Zap's Wrap January 20th

hi friends,

Last week was awesome.

• I finished raising my 5th SPV.

• I started putting together materials to launch my 6th SPV into a Nashville startup (coming next week)!!

• I am helping run a process for one of my startups to wind down.

• I have 4 portcos raising a round in the next month so we are working on decks + narratives (with the help of Joey- MVP).

• I started planning Lightning 2026, my anti-conference to bring VCs to Nashville for one day to meet founders.

• I hosted 40 coders & sellers at the first ‘Cofounder Connect’ gathering.

• We had our Lighthouse founder 2026 kickoff.

• I said goodbye to one of my favorite founders who is moving away from Nashville 😢😢😢 

Some interesting data

I went through my portfolio and looked at where the lead investor in their first round of institutional capital was based:

1. Nashville VC
2. NYC VC
3. Local angels
4. NYC VC
5. Customers
6. Boston VC
7. Cayman Islands family office
8. Dallas family office
9. Toronto VC
10. Friends & family
11. Not sure
12. NYC VC
13. NYC VC
14. Chicago VC
15. NYC VC
16. SF VC
17. Las Vegas VC
18. SF VC
19. Angels, so far
20. SF + Boston VC coleads
21. SF VC
22. NYC VC
23. Friends & family
24. Customers
25. SF VC

When I map out the lead investors across my portfolio, the picture is mixed, but one thing is hard to miss: most of the institutional capital landing in our rounds still comes from outside Nashville, especially from the coasts.

That makes me all the more proud to be in these deals and to help channel that capital back into our city. To me, it shows that something real is happening here. Nashville isn’t just “up and coming” anymore. We’re producing companies compelling enough to draw the attention of investors who could put their money anywhere and are choosing to invest here.

Events

• FOUNDERS ONLY @ THE LIGHTHOUSE, Tuesday, January 27th

  • It’s in the name

• Engineers meet Nashville startups, Tuesday, February 3rd

  • Engineers only! Hear startups pitching that are growing and need engineers

• Raising Money 101, Friday February 6th

  • We’ll talk about how to run a process, mechanics, expectations, and real-world tradeoffs so you can make better decisions for your company.

• Startup Operators Only Networking, Thursday, February 12th

  • If you work in tech and want to meet other people who do to, I am putting together an event for you! Looking for product, sales, marketing, growth, design, ops, etc type folks.

• Angel Investing 201, Friday February 13th

  • ​This session goes deeper than the basics and focuses on how early-stage returns actually work: power laws, portfolio construction, position sizing, and why most of the outcomes you care about come from a very small number of companies. We will use real examples to walk through the numbers and make you feel more confident when evaluating startups.

• Startup internship fair, Wednesday, February 18th

  • If you are a startup who is looking for interns or post-grad hires, hmu to join this!!!

Lighthouse updates

We hosted our new year kick off and recorded videos of every founder describing where their company is at right now and where it will be in 5-10 years to put into a time capsule!

I am busy planning a Lighthouse founder field trip to San Francisco the week of February 23rd! I will be hosting a handful of events out there and am super pumped to travel with a group of founders (: Some are raising preseed and some are raising their seed.

Startup jobs

• I have a ton of engineering roles open. Full stack, ML, data engineers, forward deployed engineers, etc. Now is the time to work at a startup!

• Edgevanta is hiring for a Customer Success Manager

• A manufacturing startup is hiring for a product manager

• Valinor is hiring for a mechanical engineer here locally

  ^email me about any of these roles!

Personal

I spent the weekend in Brooklyn seeing Fred Again!!! It was an insane show and I had a blast!!

to the moon,

zap⚡