StrictlyVC events deliver exclusive insider VC content while creating meaningful connections with leading investors & entrepreneurs. Join us for an evening of intimate interviews with industry heavy hitters and impactful conversation.
Exclusive VC insights and networking at StrictlyVC
Mix and Mingle – Cocktail parties with killer content.
StrictlyVC events deliver exclusive insider content from Silicon Valley and the global venture scene. If you’re an investor looking to mingle with your peers and watch some killer content, this event is for you. Get the inside scoop directly from sources you can trust. Previous events included interviews with Sam Altman (OpenAI), Marc Andreessen (Andreessen Horowitz), Katie Haun (Haun Ventures), Hans Tung (GGV Capital) and many more!
Speakers
More speakers to be added to the lineup. Check back in for more updates.
Campbell Brown is co-founder and CEO of Forum AI, an independent AI evaluation company helping AI labs, enterprises, and government contractors meet emerging requirements around bias, neutrality, and accuracy in high-stakes AI systems.
Forum AI produces audit-grade evaluations for sensitive domains like politics, foreign affairs, and mental health, where errors, bias, or hallucinations create real compliance, commercial, and reputational risk. The company’s expert-in-the-loop methodology scales the judgment of world-leading domain experts, including Antony Blinken, Kevin Mc Carthy, and institutional partners such as the Cleveland Clinic, Atlantic Council, and Manhattan Institute.
Previously, Brown was Vice President of Global Media Partnerships at Meta, where she led teams overseeing news, entertainment, and sports partnerships across all Meta platforms and worked with governments and policymakers on content policy and misinformation.
Before joining Meta, Brown was an award-winning journalist and anchor for CNN and NBC News. At CNN, she hosted “Campbell Brown,” a daily prime-time news program. At NBC News, she served as Weekend Today host and White House correspondent.
Campbell Brown has seen the media crisis from every angle. She reported the news, then ran what became the world’s most powerful news distribution platform as Head of News at Meta. Now, as people begin to shift towards AI as their primary way to get information, Brown is building a startup to ensure AI systems are accurate and trustworthy. If anyone knows what happens when information goes wrong at scale, it’s her.
Tim Fernholz is a journalist who writes about technology, finance and public policy. He has closely covered the rise of the private space industry and is the author of Rocket Billionaires: Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and the New Space Race. Formerly, he was a senior reporter at Quartz, the global business news site, for more than a decade, and began his career as a political reporter in Washington, D.C.
You can contact or verify outreach from Tim by emailing [email protected] or via an encrypted message to tim_fernholz.21 on Signal.
Replit started as a browser-based code editor. It’s now one of the most direct threats to how software gets built and who gets to build it. Amjad Masad chats to us about what it takes to compete with players like Anthropic, OpenAi, and Microsoft from a scrappy SF startup, and how fast “anyone can build software” goes from slogan to reality.
Loizos has been reporting on Silicon Valley since the late ’90s, when she joined the original Red Herring magazine. Previously the Silicon Valley Editor of TechCrunch, she was named Editor in Chief and General Manager of TechCrunch in September 2023. She’s also the founder of StrictlyVC, a daily e-newsletter and lecture series acquired by Yahoo in August 2023 and now operated as a sub brand of TechCrunch.
You can contact or verify outreach from Connie by emailing [email protected] or [email protected], or via encrypted message at ConnieLoizos.53 on Signal.
How Industrial Giants Are Betting on the Next Wave
Most founders treat corporate VCs as a last resort. Nicolas Sauvage thinks that’s a mistake and he has the portfolio to prove it. The TDK Ventures president joins us to discuss how corporate capital works differently, what industrial giants actually want from their startup bets, and why founders should be paying attention.
From Anchor to Zuckerberg's Newsroom to Founder
Campbell Brown has seen the media crisis from every angle. She reported the news, then ran what became the world’s most powerful news distribution platform as Head of News at Meta. Now, as people begin to shift towards AI as their primary way to get information, Brown is building a startup to ensure AI systems are accurate and trustworthy. If anyone knows what happens when information goes wrong at scale, it’s her.
Amjad Masad
Co-founder and CEO, Replit
Amjad Masad is CEO and co-founder of Replit, a company that makes coding accessible to billions on the planet from children making school projects to enterprises running their business. Prior to Replit, Amjad worked at Meta, where he led the JavaScript infrastructure team and contributed to popular open-source developer tools. In addition, he played a key role as a founding engineer at Codecademy, a prominent online coding school.
Replit started as a browser-based code editor. It’s now one of the most direct threats to how software gets built and who gets to build it. Amjad Masad chats to us about what it takes to compete with players like Anthropic, OpenAi, and Microsoft from a scrappy SF startup, and how fast “anyone can build software” goes from slogan to reality.
