Ishani Ummat
Madrona Ventures Invests in Vilya to Develop AI-Designed Macrocycle Drugs Using IPD Tools
Madrona announces its investment in Vilya, which uses AI and computational protein design tools from David Baker’s Institute for Protein Design to generate novel macrocycle drugs that aim to combine oral dosing and high bioavailability with large binding surfaces to target diseases like cancer, inflammation, and neurodegeneration.
IA40 Spotlight: Cresta Co-founder and CEO Zayd Enam on Using AI to Empower People to be More Productive
We've all struggled with call center experiences. Madrona's Ishani Ummat talks with Cresta Co-founder and CEO Zayd Enam about the unique angle Cresta takes to leverage AI to drive a better customer experience in real time. The two dive into the important topic of how AI can be used to help empower people to be more productive. we hear the story of why Zayd dropped out of his Ph.D. program to pursue launching his own company based on what he explains as the "schlep blindness" of contact centers. He also discusses the unique way he landed his first customer, which…
Cresta CEO Zayd Enam Discusses AI for Contact-Center Productivity, Leaving Ph.D. and Landing Intuit as First Customer
Ishani Ummat interviews Cresta AI co-founder and CEO Zayd Enam about using AI to boost contact-center worker productivity, covering his decision to leave a Ph.D., Cresta’s modular approach, and landing Intuit as an early customer. The conversation highlights Cresta’s real-time AI-driven productivity suite and practical deployment strategy for modern contact centers.
By Ishani
See all 4Madrona doubles down on MotherDuck in Series A to commercialize DuckDB-based serverless analytics
Madrona announces a follow-on Series A investment in MotherDuck, a team building a serverless, enterprise-focused analytics platform that extends the open-source DuckDB to provide scalable, fast, cost-effective, and collaborative cloud analytics for businesses.
IA40 Spotlight: SeekOut CEO Anoop Gupta and VP of People Jenny Armstrong-Owen on AI-powered talent solutions, developing talent, and maintaining culture
This week on Founded and Funded, we spotlight our next IA40 winner – SeekOut. Investor Ishani Ummat talks to SeekOut Co-founder and CEO Anoop Gupta and VP of People Jenny Armstrong-Owen about their AI-powered intelligence platform, the importance of not only finding and recruiting new hires but also developing and retaining employees within a company, and maintaining SeekOut's own culture while seeing significant growth over the last year.
Investor Announces Funding for Yoodli, an AI App Delivering Real-Time Feedback to Cure Public-Speaking Fear
The author announces their investment in Yoodli, an AI-powered app that gives real-time verbal and nonverbal feedback, progress tracking, peer review, and coach connections to help users overcome fear of public speaking.
