Fund Manager Spotlight: Streamlined Ventures

At Rohati Capital, we back operators and founders who see the future before it arrives. Ullas Naik, founder of Streamlined Ventures, is one of them. We have known Ullas for years and built a strong working relationship across multiple funds.

Streamlined Ventures is a Seed stage investment firm focused on software applications and the infrastructure that powers them, including a deep focus on AI-enabled vertical applications and agents. They lead seed rounds and have seeded almost 200 companies in the 14 years since their inception, including market leaders such as AppLovin, DoorDash, Rappi, Speechify, Rigetti Computing, OpenGov, EasyPost, Forge Global and TubiTV. Streamlined's portfolio companies have generated over $200B of value.

You were the first investor in DoorDash and Rappi (as well as AppLovin). What was it about these models or entrepreneurs that motivated you to make the investment?

Ullas: In each of these companies, we had a prepared mind on the market and trends that the companies were active in. In 2011, we had a strong thesis on on-demand models and the potential to build new market leaders in many categories using this new tech. This thesis led to our investments in DoorDash and Rappi, and subsequently in companies such as Calii, all of which have become significant leaders in their markets.

With regard to AppLovin, we had a thesis on the migration of online advertising into a mobile ecosystem, and AppLovin had built an incredible platform in this category underpinned by deep data science, an area of historical expertise for us. In all of these companies, the founders were compelling with a strong and sophisticated point of view on the market they were targeting as well as its dynamics. That characteristic in founders is extremely compelling to me. The founders also had extraordinary drive, which was apparent even at the early stages.

We are in the midst of a significant liquidity crunch. Cash returns are at a material low versus average forecasts and have been for years. What is going on and how are you reacting to it at Streamlined?

Ullas: The liquidity crunch is very real. There was an expectation earlier this year that we may see the IPO and M&A markets open back up based on optimism for a more business-friendly administration and environment. However, the current confusion over the new tariffs has potentially pushed out the liquidity crunch by at least six months.

We expect to see ebbs and flows in market conditions and, despite these shifts, venture continues to outperform other asset classes. At Streamlined, we feel our foundations are strong as we continue to make bets on business models in emergent areas and on compelling entrepreneurs. We have 30+ companies that are cashflow positive and we are looking at alternative forms of liquidity on some of these positions, such as sales to secondary funds.

While there aren't enough secondary funds to offer a full structural solution to the liquidity problem, we continue to track this phenomenon and expect more secondary funds to emerge to take advantage of the liquidity crunch. We are hopeful that our top performing companies from earlier fund vintages will be able to see IPOs or acquisitions happen in the second half of this year, or at the very least by early 2026.

Tell us your vision for where AGI heads next and the steps we will see before we get there (plus, how long are we talking?).

Ullas: In my mind, AGI is inevitable. It's just a question of when. We anticipate we will see the beginning of AGI some time in the next 5-7 years based on our understanding of the work being conducted at market-leading AI companies including OpenAI, Google and xAI. We will see highly effective tools emerge on the path to AGI that will improve human productivity and quality of life. That said, we are somewhat concerned about the potential impact on employment, especially for entry-level white collar jobs and some categories of blue collar jobs. Unemployment in these areas could have negative societal implications and we will need thoughtful business and political leadership to help us navigate them.

What are you currently excited about? Tell us about some of your recent investments in Streamlined 5.

Ullas: The rise of AI has created a very exciting investment environment, akin to the advent of the internet. We are already seeing transformative new business models emerge with incredible momentum very early (we are investors in some of these). That said, it is worth bearing in mind that unlike in prior trends, the incumbents in tech have enormous power — distribution, data, talent — in this AI trend, and we are investing based on an acute understanding of how to navigate the pitfalls of such a market dynamic.

In the last five years, we have invested in vertical AI applications and in the last two years we have been focused on vertical agentic workflows. Some of the companies doing exciting work in these areas include Flip, using sophisticated AI algorithms in social networking and commerce and driving enormous engagement and growth; Speechify, using advanced AI in text-to-speech to make reading and learning highly efficient; Cimphony.ai, building a new law firm comprised entirely of software agents that are 'lawyers', making legal work much cheaper and faster; and Adsgency.ai, deploying AI agents around performance advertising which are generating massive improvements in that function.