Lobby Capital — Investment Thesis & Preferences

01Investment Thesis

Back-to-basics venture capital: fund inspiring entrepreneurs with the audacity to challenge, disrupt, and redefine the technological landscape. Partner-led, hands-on approach leveraging the Lobby network of 2,000+ founders and the August Capital legacy.

Exclusion Criteria

Not explicitly stated; firm appears to avoid pure hardware, deep consumer social, and pre-revenue moonshots without clear enterprise application.

02Investment Team

DH

David Hornik

General Partner

EC

Eric Carlborg

General Partner

BA

Buddy Arnheim

General Partner

CW

Collin Wallace

General Partner

ST

Selina Tobaccowala

Venture Partner

KJ

Kevin Johnson

Venture Partner

HH

Howard Hartenbaum

Venture Partner

CF

Candice Faktor

Venture Partner

AH

Abby Hipps

General Counsel

KP

Kevin Pineda

Director of Portfolio Management

LW

Linda Wong

Director of Finance

03F4 Research Brief

Lobby Capital Research

Investment Thesis

Lobby Capital is an early-stage venture capital firm founded in 2021 that backs inspiring entrepreneurs with the audacity to challenge, disrupt, and redefine the technological landscape. The firm operates with a "back-to-basics" approach to venture capital, placing human capital and deep founder relationships at the center of every investment decision.

Lobby Capital emerged from two interconnected legacies: the August Capital portfolio (where co-founder David Hornik spent 20 years as a General Partner) and the Lobby Conferences, which have hosted over 2,000 entrepreneurs and cultivated a curated community of operators, investors, and founders. All new investments are now made through Lobby Capital while the legacy August Capital portfolio continues to be managed separately. The firm describes its edge as providing not just capital but access to an extensive network of "founders, advisors, technologists, journalists, lenders, lawyers, accountants, consultants, and investors."

Sector Focus

Lobby Capital maintains a diverse but enterprise-oriented portfolio. Primary focus areas include:

Enterprise Software: Vertical SaaS, automation, productivity, and operations tools
AI/ML Infrastructure: Developer tooling, MLOps, AI agents, and enterprise AI platforms
FinTech/InsureTech: Financial services technology, payments, and insurance platforms
Cybersecurity: Identity management, mesh security, and autonomous security execution platforms
Deep Tech: Robotics, computer vision, aerospace and hardware-software fusion

Secondary exposure includes consumer internet, VR gaming, eCommerce marketplaces, and edtech.

Stage Focus

Lobby Capital primarily invests at the Seed and Series A stages. Historically, the vast majority of their investments have been at Series A (approximately 11 of 15+ total investments), with selective seed investments in particularly compelling early-stage opportunities.

Check Size

The fund's check size is not publicly disclosed. Based on portfolio context — including leading $16M Series A rounds (Stack AI, May 2025) and $12M Series A rounds (Mesh Security, January 2026) — typical lead check sizes are estimated to be in the range of $1M–$5M, with follow-on reserves for portfolio companies.

Lead Tendency

Lobby Capital leads rounds when they have high conviction. They led Stack AI's $16M Series A in May 2025 and Mesh Security's $12M Series A in January 2026. They also participate as a co-investor when partnering with other lead investors, as seen with Apera AI's Series A (led by BDC Capital, with Lobby as a participant) in 2025.

Recent Activity

Lobby Capital has been actively deploying capital through 2025 and into 2026:

January 2026: Led Mesh Security's $12M Series A. S Ventures (SentinelOne CVC) and Bright Pixel Capital co-invested. Buddy Arnheim stated: "Mesh's platform is uniquely positioned to help enterprises achieve true cybersecurity mesh architecture in an era of increasing complexity."
July 2025: Participated in Apera AI's Series A, led by BDC Capital. Buddy Arnheim noted that "Apera AI is delivering not just a product, but a new standard for robotic vision in real-world manufacturing."
May 2025: Led Stack AI's $16M Series A for the enterprise AI agents platform. Other investors included Life Extension Ventures, Gradient, Y Combinator, and Epakon Capital.

