8vc
(5)
Casa Wants to Be the Uncle Kevin in Your Pocket
Two founders talked to hundreds of homeowners, decided the real product was a trusted person to ask, and shipped it as an app. This is the case for turning a family handyman into software.
Mendra
Mendra is an AI-native biopharmaceutical company based in San Francisco that acquires, develops, and commercializes therapies for rare and ultra-rare diseases with high unmet need. Founded in 2025 and launched publicly in January 2026 with an $82 million Series A, the company is run by veterans of BioMarin, Palantir, and other rare disease programs. Rather than discovering compounds from scratch, Mendra systematically scans, scores, and acquires shelved or under-resourced rare disease assets from academia, small biotechs, and big pharma, then uses AI to accelerate patient identification, clinical trial enrollment, and global market access.
Saris AI
Saris AI builds agentic AI workflow agents that automate the repetitive, high-volume back-office work at banks and credit unions - lending, underwriting, compliance, and operations - without replacing the core systems institutions already run. Founded in 2024 by the ex-Oohlala Mobile team, the Montreal- and San Francisco-based company trains agents on each institution's own workflows to execute multi-step tasks under human supervision. In May 2026 it raised a $28.8M Series A led by 8VC to scale deployments and deepen integrations with partners like Fiserv, MeridianLink, and Encompass.
Bobyard
Bobyard is a San Francisco AI company that automates construction takeoffs and estimates. Its proprietary computer-vision and NLP models read blueprints and automatically count symbols and measure areas and lengths, cutting bid-prep time by more than half. Founded in 2023 by Michael Ding, the company started with landscaping - one of construction's least-digitized trades - and has expanded into electrical, finishes, mechanical, and plumbing. It raised a $35M Series A led by 8VC in December 2025.
Flux
Flux is a browser-based, AI-native hardware design platform that turns text prompts into manufacturable printed circuit boards. The San Francisco company calls its product an 'AI Hardware Engineer' and is rewriting how electronics get designed by combining an electronic CAD environment with an agentic copilot that researches parts, draws schematics, lays out boards, and prepares files for fabrication.