First Spark Ventures

SoloPulse is a company focused on revolutionizing sensing and communication technologies through its innovative use of proprietary mathematical wave theory algorithms. By leveraging advanced sensing and beamforming techniques, SoloPulse aims to overcome the limitations faced by traditional technologies, enhancing both computational efficiency and resolution. The company's unique approach allows for the utilization of a single electromagnetic pulse, which significantly boosts data transmission rates and enables the production of high-resolution imaging. Through these advancements, SoloPulse seeks to transform how information is captured and communicated, offering clients improved performance in various applications.

Vitara Biomedical is focused on developing a therapeutic platform designed to support premature infants. The company draws inspiration from natural physiological processes to improve neonatal care, aiming to enhance the quality of life for these vulnerable newborns. By addressing the unique challenges faced by premature infants, Vitara Biomedical seeks to reduce mortality rates and associated health complications, ultimately providing a foundation for a healthier future for both infants and their families.

Tidal Metals developed a breakthrough suite of innovations for producing critical minerals and metals from seawater and brines – with no waste, no carbon emissions, and no harm to the environment.

Altera is an artificial intelligence company creating digital human beings.

SynthLabs is a research laboratory focused on developing transparent and auditable AI alignment solutions. The company operates in the software development sector, providing tools that assist various organizations in ensuring their artificial intelligence systems function according to their intended purposes. SynthLabs specializes in steering and customizing large language models, particularly those that are open source. Its products enable clients to assess and evaluate these models on complex topics, thereby enhancing the reliability and accountability of AI applications.

Flower Labs is an open-source framework specializing in federated learning, which allows organizations to train artificial intelligence models on distributed data while maintaining data privacy. The platform supports various machine learning frameworks and programming languages, making it adaptable to diverse operating systems and hardware environments. By facilitating the training of AI on sensitive data spread across different organizational silos or user devices, Flower Labs empowers companies like Banking Circle, Nokia, Porsche, and Brave to enhance their AI capabilities. The approach aims to utilize a broader spectrum of data than traditional centralized methods, potentially unlocking significant advancements in artificial intelligence applications.

Unnatural Products Inc. is a biotechnology company based in Santa Cruz, California, specializing in drug discovery through the innovative use of macrocyclic peptides. Founded in 2016, the company employs artificial intelligence and computational biology techniques to engineer these peptides, allowing them to target previously undruggable protein interactions. By leveraging machine learning for parallel chemical synthesis, Unnatural Products aims to optimize macrocyclic compounds efficiently, thereby accelerating the drug discovery process. This technology addresses a significant gap in therapeutic strategies, offering potential treatments for a wide range of diseases linked to difficult-to-target drug candidates.

Zephr powers next-generation location-based solutions by significantly improving the accuracy and resiliency of GNSS on mobile devices by enabling nearby devices to work together. Zephrs SDK and supporting cloud APIs allow a network of mobile phones to compute and share corrections that dramatically improve location performance for AdTech, AR, mobility, logistics, insurance, gaming and mapping. The team behind Zephr is composed of a seasoned group of startup veterans with multiple successful exits, and PhDs with a unique set of sophisticated computational skills and business acumen. Zephr is backed by a coalition of top-tier venture capital firms and research labs with deep expertise in PNT technologies.

Inlyte Energy is a company that creates batteries for grid storage. Inlyte Energy's grid battery uses the most abundant commodities - iron and salt - to create an energy storage solution with the unique combination of high efficiency, long lifetime, competitive energy density, and exceptional safety.

Figur8, Inc. is a Boston-based company that specializes in developing advanced wearable sensors to monitor body movement as a biomarker for musculoskeletal (MSK) conditions. Founded in 2016 as a spin-off from MIT, Figur8 combines smart biosensors, intuitive software, and artificial intelligence to analyze MSK health data. The technology captures three-dimensional skeletal movement and muscle output, allowing for objective assessment of musculoskeletal performance and recovery. This innovative solution provides valuable insights throughout the entire care process, from injury to full recovery, ultimately reducing healthcare costs, improving access to treatment, and empowering patients to manage their own MSK health effectively.

Inworld AI is an AI framework powering massive consumer applications. Inworld is funded by VCs including Lightspeed, Stanford University, Kleiner Perkins, Founders Fund, Section 32, M12, Intel Capital, CRV, Bitkraft, and Meta, as well as a team of all-star angels including corporate executives, top VC funds' partners, scouts, and industry veterans.

Flower Labs is an open-source framework specializing in federated learning, which allows organizations to train artificial intelligence models on distributed data while maintaining data privacy. The platform supports various machine learning frameworks and programming languages, making it adaptable to diverse operating systems and hardware environments. By facilitating the training of AI on sensitive data spread across different organizational silos or user devices, Flower Labs empowers companies like Banking Circle, Nokia, Porsche, and Brave to enhance their AI capabilities. The approach aims to utilize a broader spectrum of data than traditional centralized methods, potentially unlocking significant advancements in artificial intelligence applications.

