Alumni Ventures

Alumni Ventures Group, LLC is a venture capital firm founded in 2013 and based in Manchester, New Hampshire, with additional offices in major cities across North America. The firm specializes in seed, early-stage, and late-stage pre-IPO investments, focusing on companies with an alumni connection and supported by established institutional lead investors. Alumni Ventures aims to provide accredited investors, particularly alumni from top entrepreneurial schools, with access to diversified venture portfolios that span various sectors and geographic regions. The firm typically invests between $0.01 million and $3 million and does not require board or observer seats in its portfolio companies. Through its managed fund families, Alumni Ventures enables investors to participate in a collaborative investment approach, fostering connections among alumni while facilitating investment opportunities in innovative ventures.

Rob Adams

Managing Partner

Gail Ball

Venture Scout

Andrew Baum

Vice President, Treasury and Capital Management

David Beazley

Executive Partner

Ali Byrd

Investor Advisory Council Member

Matt Caspari

Managing Partner, Strawberry Creek and amp; Deep Tech

Matt Castellini

Senior Associate

Helen Chen

CEO Services Analyst

Cainon Coates

Managing Partner

Michael Collins

CEO

Thomas Edwards

Associate

Yev Gelfand

Investor

Mason Hale

Senior Associate, Chestnut Street and Triphammer Ven

Jin Kim

Senior Vice President, Office of Investments

Lucas Kirshenbaum

VC Investor

Ron Levin

Managing Partner, AV Seed Fund and Doctors Innovate Fund

Jess Liu-Brown

Principal

Michael Madden

Co-Founder and Investment Professionals

Jonathan Meltzer

Managing Partner

Tom Meyer

Managing Partner, Nassau Street

Keith Murphy

Director, Video Programs

David Muson

CFO

Aisha Robinson

Comms Team VP of Strategic Communications

Saad Shaheen

Investor Operations Manager

Stephen Stolzenberg

Senior Associate

Justin Strausbaugh

Managing Partner, Lakeshore

Brittney Wade

Senior Associate, Seed Fund

Sarah Worden

Venture Scout

Wesley Yiu

Partner

Henri Yuan

Investor

Michael Yuann

Director of Investment Operations

Past deals in Retail

Dianthus

Seed Round in 2022
Dianthus is the only AI-first E-commerce company – built from the ground up to help small to medium E-commerce brands.

Maisonette

Series C in 2022
Maisonette Inc. operates an online marketplace specializing in baby and child products. Founded in 2016 and headquartered in Brooklyn, New York, the company curates a selection of high-quality children's items sourced from renowned designer brands and unique boutiques worldwide. By focusing on an expertly curated shopping experience, Maisonette aims to provide a superior platform for both consumers seeking premium children's products and smaller retailers looking to reach a broader audience.

Trendsi

Series A in 2022
Developer of an e-commerce application designed to offer a tool to facilitate the online buying and selling of goods. The company utilizes its supply chain capability to build a reliable backbone to help anyone start and grow their fashion business at minimum risk without any upfront inventory or subscription cost, providing users with one-stop access to quality merchandise at affordable prices.

ZZ Driggs

Seed Round in 2022
Operator of an online furniture marketplace intended to offer a wide selection of contemporary and collectible furniture and home merchandise. The company manufactures and sells well-crafted sustainable furniture using ethical and environmentally sound practices, enabling clients to buy or rent a range of living room furniture, dining room, bedroom, and workspace to a variety of home decor.

Maad

Pre Seed Round in 2021
Maad is a rapidly growing B2B marketplace located in Dakar, Senegal, focused on serving small retailers and fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) brands in Francophone Africa. The company offers a technology-driven platform that facilitates mobile ordering and ensures reliable product delivery. Its services include providing data on product availability and market share, as well as targeted promotional offerings to help businesses enhance their sales. Additionally, Maad supports retailers by offering working capital loans, creating a comprehensive solution for their operational needs.

RocketCart

Seed Round in 2021
RocketCart is a grocery delivery service specializing in a diverse range of Korean products, offering customers free next-morning delivery directly to their homes. The service is currently available throughout Los Angeles and Orange County, California, as well as select areas in Riverside, Ventura, and San Bernardino Counties. RocketCart aims to enhance convenience for consumers by providing easy access to ethnic groceries online. The company plans to expand its delivery service nationwide in the near future.

