Streaming TV has exploded, but most brands still can’t advertise, measure and optimize it the way they do with Facebook or Google ads.

In our 62nd edition, meet Herman Yang, Kevin Weatherman, Mike Chang and Seth Yates, co-founders of Upscale AI, an AI-powered performance marketing platform for streaming TV.

The team brings deep experience across advertising and technology. Herman previously led product at Moloco and Twitter’s programmatic advertising business. Kevin held leadership roles at MoPub and OneSignal. Mike held product roles at Google and Salesforce, while Seth previously held engineering roles at Microsoft and Salesforce.

As paid social becomes saturated, acquisition costs rise and brands need new growth channels. Streaming TV offers massive reach, but producing ads is expensive, measurement is difficult and campaigns are slow to optimize.

Upscale lets brands run streaming TV campaigns the same way they run digital ads.

Its platform uses AI to create video ads, launch campaigns, optimize performance in real time and measure results across channels.

With the U.S. streaming advertising market exceeding $30 billion annually, the opportunity is enormous.

Last year, Upscale announced $5.5 million in financing from investors including Eniac, NVP Capital and M12, Microsoft’s venture fund.

See what Herman, Kevin, Mike and Seth have to say in this week’s Q&A 👇

*Upscale is a SuperAngel.Fund I and II portfolio company

Describe your company in 5 words or less.

Herman: AI performance marketing platform for streaming.

Kevin: Streaming TV performance ads platform.

Mike: Quality TV ads for brands.

Seth: Performance creative operating system.

What was your primary motivation for starting your business?

Herman: We started Upscale AI to help fast-growing brands tap into streaming—CTV, YouTube, and more—as a performance marketing channel. Personally, I love working with brands that have a unique ethos and innovative products, and in many ways, operate like startups themselves. I enjoy helping them leverage AI and other technologies to drive real business results. Ultimately we’re helping the brands reach consumers through more personalized storytelling, which requires both understanding the ins and outs of a complicated ecosystem as well as creativity.

Kevin: Opportunity to help brands scale while using cutting-edge AI and being able to work with amazing cofounders and investors.

Mike: Huge need for brands around creatives and how they engage with their customers on the home’s largest screen. A solution that makes it easy to do for any brand, backed by data and AI, felt like a no-brainer.

Seth: Creative was the last unautomated part of advertising. We’ve spent twenty years getting precise about who sees an ad and whether it worked, but the ad itself still comes from a shoot that takes weeks and costs a fortune.

What new product/feature are you most excited about and why?

Herman: I’m really excited about something we’ve been investing in quite a bit recently - which is our technology which uses multiple agents to do deep creative optimization. Our platform is unique in that we have the ability to generate high-quality streaming video creatives and access the raw performance data from running streaming campaigns for our brands. Our creative optimization AI not only can analyze what specific features or attributes of a creative drove a certain performance outcome and suggest improvements, but we can then produce new creatives based on those insights!

Kevin: Launch with Upscale for helping brands launch new products with TV, excited because it works!

Mike: The ever-growing quality of the TV creatives we produce is always exciting to see, especially when I see it watching my favorite shows.

Seth: The part I’m most excited about isn’t just generating creative, it’s closing the loop. We can produce many variants of an ad, then actually attribute performance back to the creative features that drove it, so the system learns which choices move outcomes rather than just shipping more assets.

What piece of advice would you give an entrepreneur starting a business today?

Herman: A lot has changed given what AI has enabled over the past 6–18 months, but the fundamentals of starting a business remain the same. Spend time deeply understanding your customers and developing empathy for their challenges. Even when you think you understand their pain points, you’re only getting started. Startups are a marathon, not a sprint. While founders make hundreds of decisions every week, it pays to keep an eye on the next major milestone.

Kevin: Choose your co-founders and investors wisely, and make sure the opportunity matches your ambition.

Mike: Figure out the superpower you and your business bring to your customer, and double or triple down on it.

Seth: The boring, legible decision usually wins, and it compounds. Your taste and judgment about what not to build is more of a moat than any feature.

What do you love to do in your free time?

Herman: I love indoor and outdoor activities like tennis, rock climbing and hiking. Beyond that, I can’t say no to a good reality TV dating show although it’s hard to find time to binge them on streaming!

Kevin: Running, scuba, photography, travel, mentoring and angel investing.

Mike: Figuring out if a TV ad or a voiceover in an ad was AI produced.

Seth: Spend time with my kids.

What is the most interesting place you’ve visited recently and why?

Herman: I haven’t been doing as much traveling as I’d like but I always discover something new and interesting every time I’m in NYC. :)

Kevin: Komodo Islands - Dragons and Scuba - so cool.

Mike: Was able to go to Omega Mart in Vegas recently. Immersive art experience. Was even more interesting because I found out after there’s a storyline, which I didn’t know of while I was there, so an interesting experience was multiplied.

Seth: Tokyo - so many things to explore.

What is your favorite app or tool in your work life and in your personal life?

Herman: Ever since I became a parent I feel like wet wipes (go Biom!) are indispensable and handy in so many situations.

Kevin: Claude Code has been amazing to 100x my ability to work and build products to help our company scale.

Mike: Claude Code and Gemini. Obvious for work, but even on the personal side, was able to navigate the electrical code here in NYC because of them. The problem we solved would not even get an electrician’s attention before.

Seth: Claude Code.

What do you want to be when you grow up (besides a successful founder)? 😊

Herman: I’d like to be a sci-fi novelist at some point in my life.

Kevin: Sub-3-hour marathoner and full-time angel investor.

Mike: Hopefully running a senior dog rescue.

Seth: Peter Pan?

What do you believe is the most important skill or attribute of a successful founder?

Herman: Resilience and humility in equal doses.

Kevin: Ability to listen and take feedback.

Mike: Honesty, with yourself and your team.

Seth: Judgment under ambiguity. Anyone can execute once the path is clear; the job is making good decisions when the information is incomplete and the stakes are real.

Know a founder building something exceptional?

Reply to this email — I’m always looking to meet great entrepreneurs.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage venture capital fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech, & Future of Work 😇.

Fund II is backed by the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds (anchored by Sequoia Capital and Squarepoint, a $100B asset manager). Based on their data, SuperAngel ranks in the top 1% on markups over baseline.

👉 Learn more about Fund II

Why am I receiving this email?

You’re receiving this because you’re part of the SuperAngel Network — a friend, founder, co-investor, or connection who has expressed interest in receiving updates.

If this isn’t relevant, you can unsubscribe below.

Companies know what their customers bought.

But very few know who they actually are.

In our 61st edition, meet Zach Zelner and Noah Friedman, co-founders of OuterSignal, the customer intelligence, personalization, and execution platform for modern consumer businesses.

Today, most companies know surprisingly little about their customers beyond what they purchased or clicked. Existing “personalization” tools are largely behavioral, tracking opens, purchases, and browsing activity.

They tell brands what customers did, but not who they actually are.

As a result, businesses market to customers like strangers.

High-value relationships go unnoticed. VIP customers remain invisible.

OuterSignal solves this by turning basic customer data into rich customer intelligence.

Using proprietary open-source intelligence technology (OSINT), the platform allows merchants to connect their Shopify store, CRM, or marketing stack and instantly receive rich customer profiles in real time.

A single order can suddenly reveal an executive at a Fortune 500 company, a major creator, a retail buyer, an investor, or a highly influential customer.

This intelligence powers smarter retention, segmentation, customer experience, outreach, and increasingly, autonomous marketing workflows.

And the customer love has been exceptional.

“OuterSignal exceeded all expectations and paid for itself the day we installed it. A buyer at the largest retailer in the world placed an order on our site using her personal email. OuterSignal identified and flagged it and we got a meeting. Highly recommend it to all Shopify merchants — it’s a no brainer.”

–Dan McCormick, Founder of Create

“OuterSignal gave us something we couldn't find anywhere else — precise, actionable clarity about who our customers really are. From uncovering hidden influencers and potential investors to shaping high-impact personas, it transformed how we target, segment, and speak to our audience.”

–Brian Keller, Founder of Rorra

The team behind OuterSignal is just as impressive.

Co-founders Zach Zelner and Noah Friedman bring a rare combination of technical, operational, and commerce expertise.

Zach is a 5x founder who has built, acquired, and invested in businesses generating hundreds of millions in revenue across SaaS, logistics, eCommerce, and marketing.

Noah co-founded Top Shelf Ventures, a prominent consumer venture fund, and also co-founded Uncharted, a global network of high-profile founders and investors.

In a world where every brand is trying to build deeper customer relationships, OuterSignal is helping companies move from generic marketing to truly intelligent personalization.

Want to learn more about OuterSignal? Reply to this email and I’ll connect you with their team.

And see what Zach and Noah have to say in this week’s Q&A 👇

*OuterSignal is a SuperAngel.Fund II portfolio company

Describe your company in 5 words or less.

Zach: Market to humans, not orders.

Noah: Market to humans, not orders.

What was your primary motivation for starting your business?

Zach: I’ve spent my career building brands and ecommerce companies, and personalization has always been at the core of how I work. OuterSignal is the platform I always wished I had. We’re ushering in the next era of commerce — and the brands working with us are already living in it. It’s deeply personal to me, and it’s my life’s work.

Noah: I’ve spent years investing in and helping consumer brands scale. The best brands build deeply human connections with their customers. OuterSignal is the tool that unlocks these capabilities and gives brand superpowers. This is the only thing I could possibly see myself doing. Building companies with people that motivate and inspire me is the ultimate dream.

What new product/feature are you most excited about and why?

Zach: We’ve already given brands an entirely new way to understand who their customers are. What comes next will make it just as easy to act on that understanding — without the friction and lack of personalization that’s defined marketing for the last decade.

Noah: TRUE persona-based marketing opens up a whole new world of growth, retention, and connection with consumers. Brands are already loving OuterSignal but wait until they see what’s coming next :)

What piece of advice would you give an entrepreneur starting a business today?

Zach: Pick an intense curiosity, dedicate your life to it, and work so hard that failure itself would be unreasonable. The founders who win are the ones who couldn’t put it down if they tried.

Noah: Remember that it’s SUPPOSED to be hard... nothing worth doing is easy. Building companies is equal parts insanely difficult and insanely thrilling. Enjoy the ride and when things get hard, lean in even harder.

What do you love to do in your free time?

Zach: Fly airplanes.

Noah: Exercise, golf, surf!

What is the most interesting place you’ve visited recently and why?

Zach: South of France. I got engaged there — it forever has my heart.

Noah: Costa Rica. Blows me away every time.

What is your favorite app or tool in your work life and in your personal life?

Zach: Work life: Claude Code. Personal life: ForeFlight.

Noah: Work life: Claude Code. Personal life: therapy.

What do you want to be when you grow up (besides a successful founder)? 😊

Zach: Cookie Chef.

Noah: Actor :)

What do you believe is the most important skill or attribute of a successful founder?

Zach: Obsession.

Noah: Resourcefulness and relentlessness.

Know a founder building something exceptional?

Reply to this email — I’m always looking to meet great entrepreneurs.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage venture capital fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech, & Future of Work 😇.

Fund II is backed by the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds (anchored by Sequoia Capital and Squarepoint, a $100B asset manager). Based on their data, SuperAngel ranks in the top 1% on markups over baseline.

👉 Learn more about Fund II

Why am I receiving this email?

You’re receiving this because you’re part of the SuperAngel Network — a friend, founder, co-investor, or connection who has expressed interest in receiving updates.

If this isn’t relevant, you can unsubscribe below.

Most founders spend years building valuable companies.

But very few spend enough time thinking about how they own them.

And that can quietly become a multi-million dollar mistake.

In our 60th edition, meet Alessandro Chesser, Edison Salman & Kyle Hanson, co-founders of Dynasty, a modern trust company helping founders maximize Qualified Small Business Stock (QSBS) tax benefits.

Before starting Dynasty, the founding team spent years at Carta, where they saw firsthand how equity gets created, managed, and ultimately monetized.

After helping scale Carta from $0 to $300M+ ARR, the team had a meaningful outcome.

But when they sold shares, they paid the maximum capital gains tax.

Then they learned something that completely changed their perspective.

An angel investor had exited $40M and paid $0 in taxes, perfectly legally, by using QSBS trust stacking.

That moment sparked a question:

Why were sophisticated investors legally paying far less in taxes than the founders and employees who actually helped build these companies?

The insight was simple:

Many wealthy founders and family offices have long used trust structures to multiply their QSBS exemption and dramatically reduce taxes at exit.

But the strategy was historically locked behind private-client law firms, opaque processes, and expensive engagements.

So they built Dynasty.

Dynasty helps founders, GPs and early employees plan, create, and administer trusts to stack their QSBS exemption, potentially shielding $15M+ in gains, at a fraction of the traditional cost.

The platform productizes the full process:

• Planning
• Legal structuring
• Trust creation
• Compliance
• Administration
• Ongoing support

All designed to make one of the most powerful tax strategies in startup history accessible to founders, employees, and investors.

Dynasty is also the only venture-backed company that operates a professionally licensed trust company, making trust administration significantly simpler and less expensive than the traditional route.