Portfolio Highlights

Active Companies (16):

Stack AI (stack-ai.com): Enterprise AI agents platform; Series A ($16M, May 2025)
Mesh Cybersecurity (mesh.security): Autonomous cybersecurity mesh platform; Series A ($12M, Jan 2026)
Faros AI (faros.ai): Engineering analytics and DevOps insights platform
Kolena (kolena.io): AI model testing and evaluation
Apera AI (apera.ai): Computer vision for industrial robotics manufacturing; Series A (2025)
Baton AI (getbaton.ai): AI-powered business process automation
Docyt (docyt.com): AI-driven accounting and financial management (FinTech)
ForeVR Games (forevrgames.com): Social VR gaming experiences
Better Trucks (bettertrucks.com): Last-mile logistics technology
Hidden Level (hiddenlevel.com): RF sensing and drone detection for national security
CarbonVoice (carbonvoice.app): Carbon accounting and voice-first sustainability tools
Ownify (ownify.com): FinTech/real estate ownership platform
Remix AI (remix.ai): Consumer AI creative tools
Smart Access (smartaccess.io): Enterprise access management
Sprout Labs (sproutlabs.com): EdTech and learning platform
WaffarX (waffarx.com): eCommerce cashback marketplace (Cairo, Egypt)

Notable Exits:

Vowel: Video meeting platform (acquired)
Vantage Discovery: AI-powered semantic search (acquired)
Procyon: Cloud security (acquired)
Feed: Consumer company (acquired)

Team

Lobby Capital has a team of 12, including 4 General Partners and 4 Venture Partners:

General Partners:

David Hornik — Co-Founder. 25 years in venture capital; 20 years at August Capital. Forbes Midas List honoree. Focuses on FinTech, Enterprise Infrastructure, SaaS, and Marketplaces. Lecturer at Stanford GSB and Harvard Law School; founder of VentureBlog and VentureCast. Education: Stanford (BA), Cambridge (M.Phil), Harvard Law (JD). Email: [email protected].
Eric Carlborg — Co-Founder. Experienced CFO and operator-turned-investor. Focuses on FinTech/InsureTech, Next-Gen Commerce, and SaaS.
Buddy Arnheim — Co-Founder. 25+ years as founder, attorney, and investor. Previously ran Perkins Coie's Emerging Company practice, Orthogonal Ventures, and Hut8 Ventures. Co-founded Titan Aerospace (acquired by Google 2014). Focuses on Deep Tech, FinTech/InsureTech, SaaS, Security, and Marketplaces. Email: [email protected].
Collin Wallace — General Partner. 3x founder; former Head of Innovation at Grubhub (founded Fango, which merged with Grubhub before its IPO). Stanford MBA. Focuses on Future of Work, Sustainability, Productivity, Verticalized SaaS, and DevOps Tools.

Venture Partners:

Selina Tobaccowala — Consumer, Small Business Services, SaaS
Kevin Johnson — Consumer, Marketplaces, Next-Gen Commerce, EdTech
Howard Hartenbaum — Consumer, Marketplaces, Enterprise Software
Candice Faktor — AI, Consumer, Network Effect Platforms, SaaS

Geographic Focus

Primarily US-focused (San Francisco Bay Area, Los Angeles, New York, Seattle), with selective investments in Canada (Apera AI in Vancouver, Smart Access in Edmonton) and international markets (WaffarX in Cairo, Egypt).

Decision Process

Partnership model. Four General Partners make investment decisions, with Venture Partners providing domain expertise and deal flow support. The firm is known for a partner-led, hands-on approach.

Founder Preferences

Lobby Capital backs founders who have the "audacity and courage to challenge, disrupt and redefine the technological landscape." They prefer technical or operator-background founders with deep domain expertise. Co-founder Collin Wallace is himself a 3x founder, and the firm deeply understands the founder journey. David Hornik's extensive Stanford and Harvard Law networks, plus the Lobby Conference community of 2,000+ entrepreneurs, provide strong sourcing from elite networks.

04Selected Portfolio