🌴 The LA Grind: Week of August 3rd

Upcoming events, venture deals, LA opportunities, and more in Los Angeles this week.

Author

Justin Gordon
August 03, 2026

👋 I’m Justin. I run The LA Grind and The SF Grind, host the Ambition Podcast, and scout for Headline.

Happy Monday! We’re about 7 weeks out from the Ambition Summit, announced two more speakers last week, and will be announcing another this week! We still have sponsorship opportunities, a limited number of service provider tickets, and other tickets available. Apply to join here.

Let’s get to it.

What happens when you put 150 ambitious founders, investors, and operators in one room for a full day?

We're about to find out.

On September 24th, Ambition 2026 takes over a private venue in Santa Monica. One day, one room, no filler panels. Speakers include:

  • Mehul Nariyawala (Matic)

  • Dee Murthy (Ghost)

  • Jessica Chang (Upwards)

  • Shamin Walsh (BAM Ventures)

  • Jo Phillips (Payabli)

  • Dara Ladjevardian (Delphi)

This isn't a massive conference you wander through with a lanyard. It's curated, it's capped at 150, and attendees have already signed up from across the US and as far as Australia.

VIP tickets include an intimate dinner the night before with some of the speakers and as many great people as I can talk into showing up.

Upcoming Events

🌴 Upcoming Events I’m Hosting 🌴  

🗓️ August 7: The LA Grind: Game Night. Hollywood. 7 - 11 pm.

🗓️ August 11: The LA Grind: Startup Community Mixer. Santa Monica. 6 - 8 pm. Sponsored by Agora.

🗓️ August 19: The LA Grind: Seed to Series A Founder Dinner. Santa Monica. 6:30 - 8:30 pm. Sponsored by Wells Fargo.

🗓️ August 21: The LA Grind: Poker Night. Hollywood. 6 - 11 pm.

👋 This Week 👋  

🗓️ August 4: Made You Look Tour: The LA Edit. Arts District. 10:30 am - 1:30 pm.

🗓️ August 5: AI Policy August Meetup. Mission Junction. 6 - 8 pm.

🗓️ August 8: Assembly Launch Party. Elysian Valley. 4:30 - 7 pm.

🗓️ August 9: Soleil Social. Hollywood. 1 - 6 pm.

👀 Events Coming Soon 👀

Marc Hankin of HPL Law advises inventors and high-growth teams on patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets, and licensing. Before your next fundraise, launch, or M&A chat, know where you stand by talking with Marc, who you can reach at [email protected].

Marc can often be found at startup events in LA and has been one of the biggest supporters of The LA Grind since its inception!

Top 5 LA Startup & VC Jobs

AI Researcher @ MindFort

Marketing Manager @ Sound Ventures

Startup Raising

Elvina Beck, Founder of Deadline, is raising capital. Deadline is a private hotel marketplace where verified travelers place blind bids on unsold rooms. Hotels protect their brand with hidden pricing while unlocking new revenue from inventory that would otherwise expire empty. Connect: [email protected]

Hiring?

Feature your job in The LA Grind newsletter or reach out to our partners:

  • RJR Partners: Experts in helping startups scale their teams with high quality hires. Their team is comprised of tech industry veterans, allowing them to source and vet candidates directly through their personal networks. Their industry expertise also enables a deeper understanding of the needs of clients and candidates on a level unmatched by other firms.

  • Relay Human Cloud: Deploy dedicated global teammates. Fully supported, ready fast, no long-term commitment. Relay handles everything behind your teammates so you just manage their work. Every seat comes fully provisioned; your teammates show up ready, supported, and embedded in your workflows from day one.

Additional Opportunities

Know a founder or investor in Los Angeles who is raising capital or searching for a co-founder? Reply to this email with more details that I could share in this newsletter for 11,000+ founders, investors, and operators.

I started the Ambition Podcast a few weeks ago, spending 100+ hours on the project already. It’s a show about the world's most ambitious people from history, and the lessons you can take from their lives and use in your own work and life.

Each episode is deeply researched, built around the definitive biography of one person (or in some cases, two), with dozens of hours spent reading, synthesizing, and pulling out what actually matters.

First episodes of Ambition:

Available now on all podcasting platforms including:

Offscript Worldwide, a provider of a creator-owned ecosystem connecting brands and platforms across media, music, sports, gaming, and creator networks, received an undisclosed amount as minority investment from Essence Ventures.

Antares, a nuclear fission energy company developing compact microreactors for defense and space applications, raised a $470M Series C co-led by Paradigm and Caffeinated Capital.

K2 Space, a company manufacturing satellites, raised a $500M Series D led by Kleiner Perkins and ICONIQ.

CopySight, a provider of an AI IP governance platform for commercial content creation, raised a $3M Seed round led by Mucker Capital.

Dimension, a provider of an agentic AI operating system for social commerce, raised a $1.65M Seed round backed by Science Inc., UpscaleX and more.

Procode Inc., a provider of an AI-powered medical billing and revenue cycle management (RCM) platform for private practice surgeons, raised a $10M Series A led by Health Velocity Capital.

PawPay, a provider of a veterinary payment and insurance activation platform, received an undisclosed amount as investment from Veterinary Angel Network for Entrepreneurs (VANE).

Send any fundraising news for LA-based companies or funds, including your own, to [email protected].

Featured Location

Real Charmer. A moody, retro cocktail bar in East Hollywood, known for its inventive drinks, intimate atmosphere, vintage décor, and cozy neighborhood vibe.

Fun Events

See you next week,

Justin

P.S. Want to connect?

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