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Amplify Partners began in 2012 when longtime Battery Ventures GP Sunil Dhaliwal set out to build a home for deeply technical founders. Headquartered in Menlo Park with a satellite office in San Francisco, the firm closed a $49 million debut fund that seeded Datadog and Fastly. Successive vintages expanded the playbook while preserving an engineer‑first culture.
In June 2025 Amplify announced three new pools totaling $900 million: Fund VI ($400 million core seed vehicle), Fund VI Select ($300 million opportunity fund) and Amplify Bio I ($200 million dedicated to digital‑biology startups). The fresh capital allows the partnership to lead pre‑seed, seed and Series A rounds, then follow winners through Series C without outside dilution.
Amplify invests in developer infrastructure, data tooling, AI and security, plus digitally native biology that marries wet‑lab automation with machine learning. Geography is largely North America, but the partners will cross the Atlantic or head to Israel when research talent demands it. Roughly half of every fund is reserved for follow‑on so founders do not scramble for insiders when they hit product‑market fit.
Beyond checks, Amplify provides hands‑on help. The internal Build Team of sales, growth, recruiting and design operators runs time‑boxed sprints that unblock early bottlenecks. A 150‑member founder Slack, annual retreats and workshops create a peer network that trades hard‑won playbooks. Open‑source essays, the Projects to Know newsletter and the annual AI Engineering Report position the firm as a thought leader, pulling in both talent and downstream investors.
Limited partners include university endowments, insurance companies and repeat founders such as Datadog’s Olivier Pomel who wanted exposure to the next wave of technical disruption. That mix delivers both staying power and specialist insight to the founders Amplify backs.
Amplify’s first checks range from $750 k to $3 million, typically buying 7–12 percent ownership. Follow‑on capacity can reach $10 million per company, funded from the Select vehicle.
Three themes dominate.
Amplify looks for products where AI or distributed‑systems expertise is the core moat, not an add‑on. Revenue can be zero at the time of investment, but founders must show either benchmark‑beating performance (for software) or in‑vitro validation (for bio). Red flags include ad‑tech, pure consumer social and cap tables with stacked uncapped SAFEs.
Term sheets are usually priced equity; the partners dislike high‑valuation notes that defer price discovery. Delaware C‑Corps are preferred, though the firm will facilitate flips from Canada, the UK or Israel when needed.
Amplify’s strategy is to lead early and stay involved through the growth stage, concentrating dollars in high‑conviction infrastructure and data companies. The approach has produced multiple IPOs and strategic exits while maintaining a seed‑stage ethos.
Below are ten representative investments that illustrate stage, sector and outcome:
Sunil Dhaliwal – Founder & General Partner
Former Battery Ventures GP who led the seed in Datadog and Fastly. At Amplify he steers overall strategy and cloud investing and authors the annual AI Engineering Report.
Mike Dauber – General Partner
Dev‑tools specialist and board member at dbt Labs and Runway. Prior roles span Battery Ventures and Cisco’s corporate dev‑rel group.
Sarah Catanzaro – General Partner
X | LinkedIn | Projects to Know
Ex‑Palantir and Mattermark data‑science leader. Publishes the Projects to Know newsletter and champions ML infrastructure and digital bio.
Lenny Pruss – General Partner
Distributed‑systems thinker behind early checks into Temporal and Chainguard. Previously at Redpoint and RRE.
David Beyer – General Partner
Stanford CS graduate and former founder who focuses on applied cryptography and developer productivity.
Barr Yaron – Partner
Cyber‑security expert who joined from GitHub to scale the defensive‑software practice.
Elliot Hershberg – Partner, Amplify Bio
Synthetic‑biology PhD driving wet‑lab automation deals in the new $200 million bio fund.
Grace Ge – Partner
Former AWS product lead covering machine‑learning infrastructure.
Decision making is straightforward: any GP can sponsor a deal; a simple majority clears the term sheet. Weekly partner calls keep the pace brisk, while specialized Build‑Team operators provide post‑investment support without voting power.
Keep your email short and data‑driven. Use a subject like “Seed – GPU orchestration platform saving 40 % cloud cost.” Attach a PDF memo and deck; avoid Google Drive permission errors. Provide benchmark numbers up front so the investment team can route quickly. One follow‑up after a week is acceptable. Multiple partners receive the alias, so avoid sending duplicates.
Amplify does not run a public scout or fellowship scheme. Instead, it opens its Projects to Know newsletter to outside technical contributors and recruits Venture Fellows ad hoc when a sector requires deep expertise.
Amplify enjoys consistent coverage across tech and finance outlets. The firm’s $900 million fund family headlined a June 18 2025 Cooley press release.
TechCrunch often taps Amplify for commentary on infrastructure trends; Mike Dauber’s analysis of retrieval‑augmented generation appeared in May 2025. The firm’s own Content Hub publishes deep‑dive essays such as “AI Agents in Production,” which are regularly syndicated on Hacker News and r/MachineLearning.
Partners are frequent podcast guests: Sarah Catanzaro discussed open‑source governance on The Data Stack Show (April 2025), and Pieter Abbeel interviewed Sunil Dhaliwal on The Gradient about scaling AI infra. Amplify’s annual AI Engineering Report and Projects to Know newsletter drive inbound press; Issue 128 was released in July 2025.
Conference presence is equally strong. Partners keynote at KubeCon, Snowflake Summit and the Applied AI Conference, while the firm’s private Founder Retreat garners photo features in Forbes each year. This visibility reassures seed‑stage founders that Amplify can attract downstream capital and talent.
When should I reach out?
Seed or even pre‑product is fine if you have a working demo or reproducible benchmark. Amplify has funded companies pre‑revenue when the technical edge was clear.
Do I need a warm introduction?
Helpful but not required. Roughly thirty percent of Amplify’s investments begin with a cold email that clearly outlines the product, data advantage and team.
What should the initial email include?
A two‑page memo (problem, solution, moat, roadmap) plus a concise slide deck. Include benchmark numbers or early design partners.
How fast is the process?
Term‑sheet decisions arrive within seven days of the first call if IP and security diligence are straightforward. Closing typically takes three weeks for Delaware entities.
Will Amplify lead my seed?
Yes. The firm leads about two‑thirds of seed rounds it joins and will set terms.
How much capital can I expect over time?
First checks range from $750 k to $3 million. The Select fund allows follow‑on capacity up to $10 million through Series B.
What post‑investment help is concrete?
Founders get access to the Build Team for sprints in sales, marketing, design and hiring, as well as a 150‑founder Slack for peer problem‑solving.
Does Amplify invest outside the United States?
Primarily North America, with selective deals in Europe and Israel. You may be asked to flip into a Delaware C‑Corp before Series A.
Which metrics matter most?
Technical differentiation. For software, outperform open‑source baselines by 20 percent or cut cloud spend dramatically. For bio, show statistically significant in‑vitro results.
What kills a deal?
Uncapped stacked SAFEs, unclear IP ownership, and teams without deep technical co‑founders are the fastest paths to no.
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