Singuli

Venture Round in 2021
Singuli is an optimization platform for modern retail for retailers who are hindered in managing merchandise-planning with spreadsheets, reports, and legacy tools. This SaaS platform uses real-time data-sets and advanced machine learning to provide demand forecasting and inventory optimization tools that yield dramatic improvements in margins and working capital utilization.

Tundra

Series B in 2021
Tundra Inc. operates an online marketplace designed for businesses to buy and sell products efficiently and without fees or markups. Founded in 2017 and headquartered in San Francisco, California, Tundra utilizes proprietary technology to streamline wholesale processes, significantly reducing the time and effort required for transactions. The platform enables direct sales and delivery from U.S. and Canadian brands to a diverse community of over 10,000 businesses across the globe. Tundra offers a wide variety of products in categories such as kids, home, beauty, apparel, and general merchandise, facilitating instant online transactions with freight included. The company is also venture-backed and maintains an office in Zurich.

Vitrina

Seed Round in 2021
Vitrina is a pioneering mobile and social fashion marketplace based in Brazil, designed to facilitate the buying, selling, and sharing of fashion products with an emphasis on user experience and security. The platform combines elements of social media and gamification to create an engaging environment for users, allowing them to interact seamlessly while exploring a diverse range of handmade fashion items, including accessories and mobile cases. Vitrina aims to establish itself as the most social marketplace in the region, catering to the growing trend of mobile commerce. The service is currently accessible through its website and Apple's App Store, with plans to expand to Android in the near future.

Markable Creators

Convertible Note in 2020
BCG reported that 70% of Gen Z discover products through content platforms, not directly on a retailer website. Social commerce is NOW. The global fashion E-commerce digital advertising allocation is $200 billion. Mai is making social visual discovery shopping a reality on every photo and video across any social platforms or devices. Viewers can click and shop the clothing they see while watching videos, such as TV shows, movies, and other digital media. Mai bridges the gap between social content and e-commerce, through a fully-automated AI computer vision technology, a sophisticated e-commerce bidding system, and a user personalization system. At Mai, we have spent three years working with top computer vision AI scientists, AI engineers, and fashion experts that created the world’s 1st fully automated video fashion shopping solution. We are connected with numerous top global e-commerce platforms, with total 200M SKUs available, daily updated with an out-of-stock rate <3%. Moreover, Mai is already live with two of the biggest social content platforms in Asia, with more to come. Mai has won the No.1 winner of MIT AI Idol contest in Jul 2020, and also won the title of “Most fundable company by investment value” at the biggest Asia Internet Conference in Nov 2020.

Trendsi

Seed Round in 2020
Developer of an e-commerce application designed to offer a tool to facilitate the online buying and selling of goods. The company utilizes its supply chain capability to build a reliable backbone to help anyone start and grow their fashion business at minimum risk without any upfront inventory or subscription cost, providing users with one-stop access to quality merchandise at affordable prices.

Zero Grocery

Seed Round in 2020
Zero Grocery Inc. is an online grocery retailer based in Redwood City, California, that specializes in a subscription-based delivery service focused on sustainability. Founded in 2019, the company aims to eliminate single-use plastics from the food supply chain by offering groceries in reusable packaging. This approach not only provides convenience for customers but also promotes a zero-waste lifestyle, aligning with growing consumer demand for environmentally friendly practices in grocery shopping.

Arrive Recommerce

Seed Round in 2020
Arrive Outdoors offers a premium rental service for consumers, brands, and retailers. Our Rental-as-a-Service technology and reverse logistics gives brands and retailers the ability to integrate rental directly into an existing ecommerce experience. With our unique model, Arrive Outdoors makes it possible for any company to seamlessly launch a rental channel - ultimately reaching more consumers, driving more revenue, and promoting a more sustainable solution. Arrive Outdoors also supports partners like outdoor companies, organizations, nonprofits, park systems and resorts to provide an 11 star outdoor experience for all. Arrive Outdoors was awarded the 2019 Outdoor Retailer of the Year by the Outdoor Retailer Association for our innovative model.

Verishop

Series B in 2020
Verishop is an online shopping portal based in Santa Monica, California, founded in 2018. It positions itself as a premium lifestyle destination, offering a curated selection of elevated brands in fashion, beauty, home, and more. The platform connects independent brands and creators with consumers, facilitating the discovery of unique products alongside an efficient online purchasing process and fast delivery. Verishop aims to provide a quality-driven shopping experience, making it a go-to resource for customers seeking luxury and distinctive items.