Since launching in July 2025, Dynasty has already served 400+ founders, angel investors, and early employees and created 1,000+ trusts for QSBS stacking.

Revenue has increased rapidly month by month, reflecting strong demand for the product.

This is one of the few decisions that can materially change your outcome…without changing anything about your company.

Learn more or book a call with the team here: getdynasty.com

And see what Alessandro, Edison, and Kyle have to say in this week’s Q&A 👇

*Dynasty is a SuperAngel.Fund II portfolio company

Describe your company in 5 words or less.

Alessandro: QSBS stacking for founders/investors.

Edison: QSBS Trust Stacking for Founders.

Kyle: We help founders save taxes.

What was your primary motivation for starting your business?

Alessandro: I was employee #13 at Carta. I didn’t know about QSBS, didn’t exercise in time, and paid maximum taxes when I sold my shares. Meanwhile, a friend of mine (an early investor in Carta) told me he’d set up trusts and paid zero taxes on $30M+ in capital gains. So I, a middle-class employee, paid maximum taxes on a couple million. My wealthy investor friend paid zero on $30M+. That’s when I knew I wanted to fix it. For the founders and investors who can’t afford the traditional way of setting up these trusts, which can run $100K+ in the first year alone.

Edison: I wanted to build simple and modern infrastructure for estate and tax planning.

Kyle: Working at Carta I got to see an antiquated process (paper stock certificates) sucked into a software world. Creating those efficiencies was really exciting and I wanted to find other similar processes that we could convert to software.

What new product/feature are you most excited about and why?

Alessandro: Dynasty for GPs. We launched it last week and already have customers plus a strong pipeline. What’s interesting is it’s not just attracting early-career GPs with new funds. It’s also attracting some of the richest, most well-known investors in startups. We didn’t expect that. You’d assume they’d want to work with traditional lawyers, but it turns out they want a tech solution (even from an early-stage startup) far more than a traditional one.

Edison: Automating simple stock transfers through a 5 step workflow so founders don’t need to involve expensive corporate lawyers.

Kyle: Not necessarily a specific feature, but I am really excited to keep driving down the time to trust creation and funding. Reducing onboarding time trust creation is a company wide effort that includes crafting the document template, onboarding and funding. We have taken a process that took months before and condensed it down to as little as a day and I am excited to push the boundaries further.

What piece of advice would you give an entrepreneur starting a business today?

Alessandro: Plan for your exit as early as possible. Even day one when starting your company. It can save you millions of dollars later.

Edison: Find the fastest way to test your assumptions so you can iterate toward the right answer. Building in the wrong direction is the biggest drain on both time and morale.

Kyle: It’s really hard to manufacture demand and it is much lower friction to go where demand already exists. Having a product that solves a range of problems and then zeroing in on exact use cases within that range can allow you to pivot faster.

What do you love to do in your free time?

Alessandro: Play with my kids, go hiking in the woods, and play basketball!

Edison: Spend time with my family.

Kyle: Right now I am really into 3D printing and have been printing variations of an open-source violin.

What is the most interesting place you’ve visited recently and why?

Alessandro: Sumba island off the coast of Bali. There were literally wild horses swimming in the ocean next to us. Most beautiful place I’ve ever been to by far.

Edison: I was at the underground parking of our new office building. It’s a smaller building in San Francisco and the parking entry is incredibly tight. I can barely fit my midsize truck through. It reminded me that we can do a lot with very little if we focus on a problem.

Kyle: With twin infants, the grocery store is about the most interesting place I’ve been able to get to recently.

What is your favorite app or tool in your work life and in your personal life?

Alessandro: Claude! It makes me significantly more productive. Automating manual tasks, helping me get through my inbox faster, and helps me create decks in a quarter of the time (or less).

Edison: I’m someone who likes to deeply understand problems before attacking them, which means I naturally fall into research rabbit holes. ChatGPT has been one of the biggest unlocks for helping me cut through the noise and get to clarity faster.

Kyle: Right now probably would have to say Codex. At work for obvious reasons and in my personal life I am using it to tinker with CAD and 3D modeling.

What do you want to be when you grow up (besides a successful founder)? 😊

Alessandro: A grandfather! Maybe even a great grandfather if I’m lucky.

Edison: I want to grow my own food.

Kyle: I always thought it would be cool to open an American breakfast restaurant in Rio de Janeiro (where my wife is from) and sell French toast, bacon and eggs, etc.

What do you believe is the most important skill or attribute of a successful founder?

Alessandro: Resiliency. We take a lot of punches so it’s important to keep getting back up no matter what.

Edison: Protect your time and delegate when you can.

Kyle: An ability to take 1000 no’s and stick to your convictions.

Know a founder building something exceptional?

Reply to this email — I’m always looking to meet great entrepreneurs.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage venture capital fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech, & Future of Work 😇.

Fund II is backed by the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds (anchored by Sequoia Capital and Squarepoint, a $100B asset manager). Based on their data, SuperAngel ranks in the top 1% on markups over baseline.

👉 Learn more about Fund II

Why am I receiving this email?

You’re receiving this because you’re part of the SuperAngel Network — a friend, founder, co-investor, or connection who has expressed interest in receiving updates.

If this isn’t relevant, you can unsubscribe below.

This week we’re featuring one of the fastest-growing wellness brands redefining the creatine category.

In our 59th edition, meet Dan & Sienna McCormick, co-founders of Create Wellness, the first modern creatine brand.

Dan is an experienced consumer operator with a background in finance, operations, and brand building. He previously worked at Away, served as Head of Finance at Parade, and later joined Not Boring as Chief of Staff helping scale one of Substack’s top business newsletters.

Sienna spent six years at Goldman Sachs before co-founding Create.

But Create didn’t start as a market opportunity. It started as a personal frustration.

Dan had been taking creatine for over a decade. He believed in the science but hated the experience. Powders were inconvenient, messy, and difficult to build into a daily routine.

At the same time, Dan and Sienna saw a broader disconnect: creatine is one of the most researched supplements in the world, yet remains misunderstood and culturally pigeonholed as a “bodybuilder” product.

Together, they set out to change that.

The early days weren’t easy.

More than 20 manufacturers told them a true creatine gummy wasn’t possible. After months of R&D and iteration, they found a partner willing to build it from scratch.

That persistence led to a breakthrough.

Create pioneered the first creatine monohydrate gummy, transforming an inconvenient powder into a simple daily habit.

The product is vegan, non-GMO, NSF Certified for Sport®, third-party tested, and built around a science-first brand.

From day one, the brand was intentionally built for both men and women, expanding the category far beyond traditional bodybuilding audiences.

The timing was also critical.

Today, creatine is one of the most researched supplements in the world, yet only ~2% of Americans take it regularly, despite 100M+ Americans participating in strength or fitness routines.

A massive gap and opportunity.

Create has built a loyal and rapidly growing customer base across DTC, Amazon, and retail. Today, the brand is available at Target, GNC, The Vitamin Shoppe, Sprouts & Wegmans, with more to come.

Since launch, Create has emerged as one of the breakout brands helping bring creatine into the mainstream.

A few months ago Create launched Creatine + Electrolytes, expanding beyond core creatine into hydration and performance, two of the largest and most important daily-use categories in wellness.

And recently, the company announced a $20M Series B led by Alliance Consumer Growth, with participation from Unilever Ventures and Impact Capital.

Want to give Create a try? Use code SUPERANGEL25 to get started.

And see what Dan and Sienna have to say in this week’s Q&A 👇

Describe your company in 5 words or less.

Dan & Sienna: Leading Creatine Company.

What was your primary motivation for starting your business?

Dan & Sienna: Only 2% of the population was taking creatine when we started Create. We knew that the other 98% of the population could experience the meaningful benefits of creatine if we made it more accessible from a product, brand, and go-to-market perspective. We just love creatine and wanted more people to discover it.

What new product/feature are you most excited about and why?

Dan & Sienna: Creatine + Electrolytes. This is our newest product that, as the name says, combines creatine with electrolytes. It contains 5g of creatine monohydrate, a balanced electrolyte blend, and taurine. From a practical perspective, so many of our customers are already mixing this up every morning -- we just made it convenient, delicious, and more affordable. From a science perspective, these ingredients are synergistic. Creatine helps you get more out of electrolytes and electrolytes help you get more out of creatine -- they just go better together.

What piece of advice would you give an entrepreneur starting a business today?

Dan & Sienna: Pick the right category and make sure you’re able to care about whatever you’re doing within that category more than anyone else in the world for 5+ years. For us, we made a really timely bet on creatine in 2022 -- the category was already decently sized, but was (and is) growing rapidly. And within creatine, we were able to obsess over creatine gummies more than anyone else in the world. We’d like to say that there was not another person in the world obsessing over creatine gummies on a random Sunday night in 2023, but we were.

What do you love to do in your free time?

Dan & Sienna: Sienna and I love to stay active. We just completed our first Hyrox in January, and are doing the upcoming NYC Hyrox in June. We pretty much stick to the basics: fitness, family, friends, work. We also have a 4 year old golden retriever that forces us to spend most of free time in dog parks throughout the city.

What is the most interesting place you’ve visited recently and why?

Dan & Sienna: We honeymooned in New Zealand and Fiji last year. New Zealand is gorgeous with mountains, and beaches, and greenery, and lots of sheep. Fiji is a great place to completely unplug from the world.

What is your favorite app or tool in your work life and in your personal life?

Dan & Sienna: Been really loving Granola. We’ve implemented a policy in our company that every meeting needs to have at least one Granola recording. We’re building a system where all meeting notes are then saved down, piped into Claude, and then searchable for the team.

What do you want to be when you grow up (besides a successful founder)? 😊

Dan & Sienna: The World’s Best Family Members.

What do you believe is the most important skill or attribute of a successful founder?

Dan & Sienna: The ability to really care about things that we find extremely important, even when everyone else around us finds that thing silly.

Know a founder building something exceptional?

Reply to this email — I’m always looking to meet great entrepreneurs.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage venture capital fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech, & Future of Work 😇.

Fund II is backed by the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds (anchored by Sequoia Capital and Squarepoint, a $100B asset manager). Based on their data, SuperAngel ranks in the top 1% on markups over baseline.

👉 Learn more about Fund II

Why am I receiving this email?

You’re receiving this because you’re part of the SuperAngel Network — a friend, founder, co-investor, or connection who has expressed interest in receiving updates.

If this isn’t relevant, you can unsubscribe below.

One year ago, I launched SuperAngel.Fund II.

Since then, 100+ LPs have committed to invest alongside me, and we’ve made 60 investments across 45 companies, with 20 already marked up.

While we are still early in the journey, I’ve never been more confident in the quality of our portfolio and the long-term potential of the companies we’ve backed.

Based on AngelList’s proprietary performance data, SuperAngel.Fund ranks in the top 1% of GPs on markups over baseline, which AngelList believes is one of the strongest leading indicators of future venture fund performance.

Last year, I received an unsolicited email from Abe Othman, Chief Investment Officer of Strawberry Tree Management, investment adviser to the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds.

Based on their internal data and underwriting, the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds invested $800,000 into SuperAngel.Fund II.

The Fund-of-Funds is backed by Sequoia Capital, Squarepoint (a $100B+ quantitative asset manager), Naval Ravikant, and others.

While no outcome is guaranteed, I view this as meaningful third-party validation of both our strategy and early execution.

Below is a copy of their signed commitment letter: ⬇️

Fund II Portfolio

Investments across Consumer, PropTech & Future of Work

How we invest

Fund II is designed to make approximately 100 investments across 60 companies over a four-year deployment period.

We invest as early as possible — typically Pre-Seed through Series A — where ownership can be established at attractive prices.

From there, we stay close to founders and selectively increase ownership as breakout growth and supporting data emerge.

The strategy is intentionally simple:

• Early entry valuations → disciplined pricing below market averages

• Broad diversification → maximize exposure to breakout outcomes

• Access advantage → a growing founder and LP network continues to improve deal quality and access

In early-stage investing, access and diversification matter. Research from Carta and AngelList continues to reinforce that broad portfolios meaningfully improve the probability of capturing outlier returns.

A favorable vintage for early-stage investing

Recent changes to Qualified Small Business Stock (QSBS) rules further improved the after-tax profile of venture investing — including higher exclusion caps, shorter holding period benefits, and expanded eligibility.

Combined with disciplined entry pricing, broad diversification, and improved after-tax treatment, I believe this creates an attractive environment for long-term early-stage investing.

Venture investing can often feel like a black box. I believe LPs deserve more transparency, access, and communication.

Beyond returns, I strive to build an investing experience that is unusually transparent, accessible, and communicative — with regular portfolio updates, direct access, and a front-row seat to the journey of building enduring companies.

Fund II is scheduled to hold a final close at the end of 2026, after which we do not expect to accept additional LP commitments.

If you’d like to learn more, simply reply to this email and I’ll send over additional materials, portfolio updates, and access to our investor portal.

Why am I receiving this email?

You’re receiving this because you’re part of the SuperAngel Network — a friend, founder, co-investor, or connection who has expressed interest in receiving updates.

If this isn’t relevant, you can unsubscribe below.

