Andrew Kortina

Co-founder, Venmo and Fin; Angel Investor at independent

Reviewed Updated May 1, 2026

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Location New York, NY
Check Size Small angel checks; specific size not publicly disclosed
Last Verified Investment Storyboarder (Pre-seed) — ~2023
Social @kortina LinkedIn
Stage Focus
pre-seed seed
Sector Focus
consumer fintech payments AI creator-economy vertical-saas

Background

Andrew Kortina is a New York-based technologist, writer, and angel investor best known for co-founding the peer-to-peer payments app Venmo with his college roommate Iqram Magdon-Ismail in 2009 12. Kortina and Magdon-Ismail were randomly assigned freshman roommates at the University of Pennsylvania in 2001; Kortina studied Philosophy and English at Penn before founding Venmo together 32. The company was acquired by Braintree in 2012 (and Braintree was in turn acquired by PayPal in 2013) 14.

After Venmo, Kortina co-founded Fin in 2015 with Sam Lessin (former Facebook VP of product, now general partner at Slow Ventures) 56. Fin launched as a human/AI-powered personal assistant (“Uber for executive assistants”) and pivoted in late 2018 to a B2B workplace analytics SaaS product, raising a $20M Series A in September 2021 led by Coatue with First Round Capital, Accel, and Kleiner Perkins 57. The original Fin Assistant service was wound down before the pivot — Kortina later wrote that “although our team was very efficient, it was still more expensive than most customers wanted” 8.

Kortina maintains a personal blog at kortina.nyc focused on technology, philosophy, politics, and culture 9. His current activities include writing essays, producing short films, running an Oakland Film Club, and teaching MIT IAP seminars on narrative, AI, consciousness, and film noir 9. He is on Twitter/X as @kortina (account joined April 2007) 10. No Bluesky account was located within the research window.

Stated Thesis

Kortina does not publish a formal investment thesis. His public writing and interview commentary instead emphasize how technology reshapes work, dignity, and culture — themes that consistently surface in the Y Combinator interview and his essays 11.

In a Y Combinator interview, Kortina framed his framing of money and software in expansive, philosophical terms: “Money is the API for people” and “The singularity already happened and money is the algorithm that is already controlling all the people” 11. He has also publicly contrasted Silicon Valley’s self-image with Wall Street’s: “Wall Street is honest about making money. Silicon Valley oversells the feel-good-about-yourself thing” 11.

On building Fin, he emphasized the difficulty of going horizontal rather than narrow: “The hardest thing about Fin is just complexity… We’re competing with a full-time human assistant, and a full-time human assistant will just do whatever you ask them” 11.

Inferred Thesis

This analysis is based on a small set of publicly verifiable angel checks. CB Insights records 5 total investments for Kortina, with full details disclosed only for the most recent (Axis, Nov 2021); the four earlier investments (June 2013, July 2014, October 2014, January 2015) are listed without company names on the public CB Insights profile 12. PitchBook, Tracxn, and aggregator sites name three additional companies in his portfolio — Storyboarder, Left Right Studios, and Communo — without dates or round details for most 1313. Sample size is too small for reliable percentages.

Verified angel investments (4):

  • Axis (Egyptian fintech, Seed, Nov 2021) — co-invested alongside Tiger Global, Sawari Ventures, Raba, Firstminute Capital, RaliCap, Kunal Shah, Iqram Magdon-Ismail, and others 1412
  • Communo (Canadian gig-economy platform for creative professionals, Angel, Jan 2020) — co-invested with W. Brett Wilson and others 13
  • Storyboarder (YC-backed comic/manga creation tool, Pre-seed, May 2023) — co-invested with Y Combinator and David Karp (Tumblr founder) per third-party reporting 1516
  • Left Right Studios — listed as a Kortina investment by PitchBook/Tracxn aggregators; no primary press confirmation located within the research window 13

Sector observations (qualitative, given small sample): Of the four named companies, two are fintech/payments-adjacent (Axis, Communo’s gig-economy creator platform), one is a creative/media tool (Storyboarder), and one is media production (Left Right Studios, per aggregators). Despite his Venmo origins, his verified angel checks are not predominantly fintech.

Co-investor patterns: Kortina frequently co-invests with his Venmo co-founder Iqram Magdon-Ismail (confirmed on Axis 14) and is connected to Sam Lessin / Slow Ventures through Fin and shared early-stage networks 5. He has co-invested with Kunal Shah (CRED founder, confirmed on Axis) 14.

Geographic focus: Mixed — Axis is Egypt-based, Communo is Canadian, Storyboarder is US-based. Sample too small to characterize geographic preference.

