Dream Ventures Research
Investment Thesis
Dream Ventures is an early-stage venture capital firm founded in 2022 by Richard Blankenship (Founder & CEO, also co-founder of the fintech company Prizeout). The firm's own website (dreamventures.com) is a minimal single-page splash site — "Investing In Extraordinary Dreamers" — with no published thesis, portfolio, or team pages, so this profile is built primarily from third-party aggregators (Tracxn, LinkedIn, Crunchbase, Round Funded, Silicon Valley Investclub) and a firm-authored LinkedIn recap post. In that post, the partners describe their focus directly: "If you're building in national security, AI or Consumer / Entertainment, send us a note," and note the team operates "between Vegas, NYC and London." Since 2022 the firm says it has deployed roughly $100M across 75+ founding teams.
Important disambiguation note: multiple unrelated entities share close variants of this name — a women-founder-focused fund/accelerator at dreamventures.co and a separate accelerator ("Dream Ventures VC," Purchase, NY, founded 2016 by Annie Evans, $2,800/cohort program) that some aggregators (notably startupintros.com's "About" text) conflate with this firm. This research includes only data corroborated against dreamventures.com, Richard Blankenship's own profile, or firm-authored posts.
Sector Focus
A generalist early-stage investor spanning consumer/D2C brands, fintech, gaming and crypto/Web3, AI infrastructure, and — per its stated thesis — national security and defense tech (e.g., Vatn Systems' autonomous underwater vehicles, Valar Atomics' nuclear energy platform).
Stage Focus
Pre-seed through Seed is the core focus, with selective follow-on participation into Series A/B for standout portfolio companies (e.g., continued participation in Valar Atomics through its Series A and $1B Series B).
Check Size
Round Funded lists Richard Blankenship's typical check around $375K. Given the firm leads smaller seed rounds (e.g., a $2M seed in Roomza) and also participates alongside large syndicates in bigger rounds, a working range of roughly $100K–$1M per check is a reasonable estimate, held at low-moderate confidence pending firm-verified figures.
Lead Tendency
Both. Dream Ventures has led/co-led early rounds (e.g., Mezcla's Series A, Roomza's seed) and also participates as one of several investors in larger syndicated rounds (e.g., Valar Atomics' Series B alongside Sequoia Capital, Point72, and others).
Recent Activity
Actively deploying as of September 2026. Most recent tracked investments: Rainmaker (Series B, September 2026), Valar Atomics (Series B, August 2026, part of a $1B round led by Sequoia Capital that valued the nuclear-energy startup at $6B), Coologics (Seed, April 2025), and MonkeyTilt (Series A, November 2024).
Portfolio Highlights
Notable current and past portfolio companies include: micro1 (AI data/training platform, now valued near $500M), Valar Atomics (nuclear energy), Vatn Systems (autonomous underwater vehicles), Splitero (home equity fintech), Compose.ai, Rainmaker (cloud seeding), MonkeyTilt, Coologics, Mezcla (protein snack brand), Cuts Clothing, Prizeout, The Skinny Confidential, Venus et Fleur, Splash Sports, ProSupps USA, Drumroll Snacks, and Roomza. One portfolio company, Ather Digital, was acquired by VersiFi (May 2024).
Team
- Richard Blankenship — Founder & CEO. Also co-founder of Prizeout; based in Las Vegas.
- Pedram Sheraf — Partner
- Jonah Vella — Partner
- Joe Kakaty — Partner
- Eric Wong — Partner
- Oli Harris — Partner
- Aryan Bhatnagar — Partner
- Oak Suwanvichit — Venture Partner
Titles for partners beyond Blankenship are drawn from the firm's own LinkedIn post signature and third-party aggregation (Tracxn); none were independently verified against a firm-hosted team page, since none exists on dreamventures.com.
Decision Process
Likely a partnership model given the multiple named partners active in sourcing and closing deals; not independently confirmed.
Founder Preferences
Consumer, D2C, and brand-builder founders (protein snacks, apparel, flowers, supplements); technical founders in AI infrastructure and defense/energy hard-tech; and operators in gaming/crypto entertainment.
Geographic Focus
Primarily United States, with the firm describing itself as operating "between Vegas, NYC and London." Portfolio companies are concentrated in the US, with at least one in Canada (Rainmaker) and one in Curaçao (MonkeyTilt).