful for Sebastian’s profound insights, Ravi’s discourse, and every person who joined us last week.