Nicolas Sauvage is President of TDK Ventures, the corporate venture capital arm of TDK Corporation, where he leads the firm’s $500M mandate to invest in early-stage startups driving digital and energy innovation. Since its founding in 2019, TDK Ventures has backed 52 startups under his leadership, including three unicorns—Ascend Elements, Groq, and Silicon Box.
Recognized globally, Nicolas has appeared on the GCV Powerlist for six consecutive years, most recently ranking #17 among the top 150 heads of corporate venture. He is also one of only a few corporate VCs inducted into the prestigious Kauffman Fellows program.
A champion of knowledge-sharing, Nicolas contributes to outlets including Harvard Business Review, London Business School, and INSEAD, and hosts the Corporate Venturing Insider podcast to spotlight best practices in venture investing.
He currently serves on the boards of Sagence AI, AutoFlight, Faction, Metalenz, Virewirx, and TDK Ventures. Prior to TDK, Nicolas held leadership roles at InvenSense—managing strategic relationships with Google and Qualcomm—and at NXP Software, where he oversaw global sales and OEM strategy.
Nicolas holds an engineering degree from ISEN in France, studied at King’s College London through Erasmus, and is an alumnus of Stanford GSB and Harvard Business School’s Corporate Director program.
How Industrial Giants Are Betting on the Next Wave
Most founders treat corporate VCs as a last resort. Nicolas Sauvage thinks that’s a mistake and he has the portfolio to prove it. The TDK Ventures president joins us to discuss how corporate capital works differently, what industrial giants actually want from their startup bets, and why founders should be paying attention.
Lior Susan is the Founder and CEO of Eclipse, a firm dedicated to partnering with entrepreneurs transforming the critical physical industries that underpin economic resilience and national security.
Lior brings a rare combination of operating experience and investment perspective. Eclipse was born out of his unique understanding of the physical economy, which was shaped by his varied career experience: First in the military, then building and scaling technology companies, then leading hardware investments at Flex, where he experienced both the challenges and opportunities facing global industrial systems. These experiences sharpened his conviction that the U.S. must modernize its physical industries, and that doing so requires pairing world-class operators with aligned, long-term capital: Operators with capital.
He founded Eclipse on that belief: Transforming critical industries is not just a market opportunity, but a national imperative, and the next generation of iconic companies will be built at the intersection of software, hardware, and the real world.
Fresh off raising $1.3 billion to back and build what it calls “physical AI” startuos, Eclipse Ventures is doubling down on a future where intelligence moves beyond software in the real world. From robotics and manufacturing to autonomous systems, co-founder and Managing Partner, Lior Susan shares what it takes to build enduring companies at the intersection of AI and the physical world.
Marina Temkin is a venture capital and startups reporter at TechCrunch. Prior to joining TechCrunch, she wrote about VC for PitchBook and Venture Capital Journal. Earlier in her career, Marina was a financial analyst and earned a CFA charterholder designation.
You can contact or verify outreach from Marina by emailing [email protected] or via encrypted message at +1 347-683-3909 on Signal.
Fresh off raising $1.3 billion to back and build what it calls “physical AI” startuos, Eclipse Ventures is doubling down on a future where intelligence moves beyond software in the real world. From robotics and manufacturing to autonomous systems, co-founder and Managing Partner, Lior Susan shares what it takes to build enduring companies at the intersection of AI and the physical world.
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Agenda
More to come on the agenda! Check back in for the latest updates.
Most founders treat corporate VCs as a last resort. Nicolas Sauvage thinks that’s a mistake and he has the portfolio to prove it. The TDK Ventures president joins us to discuss how corporate capital works differently, what industrial giants actually want from their startup bets, and why founders should be paying attention.
Campbell Brown has seen the media crisis from every angle. She reported the news, then ran what became the world’s most powerful news distribution platform as Head of News at Meta. Now, as people begin to shift towards AI as their primary way to get information, Brown is building a startup to ensure AI systems are accurate and trustworthy. If anyone knows what happens when information goes wrong at scale, it’s her.
Replit started as a browser-based code editor. It’s now one of the most direct threats to how software gets built and who gets to build it. Amjad Masad chats to us about what it takes to compete with players like Anthropic, OpenAi, and Microsoft from a scrappy SF startup, and how fast “anyone can build software” goes from slogan to reality.
Fresh off raising $1.3 billion to back and build what it calls “physical AI” startuos, Eclipse Ventures is doubling down on a future where intelligence moves beyond software in the real world. From robotics and manufacturing to autonomous systems, co-founder and Managing Partner, Lior Susan shares what it takes to build enduring companies at the intersection of AI and the physical world.
7:20PM – 9:00PM
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