Aarthi Ramamurthy, a Silicon Valley technologist and podcaster, founded her venture capital firm, Schema Ventures, on Wednesday with a $20 million fund.
Key Highlights
- Aarthi Ramamurthy launches Schema Ventures, a $20M solo GP fund, backing early-stage 'outsider' founders in infrastructure and developer tools.
- Schema Ventures' initial investments include Cosmic Robotics, Confido Health, and Powerhouse, focusing on industrial automation, healthcare operations, and legal tech.
Ramamurthy stated in LinkedIn and X posts that the fund will invest in early-stage startups founded by "exceptional outsider founders"."I grew up as an outsider. I moved to San Francisco and founded two startups. "My story — figuring it out without a roadmap — is the blueprint for Schema," the post stated.
Schema will concentrate on the early stages of a company in a variety of areas, including industrial software, robots and intelligence for factories, construction and logistics, workflow intelligence, and developer tools.
Ramamurthy, who has previously led product and tech teams at Microsoft, Netflix, and Meta, stated that her fund will support outsiders who build from lived experience rather than "pedigree or proximity".
In 2020, the entrepreneur gained media attention when she co-hosted a Clubhouse show with her husband, Sriram Krishnan, a former Andreessen Horowitz general partner and current White House senior AI policy advisor. 'The Good Time Show' featured organic conversations about startups, venture capitalism, and cryptocurrencies. High-profile guests included Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg.
The show later moved to YouTube and became 'The Aarthi and Sriram Show', which signed a podcasting deal with iHeartMedia and had over a million downloads by early 2023.