Lily AI

Series A in 2020
Lily AI is the leader in predictive psychographics for retail e-commerce. Consumer spending online for apparel now accounts for over 27% of all clothing sales. Retailers need to understand each consumer’s emotional context while they are actively shopping. Lily AI combines deep product tagging with deep, real-time psychographic analysis to determine the active state of mind of each shopper, and turns that into precise and timely recommendations. These recommendations are proven to lead to higher conversions and lower return rates. Lily AI (lilystyle.ai) was founded by two women who believe clothes to reflect how they feel about themselves. The company is venture-backed and headquartered in Mountain View, CA.

Lily AI

Series A in 2020
Lily AI is the leader in predictive psychographics for retail e-commerce. Consumer spending online for apparel now accounts for over 27% of all clothing sales. Retailers need to understand each consumer’s emotional context while they are actively shopping. Lily AI combines deep product tagging with deep, real-time psychographic analysis to determine the active state of mind of each shopper, and turns that into precise and timely recommendations. These recommendations are proven to lead to higher conversions and lower return rates. Lily AI (lilystyle.ai) was founded by two women who believe clothes to reflect how they feel about themselves. The company is venture-backed and headquartered in Mountain View, CA.

Galaxy

Seed Round in 2019
Galaxy is a fashion resale marketplace that offers vintage, handmade, and upcycled clothing, through live video.

Verishop

Venture Round in 2019
Verishop is an online shopping portal based in Santa Monica, California, founded in 2018. It positions itself as a premium lifestyle destination, offering a curated selection of elevated brands in fashion, beauty, home, and more. The platform connects independent brands and creators with consumers, facilitating the discovery of unique products alongside an efficient online purchasing process and fast delivery. Verishop aims to provide a quality-driven shopping experience, making it a go-to resource for customers seeking luxury and distinctive items.

Tundra

Series A in 2019
Tundra Inc. operates an online marketplace designed for businesses to buy and sell products efficiently and without fees or markups. Founded in 2017 and headquartered in San Francisco, California, Tundra utilizes proprietary technology to streamline wholesale processes, significantly reducing the time and effort required for transactions. The platform enables direct sales and delivery from U.S. and Canadian brands to a diverse community of over 10,000 businesses across the globe. Tundra offers a wide variety of products in categories such as kids, home, beauty, apparel, and general merchandise, facilitating instant online transactions with freight included. The company is also venture-backed and maintains an office in Zurich.

Markable Creators

Series A in 2019
BCG reported that 70% of Gen Z discover products through content platforms, not directly on a retailer website. Social commerce is NOW. The global fashion E-commerce digital advertising allocation is $200 billion. Mai is making social visual discovery shopping a reality on every photo and video across any social platforms or devices. Viewers can click and shop the clothing they see while watching videos, such as TV shows, movies, and other digital media. Mai bridges the gap between social content and e-commerce, through a fully-automated AI computer vision technology, a sophisticated e-commerce bidding system, and a user personalization system. At Mai, we have spent three years working with top computer vision AI scientists, AI engineers, and fashion experts that created the world’s 1st fully automated video fashion shopping solution. We are connected with numerous top global e-commerce platforms, with total 200M SKUs available, daily updated with an out-of-stock rate <3%. Moreover, Mai is already live with two of the biggest social content platforms in Asia, with more to come. Mai has won the No.1 winner of MIT AI Idol contest in Jul 2020, and also won the title of “Most fundable company by investment value” at the biggest Asia Internet Conference in Nov 2020.

Spruce Up

Seed Round in 2019
Spruce Up, Inc. is a home furniture and décor retailer based in Seattle, Washington, established in 2017. The company provides a personalized shopping service that combines artificial intelligence and design expertise to create tailored home and design solutions. By leveraging data science alongside a personal stylist, Spruce Up curates professionally designed looks featuring hand-picked items that align with individual customers' homes, budgets, and lifestyles.

