The OPTIM Circle


A curated community of founders, investors, and operators investing together in Real-World AI, where software meets the physical world.

We're a tight-knit group of people across Berkeley, Stanford, and the Bay Area who share deal flow, review opportunities together, and make collective bets into the most compelling early-stage companies we see.

Time and attention are our most valuable assets. Optimizing who we spend them with leads to better conversations, outcomes, and opportunities.

Marya Unwala

ALM Ventures

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Ruddick Lawrence

Bee Partners

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Caleb Appleton

Bison Ventures

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Michael Paniccia

Catapult Ventures

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Jonathan Tan

Coreshell

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Francesco Favaro

Crosscourt Ventures

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Pavlo Pikulin

Deus Robotics

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Paulina Szyzdek

E12 Ventures

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Ryan Cunningham

Edgerunner

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Anil Achyuta

Energy Impact Partners

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Saman Farid

Formic

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Ivy Nguyen

GFT Ventures

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Nick Halla

GigaClimate

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Xiaoming Yin

Grit Ventures

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Jennifer Gill Roberts

Grit Ventures

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Benjamin Bolte

K-Scale Labs

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Andrew Hsieh

liminalinsights.com

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Brock Csira

Matter Venture Partners

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Meaghan O'Neill

Matter Venture Partners

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Mike Xia

Anvil Robotics

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Finn O’Kelly

ohmnow.com

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Simon Lancaster

Omni Venture Labs

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Sabrina Paseman

Omni Venture Labs

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Quanting (Daniel) Xie

Origami Robotics

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Eahab Naga

Pura

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Gary Chen

Raise Robotics

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Edi Danalache

Scale Venture Partners

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Johnson James

Skillfully

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Asad Tirmizi

T-robotics

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Michael Raybman

Umami Capital

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Kevin Weekly

TC Circuits

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Sachin Seth

Trousdale Ventures

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Nare Janvelyan

Voyager VC

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Megan Cain

Westly Group

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Jason Kalira

Westly Group

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Ashwin Lalendran

Moxie Ventures

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