Harshul Sanghi’s Post

Introducing WillowTree Investments - seed capital for “AI first” startups Excited to share what we have been building for the last couple years! WillowTree Investments is a seed-stage investment vehicle focusing on startups leveraging the power of data, AI and automation, optimized for sector specific use cases. WillowTree is managed by Rohit Bodas Harshul Sanghi and Venkat Varadachary, teaming up again after successfully founding and growing Amex Ventures into a billion-dollar portfolio. We have completed eighteen investments (five so far in 2023) in a broad range of sectors and geographies. Our portfolio companies continue to scale rapidly, most of which have gone on to raise follow-on capital from top-tier funds. Follow us at WillowTree Investments. When we started WillowTree, (fka Amara VC), we wanted to redefine “VC value add”, especially at the seed stage, to transcend individual expertise and networks to establish a systemic process that offers founders critical assistance with product development, technology feedback and customer access. To that end, we strategically built a curated LP base like no other, to maximize support for our founders. Backed by 50+ unicorn founders, VCs, and industry veterans, our network is a powerful force that amplifies our reach and ability to help portfolio founders get access to domain experts as well as connect with prospective early customers to accelerate their journey towards product-market fit.   Despite the macro headwinds, we remain steadfast in our conviction that innovation perseveres, and exceptional businesses will continue to be built. 🚀 Calling early stage tech founders 🌟: our focus is Enterprise Tech, Fintech, SaaS and Sustainability. We like products with deep technology moats especially with AI and automation as a core aspect of the value proposition. If this describes your company, we would love to have a chat. WillowTree selectively invests when we have high conviction about the founding team and our ability to help them solve meaningful problems. We typically look to back 10-12 new companies each year. As an evergreen fund, we are continuously adding high value operator investors to our LP base, especially those keen to help founders navigate the challenges of starting up. If this is you, join us in building WillowTree - let's help shape the future together! 🌳 #AI #venturecapital #genAI #startups

From the first day in the garage to today.. what a ride it's been. Not many people believed in us when we were the left picture. But, along the journey, so many of you here have helped make the picture on the right come true. It's the beginning of the next chapter..and I have our customers, partners and all of you to thank for this incredible milestone.

“We are unique in the sense that we have an end-to-end platform and a closed network. So we have an issuing platform, we have the network payments that work, and we also have our merchant acquiring business. We also serve both consumers and businesses. When you look at all of that, we’re able to partner with a startup, bring that innovation and plug it into our business and affect that in a much shorter timeframe than I believe some of our competitors will — just because we have all of that within our control and our ecosystem.” Gabriela Ariana Campoverde sits down with Harshul Sanghi, Founder and Global Head of Amex Ventures. Harshul has over thirty years of operating experience, and for the past 10 years has led the venture arm of American Express and oversees global investment activity across the company. To date, Amex Ventures has invested in 80+ companies and has offices in New York, San Francisco, and Boston. It now has a portfolio valued at over $1B. Full Wharton Fintech interview - https://bit.ly/3rrv8g4  Spotify - https://spoti.fi/31lptx3 #fintech #venturecapital #innovation #americanexpress

Amex Ventures's Lindsay Fitzgerald is featured in today's Protocol Braintrust column discussing what she's excited about in the fintech space.

We are excited to announce both our investment in BodesWell.io and the launch of the pilot for My Financial Plan, a digital financial planning tool that Amex co-developed with the startup. My Financial Plan provides a complete visual picture of your financial health and is designed to help you make and achieve life goals. We are excited to be working with Matthew Bellows and the entire BodesWell.io team. Read more about our investment and how we’re democratizing financial planning here: https://lnkd.in/eVicHPx

We’re so proud to have backed Clip – Mexico’s first payments Unicorn since the early innings. Clip’s ambition to provide seamless access to a suite of commerce-enabling solutions to empower any merchant, big or small could not be more important in today’s climate. Read more about Clip here: https://lnkd.in/ggS4Qhp

We’re thrilled that six of our portfolio companies made it onto Forbes’ Fintech 50. Check out why Forbes thinks @Finix, Guideline, Next Insurance, Orum.io, Plaid and Stripe are amongst “The Most Innovative Fintech Companies in 2021” https://lnkd.in/gQE6Z7A