Liquid2 Ventures
Liquid 2 Ventures is a San Francisco seed-stage venture capital firm, co-founded in 2015 by NFL Hall of Famer Joe Montana, that writes small early checks across technology, from AI and consumer to deep tech. Water is occasional, not a thesis: as of 2026, (don't) Waste Water tracks two water-related bets, in wastewater data and desalination chemistry.
Compiled by Antoine Walter, (don't) Waste Water, from official filings and direct intelligence in Leviathan.
The take
Liquid 2 Ventures is the rare seed fund whose best-known name never wrote a line of code: it was co-founded in 2015 by Joe Montana, the NFL Hall of Fame quarterback, who had already spent a decade in finance at HRJ Capital before turning to startups. The technical half of the story is the operating team, Mike Miller, a Yale particle-physics PhD who built the Y Combinator-backed database company Cloudant, and Michael Ma, the TalkBin founder Google acquired in 2011. Together they run a seed shop wired deep into the YC network.
Liquid 2 Ventures backs founders at the earliest stage and across almost every sector, AI, fintech, consumer, space, defense, and deep tech, with small pre-seed and seed checks rather than leading rounds. Its portfolio runs past 800 companies and includes 35 that grew into billion-dollar businesses, among them Gitlab, Rippling, Anduril, and Astranis. Water is not part of that pitch; it surfaces only when a technical founder happens to be aiming at a water-shaped problem.
Liquid 2 Ventures' water footprint is small and specific. Of more than 800 companies firm-wide, I can place only two water-related deals in the sector, both at the data-and-chemistry edge rather than in pipes or treatment plants. Biobot Analytics turns municipal sewage into public-health data, the wastewater-epidemiology work that mapped COVID and opioids across US cities; Heimdal works the chemistry of desalination brine. The more recent of the two closed back in 2021.
Liquid 2 Ventures is worth knowing for what it is, not for a water thesis it does not claim. For a water founder its draw is the network and the name, a fast seed cheque and a bench of YC advisors, not domain expertise in water. Read it as a generalist that will occasionally follow a strong technical team into a water problem, the way it followed Biobot and Heimdal.
Water Commitment Score
Compiled from official filings, third-party records, and direct intelligence from investors and founders, in Leviathan · recomputed monthly · as of Jun 2026.
How they invest
Portfolio · 2 water companies
Invests alongside
Highlighted = profiled on (don't) Waste Water.
Frequently asked
- What does Liquid 2 Ventures invest in?
- Liquid 2 Ventures is a generalist seed-stage venture firm that backs founders across technology, including AI, fintech, consumer, space, defense, and deep tech. Liquid 2 Ventures writes small pre-seed and seed checks rather than leading rounds, and rarely invests in water specifically.
- Is Liquid 2 Ventures a water fund?
- No. Liquid 2 Ventures is a generalist technology seed fund, not a water-focused investor. (don't) Waste Water rates its water commitment Occasional: of more than 800 portfolio companies, just two are water-related, and its most recent water deal closed in 2021.
- Which water companies has Liquid 2 Ventures backed?
- Liquid 2 Ventures has backed two water-related companies that (don't) Waste Water tracks: Biobot Analytics, which turns sewage into public-health data through wastewater epidemiology, and Heimdal, which works the chemistry of desalination brine. Both sit at the data and deep-tech edge of water.
- Who founded and runs Liquid 2 Ventures?
- Liquid 2 Ventures was co-founded in 2015 by NFL Hall of Famer Joe Montana, Cloudant founder Mike Miller, and TalkBin founder Michael Ma. Joe Montana is Managing Partner. The partner roster also includes General Partner Nate Montana and Matt Mulvey, who joined from Coatue.
- Where is Liquid 2 Ventures based?
- Liquid 2 Ventures is based in San Francisco, in the United States, and invests primarily in US technology startups. It was founded in 2015 and manages roughly $300M across an early-stage seed fund and a later growth-stage fund.