🌴 The LA Grind: Week of September 28th

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

Author

Justin Gordon
September 28, 2026

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

Happy Monday! Last week was insane, hosting the very first Ambition Summit in Santa Monica with 100+ founders, investors, and operators. I can’t wait to view all of the photos and videos from the amazing Irina Logra, but I shared a few of them here if you haven’t seen. I’ve got a recap post coming soon for you and we already have Ambition 2027 on the calendar!

Thank you. Huge thanks to DLA Piper and Citizens Private Bank, our headline sponsors for the Ambition Summit. I couldn’t have hosted the event without them. Thank you as well to Venice Inc., Bailey Glasser, Ardas, Tax Hack, and Agora for supporting.

Let’s get to it.

A note from a fellow member: Shawn Gold, long-time LA Grind member, CMO of Relay Human Cloud, 25 years hiring for startups in LA.

I know the tradeoff: the hire you need versus the runway you have. Relay solves it. Dedicated, full-time team members from Asia and Latin America at roughly 75% below US rates, month to month. Not freelancers. Not outsourcing. 100% dedicated people, managed by you, in your standups, on your systems. Developers, accountants, marketing, ops, AI-capable talent. SOC-verified, Dallas-based.

Questions? Message me directly. [email protected]

Upcoming Events

🌴 Upcoming Events I’m Hosting 🌴  

🗓️ September 29: Members Coffee. Santa Monica. 8 - 9:30 am.

🗓️ October 27: Members Dinner. West Hollywood. 6:30 - 8:30 pm.

🗓️ October 29: Game Night. West Hollywood. 6 - 10 pm.

🗓️ September 23, 2027: Ambition Summit. Santa Monica. 9 am - 8 pm.

👋 This Week 👋  

👀 Events Coming Soon 👀 

LA Grind Club

Over the past 16 months, we’ve hosted ~100 events in Los Angeles to bring together the startup community.

Who were many of these events specifically for?

Members of The LA Grind Club.

The LA Grind Club is where the LA startup community comes to life. We’re a community of ~70 founders, investors, and operators in LA who gather multiple times per month through basketball runs, poker nights, coffee meetups, dinners, and other member-only events.

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

Content Lead @ White Circle

Generalist @ Eventual

Hiring?

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.

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.

The Ambition Podcast is 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: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, YouTube, and more.

Rainmaker Technology, a provider of a cloud seeding technology platform, raised a $100M Series B backed by NOA VC, Upfront Ventures and more.

Fluxnium, Inc., a provider of a platform for domestic uranium supply adsorbed from seawater, raised a $7M Seed round led by Congruent Ventures.

Brahma AI, a provider of an AI-native operating system for enterprise audiovisual content, received a $100M investment from Multiples Alternate Asset Management.

Arey, a company that develops supplements and topical treatments for graying and aging hair, raised an undisclosed Series A led by Unilever Ventures.

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

Featured Location

Cobi’s. Gorgeous Santa Monica restaurant inspired by Southeast Asia, with lush interiors, patterned fabrics, and vibrant shareable food.

Fun Events

See you next week,

Justin

P.S. Want to connect?

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