VC Panels & Pitch Competition | June 2025 | San Francisco
Raising Capital in 2025: Curious about what’s on the minds of venture capitalists this year?
Join us on June 27th, for exclusive fireside chats with top investors who will break down the strategies, trends, and insider insights that will shape the venture landscape in 2025.
Venue: Zo House, 300 4th St, San Francisco, CA 94107
=================================================================
Schedule:
1:00 PM – 2:00 PM: Lunch & Networking
VC Panel with:
2:00PM to 3:00PM
Tian Yu (T.Y.), VC at Micron Ventures
Investment focus: Enterprise AI, Deep Tech
LinkedIn
Gaurav Bhogale, Principal at Mantis Venture Capital
Investment focus: AI & Infrastructure
LinkedIn
3:00 PM – 5:00 PM: Pitch Competition
Pitch Competition Judges:
Eliza Dragomir, Senior Analyst at JetBlue Ventures
Investment focus: Enterprise Tech, Deep Tech
LinkedIn
Henry Pham, Managing Partner at Octant Ventures
Investment focus: AI, Fintech, Cleantech (Renewable Energies)
LinkedIn
Emil Rustamli, VC Analyst at Fiat Ventures
Investment focus: Fintech+
LinkedIn
Tian Yu (T.Y.), VC at Micron Ventures
Investment focus: Enterprise AI, Deep Tech
LinkedIn
Nicole Seah, Associate at Costanoa Ventures
Investment focus: Health Tech, Early-stage healthcare infrastructure and AI applications
LinkedIn
5:00 PM – 7:00 PM: Happy Hour and Closing
===================================================================
Link to Apply to the Pitch Competition
Pitch Competition Application Deadline: June 22nd, 2025
===================================================================
Tech Weekend is the best event in San Francisco for startup founders who are fundraising — You can make direct investor connections & meet the coolest tech startups in one place.
Over 3 days at Tech Weekend, you'll meet 100+ tech founders and over 50 venture capitalists actively investing in early-stage tech startups.
Founders can:
Join VC Office Hours for direct feedback
Attend VC Panels on 2025 investing trends
Connect with VCs during VC dinners dinners
Pitch live in front of VCs at the Tech Weekend Pitch Competition
and meet some of the coolest tech startups gathered from all around US and abroad.
If you're building in AI, Deep Tech, Health Tech, Fintech, Climate Tech, Biotech, Vertical Tooling, EdTech, Dual-Use Tech, Quantum, or any frontier sector — and fundraising in 2025 — this is where you want to be.
Join our mailing list @ Foundersvillage.bio
For More information checkout the following links:
Website: Founders Village
LinkedIn: Founders Village on LinkedIn
Instagram: @founders.village
X (Twitter): @foundersvillge
Tech Weekend June 2025: Pitch Competition Finalists
BOT Auto
Founder: Paul Lam
BOT Auto is building L4 autonomous trucks to offer efficient freight services. The company is at the Series A stage and has raised over $50M.
Avalon Holographics
Founder: Wally Haas
Avalon is building true holographic displays to revolutionize digital interaction. The team is Series A and has raised over $30M, with $65M total committed capital.
Vertoro
Founder: Michael Boot
Vertoro produces sustainable, low-cost bio-based fuel and materials. With a Growth stage designation, they've raised approximately $15M USD.
Vectra
Founder: Vinod Kettay
Vectra is reinventing mechanical systems for industrial automation and sustainability. At the Seed [pre-Series A] stage, they’ve raised about $4M.
Frontier Bio
Founder: Eric Bennett
Frontier Bio creates lab-grown human tissues to address the global organ shortage. They’re in the Seed stage with $3.9M raised.
Supernova
Founder: Marta Mico
Supernova is helping the West regain its industrial edge through advanced 3D printing technology for manufacturing. They’re currently at the Seed stage and have raised $3M.
Voltaic Marine
Founder: Richard Pham
Voltaic Marine designs high-performance electric boats for a cleaner marine future. At Pre-Seed/Seed, they’ve raised $1.6M.
infiniRel Corporation
Founder: Bert Wank
infiniRel offers an “inverter EKG” to provide predictive analytics for clean energy infrastructure. They’ve deployed their MVP and are Seed stage, with $1.5M raised to date.
Focal
Founder: John L. Connell
Focal is Charles Schwab’s selected AI notetaking solution, transforming financial conversations into insights. The company is at Seed stage with $600K raised from GPs and C-suite leaders.
Magnefy
Founder: Joseph Kao
Magnefy builds cost-effective, edge AI-powered perception stacks for autonomous systems. Currently Pre-Seed, they’ve raised $510K.
Saferide.ai
Founder: Will Bright
Saferide is a universal compute and vision platform for all forms of robotic mobility. They are in the Seed stage and have raised $800K for this venture (note: $100M raised across prior ventures).
Yondu Inc.
Founder: Michael Chen
Yondu is building a robotic workforce for logistics and commercial spaces. The company is in the Seed stage and has raised a few million.
Symulat
Founder: Sergey Knysh
Symulat enables 100x faster scientific and engineering simulations via breakthrough compute infrastructure. The company is in product development and has raised $100K SAFE
Startup Showcases at Tech Weekend June 2025
Meet Lvlup.ai — your AI best friend, creative sidekick, and always-on super-agent.
Everyone deserves a best friend: One who listens without judgment, shows up without fail, and helps turn your dreams into reality.
Lvlup is more than a chatbot — it’s an AI companion that helps you write, plan, search, reflect, and grow. With a face, a voice, a memory, and a personality, Lvlup evolves with you. Whether you're creating content, exploring ideas, or just needing a late-night thought catcher — it's always by your side.
No mixed signals. No ghosting. Just presence.
👉 Try it for free: https://lvlup.ai
📍 Stop by their booth to chat with:
🔹 Tong Xu, Co-founder & CEO – LinkedIn
StealthGPT — the team humanizing AI writing.
StealthGPT helps you create high-quality, human-like content that effortlessly bypasses AI detectors like Turnitin and GPTZero. Whether you're crafting essays, blogs, or marketing copy, StealthGPT combines a user-friendly interface with multi-language support, SEO tools, and PDF interaction—making it the go-to tool for students, writers, and professionals alike.
👉 Try it free at stealthgpt.ai
📍 Stop by their booth to chat with:
🔹 Jozef Gherman, Founder – LinkedIn
Skyrelis, the team pioneering security for the Agentic AI era.
As enterprises deploy autonomous AI agents to automate workflows and decisions, Skyrelis is building the foundational layer of protection—real-time agent-aware policy enforcement and behavioral controls for secure, cloud-native environments.
Founded by leaders in cybersecurity and AI, they’re defining a new category in enterprise security.
📍 Stop by their booth to chat with:
🔹 Jaz Lin, CEO – LinkedIn
🔹 Sree Vakil, CTO – LinkedIn