GrubMarket

Series C in 2019
GrubMarket, Inc. operates an online marketplace that connects sellers of food and related items with customers, offering a wide range of products at wholesale prices. The marketplace features organic, vegan, gluten-free foods, fresh produce, snacks, beverages, pantry items, home goods, health and beauty products, as well as items for babies, pets, and specialty diets like non-GMO and paleo. GrubMarket sources products from local farms, fisheries, commercial kitchens, certified home kitchens, and restaurants, ensuring a diverse selection for its customers. Additionally, the company provides a Software-as-a-Service platform for food delivery services and has developed GrubMarket FarmBox, a gaming application. Founded in 2014, GrubMarket is headquartered in Newark, California, with an additional office in San Francisco.

Friendshop

Seed Round in 2019
Friendshop is an online retailer specializing in beauty and skincare products. The company offers a wide range of makeup items for the eyes, face, and lips, including eyeliners, foundations, lipsticks, and various skincare essentials like face masks and sunscreens. Based in San Francisco, California, Friendshop innovates the shopping experience by enabling users to recruit friends to shop together, which allows them to unlock exclusive deals on popular brands such as Urban Decay, NARS, and Drunk Elephant. This approach to social shopping sets Friendshop apart in the beauty retail sector.

Lily AI

Funding Round in 2018
Lily AI is the leader in predictive psychographics for retail e-commerce. Consumer spending online for apparel now accounts for over 27% of all clothing sales. Retailers need to understand each consumer’s emotional context while they are actively shopping. Lily AI combines deep product tagging with deep, real-time psychographic analysis to determine the active state of mind of each shopper, and turns that into precise and timely recommendations. These recommendations are proven to lead to higher conversions and lower return rates. Lily AI (lilystyle.ai) was founded by two women who believe clothes to reflect how they feel about themselves. The company is venture-backed and headquartered in Mountain View, CA.

Markable Creators

Venture Round in 2017
BCG reported that 70% of Gen Z discover products through content platforms, not directly on a retailer website. Social commerce is NOW. The global fashion E-commerce digital advertising allocation is $200 billion. Mai is making social visual discovery shopping a reality on every photo and video across any social platforms or devices. Viewers can click and shop the clothing they see while watching videos, such as TV shows, movies, and other digital media. Mai bridges the gap between social content and e-commerce, through a fully-automated AI computer vision technology, a sophisticated e-commerce bidding system, and a user personalization system. At Mai, we have spent three years working with top computer vision AI scientists, AI engineers, and fashion experts that created the world’s 1st fully automated video fashion shopping solution. We are connected with numerous top global e-commerce platforms, with total 200M SKUs available, daily updated with an out-of-stock rate <3%. Moreover, Mai is already live with two of the biggest social content platforms in Asia, with more to come. Mai has won the No.1 winner of MIT AI Idol contest in Jul 2020, and also won the title of “Most fundable company by investment value” at the biggest Asia Internet Conference in Nov 2020.

Markable Creators

Venture Round in 2017
BCG reported that 70% of Gen Z discover products through content platforms, not directly on a retailer website. Social commerce is NOW. The global fashion E-commerce digital advertising allocation is $200 billion. Mai is making social visual discovery shopping a reality on every photo and video across any social platforms or devices. Viewers can click and shop the clothing they see while watching videos, such as TV shows, movies, and other digital media. Mai bridges the gap between social content and e-commerce, through a fully-automated AI computer vision technology, a sophisticated e-commerce bidding system, and a user personalization system. At Mai, we have spent three years working with top computer vision AI scientists, AI engineers, and fashion experts that created the world’s 1st fully automated video fashion shopping solution. We are connected with numerous top global e-commerce platforms, with total 200M SKUs available, daily updated with an out-of-stock rate <3%. Moreover, Mai is already live with two of the biggest social content platforms in Asia, with more to come. Mai has won the No.1 winner of MIT AI Idol contest in Jul 2020, and also won the title of “Most fundable company by investment value” at the biggest Asia Internet Conference in Nov 2020.
Cognitive Operational Systems, LLC, based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, specializes in developing inventory management solutions for the retail sector through the use of robotics, artificial intelligence, and computer vision. Founded in 2012, the company’s technology enables robots to efficiently navigate retail environments, managing inventory, ensuring compliance with planograms and promotions, and providing indoor localization and navigation. Additionally, it offers mapping capabilities that detail store layouts and architecture. By leveraging university research, Cognitive Operational Systems aims to bridge the gap between academic advancements and practical applications in the fields of artificial intelligence and machine perception.
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