Paige Finn Doherty
San Francisco, California, United States
17K followers
500+ connections
About
Founding Partner of Behind Genius.
Behind Genius focuses on finding and…
Articles by Paige Finn
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3 Key Insights from Giff Constable's "Talking to Humans"
3 Key Insights from Giff Constable's "Talking to Humans"
For SDSU's Lavin Entrepreneurship program, we read a couple books each semester in the product/entrepreneurship space…
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Lessons from Shaun White: Olympian & Entrepreneur
Lessons from Shaun White: Olympian & Entrepreneur
I wanted to share a few lessons that I learned at the Entrepreneur Organization dinner that I attended where Shaun…
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How Informatics is Busting Silos of Health Care and Data Science
How Informatics is Busting Silos of Health Care and Data Science
This past weekend, I had the honor of being one of ten undergraduate students selected from across the country for the…
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Activity
17K followers
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Paige Finn Doherty shared thisOne of the founders we've backed, Dhaval Patel, shows me amazing customer videos on every catch-up call. His company, Lotus, helps folks with limited mobility increase their agency. The beauty of Lotus is its ease of use - a small infrared ring you only need to charge every 60 days or so, and a magnetic light switch cover that snaps on. No wifi, wiring, etc needed. When I first met Dhaval on The Pitch a few years ago, I was wowed by his technical storytelling ability. He is a former Apple engineering manager who sought a solution to his own problem. One of the most crisp pitches I'd ever heard. And then he clicked his Lotus ring and turned on the light in a studio. Magic. I committed in the studio, live, that day (of course, subject to further due diligence, which revealed even more incredible details). Behind Genius was one of the first backers of Lotus, and they've grown from a few prototypes to huge demand from state Medicare programs seeking technology to help our elders stay independent longer. But what really gets me is their customer interviews. I have teared up multiple times hearing customers describe the impact Lotus has had on their independence. Sharing a great one below, hope it brightens your day!
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Paige Finn Doherty reposted thisPaige Finn Doherty reposted this"There's almost an element of performance... a guiding of you as the investor through: here's my background, here's the size of the market and the opportunity, here's the interesting wedge we found... That is a fantastic experience, and it happens when founders have deep clarity about the opportunity and where they stand." On the latest episode of Fun Raising, I got to sit down with Paige Finn Doherty the founding partner at Behind Genius. We spent a lot of time talking about what makes a founder stand out during the fundraising process, especially in the first conversation(s). A couple things stood out: The first is that you have to show up as yourself. The details of your lived experience, and why you're the one to build this, are the part of your pitch nobody can "AI away" (a term we use a few times in this episode). The second is to also come fully prepared. Deep clarity on the market, the opportunity, and the specific wedge you've found. A real view of how you'll pull it off. When a founder can guide an investor through all of that with command, it shows they've done the homework. And that can make all the difference. We also dive into: - How to build a network from scratch when you don't have one - Why obvious AI in your outreach works against you (a best a "beige flag") - How to time a raise so your conversations create real momentum - What to look for when you're lucky enough to pick between offers - And so much more! Thanks for being on, Paige! Full episode in comments 🎧
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Paige Finn Doherty reposted thisPaige Finn Doherty reposted thisCongratulations to Hostie on their $12M Series A announcement today! Hostie is a vertical voice AI company in the restaurant and hospitality space, led by award-winning restaurateur / product designer Randall Hom and expert voice AI engineer Brendan Wood. We met Randall Hom through Andrew Brackin at Gradient around a year ago, and it's been wonderful to build a relationship: supporting the team with marketing strategy & successful investor introductions, and also getting to share delicious meals together! Since we first invested in April 2025, Hostie's product has continued to evolve and delight customers. Hostie has helped operators manage more than 2 million guest conversations and 24 million messages, book over 400,000 covers, and support more than 50,000 private event inquiries. This growth resulted in 10x’d revenue in under a year! The $12 million Series A funding round is led by Obvious Ventures, with participation from Gradient, Scribble Ventures, Burst Capital, and Behind Genius, bringing total funding to $16 million. The round also includes investments from leading restaurant operators Tim Stannard of Bacchus Management Group and Stuart Brioza, Nicole Krasinski, and Elizabeth DePalmer of Atomic Workshop, underscoring Hostie's growing role in modern restaurant operations. We are proud to be participating in their Series A, and to be continuing our partnership. Go team Hostie!!