Insurance is one of the largest line items for many businesses, yet most founders only realize what their policy doesn’t cover when something goes wrong.

In our 58th edition, we are featuring JD Ross and Max Brenner, co-founders of With Coverage, an AI-enabled risk management and insurance platform helping businesses save money, improve coverage and proactively manage risk.

JD is a repeat founder who previously co-founded Opendoor, the real estate technology company that went public in 2021.

Max was part of the founding team at Compound, a technology-driven wealth management platform that now manages $1B+ in assets.

Today, most companies still rely on traditional insurance brokers and manage policies through emails, PDFs, and outdated systems.

As a result, many businesses:

• overpay for insurance
• have gaps in coverage
• lack visibility into their policies
• and don’t have a dedicated risk management team

Enter With Coverage.

Instead of operating like a traditional broker, With Coverage combines an expert advisory team with modern software and AI to help companies better understand, optimize, and manage risk.

The platform centralizes policies, claims, certificates, and compliance in one place while proactively monitoring a company’s operations to ensure the right coverage at the right time.

Unlike traditional brokers who are compensated through commissions, With Coverage operates on a flat-fee model, creating better alignment with customers and helping businesses save money while improving coverage.

Since launching in 2023, With Coverage has grown to support 700+ customers, including GoPuff, Bombas, Caraway, Windmill, Popsmith, Lalo, Hungryroot, Blank Street, Salt & Straw, Eight Sleep, and Chomps.

The company also recently announced a $42M Series B led by Sequoia, Khosla Ventures & Crystal Venture Partners, further validating its vision to modernize commercial insurance and risk management.

Want a complimentary insurance audit? Reply to this email and I’ll connect you with their team. It’s free, won’t notify your existing broker, and could uncover meaningful savings or gaps in coverage.

See what JD and Max have to say in this week’s Founder Q&A 👇

Describe your company in 5 words or less?

JD: Replace your crappy insurance broker.

Max: Modern Risk Management Solution.

What was your primary motivation for starting your business?

JD: Every year I had to handle insurance at Opendoor, and it sucked so much that I knew we could build an amazing business by just being better.

Max: Attack a backwards and misaligned insurance industry where businesses consistently get overcharged, are mis-covered, and left with a poor and opaque experience. Mission is to provide a solution that actually puts businesses first, delivers substantial value, and leads with transparency.

What new product/feature are you most excited about and why?

JD: I love AI for how it makes our risk management offering superhuman, not just automation for cost savings.

Max: Claims Operating System. We’ve recruited top insurance attorneys to own handling claims for our clients, while pairing them with a claims management platform to identify repetitive problems and implement proactive solutions to better protect businesses.

What piece of advice would you give an entrepreneur starting a business today?

JD: Everything is now open for competition in a way it hasn’t been in 10 years. Lean in hard to what’s possible now that wasn’t possible last year, and then extrapolate that further into the future.

Max: Obsess over the actual value you can deliver your end customer. People are exceptionally busy and your product must fundamentally be worth their time.

What do you love to do in your free time?

JD: I live in Austin, Texas now, which is basically the “hosting other people” capital of the world. Come visit!

Max: Go for runs!

What is the most interesting place you’ve visited recently and why?

JD: The OB/GYN office, nothing like seeing your baby growing.

Max: Japan. The cultural and societal contrasts are incredible and it truly feels like a different world.

What is your favorite app or tool in your work life and in your personal life?

JD: Codex and Claude -- everything else would be lying for cool points.

Max: Whispr - Voice to text tool.

What do you want to be when you grow up (besides a successful founder)? 😊

JD: A great father and husband, a leader for the next generation, a good friend to many, and someone who leaves things better than I found them, over and over, ad infinitum.

Max: A great dad and husband? Ha! Work wise though I just love building things that make people happy.

What do you believe is the most important skill or attribute of a successful founder?

JD: Successful founders know why they’re doing it. I think it’s incredibly important. Some people do it for money, for power, for legacy, or for love of the game. But if you don’t know why you’re doing it, it’s very easy to burn out. Everything takes a lot longer than you think it’s going to take, but it also happens much faster than you think it’s going to happen. “The days are long but the decades are short.”

Max: Relentlessness, while maintaining your kindness. People want to work with people they get along with, but you simply must be relentless in every part of the business.

Know a founder building something exceptional?

Reply to this email — I’m always looking to meet great entrepreneurs.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage venture capital fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech, & Future of Work 😇.

Fund II is backed by the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds (anchored by Sequoia Capital and Squarepoint, a $100B asset manager). Based on their data, SuperAngel ranks in the top 1% on markups over baseline.

👉 Learn more about Fund II

Why am I receiving this email?

You’re receiving this because you’re part of the SuperAngel Network — a friend, founder, co-investor, or connection who has expressed interest in receiving updates.

If this isn’t relevant, you can unsubscribe below.

Hotels throw out millions of half-used toilet paper rolls every year.

In our 57th edition, we are featuring Ludo Siouffi and Greg Hegger, co-founders of Fox Fold, a company building sustainable, refillable tissue solutions for hotels.

The idea for Fox Fold came from a simple observation: hotel bathrooms are incredibly wasteful, yet the products used in them haven’t meaningfully evolved in decades. Early on, the founders partnered with Box Clever, the industrial design firm behind category-defining brands like Caraway and Away, to reimagine the experience from the ground up.

Hotels discard millions of partially used rolls and tissue boxes each year, creating enormous waste and unnecessary costs.

Fox Fold is changing that.

The company has built the world’s first refillable tissue system for hotel guest rooms, allowing hotels to refill instead of throw products away. The result is a better guest experience, improved operations, and meaningful cost savings.

Hotels can save 30% to 50% on costs while upgrading both design and sustainability.

Within its first two years, Fox Fold has deployed more than 40,000 dispensers and is on pace to double that footprint by year-end. The company is already working with many of the hospitality industry’s leading brands, including Marriott, Hilton, Hyatt, Fairmont, Ritz-Carlton, Sheraton, and Accor.

Last year, Fox Fold was featured in Forbes, highlighting how its bamboo-based refillable system is helping operators reduce waste, lower costs, and modernize the hotel guest experience.

Last October, the company announced an oversubscribed $5M Series A led by Alex Cabañas of Astound Ventures, known for his leadership roles with Benchmark and Pyramid Global Hospitality, which operates more than 230 hotels worldwide.

As the team puts it, they are building the “SaaS of toilet paper.”

See what Ludo and Greg have to say in this week’s Founder Friday Q&A 👇

Founder Q&A

Describe your company in 5 words or less.

Ludo: Sustainable tissue solutions for hotels.

Greg: Patented tissue solution for hotels.

What was your primary motivation for starting your business?

Ludo: Tourism is fun and amazing, but also incredibly wasteful as an industry. No fault of their own, innovation in the space is slow. We look to change that starting with facial tissues and toilet paper, reinventing what has been for 100+ years with a new sustainable, refillable option. Better for the the environment and your bottom line, while adding to the guest experience.

Greg: Well no one grows up dreaming of being a tissue salesman! Throughout my career, I always wanted to be an entrepreneur with a focus on real tangible things. On improving the real-life things we interact with every day. We happened to noticed a problem with a super simple solution: Hotels buy far more tissue than they need. That’s because toilet paper rolls and facial tissue boxes are tossed before they’re finished. We developed a refillable system that solves this - helping hotels save money and waste. Seems crazy, but I’ve thoroughly enjoyed bringing the “disruptor” mentality to something as boring and unsexy as tissue paper. And frankly I think there are many other startup ideas that can drive change and create profit in boring categories.

What new product/feature are you most excited about and why?

Ludo: We launched with a refillable toilet paper and facial tissue dispenser, saving hotels 20-40% versus traditional rolls and cardboard boxes. What if we took it further and now made those solutions profit centers? #mindblowing

In short, we’re trialing the concept of a small sticker on our facial tissue dispensers what would allow guests to buy our dispensers at a discount with a hotel promo code. Every purchase would be revenue shared to the hotels.

With 200+ people going through a hotel room each year, all we need is 1% of them to make a purchase online for that hotel to then pay off the tissues in that dispenser every year.

Greg: Two things: 1) we continue to improve our packaging to make it as efficient as possible to transport and store our product. When you think of how much space tissue takes in a hotel’s small storage place - these improvements are a material benefit. 2) We’re building a front loading toilet paper dispenser to compliment our existing unit. This will allow hotels with smaller toilet spaces to benefit from our refillable solution.

What piece of advice would you give an entrepreneur starting a business today?

Ludo: Just start. Don’t sit there in analysis paralysis mode trying to make it perfect.

Greg: You don’t need to be a tech wizard. You don’t need to create the next Uber, Airbnb or AI solution. You can launch and grow a business by improving an everyday product or function in boring categories. The key is making sure you’re adding true value to a person or company.

What do you love to do in your free time?

Ludo: Spend time with my wife and 2 little ones.

Greg: My kids. We launched Fox Fold 3 years ago when my kids were 1 and 2 - not ideal TBH. But it completely reshaped my priorities. I dedicate the overwhelming majority of my time to family and work right now. Because I work from home and set my own schedule, I actually spend more time with my kids than one would think, and I’m grateful for that.

What is the most interesting place you’ve visited recently and why?

Ludo: This new career in hospitality has taken me to some incredible places... with that being said, the most recent interesting place for me was the back of house of the Fairmont Scottsdale Princess - the immensity and perfect coordination of everyone involved in the background is unbelievable.

Greg: Casa Di Campo Dominican Republic. It may not be the most interesting place ever, but it was the first real vacation my wife, kids and I took in the past 5 years. The location, the house, the beach, the food - it was exactly what we needed.

What is your favorite app or tool in your work life and in your personal life?

Ludo: I use a lot of Fathom.ai for all my meetings and email responses. It’s saved me countless hours!

Greg: LinkedIn. I can’t express how much of our success has been a result of “building out loud” on LinkedIn. We share our struggles, our wins, our new customers... this seems to resonate with people and connects us with prospects.

What do you want to be when you grow up (besides a successful founder)? 😊

Ludo: I love building and have 100x more ideas - especially within bathrooms. Would love to have a platform and partners to make those ideas into a reality.

Greg: I want to encourage youth to think differently about their careers, beyond your standard corporate path. I don’t think we do enough as a society to build the skillset required to be an entrepreneur. That I and I’m obsessed with music trivia, not sure how to make money there though. Perhaps a professor of music history in a big cardigan at a stuffy university?

What do you believe is the most important skill or attribute of a successful founder?

Ludo: The ability to keep pushing forward.

Greg: The ability to think clearly under mounting pressure and obstacles. The ability to stay positive and solution oriented in the many storms that arise.

Know a founder building something exceptional?

Reply to this email — I’m always looking to meet great entrepreneurs.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage venture capital fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech, & Future of Work 😇.

Fund II is backed by the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds (anchored by Sequoia Capital and Squarepoint, a $100B asset manager). Based on their data, SuperAngel ranks in the top 1% on markups over baseline.

👉 Learn more about Fund II

Why am I receiving this email?

You’re receiving this because you’re part of the SuperAngel Network — a friend, founder, co-investor, or connection who has expressed interest in receiving updates.

If this isn’t relevant, you can unsubscribe below.

This week we’re featuring a company rethinking how renters qualify for housing, while helping landlords drive higher occupancy and income.

In our 56th edition, meet Zach Schofel & Jacob Schofel, co-founders of Cosign, a PropTech platform modernizing tenant qualification for both renters and property owners.

Zach comes from a family real estate business, Eastman Residential, and holds a Master’s in Real Estate from NYU and a B.S. in Information Technology from Syracuse University.

Jacob previously worked as an engineering lead at one of the largest real estate software platforms in the U.S., specializing in tenant screening and compliance. He graduated from Carnegie Mellon with a degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering.

Together, the brothers bring deep real estate operating experience and technical expertise to the rental market.

Cosign’s mission is to expand housing access for renters while improving outcomes for landlords.

In the U.S. rental market, roughly 40% of renters face barriers qualifying for housing due to credit history, income requirements, or lack of rental history.

At the same time, landlords face persistent challenges identifying qualified renters that can impact occupancy and financial performance.

Cosign is bridging that gap.

The platform acts as a rental guarantor, similar to a parent co-signer, becoming legally responsible for rent obligations if a tenant defaults.

Approved renters pay a one-time fee, while landlords receive a guarantee that enables them to confidently approve applicants who may not meet traditional qualification standards.

Since launching in September 2024, Cosign has scaled rapidly, partnering with 250+ property management groups across the country and becoming accessible across hundreds of thousands of units.

In just over a year, Cosign has become one of the fastest-growing companies in PropTech and has expanded its team to more than 25 employees.

As housing affordability challenges continue to rise, Cosign is building what could become critical infrastructure for the future of rental housing.

See what Zach and Jacob have to say in this week’s Founder Friday Q&A 👇

Founder Q&A

Describe your company in 5 words or less.

Zach & Jacob: Boost occupancy + expanding housing options.

What was your primary motivation for starting your business?

Zach: I built Cosign after spending years acquiring and operating 3,000+ apartments across the U.S., where I saw firsthand that nearly 40% of renters were being denied from their choice apartment because of a broken system. It felt like my experience as a landlord and my love for tech were the perfect combination to address the issue.

