OneSixOne Ventures Research
Investment Thesis
OneSixOne Ventures is a community-first pre-seed venture firm based in Gainesville, Florida, with a strong presence in Miami, Seattle, New York and San Francisco. The firm was built by Justis Mendez and Pablo Casilimas, who met at the University of Florida in 2016 and saw a gap in early-stage capital and startup infrastructure in Florida despite a deep UF engineering talent pool. They began hosting meetups, workshops and roundtables (the first event was in February 2017), grew into the largest startup event series between Orlando and Atlanta by 2020, ran a Zoom-based accelerator during the pandemic that helped 40+ startups raise over $13M, and launched their flagship Fund I in February 2022. The name comes from 1.61, the golden ratio, a symbol of efficient organic growth.
The firm describes itself as a tier-one fund built on true founder support. Fund I focused on AI and cloud infrastructure, deep tech, dual-use technologies, enterprise software, B2B SaaS and government technology. Mendez told Hypepotamus (August 2026) that he looks for people who understand something about the world that others do not, with hungry talent and a high pain tolerance, and that he wants to hear what hardships founders have overcome rather than just a list of exceptional achievements.
Stage Focus and Check Size
OneSixOne invests at pre-seed and seed, often at day one of a company. Private Equity International reports initial checks of roughly $50K to $100K. Tracxn shows seed rounds in the portfolio with an average round size of about $2.2M, so the firm usually participates in rounds led by others rather than setting terms itself, though lead status is not confirmed on any deal we could verify.
Fund Size and Recent Activity
The flagship Fund I is about $5M, backed by notable UF alumni LPs including the Gatorade family and a former Tableau CFO. LinkedIn and Deep Tech Week cite roughly $4M in assets under management and 20 to 22 portfolio companies. The partners say they are eyeing Fund II. Tracxn counts one investment in 2023, two in 2025 and three in 2026 year to date. Recent deals include JoinScholar (Scholar Education, $2M seed, September 2026), Ottosales AI (seed, April 2026, with BackFuture and others), Emobi (seed, January 2026, with Florida Funders, Collaborative Fund, Goodwater and others), Clockout (seed, June 2025, with Cofounders Capital) and Agentuity (seed, January 2025, with Boldstart). Portfolio company Pathpoint Energy was acquired by Spotlight Energy in December 2025.
Portfolio Highlights
The website lists EaseAlert (tactile pre-alert system for first responders), Universe (gamified learning platform), Sunthetics (AI optimization for chemical processes), Airia (live data tracking for IT and security teams), EveryKey (universal smart key) and LeGrande Health (Rx commerce platform for patients), with a 'view all companies' link. Other sources add Rain AI (energy-efficient AI hardware), Emobi (EV charging station software), Clockout (earned wage access), Nerd Apply (college counseling), Agentuity (agent infrastructure), Ottosales AI, JoinScholar and Neurotone AI.
Team and Decision Process
Justis Mendez and Pablo Casilimas are Managing Partners and co-founders. Christopher Kennamer, Victor Moncada and Rajendra Kulkarni are listed as partners, and Ken Morimoto, TJ Villamil and Jordan Baker (venture partner, joined 2026) appear in recent firm activity. Decision making appears to sit with the managing partners in a small partnership, with the wider partner group sourcing deals through the event network.
Events as the Sourcing Engine
Events are the firm's stated superpower. It has hosted 150+ gatherings across 13 cities for over 10,000 founders, operators and investors. Recent examples are the Florida Startup Summit at UF (October 9, 2026, the fourth annual), the Fed AI Leaders Summit in Washington DC with Innodata (October 2026), a Seattle fireside chat with Routable's Omri Mor, and an Oversubscribed GP/LP series in New York (November 2). Warm introductions from this network are the main route to a check.
Founder Preferences and Geography
The firm backs technical, domain-expert founders who show grit and have overcome hardship. It is US-focused: Florida and the Southeast, Miami, Seattle and the Pacific Northwest, New York and San Francisco. Applications are taken through a Google Form on the website, but event-sourced and warm introductions are the common path. Gaps: the team and homepage pages blocked automated reads, so titles beyond the two founders come from Tracxn and LinkedIn, and lead tendency and check size are inferred from third-party data.