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Paige Finn Doherty shared thisHad a blast discussing a hot hot hot IPO summer, founder / VC power dynamics, and if seed stage valuations are still underpriced, despite their steep rise, on This Week in Startups with Alex Wilhelm, Tomasz Tunguz, and Michael Downing. Thanks for having me! A spicy one!
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Paige Finn Doherty reposted thisPaige Finn Doherty reposted thisAt Maneva, we are building the operating layer for modern factories. Menlo Times dug into the thesis behind Maneva's $27M Series A: factories stall near 60% Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) because they lack a real-time control layer for the floor, and that's the layer we're building. What stood out in the piece is the framing of physical AI as core manufacturing infrastructure, with Video-to-Action AI (VITA) and AI Line Supervisor (ALIS), our on-floor agents, as the operating layer rather than another dashboard. Grateful to the Menlo Times team for telling the story. 📖 Read it https://buff.ly/7vxjkIF #Manufacturing #SmartFactory #Industry40 #IndustrialAI #ManevaAIManeva Raises $27 Million to Tackle Inefficiencies Across the $46T+ Manufacturing IndustryManeva Raises $27 Million to Tackle Inefficiencies Across the $46T+ Manufacturing Industry
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Paige Finn Doherty shared thisCongrats to Zane Hengsperger and the entire NOX METALS team on their $11.5M seed announcement today! The seed round was led by Hyperion, with participation from Palmer Luckey, Y Combinator, Jared Friedman, RoboStrategy Advisors, Operator Collective 🔆, DTX Ventures, Alumni Ventures, and others. Especially stoked to be collaborating with long time friend and fellow NOX preseed investor Amber Illig. Since launching production only 7 months ago, Nox has shipped metal to hundreds of American factories. Their growth since Behind Genius invested has been meteoric, and they're just getting started. More metal!!!! 🚀🚀 Sharing a fun throwback from YC Demo Day with Zane last September - he brought one of these large aluminum blocks on TBPN and I got to keep my small block...one of my favorite investing mementos so far. Honored to be an investor!
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Paige Finn Doherty reposted thisPaige Finn Doherty reposted thisNox Metals exists so America can build 100x more factories and technologically abundant industrial capacity in the West. We are announcing our $11.5M Seed round led by Hyperion, with participation from Palmer Luckey, Y Combinator, Jared Friedman, RoboStrategy, Operator Collective, DTX, Alumni Ventures, and others. Over the past few decades, America has neglected domestic production. We lost our dominating ability to build in the world of atoms while jobs on the factory floor plummeted. It's time to build for America again. As our grandfathers once did. Since launching production only 7 months ago, we have shipped metal to hundreds of American factories. Countless truckloads to America's industrial base. And we are no where near slowing down. Our metal has gone to space. It has protected our troops. It is in your car and in the machine that scanned your chest. It is all around us. And we can't stop supplying at warp speeds. We will be revitalizing a WW2 era, 30,000 SQFT factory in Detroit this summer where we will have our techno industrialists working hard to further pursue our mission. We will be tripling down on technology, which has allowed us to move this fast for America thus far. More code. More machines. More metal. More production.
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Paige Finn Doherty reposted thisPaige Finn Doherty reposted thisBridgemaxxing w/ Paige Finn Doherty of Behind Genius Ventures — she finds genius founders and bets big on them, bridges can sometimes be a bit harder to find. Ramp's on the financial ops. She's on the big swings.
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Paige Finn Doherty shared thisExcited to share Maneva (our largest investment out of Behind Genius's Fund II) announced their $27M Series A today! U.S. Venture Partners (Matt Garratt) led the new funding round, with participation from Bling Capital, Freestyle Capital, alongside a group of leading angel investors and funds. Today, Maneva serves customers across confectionery, steel, glass, wood, meat processing, food and beverage, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, distribution, automotive, and electronics with Video-to-Action AI that turns existing factory cameras into real-time operational decisions. Congrats to Rae Jeong & the entire Maneva team, so happy I got to host you for a fireside chat at our 2026 Annual Summit & honored to have been part of your journey since your seed round! And thanks so much to Henry Shi for introducing us. Full release here: https://lnkd.in/e9HJmAFw A quote from Rae's fireside chat: " When you're combining the world of bits and atoms and now intelligence, you're able to unlock one of the biggest outcomes that the world has ever seen."