Jacob: I wasn’t actively looking to leave my role. But between my time working on tenant screening and Zach’s experience as a landlord, we’d identified a problem worth solving. Cosign was an exciting challenge that aligned with my technical background and what I find interesting, and the bonus of building it with family made it hard to pass up.

What new product/feature are you most excited about and why?

Zach & Jacob: Top secret!! One thing we always look forward to is continuing to invest in our systems to evaluate all renters and give as many renters as possible access to homes.

What piece of advice would you give an entrepreneur starting a business today?

Zach: Don’t work with your brother :) Just kidding! Quick feedback loops — quick feedback loops across all aspects of the business and with customers. It allows you to have almost unlimited iterations as you find product market fit and continually iterate toward success.

Jacob: Answering this from an engineering lens: fight the urge to overengineer. Fast feedback loops are everything at an early stage, and getting there means intentionally taking on tech debt you won’t always have the resources to pay back. You have to be more ruthless about what’s actually worth building (and what’s worth building well) the first time.

What do you love to do in your free time?

Zach: I love to travel and explore the world! My goal is to visit every country and spend my Julys working from Tel Aviv. Also a big fan of sci-fi.

Jacob: Travel and anything outdoors. I love hiking, and recently picked up cycling too. Basically any excuse to be outside.

What is the most interesting place you’ve visited recently and why?

Zach: Panama! We did a company offsite there. Such a beautiful country — we went with our entire team two hours outside the city to visit an indigenous village with no access to the outside world. Really special seeing how they live, and it makes you appreciate the small things in life. Over 15% of Panama is indigenous!!

Jacob: Outside our team offsite to Panama, Crater Lake in Oregon was a recent highlight. The deep blue color is wild in person, not really something a camera can capture. You’re climbing up and then out of nowhere this massive lake just opens up in front of you.

What is your favorite app or tool in your work life and in your personal life?

Zach: Superhuman! I live in my email all day and it allows me to work so much faster. Also Slack — we automate a lot of our company through Slack, and it allows us to keep the important stuff in email. Personal is Twitter — I’m addicted.

Jacob: Work: Claude Code. As an engineer it’s changed how I build day to day, and it’s added a ton of context to the planning and management side too. Personal: Messenger, controversially. I know most people don’t love it, but I’m a fan.

What do you want to be when you grow up (besides a successful founder)? 😊

Zach: A great dad/husband and world traveler.

Jacob: Someone who’s traveled and explored as much of the world as possible?

What do you believe is the most important skill or attribute of a successful founder?

Zach: What is a no and what is failure? Never heard of it. If you iterate quickly enough, you have unlimited tries — and failure becomes impossible.

Jacob: I don’t think there’s one answer. It depends on the business, your team, your role, and what stage you’re at. If I had to name something that matters regardless, it’d be communication, internally and with customers.

Know a founder building something exceptional?

Reply to this email — I’m always looking to meet great entrepreneurs.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage venture capital fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech, & Future of Work 😇.

Fund II is backed by the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds (anchored by Sequoia Capital and Squarepoint, a $100B asset manager). Based on their data, SuperAngel ranks in the top 1% on markups over baseline.

👉 Learn more about Fund II

Why am I receiving this email?

You’re receiving this because you’re part of the SuperAngel Network — a friend, founder, co-investor, or connection who has expressed interest in receiving updates.

If this isn’t relevant, you can unsubscribe below.

This week we’re featuring a company modernizing one of retail’s biggest blind spots: what actually happens once products hit the shelf.

In our 55th edition, meet David Roger, Michael Rostowsky, Bobby Shomrony, and Mike Walters, co-founders of Hetal Retail, an AI-powered platform helping brands understand and optimize what’s happening on shelf.

The Hetal team previously worked together at Felix Gray, a venture-backed consumer brand they scaled into major retail channels like Target, CVS, and Best Buy before selling the company in 2023.

Through that experience, they saw firsthand how little visibility brands have once products hit the shelf.

I first met David while he was building Felix Gray and was fortunate to write the first check into Hetal.

While over 80% of purchases still happen in retail, 25% of sales are lost due to poor execution, and 20–40% of displays are set up incorrectly.

Hetal helps brands understand what’s happening on shelf and turns that visibility into better execution, merchandising, and sell-through.

Legacy solutions are expensive, manual, and slow. Hetal flips that model.

Using a network of everyday shoppers (“Hetalites”) and proprietary computer vision AI, Hetal:

• Captures shelf-level data across stores

• Identifies out-of-stocks, pricing errors, product orientation, number of facings, shelf placement, and merchandising compliance

• Connects execution directly to sales outcomes

Brands use Hetal to improve availability, win shelf space, and deploy merchandising spend more efficiently.

In short, Hetal is building a “Google Analytics for retail shelves.”

In just six months, Hetal surpassed 100 customers and now works with leading brands, including: Caraway, Cleancult, Freestyle, Lalo, Windmill, Grüns, Lemme, Oats Overnight, David Protein, Starface, and Everyday Dose.

Hetal is already helping brands audit major retailers including Target, Walmart, Sprouts, and Whole Foods, and will be expanding into conventional grocery including Kroger, HEB, and Publix starting Q2 2026.

As digital channels become more competitive, physical retail is becoming more important—and complex. Hetal is building the infrastructure layer that makes retail shelves measurable.

Reply to this email if you or anyone you know might be interested in speaking with the Hetal team!

And see what David, Michael, Bobby, and Mike have to say in this week’s Q&A 👇

Founder Q&A

Describe your company in 5 words or less.

David: Affordable/powerful shelf analytics/actionability.

Michael: Retail analytics and workflows.

Bobby: Auditing. Trends. Insights. Merchandising. Intelligence.

Mike: Continuous retail shelf data.

What was your primary motivation for starting your business?

David: Having experienced growing in retail firsthand at Felix Gray, we realized that the current system is broken. The data is expensive and it’s unwieldy. Auditing and correction shouldn’t be part of the same merchandising visit, it’s inherently what makes understanding the shelf so expensive. Computer Vision AI can be used to mine the data in the photos to actually generate useful data/insights. And, a platform needs to be designed to action the information. Operators are too busy to use another tool to help them figure out what to do. The best companies figure it out on your behalf.

Michael: Brands had no affordable way to understand what was actually happening on the shelf, a problem that directly impacted our last business. We wanted to build the solution.

Bobby: Nobody actually knew what was happening on the shelf in CPG. The data existed in spreadsheets and disparate data sources — never in real time, never affordably. That gap felt both obvious and fixable. So we fixed it.

Mike: Working with my other founders on a fun and exciting project.

What new product/feature are you most excited about and why?

David: Our new merchandising coordination (Dispatch) is pretty amazing. We’re helping brands save 70-90% of their merchandising budgets, correct issues faster (2 week lead time), and no longer have to handle the time consuming coordination + confirmation. We hone in on what stores are worth visiting by cross referencing our audits with brand provided criteria and budget. Then we push that work out to approved merchandising firms, but we batch jobs across our customer set to get better pricing. We’ll handle all the coordination and grade the after-photos to grade issue resolution.

Michael: Improved merchandising coordination, it closes the loop from diagnosis to action. Brands can see exactly which stores need attention and dispatch help automatically.

Bobby: Campaign-based merchandising coordination. We’re building the ability to support recurring, reactive, and proactive merchandising workflows — giving brands a complete, closed-loop system for managing shelf execution from diagnosis all the way through resolution. No more one-off store visits or reactive firefighting. Just a structured, intelligent approach to getting and keeping — your shelf right.

Mike: AI across the board and its ability to give insights that were previously hidden.

What piece of advice would you give an entrepreneur starting a business today?

David: It’s a three legged race. Everyone at the team needs to work towards the same goal and put the team’s goals above their own priorities.

Michael: Your plan will change a hundred times. Be okay with that and stay close to your customers.

Bobby: Talk to your customers obsessively — before you build, while you build, after you build. Every major Hetal decision came from standing in actual store aisles, not a whiteboard. Reality always beats assumptions.

Mike: Perfect is the enemy of good. Get a good MVP and ship.

What do you love to do in your free time?

David: Outside of family/friends, anything that gets me into a flow state and clears my head. Skiing, biking, cooking, swimming all do this for me.

Michael: Tennis, trying new restaurants, reading when I can.

Bobby: Get outside — playing basketball, exploring new places and having fun with my kids.

Mike: Video Games and Family Time.

What is the most interesting place you’ve visited recently and why?

David: Greenland for a backcountry ski trip.

Michael: The Magic Castle in LA, a private club for magicians. Hard to explain, worth experiencing.

Bobby: Disney World with my kids. Hundreds of thousands of people, all completely bought into the same experience — it’s a wild thing to witness. As a founder, you can’t help but marvel at the brand machine they’ve built. The operational scale, the emotional buy-in, the consistency across every touchpoint. Nobody executes an experience quite like Disney, everyone drinking the same Kool-Aid.

Mike: Sesame Place American Dream - Getting to see my daughter enjoy seeing Elmo in person.

What is your favorite app or tool in your work life and in your personal life?

David: Evernote. It’s old, there are probably better solutions, but without my lists, I’m lost.

Michael: Work: Claude, has enabled so much. Personal: Spotify, always have a podcast going.

Bobby: Asana. It’s where my thinking lives and keeps the chaos organized enough to move fast.

Mike: Claude. Has changed how my development works and allows me to prototype in hours what took days.

What do you want to be when you grow up (besides a successful founder)? 😊

David: Would rather always be a kid, but you know, a responsible one. Life is too short: stay curious and have fun.

Michael: New York Knicks Season Ticket Holder.

Bobby: A great mentor and father to my children. The people who gave me honest, unfiltered feedback early on shaped everything. I want to be that person for the next wave of founders.

Mike: Video Game Designer.

What do you believe is the most important skill or attribute of a successful founder?

David: Depends on the role. For me, selling a vision, prioritizing the steps to get there, and communicating that effectively to keep everyone working together.

Michael: Resilience.

Bobby: Resilience with self-awareness. The best founders absorb hard feedback, adapt fast, and keep going — without losing sight of why they started.

Mike: The ability to see problems in a different light or attack them from unseen angles.

Know a founder building something exceptional?

Reply to this email — I’m always looking to meet great entrepreneurs.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage venture capital fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech, & Future of Work 😇.

Fund II is backed by the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds (anchored by Sequoia Capital and Squarepoint, a $100B asset manager). Based on their data, SuperAngel ranks in the top 1% on markups over baseline.

👉 Learn more about Fund II

Why am I receiving this email?

You’re receiving this because you’re part of the SuperAngel Network — a friend, founder, co-investor, or connection who has expressed interest in receiving updates.

If this isn’t relevant, you can unsubscribe below.

One of my favorite parts of this job is meeting incredible founders early, often before the rest of the world catches on.

Years ago I started Founder Friday where I showcase these entrepreneurs with my network.

I’m excited to bring the series back.

In our 54th edition, we are featuring Russ Wallace and Mike Constantiner, co-founders of Freestyle, a high-performance babycare brand redefining diapers and wipes for modern families 👶.

Russ and Mike bring deep experience across consumer brands and startups. Mike previously co-founded Cameo, the viral video platform that reached the App Store Top 10 before later being acquired by Vimeo, while Russ helped scale Hello Bello past a $100M run rate as Head of Business Development.

While legacy brands like Pampers and Huggies dominate the market, many parents have begun seeking cleaner ingredients, better materials, and higher-performance products for their babies.

So they built Freestyle.

Freestyle’s flagship diapers feature patent-pending 7-layer absorbency technology, are Total Chlorine Free, and EWG Verified®.

Since launching online in 2022, Freestyle has grown rapidly and expanded into major retailers including Target, Walmart, and Whole Foods, and is also available on Amazon and Freestyle.world.

The brand has also built an impressive marketing engine powered by 1,000+ creators and influencers, powering it to become one of the fastest players in the category, with ~400% year-over-year growth.

SuperAngel was proud to first back Freestyle in 2021 and continue throughout their scale up stages, including in their most recent Series A round.

If you or someone you know is currently in the diaper buying phase, feel free to use or share promo code SuperAngel20.

And see what Russ and Mike have to say in this week’s Founder Friday Q&A 👇

Founder Q&A

Describe your company in 5 words or less.

Russ: High performance diapers and wipes.

Mike: Premium family essentials.

What was your primary motivation for starting your business?

Russ: Hello Bello had been an eye-opening experience into the world of diapers and wipes, and it felt like even though the business was doing really well (at the time), they were leaving a lot on the table in terms of content around modern parenting. What I saw in the world as a parent was young people genuinely trying to rethink the entire act of building a family -- what it meant for them and their kids, how to fix perceived misses in their own upbringing, even where to live when raising a family. So when Mike and I found that we could talk about these generational differences for hours at a time, it felt like we uniquely had the kind of passion, insights, and experience that could support building a new brand for the category.

Mike: When I became a dad, I was genuinely disappointed by the options in the category. Most were dated, underperforming, or overpriced — usually some mix of the three. Freestyle started as our answer to that.

