Lumos Labs is the San Francisco company behind Lumosity, the brain-training app that turned cognitive exercises into a daily habit for more than 100 million people. Founded in 2005 by Kunal Sarkar, Michael Scanlon, and David Drescher, Lumosity packages neuropsychology-inspired tasks - memory, attention, processing speed, problem solving, flexibility - into short, gamified workouts. Its database of player performance, the Human Cognition Project, has fueled collaborations with researchers at Stanford, Harvard, Cambridge, and beyond.
Cory Li is the CEO and co-founder of Spellbrush, the San Francisco-based generative AI studio behind niji-journey - the world's leading AI anime art platform built in collaboration with Midjourney. A MIT-trained bioengineer turned AI entrepreneur, Li previously co-founded Benchling (YC S12), the biotech R&D platform that went on to become a unicorn. At Spellbrush (YC W18), he leads a 31-person team building AI-powered anime games and creative tools - from WaifuLabs' anime portrait generator to Arrowmancer, an anime RPG where players design characters using generative AI, to niji-journey's mobile app with millions of users.
Samira Behrouzan is a Partner at Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) focused on Marketing and Games, and the force behind a16z speedrun - a pre-seed accelerator that has deployed over $180 million to 150+ startups at the intersection of games and technology. Before joining a16z, she led marketing at 100 Thieves and drove 20+ brand partnerships for Riot Games' Emmy-nominated Arcane series, including boundary-pushing collaborations like bringing ZEDD into VALORANT. A lifelong gamer who grew up on Sega Saturn and N64, she holds an Executive MBA from the IE Brown program and is a vocal advocate for women and underrepresented communities in gaming.
Troy Kirwin is an Investment Partner at Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Cohort Lead for a16z speedrun, the firm's pre-seed accelerator program. A native New Yorker now based in San Francisco, he focuses on B2B AI and creative tech - including next-gen storytelling and design tools, marketing technology, 3D simulations, and vertical AI agents. Before a16z, he spent roughly 4.5 years as a Senior Manager at Unity Technologies, where he orchestrated over 20 acquisitions including Parsec and IronSource. He started his career as an investment banking analyst at Jefferies covering media and tech clients. His portfolio includes K-ID, Hedra, Backflip, Nunu.ai, and a dozen more.