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Paige Finn Doherty liked thisI've had a lot of convos with LPs over the past couple of years questioning venture amid the prolonged liquidity squeeze. Those who know me know I’ve always believed venture deserves a permanent seat in the portfolio, regardless of market cycle, and Miguel Luina, co-head of venture capital at Hamilton Lane ($1T AUA), just unpacked exactly why. Venture and growth now make up roughly 1/3 of all private markets, a portion an institutional investor can no longer ignore. Value creation is now happening long before a stock becomes available in the public markets, and investors who wait are missing out on the opportunity to access the upside of disruption and the companies shaping the future economy. A great episode with David Weisburd on “How I Invest” - check it out below 👇Paige Finn Doherty liked thisAmazon returned ~10x to its Series A investors, and roughly 2,000x to those who bought at the 1997 IPO. The best place to own the last generation of winners was the public market. The next generation is different: most of that return will be captured in private markets, before you can buy the stock. On the latest "How I Invest Podcast", David Weisburd hosts LP Miguel Luina, co-head of Global VC at Hamilton Lane ($1T AUA). They discuss: 🔹 How venture and growth have become impossible to ignore in an institutional LP's portfolio, now making up 1/3 of all private markets 🔹 Why 75% of Q1 venture dollars flowed into fewer than 5 companies, and what that means for selection 🔹Why the SpaceX, OpenAI, and Anthropic IPOs could unlock a new liquidity cycle for venture LPs 🔹Why less than 0.5% of venture's $3.4 trillion NAV trades in secondaries, creating a rare buyer's market Great episode on conviction investing, sourcing and selecting + so much more.👇 https://lnkd.in/gyQcsR2k
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Paige Finn Doherty liked thisPaige Finn Doherty liked thisA16Z American Dynamism presents: Ulysses. Mariana Minerals. Radiant. Coming soon.
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Paige Finn Doherty liked thisPaige Finn Doherty liked thisWe talked to 200 investors when we started Volition Capital. Most of them didn't even say no. They ghosted us. It was 2010 - two years after the financial crisis. Nobody wanted to invest in a new emerging firm. They wanted to cut allocations and stick with names they already knew. We didn't take any of it personally. We understood that we were a new firm, there were real reasons not to invest with us. It's a long-term commitment. It's like a marriage. Why would you take a chance on someone you don't know? So we kept our heads down. And somewhere between investor 200 and 210, someone said yes. That started the ball rolling. We raised our first fund. And our first investment out of that fund was Chewy, which became the leading pet food e-commerce business and a multi-billion-dollar exit. We've been off to the races for 16 years since. We still don't take turndowns personally. There will always be times when it's not the right fit, and that's okay. What we never take for granted is any investor who does say yes - because we remember exactly how hard it was to get that first one.
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Paige Finn Doherty liked thisPaige Finn Doherty liked thisIt's become really sexy to get sucked into tech doomerism, and I really want to be a voice against that in a way that makes us all feel empowered to engage in more nuance together. Was a pleasure talking with Hannah Doyle at The Publish Press this week on the birth of / vision for Charts & Crafts.
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Paige Finn Doherty liked thisPaige Finn Doherty liked thisI guest lectured at Stanford d.school this spring in the Visual Frontiers design course! I shared my career journey, my 10 principles for creating great work, and our creative vision at Reve. Thank you to Professor Patrick Fenton & Lord Crawford for having me!
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Paige Finn Doherty liked thisPaige Finn Doherty liked thisJackie Halterman has been in motorsports for 20+ years. She discovered it with Formula SAE at Texas A&M University. The moment physics class principles and racing converged. Today she oversees the entire software ecosystem at Pratt Miller Motorsports — the tools, the data pipeline, the strategy that turns raw race data into decisions fast enough to win. We made a short film about Jackie and the team behind Pratt Miller Motorsports.
