The Council Fund in Motion Throughout 2025

From Thesis to Traction: Our Highlights from 2025

2025 has been a big year at The Council! This was the year our thesis moved from conviction to proof. From our new branding to breakout portfolio wins, we’re proud to share our highlights with you. 

• Doubled down on high-slope operators in the new tech mafia as our founder archetype and launched The First Builders Podcast with 21 episodes to date.

• Started deploying from Fund II and invested in 4 companies including Rosarium Health, Quintess AI, Nox Metals, and one healthcare company in stealth mode. These are companies we believe will define their categories.

• Announced GC AI’s (a Fund I portfolio company) accelerated Series B $60M fundraise after they rocketed from $1M to $10.8M+ ARR in less than one year.

• Released our new official Council branding to reflect our evolution from a grassroots angel investing community to an institutional VC firm. Our updated brand reflects our operating principles: 

  • Technical

  • Fast

  • Substantive

  • Trusted

  • Demystifying 

  • Quiet Power

• Hosted our Annual General Meeting (AGM) in November at the Hanwha AI Center in SF! It was a great opportunity to share fund updates with our LPs, founders, and friends. We included three panels with portfolio founders on the hardest problems they're solving.

  • Record-breaking AI Adoption in $1B+ Enterprises with Loamy and Quintess AI

  • Signed ≠ Success: Driving Utilization in a Policy-Heavy World with Rosarium Health and Joyful Health 

  • Scaling Sustainably in the Age of AI with Siena and GC AI

As a reminder, if you are a First Builder building vertical AI for an essential (think: complex, foundational) industry like healthcare, law, or manufacturing, we’d love to hear from you.

Check out our team’s favorite clips from our podcast episodes

Watch Amber’s favorite episode featuring Jack Greco, Co-Founder, COO & CFO of ACV Auctions, on what it really looks like to reach hypergrowth and then make the choice to step away. Jack shares how, after years of working 100+ hour weeks, he left the company with just $40K in savings to prioritize his family - never expecting his equity to be worth anything. Six months later, ACV Auctions went public at a $3.85B valuation.

Watch Rachel’s favorite episode featuring Prashanthi Raman, former head of government affairs at both Cruise and Lyft, on why policy shouldn’t be treated as a blocker in tech. Prashanthi breaks down how, when you’re building in a new category or at the frontier, government affairs can be a powerful catalyst; it opens doors, drives revenue, and accelerates growth.

Discover open roles at our fast-growing performing portfolio companies!

Let us know why you might be the perfect fit and we may be able to get your resume to the top of the pile.

• Flex is the AI-native private bank for owners to manage their personal spend and business revenue in one seamless platform.

  • Recently announced their $60M Series B led by Portage.

  • Open roles include Director of Underwriting, Account Executive, and Software Engineers.

• GC AI is the AI tool for in-house legal counsel.

  • Recently raised their $60M Series B at a $550M valuation and serving 1000+ in-house legal teams across 50 countries and continuing to grow quickly.

  • Open roles include Head of Revenue, Enterprise Sales, and Engineers.

• NOX METALS is building the fastest metals processing factories in North America. 

  • Recently their founder made Forbes 30 Under 30.

  • Open roles include Business Operations Associate. 

• Siena creates empathetic AI CX agents designed for commerce. 

  • Recently launched their Reviews Agent with Okendo and hit 100 billion tokens with OpenAI. 

  • Open roles include Account Executives and Product Managers.

Our exclusive operator network continues to deepen

The Council Angels is an application-based network of First Builders that angel invest together and collaborates with our venture fund.

Sharing Our Operator Network 2025 Highlights

We continued focusing on accepting the best operators into our angel network which powered vetted deal flow on a daily basis, collaborative group diligence calls, and ultimately led to 10 council-backed SPVs. Here are the key end of year stats you should know.

Educational Partnerships on Alternative Investing

Our goal of providing valuable insights on finance, angel/VC investing, and the startup ecosystem led us to form partnerships with Women in Healthtech and the Women on Boards Project in 2025. Together, we delivered educational workshops on alternative investing, with a focus on demystifying angel and LP investing for senior leaders. In 2026, we’re looking to bring this content to select senior leadership organizations. If you’re interested in partnering with us, please reach out to [email protected].

Thank you from The Council Team!

 About Us: The Council Fund is an operator-led venture firm investing in First Builders transforming our most essential industries like manufacturing, legal, and healthcare as part of Software’s Third Act.