What new product/feature are you most excited about and why?

Russ: For sure our SkinShield diaper, which is low key the best diaper that has ever been made (unbiased opinion). Lab results confirm it, customers shout it out on socials, and the look on people’s faces when they actually test in person is shocking and deeply satisfying. And the fact that you don’t need a trust fund to have access to an exceptional diaper makes me very proud of the hard work we put into engineering it.

Mike: Our new diaper, SkinShield, is really innovative. We designed a completely novel way it absorbs and makes it the top performing diaper we’ve ever tested.

What piece of advice would you give an entrepreneur starting a business today?

Russ: I’ve tried many times to build a venture-backed startup, and this is the first one that found the path to escape velocity. The difference that stands out the most to me is that (i) I got lucky in finding a great partner who balanced out the gaps in my capabilities and many of my bad instincts, and (ii) I finally learned to ignore the vanity metrics -- investment rounds, users, visits, reviews, social media metrics -- and get laser focused on revenue and the path to profit. At the end of the day, a business is just a cash-generating machine; you can convince yourself that it’s about something else, that yours is different, but it won’t survive unless it becomes that machine. So my advice is try to separate out the things that the company does for you -- the vanity stuff -- and learn to care deeply about the things the company does that generate (or that can generate in the near future) profits. It’s harder than it sounds, and for me, it was the unlock to building something that has a chance to succeed.

Mike: Lack of focus is the number one thing that kill startups. Have a clear goal of where you want to get to, and be very mindful of the daily steps it will take to get there. Nothing happens overnight.

What do you love to do in your free time?

Russ: Exploring anything -- an academic field or a place in the world -- with my family. I thrive on constant movement and new things.

Mike: Spend time with my family and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.

What is the most interesting place you’ve visited recently and why?

Russ: By far, it’s China. I had so many preconceived notions about our first visit to China to see our suppliers, and the experience blew me away. It’s a genuinely unique and authentic culture and place, and as a visitor and a business partner my experiences there have far exceeded my expectations.

Mike: China. It’s like jumping forward 10-20 years into the future in certain ways. Super cool to see what’s going on there first hand. Also, easily the best food in the world.

What is your favorite app or tool in your work life and in your personal life?

Russ: Using OpenClaw to help me organize my schedule and tasks has been surprisingly effective. It’s not everything the hype promises it will be, but I’m more productive with it than without it.

Mike: Work: As lame as it sounds, Slack. We’re a fully remote team, so it’s the hub of communication internally. Personal: Skylight. Keeps our family’s schedules easily accessible for both us parents and the kids.

What do you want to be when you grow up (besides a successful founder)? 😊

Russ: Jimmy Buffett 2.0. That guy cracked the code.

Mike: Healthy and my kids to still want to hang out with me lol.

What do you believe is the most important skill or attribute of a successful founder?

Russ: Persistence and a lack of shame.

Mike: Resilience.

Know a founder building something exceptional?
Reply to this email — I’m always looking to meet great entrepreneurs.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage venture capital fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech, & Future of Work 😇.

Fund II is backed by the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds (anchored by Sequoia Capital and Squarepoint, a $100B asset manager). Based on their data, SuperAngel ranks in the top 1% on markups over baseline.

👉 Learn more about Fund II

Why am I receiving this email?

You’re receiving this because you’re part of the SuperAngel Network — a friend, founder, co-investor, or connection who has expressed interest in receiving updates.

If this isn’t relevant, you can unsubscribe below.

Dear Friends,

Q1 was a strong start to 2026.

We continued scaling SuperAngel.Fund II, deploying capital into high-quality companies while increasing ownership in breakout performers.

We’re also beginning to see several Fund I companies reach meaningful inflection points.

🎙️Prefer to listen? Click here/below for the audio version.

🔥 Q1 2026 — At a Glance

• $2.45M deployed to date across 50 investments into 40 companies

• ~$1M deployed in Q1 across 9 new investments and 5 follow-ons

• $50K median check size

• $15M median entry (vs. $20M market)

• 14 companies already marked up

• Fund II now $10M+ committed from 100+ LPs

• New institutional LP: Schesto Ventures

📊 Fund II — Performance & Activity

We continued to deploy capital across both new and existing portfolio companies, with a mix of primary and secondary transactions.

We are increasingly accessing companies outside formal fundraising processes through secondaries and direct founder-led allocations.

We also proactively approach our highest conviction companies to participate in one-off primary rounds, often enabled by flexible SAFE structures.

Our entry pricing compares favorably to the broader market, reinforcing our ability to access high-quality companies at disciplined prices.

To date, 14 investments have been marked up, with several others showing strong traction not yet reflected in reported valuations.

The Fund II portfolio currently spans:

• Consumer: 18

• Commerce Tech: 14

• PropTech / Future of Work: 8

👉 Interested in learning more? Additional materials:

• AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds commitment letter

• SuperAngel.Fund II investor memo

🧠 Our Strategy

Our edge is designed — not random:

• Brand-driven inbound (35K+ Substack, 20K+ LinkedIn, 10K+ X)

• Proprietary network of founders, operators, and LPs

• Early access + disciplined entry pricing

• Selective concentration into breakout performers

This approach is supported by both internal results and external data.

A recent Carta study (20,000 simulated funds) showed that highly diversified portfolios (~100 investments) are significantly more likely to produce top-decile outcomes than concentrated portfolios.

Additionally, Fund II received backing from the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds (anchored by Sequoia Capital and Squarepoint). Based on their “markups over baseline” metric, SuperAngel ranks in the top 1% of GPs on the platform

👉 You can review our investment strategy here.

🚀 Fund II Portfolio Companies

We’ve built a highly diversified portfolio across consumer, commerce tech, and PropTech / Future of Work.

Many of these companies are already demonstrating strong early traction, with several scaling rapidly and multiple investments already marked up.

Below is a snapshot of companies we’ve backed in Fund II to date:

Consumer (18 companies)

• 📱 Freckle: The first phone kids love and parents trust

• 🍓 Feel Goods: All-natural supplements built for Gen Z

• 💦 Rorra: A modern water filtration company

• 🥣 Man Cereal: Creatine-infused, high-protein cereal

• 🪴 Arber: Modern lawn, garden, & plant care brand

• ⚡ Orka: Energy drink that tastes like water

• 👶 Freestyle: Babycare brand for the next generation

• 🧻 Fox Fold: Sustainable tissue solutions for hotels

• 🍝 Ripi: Premium frozen pasta brand

• 💪 Create: The first modern creatine brand

• ♻️ Biom: Sustainable wipes brand

• 🌿 Rose: The future of residential health & wellness

• 🧴 Cottonball: Personalized prescription skincare

• 🧃 NoBiggie: BFY kids food & beverage brand

• 🧴 Parivie: Paris Hilton skincare brand

• 🗄️ Branch: Office furniture that works

Commerce Tech (14 companies)

• 📺 Upscale AI: TV marketing platform for brands

• 📊 Marathon Data: Brand measurement & analytics platform

• 🛒 Hetal: Retail audit & execution platform

• 🛡️ Patrol: Security & compliance for eCommerce

• 💰 RetailPath: Retail chargebacks on autopilot

• 💼 Storetasker: Marketplace for eCommerce experts

• 📦 Two Boxes: Returns management for brands & 3PL

• ✨ Overjoy: AI-powered wholesale growth platform

• 💫 Hoop: Effortless resale platform

• ✨ OuterSignal: Customer intelligence for merchants

• 🌐 Bonsai: AI commerce infrastructure for brands

• 🔀 Jurni: AI-powered marketing funnels

• 🏬 SignalLift: AI operating system for multi-unit retailers

• ⚡Won.AI: AI-first commerce agency

• 💥YouPop: Creator commerce & infrastructure

• 🔬 Light Labs: Modern lab testing for cleaner, safer products

PropTech / Future of Work (8 companies)

• 🔑 Cosign: Helping landlords convert more renters

• ✨ Harmony: AI workflow automation for manufacturing

• 🧑‍💼 Stealth: Workforce planning & optimization

• 💻 candidate.fyi: Candidate experience platform

• 🏡 Doorvest: AI-first property management

• 📒 LDGR Systems: AI agents for property accounting

• 🏦 Dynasty: A trust company built for founders

We’re proud to partner with these founders and continue to support them as they scale.

📊 Fund I — Performance (2021-2024)

Fund I is now fully deployed and continues to show strong early performance.

• Top 10% of all 2021 vintage funds (AngelList benchmark data)

• $10.2M deployed across 201 investments into 130 companies

• ~$16.65M estimated current value

• 1.63x gross MOIC | 14.58% IRR

• 77% of investments active and/or marked up

Early-stage portfolios often see smaller outcomes early, with larger winners emerging over time. We remain confident in the long-term upside of the portfolio.

👉 View detailed performance

🌐 The Super Angel Network

The Super Angel Network is a core driver of our strategy — and a key reason we consistently see proprietary deal flow and differentiated access.

A private network of founders, operators, and LPs that:

• Drives proprietary deal flow

• Enables faster, higher-quality diligence

• Supports hiring, partnerships, and customer growth

• Compounds in value over time

We continue to see this become a meaningful competitive advantage.

🔗 SuperAngelNetwork.com

🤝 LP Momentum

During the quarter, we added Schesto Ventures as a new institutional LP.

The Schestowitz Group is a multi-generational global operator (founded 1954), with deep expertise across consumer distribution and brand building.

Fund II now exceeds $10M in commitments from 100+ LPs, including founders, operators, venture investors, and family offices.

🧾 QSBS Tailwinds

Recent changes to QSBS meaningfully improve the after-tax potential of early-stage investing:

• Higher exclusion caps

• Tiered holding periods

• Expanded eligibility

Combined with early entry and long holding periods, we believe this creates a strong structural tailwind for this fund vintage.

👉 Read more on QSBS updates.

🤖 AI’s Impact on Consumer

AI is disrupting software, but accelerating consumer.

While AI is increasing competition and compressing defensibility in parts of the software ecosystem, it is simultaneously improving the economics of building consumer and physical-world businesses.

These businesses:

• Cannot be easily unbundled

• Benefit from lower costs (production, marketing, ops)

• Retain more durable demand characteristics

We are beginning to see capital rotate toward businesses with tangible products, inelastic demand, and stronger structural defensibility, where AI acts as an enabler rather than a disruptor.

We expect this trend to continue — and believe it creates a particularly favorable backdrop for the types of companies we invest in.

🔭 Looking Ahead

We continue to see strong deal flow across Consumer, Commerce Tech, and PropTech / Future of Work — increasingly sourced directly through our network.

We expect:

• Continued steady deployment through 2026

• Ongoing focus on disciplined entry pricing

• Increased ownership in breakout performers

• Select secondary opportunities

If you come across exceptional founders in these areas, I’m always grateful for introductions.

Thank you for your continued trust and support.

Ben Zises

Founder & GP

SuperAngel.Fund

ben@superangel.vc

P.S. Prior quarterly updates are available here.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage venture capital fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech, & Future of Work 😇.

Fund II is backed by the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds (anchored by Sequoia Capital and Squarepoint, a $100B asset manager). Based on their data, SuperAngel ranks in the top 1% on markups over baseline.

👉 Learn more about Fund II

Why am I receiving this email?

You’re receiving this because you’re part of the SuperAngel Network — a friend, founder, co-investor, or connection who has expressed interest in receiving updates.

If this isn’t relevant, you can unsubscribe below.

Dear Friends,

I’m pleased to share some exciting news with you: SuperAngel.Fund II is proud to welcome Schesto Ventures as a new LP. Schesto Ventures is the venture capital arm of The Schestowitz Group, a multi-generational operating company founded in 1954.

The Schestowitz Group is a leading global importer, marketer, and distributor of consumer brands across personal care, cosmetics, household goods, food, and health, supporting thousands of points of sale and employing 1,100+ people worldwide.

Schesto Ventures is led by Roy Gat, General Manager, and backed by Yoni Schestowitz, Owner and CEO.

“We are excited to add SuperAngel.Fund II to the Schesto Ventures portfolio. Ben brings over a decade of early-stage investing experience, a proven track record, and a strong fiduciary mindset. His disciplined approach combining speed, conviction, and diversification aligns with our focus on operational excellence and execution. We believe Fund II is well positioned to succeed.”

We are grateful to partner with a storied group that brings decades of operating experience and a principled mindset to venture investing. This partnership reflects the continued momentum behind Fund II as we approach our next close.

For those interested in learning more, you can review our latest Fund II materials here.

Thank you, as always, for your continued trust and support.

Ben Zises

SuperAngel.Fund

ben@superangel.vc

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage venture capital fund that invests in Consumer, PropTech & Future of Work😇.

Fund II is backed by the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds, which ranks us in the top 1% based on markups over baseline, a leading indicator of future performance.

Click here to learn more about Fund II

Why am I receiving this email?

You are receiving this email because you are either a friend, co-investor, associate, or connection of Ben Zises or SuperAngel, who at one point expressed interest in receiving updates and other correspondence from me. If you received this email in error please accept my apologies and feel free to unsubscribe at the link below.

Dear Friends,

I hope you had a wonderful holiday season.

