{"id":3490805,"date":"2026-07-08T15:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/08\/solo-gp-ashley-smith-unveils-new-25m-fund-to-support-startups-in-ai-security-and-other-sectors\/"},"modified":"2026-07-08T15:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T15:00:00","slug":"solo-gp-ashley-smith-unveils-new-25m-fund-to-support-startups-in-ai-security-and-other-sectors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/08\/solo-gp-ashley-smith-unveils-new-25m-fund-to-support-startups-in-ai-security-and-other-sectors\/","title":{"rendered":"Solo GP Ashley Smith unveils new $25M fund to support startups in AI, security, and other sectors."},"content":{"rendered":"<div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/solo-gp-ashley-smith-unveils-new-25m-fund-to-support-startups-in-ai-security-and-other-sectors.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\"><\/div>\n<p id=\"speakable-summary\" class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Vermilion Cliffs Ventures declared on Wednesday the completion of a $25 million Fund II. The company was established in 2023 by operator-turned-investor Ashley Smith, who leads it as one of the rare solo female GPs in venture capital. In a conversation with TechCrunch, Smith stated that this fund will persist in the firm\u2019s mission of supporting technical founders, particularly those developing in AI infrastructure, security, and development tools.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">She mentioned that it took her roughly four months to raise the new fund this year, with a significant portion of the capital sourced from existing investors. The typical check size for Fund II will range from $500,000 to $1 million, aiming to invest in at least 25 companies over the next two and a half years, having already supported six companies. The firm had previously secured a $13 million inaugural fund that funded 35 companies, including the cybersecurity startup Keycard and the AI infrastructure company CopilotKit.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Smith remarked that many early-stage firms exist to assist founders in securing their next round, and from her background in marketing at Twilio, Facebook, GitHub, and GitLab, she aims to aid founders with go-to-market strategies that drive revenue. \u201cSelling to developers and security teams is a distinct discipline, and most founders experience learning it the hard way over time,\u201d she noted. \u201cI strive to help them avoid the pitfalls I\u2019ve encountered or witnessed other founders experience.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/solo-gp-ashley-smith-unveils-new-25m-fund-to-support-startups-in-ai-security-and-other-sectors.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\"><\/div>\n<p id=\"speakable-summary\" class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Vermilion Cliffs Ventures declared on Wednesday the completion of a $25 million Fund II. The company was established in 2023 by operator-turned-investor Ashley Smith, who leads it as one of the rare solo female GPs in venture capital. In a conversation with TechCrunch, Smith stated that this fund will persist in the firm\u2019s mission of supporting technical founders, particularly those developing in AI infrastructure, security, and development tools.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">She mentioned that it took her roughly four months to raise the new fund this year, with a significant portion of the capital sourced from existing investors. The typical check size for Fund II will range from $500,000 to $1 million, aiming to invest in at least 25 companies over the next two and a half years, having already supported six companies. The firm had previously secured a $13 million inaugural fund that funded 35 companies, including the cybersecurity startup Keycard and the AI infrastructure company CopilotKit.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Smith remarked that many early-stage firms exist to assist founders in securing their next round, and from her background in marketing at Twilio, Facebook, GitHub, and GitLab, she aims to aid founders with go-to-market strategies that drive revenue. \u201cSelling to developers and security teams is a distinct discipline, and most founders experience learning it the hard way over time,\u201d she noted. \u201cI strive to help them avoid the pitfalls I\u2019ve encountered or witnessed other founders experience.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3490806,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"Default","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3490805","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3490805"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3490805"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3490805\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3490806"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3490805"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3490805"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3490805"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}