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Paige Finn Doherty liked thisI really enjoyed chatting with Kristen and Brandon about how technology can support great hospitality and help restaurants communicate better with their guests. And next time, we need to get Brandon out to "the city" to continue the convo over a good meal.Paige Finn Doherty liked thisCan AI make guests feel more known, not less? That's the question at the center of the latest episode of The Simmer Podcast. Kristen Hawley and Brandon Barton spoke with Randall Hom, co-founder and CEO of Hostie, an AI-powered restaurant concierge that just raised a $12M Series A. Randall's also a San Francisco restaurateur, giving him a rare view from both sides of the table: running the dining room and building the tech meant to support it. The conversation covers guest preferences, what real engagement means in the age of AI, and "the city"—you'll have to tune in for that part. New episode, out now. https://lnkd.in/es_zKwSp #BiteKiosks #KioskTechnology #RestaurantTech #AI #FutureOfDining
Experience
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Education
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San Diego State University
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Full ride merit scholarship. Started out in ME, switched to CS. Lavin Entrepreneur program
Recognized as a Rising Aztec Alumni 2025 -
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Volunteer Experience
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Venture Capital Investment Competition Coach
San Diego State University
- Present 5 years 5 months
Education
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Mrs. Floto's Assistant
UC San Diego Extension
- 5 months
Education
Taught speaking, critical reading, writing, and everyday discussion in English to study abroad middle schoolers from China, alongside my favorite English teacher (RIP Mrs. Floto)
Honors & Awards
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Forbes Under 30 All Star Alumni
Forbes
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Hall of Fame Inductee
Rancho Bernardo High School
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2025 Rising Aztec
San Diego State University
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Cover of Forbes 30 Under 30: Venture Capital
Forbes
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Forbes Under 30 Scholar
Forbes
An award granted to 1,000 college students nationally, recognizing achievements in leadership, academics, and community service
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2nd Place - Silicon Valley Regional Venture Capital Investment Competition
Venture Capital Investment Competition
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Class of 2020 SDSU Scholarship
San Diego State University
An scholarship given to Aztecs who uphold SDSU's value and are active servant leaders in their communitities
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AP Scholar with Honors
College Board
Awarded to students who complete three or more AP exams with scores of 4 or higher.
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Paul Marchisotto HIP Scholarship
Northrop Grumman
A competitive scholarship awarded to one HIP student nationwide based on factors such as community involvement, academic performance, and future career goals.
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John Jester Memorial Scholarship
San Diego State University
A highly competitive four-year scholarship focused on dedication to community service, involvement, and academic performance.
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Lakshmi Shankar
Thrilled to announce that Together Fund is investing in Sentra, alongside a16z speedrun! You track results in Jira. Decisions in Notion. Conversations in Slack. But the reasoning, the debates, trade-offs, and context behind why you chose A over B, disappears into what we call "Dark Matter." A decision made in March looks insane by July because no one remembers the constraints that made it smart. I lived this firsthand at Twitter scaling from 800 to 8,000 employees, and at Google while launching AI Overviews to billions at planet scale. The problem isn't process. Process is compensation for something deeper: organizational amnesia. An organization’s "Systems of Record" doesn’t solve this, they encode it. They store what happened, never why. That's why we are investing in Sentra. Sentra is the always-on collective memory that eliminates organizational amnesia by maintaining accurate context for all members and agents, functioning as an operational nervous system. It connects to every channel where work happens, meetings, Slack, email, code commits, docs, calendars, and treats them not as artifacts to search, but as living signals to synthesize. The fleeting and the permanent, unified into a memory that understands. The founding team is built for this: - Jae Gwan Park (CEO): Product-first founder, memory systems research at UofT and MIT - Ashwin Gopinath (CSO): Former MIT professor, created "Reflexion" (NeurIPS 2023), agents that learn from mistakes, 2x founder - Andrey Starenky (CTO): Early Vapi engineer, ex-IBM, built to process enterprise-scale data firehose Together is an operator-led fund. We invest in problems we've lived. This is one of them. Many congrats Jae, Ashwin and Andrey, we are so excited to partner with you! Read the full thesis: https://lnkd.in/gixj9cE4 Book a demo: https://www.sentra.app/ #OrganizationalMemory #AI #Sentra #TogetherFund #a16z #ContextGraphs
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