I’m pleased to share SuperAngel.Fund’s Q4 2025 update, covering Fund I (our 2021-2024 rolling fund) as well as our newly active Fund II.

• Want to read the commitment letter from one of our largest LPs who rank us in the top 1% on AngelList? Click here.

• Want to learn more about investing in Fund II? Click here.

• Prefer to listen to this update instead? You can find the AI-generated podcast by clicking the play button below 🎙️

Introducing the Super Angel Network 🌐

While venture fundraising remains challenging by many measures, we’ve continued to grow SuperAngel.Fund II to over $9.5M from nearly 100 LPs, including both new and returning partners, with additional commitments in process.

Our LP base spans founders, operators, fellow fund managers, real estate investors, and agency owners — a community that has increasingly become a meaningful competitive advantage for both the fund and our portfolio companies.

We believe this network compounds over time, creating a durable edge across sourcing, diligence, hiring, partnerships, and founder support.

To deepen access, transparency, and collaboration, I’m excited to introduce the Super Angel Network — a private platform designed to bring together:

• Founders across our portfolio

• LPs who are invested across our funds & SPVs

The network has already proven valuable for introductions, deal flow, diligence, and operational support. Feel free to explore!

🔗 SuperAngelNetwork.com

🔐 Access: Request password or 👉 Click here to join

📊 Fund II — Performance Summary (2025- )

As of quarter-end, Fund II has deployed $1.62M across 36 investments into 33 companies, with a $50K median check size and a $15M median post-money entry valuation.

The portfolio spans our core focus areas:

• Consumer: 18

• Commerce Tech: 13

• PropTech/Future of Work: 5

Our entry valuations continue to compare favorably with current market data, where median seed valuations in 2025 were approximately $20M post-money, reinforcing our emphasis on early access and disciplined entry points.

To date, 10 investments have been marked up, with several others demonstrating meaningful traction that is not yet reflected in reported valuations.

Portfolio Overview

Consumer

• 📱 Freckle: The first phone kids love and parents trust

• 🍓 Feel Goods: All-natural supplements built for Gen Z

• 💦 Rorra: A modern water filtration company

• 🥣 Man Cereal: Creatine-infused, high-protein cereal for men

• 🪴 Arber: Modern lawn, garden, & plant care

• ⚡ Orka: The energy drink that tastes like water

• 👶 Freestyle: Babycare brand designed for the next generation

• 🧻 Fox Fold: Sustainable tissue solutions for hotels

• 🍝 Ripi: Premium frozen pasta

• 🍑 Create: The first modern creatine brand

• ♻️ Biom: Sustainable household wipes

• 🌿 Rosemary: The future of residential health & wellness

• 🧴 Cottonball: Personalized prescription skincare

Commerce Tech

• 📺 Upscale AI: TV marketing for modern brands

• 📊 Marathon Data: Brand measurement & marketing analytics

• 🛒 Hetal: Retail audit, analytics, and execution

• 🛡️ Patrol: Security & compliance for eCommerce

• 💰 RetailPath: Retail chargebacks on autopilot

• 💼 Storetasker: Marketplace for eCommerce experts

• 📦 Two Boxes: Returns management for brands & 3PLs

• ✨ Overjoy: AI-powered wholesale growth

• 💫 Hoop: Effortless resale infrastructure

• ✨ OuterSignal: Customer intelligence for merchants

• 🌐 Bonsai: AI commerce infrastructure

• 🔀 Jurni: AI-driven marketing funnels

• 🏬 SignalLift: AI operating system for multi-unit retailers

• ⚡Won.AI: AI-first commerce agency for brands

PropTech / Future of Work

• ✍️ Cosign: Helping landlords convert more renters

• ✨ Harmony: AI-powered workflow automation

• 🤐 Stealth: Agentic workforce planning & optimization

• 💻 Candidate.fyi: The candidate experience platform

• 🏡 Doorvest: AI-first property management

📝 Fund II — LP Terms

• Minimum Commitment: $100k - $250k+, with a limited number of smaller allocations available

• Capital Call Schedule: 10% per quarter over 10 quarters

• Target Fund Size: $15m

• Fees: 2% annual management fee, 20% carried interest

• Fund Administration: AngelList (Legal, tax & accounting, banking, and compliance)

📊 Fund I — Performance Summary (2021-2024)

Fund I, our 2021-2024 rolling fund, is now closed and fully deployed

• Capital Deployed: $10.2M across 201 investments into 130 companies

• Estimated Current Value: $16.18M

• Performance: 1.58x Gross MOIC | 14.65% Gross IRR

• Portfolio Health: 159 out of 201 investments (79%) remain active and/or have been marked up

• Click here to see the Fund I portfolio

Based on AngelList Fund Benchmark Data (H1 2025), Fund I ranks in the top 10% of all 2021 vintage funds.

👉 Click here to view a detailed performance summary

Notably, early-stage venture portfolios often experience smaller liquidity events and wind-downs early in a fund’s life, with larger outcomes typically emerging later. I remain confident in Fund I’s overall positioning and long-term upside as the portfolio continues to mature.

🧭 Investment Strategy, Approach & QSBS Updates

Fund II is targeting a four-year deployment period from its initial close in March 2025, with a plan to make approximately 100 investments across ~60 companies.

We focus on the earliest stages of company formation — from Pre-Seed through Series A — where pricing inefficiencies are greatest and long-term ownership can be established early.

From there, we construct broadly diversified portfolios, stay close to founders, and selectively increase exposure as breakout growth and supporting data emerge.

Recent data continues to reinforce our portfolio construction approach:

• Early pricing discipline: Our entry valuations remain below market averages

• Broad diversification: Designed to capture outliers while managing early-stage risk

• Access advantage: A growing founder and LP network continues to improve both deal quality and volume

• After simulating 20,000 venture fund outcomes, a Carta study found that larger portfolios significantly improve the probability of strong returns: funds with ~100 investments are far more likely to achieve top decile multiples of 3-4x than those with only ~20.

👉 You can review our full investment strategy here.

QSBS & After-Tax Considerations

Importantly, recent regulatory changes further enhance the after-tax profile of early-stage investing.

In July 2025, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) significantly expanded the benefits of Qualified Small Business Stock (QSBS)—including:

• Higher exclusion caps

• Tiered holding periods

• Expanded eligibility for later-stage QSBS-qualifying companies

👉 Read more on recent QSBS updates here.

Taken together, disciplined early entry, diversified portfolio construction, and improved QSBS treatment make the current vintage particularly attractive for long-term early-stage deployment.

Closing

Our strategy remains consistent: invest early, diversify broadly, support founders deeply, and compound access over time.

We continue to see a strong pipeline of opportunities and remain active on follow-on and selective secondary investments. If you come across exceptional founders in our focus areas, I’m always grateful for introductions.

Thank you for your continued trust and support.

Sincerely,

Ben Zises

SuperAngel.Fund

ben@superangel.vc

P.S. You can access prior quarterly updates here.

📚 Recent Commentary (Optional Reading)

Throughout the quarter, I shared short posts expanding on market trends, early-stage investing, and portfolio construction. For those interested, a curated selection is linked below:

Market & Investing

• Consumer M&A is back

• Access and diversification wins

• The one question that actually predicts startup success

• Investing takes practice

• Two types of bets

• What hurts most in VC

Portfolio & Strategy

• PropTech trends worth paying attention to

• My deal flow strategy isn’t luck — it’s designed

• Our hybrid model

• Protecting founder time

• How to energize founders and win deals

Founder & Fund Community

• Advice on how to pitch a VC

• You only get one chance to make a first impression

• Pitching never stops

• Supporting the international founder community

Media & Milestones

• Appreciation for AngelList

• Featured in Entrepreneur Magazine

• Reaching 20k followers on LinkedIn

• Podcast with Slice Fund

• Podcast with StartupCPG

Why am I receiving this email?

You are receiving this email because you are either a friend, co-investor, associate, or connection of Ben Zises or SuperAngel, who at one point expressed interest in receiving updates and other correspondence from me. If you received this email in error please accept my apologies and feel free to unsubscribe at the link below.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage venture capital fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech & Future of Work. Click here to learn more about SuperAngel.Fund II.

In our conversation, we dive into how I approach early-stage investing — what I look for in founders, how I evaluate pitch decks and other business fundamentals — and my unique investment strategy: a hybrid model that combines the speed and agility of an angel with the discipline and scale of a professional fund.

Part of my strategy is to also “make a lot of noise” to keep my name (and my fund) in front of as many founders as possible. The wider I cast the net, the more opportunities I get to see — and you can’t invest in a deal you never saw. Conversations like this help ensure the right founders know where to find me.

🎧 Listen on: Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or watch on YouTube below

📍 Upcoming Event: Founders & Funders — NYC, December 11, 2025

I’ll be at Founders & Funders, hosted by Startup CPG in New York City on December 11th, connecting with hundreds of CPG founders and fellow investors across the industry. If you’re building a CPG brand and want to meet active investors, this is an event you won’t want to miss. Click here to apply for a ticket.

⏰ Key Moments From The Episode

• 0:00 – Intro & welcome

• 1:00 – My path from entrepreneur to angel investor

• 3:45 – Launching SuperAngel Fund & the “help-first” strategy

• 6:40 – How to spot founders worth backing early

• 9:25 – What sets SuperAngel apart from traditional venture funds

• 12:10 – Structuring check sizes & doubling down on winners

• 15:30 – Lessons from a decade of angel investing

• 17:15 – How to create a pitch deck that stands out

• 20:45 – Why investor updates are a make-or-break habit

• 23:30 – Advice for founders raising early-stage capital

• 27:10 – The importance of financial discipline and capital efficiency

• 33:40 – What I look for in exceptional founders

• 38:30 – Market trends: supplements, health & wellness

• 43:00 – Clarity and conciseness in your pitch

• 49:00 – Final takeaways

About SuperAngel.Fund

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech & Future of Work 😇. We focus on broad diversification across sectors where we hold a clear edge—investing early, staying close to founders, and doubling down when we see breakout growth and positive data emerge. Learn more about Fund II, read our latest quarterly update, or schedule a call to learn more.

About Startup CPG

Startup CPG is the largest community for emerging brands: 30,000+ Slack members, the #1 podcast in CPG, 100+ events per year, and award-winning resources to help brands grow. Join for free.

Why am I receiving this email?

You are receiving this email because you are part of the SuperAngel network — a friend, founder, LP, or co-investor. If you prefer not to receive future posts, you can unsubscribe below.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech & Future of Work. Fund II is now backed by the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds. Their strategy leverages proprietary data, predictive modeling and quantitative analysis across 25,000+ funds and 13,000 startups on the AngelList platform. Based on their core performance metric—“markups over baseline,” used as a predictor of future success—we were ranked in the top 1% of active managers as of April 1, 2025. Learn more about Fund II.

Dear Friends,

I’m excited to share SuperAngel.Fund’s Q3 2025 update, covering Fund I, our 2021-2024 Rolling Fund, and the newly launched Fund II.

Prefer to listen to this as a podcast? Click the play button below 🎙️

📊 Fund I - Performance Summary (2021— 2024)

• $10.2m deployed across 201 investments into 130 companies

• Estimated current value: $15.9m

• 15.35% IRR | 1.56x gross multiple on invested capital

• 165 out of 201 investments (82%) are still active and/or have been marked up

• Fund I is closed and fully deployed

• Top 10% among all 2021 vintage funds (according to AngelList’s Fund Benchmark Data as of H1 2025)

Click here to view a detailed performance summary

📊 Fund II - Performance Summary (2025 — XX)

So far, we have deployed $1.125m across 24 investments into 22 companies, with a median check size of $50k at a $15m post-money valuation.

Our portfolio spans Consumer (12), Commerce Tech (8), and PropTech/Future of Work (4). As time passes, we will report more detailed performance metrics.

Summary of investments:

• 📱 Freckle: The first phone kids love and parents trust [Consumer]

• 📺 Upscale AI: TV marketing platform for brands [Commerce Tech]

• ✍️ Cosign: Helping landlords convert more renters [PropTech]

• ✨ Harmony: AI-powered workflow automation [Future of Work]

• 🍓 Feel Goods: All-natural supplements built for Gen Z [Consumer]

• 💦 Rorra: A modern water filtration company [Consumer]

• 🥣 Man Cereal: Creatine-infused, high-protein cereal for men [Consumer]

• 📊 Marathon Data: Brand measurement & marketing platform [Commerce Tech]

• 🛒 Hetal: Retail audit, analytics & execution platform [Commerce Tech]

• 🪴 Arber: Modern lawn, garden, & plant care brand [Consumer]

• 🛡️ Patrol: Security & compliance for eCommerce [Commerce Tech]

• 🤐 Steath: Agentic workforce planning & optimization [Future of Work]

• ⚡ Orka: The energy drink that tastes like water [Consumer]

• 💰 RetailPath: Retail chargebacks on autopilot [Commerce Tech]

• 👶 Freestyle: Babycare brand designed for the next gen [Consumer]

• 💼 Storetasker: Leading marketplace for eCommerce experts [Commerce Tech]

• 📦 Two Boxes: Returns processing solutions [Commerce Tech]

• 💻 Candidate.fyi: The candidate experience platform [Future of Work]

• ✨ Overjoy: AI-powered wholesale growth platform [Commerce Tech]

• 🧻 Fox Fold: Sustainable tissue solutions for hotels [Consumer / PropTech]

• 🍝 Ripi: A premium frozen pasta brand [Consumer]

• 🍑 Create: The first modern creatine brand [Consumer]

• 🍔 BiteSight: TikTok meets DoorDash [Consumer]

• 🏘️ Doorvest: Buy, manage & sell investment homes online [PropTech]

📝 Fund II - LP Terms

• Minimum Commitment: $100k - $250k+ with a few limited slots reserved for lower commitments

• Capital Call Schedule: 10% per quarter over 10 quarters

• Fund Size: $15m initial target

• Fees: 2% per year management fee, 20% carry

• Fund Admin: AngelList (Legal, tax/accounting, banking, compliance, etc.)

