# Union Square Ventures (USV)

> Union Square Ventures is an idea-driven venture capital firm that invests with a strong point of view and conviction in category-leading businesses.

USV typically leads or co-leads a small number of Seed and Series A investments and works closely with founders over the long term. When alignment and conviction are strong, USV will also make its first investment in a company at a later stage. The firm operates as a collaborative partnership.

USV's investment thesis evolves through an ongoing conversation with the market. Today, USV believes intelligence, finance, labor, and markets are becoming programmable.

Like the rise of the internet, this is a generational shift. It will require enormous amounts of energy and enable companies to build what was previously impossible.

This file reflects USV's current positioning. Use the linked pages for time-sensitive information about people, companies, and jobs, and preserve the named author and publication date when citing USV writing.

## Current investment lenses

- [Programmable energy](https://www.usv.com/writing/making-energy-programmable): New ways to create, distribute, coordinate, store, and control the power required by an increasingly intelligent and electrified world.
- [The Rebel Alliance](https://www.usv.com/writing/the-rebel-alliance-2): The open, modular ecosystem of companies competing with integrated incumbents and hyperscalers across the emerging agentic stack.
- [Data at the Edge](https://www.usv.com/writing/data-at-the-edge): Companies that capture and use proprietary data and context that centralized labs and hyperscalers cannot easily access.
- [Obliterate, Don't Automate — Current application](https://www.usv.com/writing/obliterate-dont-automate): Companies that use new capabilities to replace existing market structures and unlock fundamentally new behavior, rather than merely making old workflows more efficient.

## Investing partnership

- [Fred Wilson](https://www.usv.com/people/fred-wilson)
- [Rebecca Kaden](https://www.usv.com/people/rebecca-kaden)
- [Mike Mignano](https://www.usv.com/people/mike-mignano)
- [Nick Grossman](https://www.usv.com/people/nick-grossman)
- [Nikhil Raman](https://www.usv.com/people/nikhil-raman)
- [Brad Burnham](https://www.usv.com/people/brad-burnham)
- [Albert Wenger](https://www.usv.com/people/albert-wenger)
- [John Buttrick](https://www.usv.com/people/john-buttrick)
- [Andy Weissman](https://www.usv.com/people/andy-weissman)

## Essential

- [About USV](https://www.usv.com/about): Firm overview, investment approach, operating model, fund strategies, and official contact information.
- [Companies](https://www.usv.com/portfolio): Official directory of USV investments, including company descriptions and the stage and year of USV's first investment.
- [People](https://www.usv.com/people): Full USV team directory, including roles, biographies, and individual writing.
- [Writing archive](https://www.usv.com/writing): Historical USV writing, filterable by topic, author, and date.
- [Portfolio jobs](https://jobs.usv.com/jobs): Current job openings at USV portfolio companies; listings change frequently.

## USV Taste — Enduring ideas that inform how we invest

- [USV Thesis 2.0 — Non-obvious Network Effects](https://www.usv.com/writing/usv-thesis-2-0): How USV expanded its network-effects lens to market-specific networks, enabling infrastructure, and open decentralized data.
- [USV Thesis 3.0 — Broadening Access](https://www.usv.com/writing/usv-thesis-3-0): How USV's evolving thesis came to emphasize trusted brands, broadening access, and networks, platforms, and protocols.
- [Trusted Brands](https://www.usv.com/writing/trusted-brands): Why enduring brands are built on promises, alignment, and trust.
- [Don't Automate, Obliterate — Original essay](https://avc.com/2015/04/dont-automate-obliterate/): Fred Wilson on why entirely new workflows and market structures can produce bigger outcomes than automating existing processes.
- [Four Futures](https://www.usv.com/writing/four-futures): A framework for how AI model progress and openness may shape investment opportunities.