Sameer Dholakia

I’m thrilled to announce defy.vc’s investment in Birches Health as part of their $20M combined Seed and Series A funding round, alongside incredible partners like AlleyCorp, General Catalyst, Will Ventures, and others. As someone deeply passionate about backing companies that tackle important problems for our society, I couldn’t be more excited about what Birches is building—a national virtual clinic dedicated to treating gambling addiction and related behavioral disorders like gaming, sex, porn, and internet addictions. What excites me most is Birches’ innovative health assurance model: proactive, accessible, and affordable care that’s evidence-based and delivered right at home. With the explosion of legal sports betting—think nearly $1.5 billion wagered on this year’s Super Bowl alone—we’re staring down a looming public health emergency. Traditional options like hotlines or generic therapy fall short for this high-acuity issue, but Birches changes that by offering specialized therapy from trained clinicians, multimodal treatment, and peer support, all covered by major insurers like United Healthcare, Cigna, Aetna, and Blue Cross Blue Shield. It’s available in all 50 states, breaking down geographical and financial barriers that have left so many without help. The impact is already profound: 96% of patients report an improved quality of life, and 94% give Birches a 5/5 rating. By partnering with state governments, payors, and policymakers, Birches is pushing gambling addiction into the spotlight of behavioral health conversations, where it’s been neglected for too long—often leading to shame, worsened outcomes, and higher suicidality risks. This funding will supercharge their growth: expanding the provider network, boosting clinical excellence, scaling infrastructure, and deepening insurance and state partnerships to meet surging demand. Very excited to partner with Elliott Rapaport and the entire Birches team! See more about our POV in the blog post linked in the comments. #GamblingAddiction #BehavioralHealth #HealthTech #VentureCapital #Innovation

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Today, X, The Moonshot Factory quietly unveiled A-Life, a project that brings biomanufacturing into the AI era. It may sound niche, but it’s one of the most transformative projects I’ve ever worked on (and that includes Calico Life Sciences, Google’s effort to understand aging and lifespan). Here’s why: We now have a clear way to use living cells, like yeast and bacteria, to produce materials we currently make from petroleum and waste-heavy processes. Look around you: the textiles in your clothes, the packaging of your snacks, the medicines and supplements you take. All of these could be made cheaper, cleaner, and with less waste through biomanufacturing. What’s new is that the team built a set of AI tools specifically for biology that makes this possible at scale. For years, making biomanufacturing cost-competitive has been described as a $30 trillion holy grail for the industry. A-Life is the first time we’ve seen a viable path forward. 🔗 Introducing A-Life: https://lnkd.in/ggrYuUCS For me, collaborating on this was a full-circle ikigai moment, bringing together Google, wonderful teammates, molecular biology, and company-building all at once. Always say yes to those rare moments! Huge thanks to Relly, Jodi, Odd, and the whole team for making this such a fun version of ‘work.’ In my University of Oxford lab days, just trying to keep fibroblast cells alive, I would have been stoked to see this future taking shape. Photo: Making biochemistry thrilling since 2005 :).

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We at Upfront Ventures are proud to work with BrightAI as they raise $51M in a Series A to bring AI into America’s critical infrastructure. Story in comments. Much of the world’s essential services, like power grids, water pipelines and HVAC systems, still rely on manual checks and reactive maintenance, which leaves field teams in the dark until something breaks. BrightAI will use this new capital to scale their observability and automation platform and invest in a new HQ in the heart of Silicon Valley. Here’s to a more resilient future. Let’s go!

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AI isn't just powering software. BrightAI just raised $51 million to automate inspection and other hardware-based AI capabilities. As Alexa von Tobel, co-founder of Inspired Capital put it: “So many people are so focused on the future of digital AI, but we’re excited about this new layer of AI: the physical world AI.” We are in the early innings of a series of AI-fueled innovations! https://lnkd.in/enhmafvH

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