I want to highlight two other important updates below: (i) new data that reinforces our portfolio construction strategy, and (ii) recent tax law changes that further enhance the advantages of investing in startups.

🏗️ Portfolio Construction & Success Benchmarks

Our investment strategy centers on broad diversification across a large number of early-stage companies. We invest as early as possible, stay close to founders, and proactively double down when we see breakout growth. Like public market investors building a position over time, we increase exposure as positive data emerges.

The difference in private markets is that we’re often among the first—and sometimes the only—ones to see these signals. This allows us to follow on at valuations close to, or even the same as, our initial checks, capturing a favorable risk-reward dynamic that traditional VCs—who typically write fewer, larger checks—rarely achieve. And because the majority of pre-seed financings today are completed through SAFEs—enabling frequent transactions at virtually no cost—our speed and flexibility give us a structural edge.

This advantage is reinforced by a recent analysis from Peter Walker (Head of Insights at Carta) based on data from Dan Gray (Equidam). After simulating 20,000 venture fund outcomes, the study found that larger portfolios significantly improve the probability of strong returns: funds with ~100 investments are far more likely to achieve top decile multiples of 3-4x than those with only ~20. In other words, diversification meaningfully tilts the odds in our favor.

Top-quartile venture funds (75th percentile and above) typically deliver 2–3x returns (15–20% IRR) over a 10-year horizon, while top-decile performers (90th percentile and above) reach 3–4x multiples (25%+ IRR). Our goal across all funds is to outperform these benchmarks by pairing broad diversification with disciplined follow-on investing. With Fund II, we are targeting ~100 investments across ~65 companies—an approach designed to maximize exposure to breakout companies and deliver above-average returns.

So far, the results are encouraging. Earlier this year, we received an investment in Fund II from the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds whose backers include Sequoia Capital, Squarepoint (a $100B+ quant manager), and Naval Ravikant. Their model applies proprietary data and predictive analytics across 25,000+ funds and 13,000 startups to identify top-performing managers. Based on their core metric—markups over baseline, a leading predictor of future success—SuperAngel.Fund ranked in the top 1% of hundreds of active GPs on the platform. As their commitment letter stated: “Our data strongly suggests that Ben’s next fund has an above average chance of being an above average venture fund.” [Read their commitment letter here].

⚖️ Regulatory Updates: QSBS

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), signed into law on July 4, 2025, greatly enhanced the tax benefits of Qualified Small Business Stock (QSBS)—the most significant update since 2016. These changes directly improve after-tax outcomes for LPs in venture funds like ours.

Originally introduced in 1993, QSBS was designed to encourage investment in early-stage U.S. companies by offering capital gains exclusions to investors who held equity for at least five years. Over time, the benefit expanded to a 100% exclusion (for investments after 2010), with a per-issuer, per-taxpayer gain limit of $10M (or 10x basis, whichever is higher).

The new law makes three major improvements:

• Tiered holding periods: 3 years = 50% exclusion; 4 years = 75%; 5+ years = 100%

• Higher gain exclusion cap: now $15M (or 10x basis)*

• Expanded issuer asset limit: raised to $75M*

These updates expand the universe of qualifying companies—now covering not only most Pre-Seed/Seed but also many Series A-stage or later businesses. For SuperAngel.Fund, this expands our opportunity set while enhancing the value of existing investments. Since LPs are pass-through beneficiaries, each U.S. taxpayer can now exclude up to $15M of capital gains per issuer in the portfolio.

QSBS Treatment: Before vs. After OBBBA

Important note: investments made before July 4, 2025 remain under prior QSBS rules. As always, please consult your tax advisor for specifics. For a deeper dive, I recommend this blog post.

⌛ Fund II - Deployment Period & Strategy

The fund is targeting a four-year deployment period. We plan to make approximately 100 investments across 60 companies, focusing on the very earliest stages–from Pre-Seed through Series A.

Our investment strategy is centered on the sectors we know best–where we have a clear competitive edge in sourcing, evaluating, and supporting high-potential opportunities. These consist of the following:

• Consumer: This includes brands, CPG, eCommerce SaaS, consumer tech, and commerce enablement companies. It also includes marketplaces and other businesses that rely on consumer spend or engagement.

• PropTech: This includes all types of software, technology or digital platforms that support, overlap or connect to the real estate industry.

• Future of Work: This includes technology companies that are building tools to support the modern workforce and evolving landscape around how people work, where people work, and what they work on.

🧭 Our Approach

Our strategy is grounded in disciplined, early-stage diversification. Rather than chasing “hot” categories or rushing to deploy capital, we invest with patience and consistency—as early as possible, across sectors where we hold a clear edge, and with a long-term view.

This approach gives LPs exposure across time, markets, and cycles—maximizing upside while mitigating inevitable losses from early-stage risk. Our edge comes from founder-first support: leveraging our network to drive capital, customers, and talent; championing portfolio companies with unmatched loyalty; and earning a reputation as the most helpful investor at the table.

By combining early access, broad diversification, and founder advocacy, we increase both the quality and volume of opportunities we see—and ensure we can double down when conviction is highest. This strategy has been consistent since Fund I and remains central to delivering strong long-term results. We continue to see a strong pipeline of opportunities and actively monitor follow-on and secondary investments into breakout companies. If you come across exceptional founders raising capital in our focus areas, I’d be grateful for any introductions or referrals.

Thank you for your continued support and confidence.

Sincerely,

Ben Zises

SuperAngel.Fund

ben@superangel.vc

P.S. You can access prior quarterly updates at the link here.

Why am I receiving this email?

You are receiving this email because you are either a friend, co-investor, associate, or connection of Ben Zises or SuperAngel, who at one point expressed interest in receiving updates and other correspondence from me. If you received this email in error please accept my apologies and feel free to unsubscribe at the link below.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech & Future of Work. Click here to learn more about SuperAngel.Fund II.

Dear Friends,

I’m excited to share the Q2 2025 update for SuperAngel.Fund II.

While we initially opened the new fund to our existing LPs back in January, we announced it more broadly here in May. Raising a fund like ours typically takes 18-24 months—but I’m pleased to report we’re already halfway to our initial target, with more than $7m+ committed from 60+ LPs and growing weekly.

Click here to learn more / apply to invest in SuperAngel.Fund II 🚀

As with Fund I, I expect we’ll have over 100 LPs by the time we reach our final close. Due to regulatory limits on the number of investors allowed, capacity is filling quickly. If you know someone who may be interested, feel free to share the fund memo or connect us directly: ben@superangel.vc. I’ll continue to prioritize introductions from within our trusted network.

As previously reported, we’re also proud to have secured an $800k commitment from Strawberry Tree Management, an institutional LP and investment advisor to the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds. Their strategy uses proprietary data, predictive modeling and quantitative analysis across 25,000 funds and 13,000 startups on AngelList. Based on their core performance metric—“markups over baseline,” a predictor of future investment success—we were ranked in the top 1% of active managers as of April 1, 2025.

The Fund-of-Funds is also backed by Sequoia Capital, Squarepoint (a $100B+ quantitative asset manager), Naval Ravikant, and others.

Here’s an excerpt from their signed commitment letter 📝:

"We are excited to add Ben Zises’s Fund II, a series of SuperAngel.vc, LP to the portfolio of our Systematic Fund-of-Funds. Ben has one of the highest scores (out of hundreds of active GPs on the AngelList platform) by our preferred predictor for future investment success…We estimate Ben’s markups over baseline score to be better than the 99th percentile of the hundreds of GPs on the AngelList platform…Our data strongly suggests that Ben’s next fund has an above average chance of being an above average venture fund."

— Abraham Othman PhD, Chief Investment Officer at Strawberry Tree Management Company LLC

SuperAngel.Fund II - Investments Summary

To date, Fund II has made 12 investments, with a median check size of $50k and post-money entry valuation of $12m. These investments were spread across Consumer (5), Commerce Tech (4), and PropTech/Future of Work (3).

• 📱 Freckle: The first phone kids love and parents trust

• 📺 Upscale AI: TV marketing platform for brands

• ✍️ Cosign: Helping landlords convert more renters

• ✨ Harmony: AI-powered workflow automation

• 🍓 Feel Goods: All-natural supplements built for Gen Z

• 💦 Rorra: A modern water filtration company

• 🥣 Man Cereal: Creatine-infused, high-protein cereal for men

• 📊 Marathon Data: AI marketing automation & brand measurement

• 🛒 Hetal: Retail audit, analytics & execution platform

• 🪴 Arber: Modern lawn, garden, & plant care brand

• 🛡️ Patrol: Security & compliance for eCommerce

• 🤐 Stealth: Agentic workforce planning & optimization

We’ve also had the opportunity to co-invest alongside some of the world's leading venture capital firms, including:

776 Ventures, a16z, Adapt Ventures, Air Venture Partners, Barrel Ventures, Breakpoint Capital, Brickyard VC, Cade Ventures, Constellation Capital, Creator Ventures, Eniac, Founder Collective, Ganas VC, Geek Ventures, Groove Capital, GTM Fund, Hawke Ventures, Hustle Fund, Ignite Ventures, Interface Capital, Ludlow Ventures, Mark Cuban, Marketplace Capital, M12 (Microsoft's Venture Fund), MXV, Natureza, NextView Ventures, Nomad Ventures, NVP Capital, Ollin Ventures, OpenSky Ventures, Pari Passu Venture Partners, Precursor Ventures, Recursive Ventures, Red Bike Capital, Red Swan Ventures, Ridge Ventures, SBXI, Seaside Ventures, Spacestation Investments, TopazProp Ventures, Unpopular Ventures, Yonder VC & more.

And in several cases, we were the ones to introduce these firms to our portfolio companies.

💡 SuperAngel.Fund II - Investment Terms

• Minimum Commitment: $100k - $250k+ with limited space reserved for smaller checks

• Capital Call Schedule: 10% per quarter, new LPs are required to “catch up” by contributing the percentage called to date

• Fund Size: $15m initial target

• Fees: 2% annual management fee, 20% carry

• Fund Administration: AngelList (handles Legal, tax, banking, compliance, accounting, etc.)

🚀 SuperAngel.Fund II - Deployment Period & Strategy

The fund is targeting a four-year deployment period, with a one-year extension option, beginning from the initial close on March 17, 2025. We plan to make approximately 100 investments across 60 companies, focusing on the very earliest stages–from Pre-Seed through Series A.

Our investment strategy centers on sectors where we hold a clear competitive edge in sourcing, evaluating, and supporting high-potential companies. These focus areas include:

• Consumer: Brands, CPG, eCommerce SaaS, consumer tech, and commerce enablement companies, including marketplaces and businesses driven by consumer spend or engagement.

• PropTech: Software, technology or digital platforms that support, overlap or connect to the real estate industry.

• Future of Work: Technology companies building tools to support the evolving workforce—how, where and what people work on.

You can read more about our investment strategy on our website. I’ve also shared two recent LinkedIn posts highlighting our differentiated approach and the innovations in venture capital that enable us to execute it effectively.

📊 SuperAngel.Fund I & All-Time Performance Summary

Fund I (2021-2024):

• $10.2m deployed across 201 investments into 130 companies

• Estimated current value: $14.7m

• 13.8% IRR | 1.4x gross multiple on invested capital

• 171 out of 201 investments (85%) are still active and/or have been marked up

• Fund I is closed and fully deployed

Click here to view a more detailed performance summary

All-Time Portfolio (2014-2025):

• $21.8m deployed across 293 investments into 156 companies

• Estimated current value: $34.6m

• 15.3% IRR | 1.6x gross multiple on invested capital

• 245 out of 293 investments (84%) are still active and/or have been marked up

Click here to view a more detailed performance summary

🧭 Our Approach

A core principle of our strategy–and of successful investing more broadly–is diversification. While many funds rush to deploy capital or chase the latest “hot” category, we’ve taken a more disciplined, thoughtful, and consistent approach. Since launching Fund I in 2021, we’ve been intentionally conservative with our investable capital. This patience has allowed us to adapt to shifting market conditions and capitalize on opportunities over time.

As a result, our LPs benefit from diversification across time, sectors, and market cycles—broadening exposure to more companies and founders. In my view, that’s a key ingredient to maximizing returns over the long term.

