Vermilion Cliffs Ventures is a New York-based solo GP venture firm founded in 2023 by Ashley Smith, one of the few solo women GPs in venture capital. Smith spent her operating career in marketing leadership at Twilio, Facebook, GitHub, and GitLab, giving her deep first-hand experience in selling to developers and security teams. The firm backs technical founders at the earliest stages, with a specific focus on go-to-market strategy as a core value-add, helping founders skip the expensive mistakes most make when selling to technical buyers.
Vermilion Cliffs backs pre-seed and seed stage technical founders building in AI infrastructure, security, and developer tools.
The firm targets founders solving genuine infrastructure problems, not AI wrappers, with a preference for companies where developer adoption and security team go-to-market require specialist knowledge.
Vermilion Cliffs Ventures Fund II closed at $25M in July 2026, raised in approximately four months with the majority of capital coming from returning investors.
The fund will back at least 25 companies over two and a half years with checks of $500K–$1M, with six investments already completed.
Fund I raised $13M and backed 35 companies including Keycard and CopilotKit.
Leadership
Ashley Smith is Founder and Solo GP. She spent her career as a marketing leader at Twilio, Facebook, GitHub, and GitLab before founding Vermilion Cliffs in 2023.
She is a Georgia Institute of Technology graduate and one of a small number of solo women GPs in early-stage venture.
Investment Strategy
Vermilion Cliffs writes $500K–$1M checks into technical founders at pre-seed and seed stage, targeting companies where selling to developers and security teams is a core go-to-market challenge.
Smith's operating background provides direct, hands-on support on developer-led growth, community building, and technical buyer sales motions, areas where most generalist VCs offer limited practical help.
The fund is concentrated by design, with 25+ companies planned across a two-and-a-half-year deployment period.
Notable Investments
United States
