The world has always been shaped by outlier founders transforming industries using the most disruptive tech.

Defiance Capital is a seed fund and a community of some of the world's most extraordinary entrepreneurs. We look to be the first check in Enterprise AI companies and provide valuable mentorship to our portfolio founders through to exit and beyond.

Founders

What we look for in founders.

1. Successful Track Record

You have a history of entrepreneurship and overcoming significant challenges.

2. Passion for Growth

You have always been highly ambitious and obsessed with succeeding.

3. Problem Solving Innovation

You have a unique insight into how to leverage AI in a sector with a very large addressable market.

Featured at

Featuring and presenting with some of the most trusted financial institutions, venture capital conferences and panels.

Why Defiance?

We are a community of accomplished founders, including over 30 unicorn founders. Leveraging our network of leaders and innovators we are passionate about empowering the next generation. By fostering meaningful connections, our members get access to unparalleled resources, insights, and opportunities.

Christian Dorffer

  • Christian has over 20 years of company building experience, as an advisor, founder and early stage investor. Christian co-founded and ran Sweet Capital, the King.com founders fund, from 2015 to 2022 and has made over 75 investments in early stage tech companies across Europe and North America.

    The idea for Defiance Capital was born from a strong fact pattern in Christian’s investment experience and market data that clearly proves that you are more likely to dominate in your business category, sport or art if you are extremely ambitious and have a history of overcoming adversity since youth.

    Christian is a passionate investor in and mentor to immigrant founders, female founders, ethnic minorities and other underrepresented groups using software to solve some of the world’s greatest challenges.

    He is the dedicated husband to an African entrepreneur and a proud father of three. Christian is also a passionate athlete and founder of Midnight Runners, a running community spanning 18 metropolitan cities across five continents.

FOUNDING & MANAGING PARTNER

Nolan Gray

PARTNER & LP

  • Nolan is a climatetech entrepreneur. He co-founded Svea Solar, recently ranked Europe’s second fastest growing renewable energy company (per the Financial Times).

    Before stepping out of day-to-day operations he was the Chief Commercial Officer. During that time Svea bootstrapped to $50 million in revenue in just four years before raising a $13 million Series A. Today the company has raised over $200 million and is reducing millions of tons of CO2 emissions each year. He started his career in enterprise software, and before that he was a a former collegiate athlete.

    Nolan is also a Defiance Capital LP.

Edrizio De La Cruz

VENTURE PARTNER

  • Edrizio is an ex Visiting Partner at Y Combinator, the world's leading startup accelerator and investor. He joined YC in 2022, after co-founding and leading Arcus, a Payment-as-a-service platform that enabled millions of people in Latin America to access digital financial services.

    At YC, he leverage my 10+ years of experience in venture capital, M&A, and fintech to support and mentor hundreds of founders from diverse backgrounds and industries. Edrizio is passionate about empowering underdogs and creating positive social impact through entrepreneurship and innovation. His new book, The Underdog Founder, chronicles his journey from selling guavas in a Santo Domingo barrio to selling his startup to Mastercard.

Efe Uwaifo

INVESTOR

  • Efe is an Investor at Defiance Capital. He has a plethora of experiences working within the world of finance both in the public and private markets at firms such as Morgan Stanley and Berenberg.

    In addition he has investing and consulting experience for early-stage startups, and operational experience leading the Sales Strategy team at Saltpay (now Teya), where he oversaw the sales integration of a $350million acquisition.

    Efe holds an undergraduate degree from Harvard University in Economics, where he was All-Academic x3, Captain of the Track and Field team and 2x NCAA All-American. He is the current British Triple Jump champion.

Yasmeen Jassim

INVESTOR

  • Yasmeen is an Investor at Defiance Capital, leveraging five years of experience leading product teams across enterprise, growth-stage, and startup companies. Previously at Microsoft, she worked on cutting-edge technologies in the Azure domain, and at CloudKitchens and Wonders, she helped develop revolutionary products in the restaurant tech space.

    With a strong focus on identifying innovative opportunities, she is dedicated to supporting visionary founders who are transforming industries through AI. Her expertise in product development and market strategy enables her to provide valuable insights and mentorship to portfolio companies. As a Bahraini, she is particularly passionate about investing in MENA entrepreneurs building groundbreaking companies abroad.

    Yasmeen holds an undergraduate degree from Stanford University in Symbolic Systems, specializing in Human-Computer Interaction where she was a Crown Prince Scholar.

Advisors

Lars Rasmussen co-founder @ Google Maps

Rijul Gupta - Founder @ Deep Media AI

Mads Rydahl - ex CPO @ Siri (Apple) / co-founder @ Proemial

Defying the odds.

Defying the Odds is our podcast series that cover interviews with highly successful entrepreneurs, athletes and explorers that have all achieved great success in life, despite having to overcome tremendous challenges along the way.

Go to series

Portfolio

Human-like voice AI agents for Insurance.

The sales system of record for B2B companies.

Market research AI startup.

Developer tools startup built by ex-Stripe execs.