I believe there are exceptional entrepreneurs everywhere, building world-class companies. I spend much of my time trying to find them– and to buy a ticket on their rocket ship. I remain deeply confident in our strategy and in its ability to deliver strong results.

To rearticulate our approach:

1. Invest as close to the first check as possible—creating a unique personal bond that unlocks a strategic information advantage over time

2. Focus on sectors where we have an edge—through information, experience, insight, access or network

3. Leverage our network—to bring in strategic capital, resources, sales, operational support and talent

4. Champion our founders—to drive visibility, customer acquisition, and business development

5. Provide unmatched founder empathy and and loyalty—with the goal of being their favorite, most helpful investor

These attributes give us a strategic informational advantage, which we aim to capitalize on by securing follow-on access in our highest-conviction companies. They also lead to both higher-quality and higher-volume deal flow—arguably the most critical factor in long-term venture success.

We also believe that the earlier the stage, the more important diversification becomes (click here for recent data to support this). Since we invest very early, our strategy helps mitigate the inevitable zeros while maximizing upside from breakout winners.

The fund has a strong pipeline of new opportunities and will continue to monitor follow-on and secondary investments into portfolio companies showing outsized growth and traction.

If you know exceptional founders raising capital in any of our core focus areas, I’d be be grateful for any introductions or referrals.

Thank you for your ongoing support and confidence.

Sincerely,

Ben Zises

Founder & GP, SuperAngel.Fund

ben@superangel.vc

P.S. You can access prior quarterly updates at the link here.

Why am I receiving this email?

You are receiving this email because you are either a friend, co-investor, associate, or connection of Ben Zises or SuperAngel, who at one point expressed interest in receiving updates and other correspondence from me. If you received this email in error please accept my apologies and feel free to unsubscribe at the link below.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech & Future of Work. Click here to learn more about SuperAngel.Fund II.

Dear Friends,

After investing over $20 million into 100+ companies, we’ve been fortunate to build a highly regarded brand, strong network, and a growing reputation in the early-stage investing community.

And while it is still early in the lifecycle of our portfolio, I have never felt more excited about the performance of our investments and the differentiated strategy we’re executing.

Now, I am excited to publicly announce that we’ve opened SuperAngel.Fund II—our first traditional fund vehicle to capitalize on our strong market position. As part of this effort, we’ve also launched our new website: SuperAngel.vc 🚀

Fund II already has over $6 million committed and we’ve made our first few investments—stay tuned to our quarterly updates to learn more 👀.

I am also proud to share that Fund II is backed by Strawberry Tree Management Company LLC, an institutional LP and investment advisor to the AngelList Systematic Fund-of-Funds. Their strategy leverages proprietary data, predictive modeling and quantitative analysis across 25,000 funds and 13,000 startups on AngelList. Based on their core performance metric—used as a predictor of future investment success—we are ranked in the top 1% of active managers as of April 1, 2025.

Here’s an excerpt from their signed commitment letter 📝:

"We are excited to add Ben Zises’s Fund II, a series of SuperAngel.vc, LP to the portfolio of our Systematic Fund-of-Funds. Ben has one of the highest scores (out of hundreds of active GPs on the AngelList platform) by our preferred predictor for future investment success…We estimate Ben’s markups over baseline score to be better than the 99th percentile of the hundreds of GPs on the AngelList platform.…Our data strongly suggests that Ben’s next fund has an above average chance of being an above average venture fund.”

— Abraham Othman PhD, Chief Investment Officer at Strawberry Tree Management Company LLC

Notably, this Fund-of-Funds is also backed by Sequoia Capital, Squarepoint (one of the world's largest quantitative asset managers), Naval Ravikant and others.

When I made my first angel investment in 2014 (read How I got here), I never imagined that 11 years later we’d have a fund backed by some of the best in the business.

👉 Click here to apply to invest in SuperAngel.Fund II

Investment Terms Summary 💡

• Target minimum: $100k - $250k, with limited space reserved for smaller checks*

• Capital call schedule: 10% of the commitment due upon signing with 10% called each subsequent quarter over a ~2 year period

• Target fund size: $15m - $25m range

*Due to regulatory constraints the fund has a limited number of slots. Space is filling quickly so we encourage early commitments. Thank you to those who have already committed to Fund II.

Sincerely,

Ben Zises

SuperAngel.Fund

From our Blog…

Why am I receiving this email?

You are receiving this email because you are either a friend, co-investor, associate, or connection of Ben Zises or SuperAngel, who at one point expressed interest in receiving updates and other correspondence from me. If you received this email in error please accept my apologies and feel free to unsubscribe at the link below.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech & Future of Work. Click here to learn more about SuperAngel.Fund II.

Dear Friends,

I am pleased to share the Q1 2025 update for SuperAngel.Fund.

As mentioned in our last update, Fund I is now fully deployed. For those keeping track, Fund I consists of 14 quarterly vehicles structured as a rolling fund. Ours started in Q1 2021 and ended Q2 2024. LPs who participated had exposure to all investments made throughout the quarters in which they subscribed to, or which they gained exposure to as a result of rollover capital. You can view a list of Fund I companies by selecting the ‘Fund I’ filter on the portfolio section of our new website (H/T BX Studio!)

Stay tuned for details on Fund II next week 👀

Fund I Performance Summary

Fund I started in January 2021 and deployed $10.2m across 201 investments into 130 companies. I estimate the current value to be $14.36m which represents a 14.11% IRR and 1.41x gross multiple on invested capital. Of note, 171 out of 201 investments (85%) are still active and/or have been marked up.

Click here to view a more detailed performance summary 📊

As you probably know, it is often the unsuccessful companies that generally present themselves in the early years of a fund’s life, with the winners coming towards the end. And while it is still rather early in the life of Fund I, I feel confident that we will have a number of winners over time. Upon the receipt of distributions from liquidity events such as M&A, tender offers, secondary sales, IPOs, etc., capital will be returned to LPs.

Fund I Highlights & Strategy

You can read more about our investment strategy on our website. And, I recently published two LinkedIn posts which also describe our differentiated strategy and the innovations in VC that have allowed us to execute it.

Here are a few examples:

• Create: The first modern creatine brand

  • SuperAngel.Fund was one of the earliest investors in Create, a modern creatine brand, after the founder, Dan McCormick, reached out to me directly in June 2022 (six months before launch). Creatine has become one of the fastest growing products in the Vitamin, Minerals and Supplements (VMS) category and Create is well on its way to becoming the leading brand in the space. Click here to see a recent clip from the Joe Rogan Podcast where he talks about his creatine usage and gives an unpaid promotion of the brand. Fund I invested in Create several times over an 18-month period as the business started to show breakout performance and growth metrics. Most recently, the company announced their $5m Series A round led by Unilever Ventures.

• Motion: Creative analytics platform that enables brands to make more successful ads

  • Fund I first invested in Motion in 2022. Similar to what happened with Create, Reza Khadjavi, the founder, also reached out to me directly after noticing that I was an investor in several of his customers. Motion's platform helps brands determine which of their creative assets perform best across each of their respective marketing channels, enabling more data-centric decision making across the organization. After watching Reza and his team execute and grow the business over the months that followed our initial investment, we followed on with another investment in their Seed round. The business has grown dramatically from the early days and most recently announced their $30m Series B round led by Innovia, one of Canada’s largest venture capital firms.

Other Updates Across the Portfolio

Below is a selection of other public updates across the Fund I portfolio.

Consumer

• Arber: Lawn, garden & plant care brand (Launched new Ready To Spray Collection)

• Bandit: Community driven running brand (Opened new LA store)

• Biom: The world’s first refillable, biodegradable wipe system (Launched in Target)

• Branch: Office furniture that works (Launched new Ergonomic Chair Pro)

• Brightland: Wholesome olive oils, vinegars & honey (Launched MacKenzie-Childs holiday collaboration)

• Cadence: Next generation travel products (Launched second major product line, The Parcel, as an innovative take on the toiletry bag)

• Caraway: Cookware without the chemicals (Named One of America’s Moved Loved Brands by Newsweek)

• Cleancult: All-natural household cleaning products (Expanded on their recent Walmart launch with other major mass retail launches coming later this year)

• Create: The first modern creatine brand (Raised $5m Series A from Unilever Ventures)

• EIGHT Brewing Co.: Light beer, made right (Troy Aikman led new funding round)

• Kanpai Foods: The next great candy brand (Expanded retail presence with Target launch)

• Kimai: Fine jewelry that doesn’t cost the earth (Opened new stores in London & LA)

• Lalo: A modern baby & toddler brand built for today’s families (Launched large assortment of products in Target with premier end cap displays)

• Otis: Accessible & affordable care for pets and owners (Stay tuned for updates 👀)

• Rorra: Tap into clean water (Launched their first product, the Countertop System, to tackle the tap water crisis in America)

• Sylvie: Marketplace for vintage & antique furnishings (Partnered with Bridgerton star Phoebe Dynevor to launch first celebrity collection)

• Windmill: Smart ‘air care’ products & technology (Expanded into new category with Air Purifier)

eCommerce SaaS / Consumer Tech

• Accelpay: Powering eCommerce for Alcohol brands (Expanded internationally across UK, European Union)

• Adgile: Tech-enabled out-of-home media company (Achieved record sales in 2024 and launched case studies with new advertising client partners)

• Archive: AI-first influencer marketing platform (Launched AI-powered campaign dashboards)

• Caspian: Trade advisory & tariff optimization platform (Raised Seed round led by Primary VC)

• Crstl: B2B commerce network powered by AI (Raised Series A led by Mosaic, Cohen Circle, & Shopify Ventures)

• Disco: AI-powered retail media network for brands (Reached $20m run rate and achieved 340% YoY growth in 2024)

• Grocers List: Growth platform for recipe creators (Announced Pre-Seed round led by Founder Collective and Impellent VC)

• Highbeam: Finance platform for eCommerce businesses (Launched the first AI finance agent for consumer brands)

• Intelligems: Profit optimization platform (Raised $9m Series A led by Stage 2 Capital)

• Minoan: Furnishing and monetization platform for short-term rental hosts (Launched new marketing website, onboarding experience, Shopify App and more)

• Motion: Creative analytics platform (Raised $30m Series B led by Innovia)

• Orita: AI / ML marketing optimization for brands (Launched their second product for direct mail in partnership with PostPilot, another Fund I portfolio company)

• PostPilot: Direct mail platform for eCommerce brands (Raised Series A led by Summit Partners and Klaviyo founders)

• Settle: Financial operating system for brands (Launched in the Shopify App Store)

• Siena: AI customer service platform for brands (Launched Siena Academy, first AI certification for CX leaders)

• Superfiliate: All-in-one influencer, affiliate, and creator platform (Launched Automations to enable brands to automate their entire influencer management program and processes)

• Two Boxes: eCommerce returns processing platform (Raised $5.4m funding round led by Peterson Ventures)

• With Coverage: All-in-one risk management platform for brands (Stay tuned for updates 👀)

PropTech

• Cosign: A better rental guarantor platform (Stay tuned for updates 👀)

• Flex Storage: Digital solutions for physical storage & moving (Expanded from Florida into Texas, Georgia, Tennessee, Arizona, North Carolina)

• Rove: Marketplace and property management for luxury rentals (Stay tuned for updates 👀)

• Olive: AI-powered booking engine for hotels (Announced major partnership with Stayntouch, a leading PMS for independent hotels)

• Minoan: Furnishing and monetization platform for short-term rental hosts (Launched new marketing website, onboarding experience, Shopify App & more)

• It’s electric: EV charging built for cities (Raised $6.5m Seed round led by Failup Ventures & Uber)

Future of Work

• Candidate.fyi: The candidate experience platform (Closed multiple public companies as customers, released multiple new product features including AI-powered scheduling)

• Flex: All-in-one finance platform for SMBs and their owners (Raised $25m Series B round led by Titanium Ventures)

• Home From College: Career home-base built for Gen Z (Raised $5.4m Seed round led by Google Ventures)

• Jolly: Workforce recruiting & retention platform (Raised $16.5m Series A led by former Tesla CFO Zach Kirkhorn)

• Paiv: Field-sales platform built for the trades (Launched new website and rebranded to Paiv)

Thank you for your ongoing support and confidence. I look forward to updating you again soon.

Sincerely,

Ben Zises

SuperAngel.Fund

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech & Future of Work.

Stay tuned for details on Fund II next week 👀

From our Blog…

Why am I receiving this email?

You are receiving this email because you are either a friend, co-investor, associate, or connection of Ben Zises or SuperAngel, who at one point expressed interest in receiving updates and other correspondence from me. If you received this email in error please accept my apologies and feel free to unsubscribe at the link below.

SuperAngel.Fund is an early-stage fund led by Ben Zises that invests in Consumer, PropTech & Future of Work 😇.

This is completely backward.

The value of investor updates isn't in announcing major milestones. The value is in the consistency and transparency.

Even a short, simple update on a regular cadence is extremely valuable—both to your company and your investors.

For founders, these updates force you to assess your business objectively. For investors, they build trust.

Sometimes the most valuable updates are the ones that simply say "we're still working on X, we've encountered Y challenge, and we're trying Z next month."