Nimble Science Ltd. is a digital health company focused on transforming gastrointestinal health through its innovative SIMBA capsule technology. This platform enables the passive sampling of small bowel luminal fluid, allowing for the collection of precision datasets related to the gastrointestinal tract. By utilizing multi-omic mapping, Nimble Science provides healthcare providers with direct insights into specific regions of the GI system, facilitating improved diagnosis and treatment strategies. The company's approach represents a significant advancement in understanding and managing gastrointestinal health.

Normal specializes in providing an application development platform that integrates advanced probabilistic AI technology, aimed at enhancing the reliability and adaptability of artificial intelligence in high-stakes applications for enterprises and government entities. By leveraging a unique full-stack machine learning infrastructure influenced by thermodynamic physics, Normal allows organizations to effectively manage AI models, ensuring they are suitable for essential workflows. The company focuses on deploying AI solutions that can autonomously understand their limitations, thereby addressing critical operational challenges faced by its clients.

Simulon is a developer of innovative video production applications that cater to creators seeking to enhance their projects with professional-quality visual effects. The company's tools enable users to create high-quality visual effects in real-time, making it accessible for individuals without specialist skills or advanced technology. By focusing on affordability and ease of use, Simulon empowers users to achieve studio-quality results on consumer-grade hardware, thereby democratizing the video editing process for a broader audience.

Valitor, Inc. is a biotechnology company founded in 2010 and based in Berkeley, California. The company specializes in developing advanced, protein-based drugs through innovative methods that enhance therapeutic proteins' pharmacokinetics, target specificity, and bioactivity. Valitor's technology platform is versatile, enabling improvements in the pharmacological properties of various existing and emerging protein drugs. The company has established development pipelines in dermatology, ophthalmology, and orthopedics, showcasing its capabilities in creating novel drug products tailored to specific medical needs.

Vitara Biomedical is focused on developing a therapeutic platform designed to support premature infants. The company draws inspiration from natural physiological processes to improve neonatal care, aiming to enhance the quality of life for these vulnerable newborns. By addressing the unique challenges faced by premature infants, Vitara Biomedical seeks to reduce mortality rates and associated health complications, ultimately providing a foundation for a healthier future for both infants and their families.

Xona Space Systems, Inc. specializes in developing and manufacturing position, navigation, and timing (PNT) satellite solutions. Founded in 2019 and headquartered in San Mateo, California, the company is focused on creating a constellation of low-cost, low-Earth orbiting satellites designed to enhance navigation for various applications, including autonomous vehicles, unmanned aerial vehicles, and mobile robotics. Their flagship product, the Xona Pulsar, delivers high-power signals from low Earth orbit, ensuring secure and accurate navigation and timing services. This innovative approach aims to meet the demands of smart transportation and smart infrastructure, providing the resilience and precision necessary for modern intelligent systems to operate safely and efficiently at scale.

Walking Fish Therapeutics is focused on creating cell-based therapeutics that utilize the unique capabilities of B cells to activate the immune system for cancer treatment. The company is developing a platform that aims to function as in vivo protein factories, producing replacement proteins for deficiency diseases and engineered antibodies. By harnessing the power of locally acting proteins, Walking Fish Therapeutics seeks to address serious health conditions across oncology, regenerative medicine, and autoimmune diseases, ultimately enabling healthcare providers to concentrate on innovative therapeutic approaches in these fields.

Tauk is a platform designed to assist developers in the app development process by providing services that facilitate efficient testing, collaboration, and issue resolution. The company focuses on helping developers diagnose and address problems that arise during app testing, thereby improving the overall user experience. By streamlining the process of identifying and fixing issues, Tauk enables developers to confidently release their applications at a large scale, ensuring that they meet the demands of users effectively.

Latent AI, Inc. is a technology company based in Menlo Park, California, with an additional office in Skillman, New Jersey. Established in 2018, the company specializes in developing a platform that optimizes artificial intelligence for edge devices, facilitating smart Internet of Things (IoT) applications. Its primary offering, the Latent AI Efficient Inference Platform (LEIP), allows developers to train, quantize, and deploy edge AI neural networks efficiently. The platform supports adaptive AI, automating the exploration of low-bit-precision training to enable on-device intelligence and inference. By providing tools that streamline AI implementation and workflows, Latent AI empowers software developers to effectively access and manage AI capabilities on edge devices, promoting cost-effective solutions across various enterprise applications.

Syntegra operates a synthetic healthcare data platform designed to enhance patient care and clinical outcomes through the use of machine learning. By generating validated synthetic data that preserves the statistical properties of real healthcare data while ensuring privacy, Syntegra addresses the growing barriers to clinical data access faced by healthcare systems and data aggregators. The platform allows users to conduct analytics, build predictive models, and create synthetic control groups for clinical trials without compromising patient confidentiality or violating regulatory compliance. Data training occurs on secure, non-identifiable datasets, ensuring that no personal information is exposed. Additionally, Syntegra employs rigorous validation and benchmarking methods to ensure the integrity of its data derivatives. The company's scalable solution accommodates various data types, including images and sensor streams, which will be securely integrated into its data lake over time. Led by a team of experienced entrepreneurs and academic experts in medicine and data science, Syntegra is positioned to drive innovation in healthcare analytics.