Notable gap: Public records of Kortina’s angel investments are sparse. CB Insights records 5 investments, while aggregator pages list 3 named companies; only Axis has full primary-press confirmation 121314. He appears to be a low-volume, selective angel rather than a high-frequency check-writer. The most recent verifiable investment found is from November 2021 — there is no primary-press evidence in the research window of angel investments by Kortina in 2022-2026.

Portfolio

Company Year Stage Source
Axis 2021-11-01 Seed 14
Communo 2020-01-31 Angel 13
Storyboarder ~2023 Pre-seed 1516
~unknown Left Right Studios Year unknown Stage unknown

This table represents 4 named angel investments. CB Insights records 5 investments total but discloses only the most recent (Axis) on its public profile 12. Several earlier investments (2013-2015) appear in CB Insights’ timeline without company names. Kortina’s primary public footprint is as a founder (Venmo, Fin), not as a high-volume angel.

In Their Own Words

“Money is the API for people.” — Andrew Kortina, Y Combinator interview, “Andrew Kortina of Venmo and Fin on Technological Determinism and Work’s Relationship to Dignity” 11

“The singularity already happened and money is the algorithm that is already controlling all the people.” — Andrew Kortina, Y Combinator interview 11

“Wall Street is honest about making money. Silicon Valley oversells the feel-good-about-yourself thing.” — Andrew Kortina, Y Combinator interview 11

“The hardest thing about Fin is just complexity.” — Andrew Kortina, Y Combinator interview 11

“We’re competing with a full-time human assistant, and a full-time human assistant will just do whatever you ask them.” — Andrew Kortina on Fin’s product ambition, Y Combinator interview 11

“Why would a culture connect dignity with the idea of work?” — Andrew Kortina, Y Combinator interview 11

“We noticed that we were still using cash and checks to pay each other back and thought this was silly.” — Andrew Kortina on Venmo’s founding problem, “Origins of Venmo” essay, June 2014 2

“Let’s just try to solve this problem, and build a way to pay each other back that feels consistent with all of the other experiences we have in apps we use with our friends.” — Andrew Kortina on Venmo’s design philosophy, “Origins of Venmo,” June 2014 2

“Having as advisors two entrepreneurs who were operating companies themselves proved incredibly valuable.” — Andrew Kortina on Venmo’s early advisors, “Origins of Venmo,” June 2014 2

“Raising money for Venmo was just like, it always know there was always like some law changing where we needed tons of money immediately or we couldn’t pay people or we would be violating some law and end up in jail if we didn’t have enough money, which is never a good position to be raising money in.” — Andrew Kortina, Acquired podcast, Season 3 Episode 7 17

“Venmo never. While I was there, we never made any money. We would just be spending tons of money processing transactions.” — Andrew Kortina on Venmo’s revenue, Acquired podcast 17

“It was either like shut down the company or sell it. And we had an offer from Groupon for like a million bucks or something shitty like that.” — Andrew Kortina on the Braintree acquisition decision, Acquired podcast 17

“Although our team was very efficient, it was still more expensive than most customers wanted.” — Andrew Kortina on why the original Fin Assistant did not survive, Fin Assistant FAQ and archives, kortina.nyc 8

What Founders Say

No independently sourced founder testimonials specifically about working with Andrew Kortina as an angel investor were located within the research window for this profile. Public coverage of his named portfolio companies (Axis, Communo, Storyboarder, Left Right Studios) names him as a participating investor but does not include first-person founder quotes describing the working relationship. This section will be expanded if future founder commentary surfaces.

Connections

  • Iqram Magdon-Ismail — Venmo co-founder; Kortina’s freshman-year roommate at the University of Pennsylvania (2001) and continuous business partner through Venmo (2009-2012); confirmed co-investor on Axis (2021) 3214
  • Sam Lessin (Slow Ventures, former Facebook VP) — Co-founder of Fin (2015); was also one of the earliest angel investors in Venmo (Dec 2009 angel round, alongside his father Bob Lessin) 25
  • Chris Stanchak (TicketLeap CEO) — Early Venmo advisor; was Iqram Magdon-Ismail’s employer at TicketLeap before Venmo 2
  • Bob Lessin — Co-led Venmo’s first angel round (Dec 2009) alongside son Sam Lessin 2
  • Co-founded company: Venmo / Braintree / PayPal — co-founder from 2009 until the Braintree acquisition in 2012 (Braintree → PayPal in 2013) 14
  • Co-founded company: Fin — co-founder from 2015; consumer assistant pivoted to B2B workplace analytics SaaS in 2018-2019 57
  • Education: University of Pennsylvania — Philosophy and English, class of 2005; freshman roommate of Iqram Magdon-Ismail (2001) 32

Sources

  1. Knowledge at Wharton podcast, “Mobile Payments Pioneer: Venmo Was the Brainchild of Two University of Pennsylvania Graduates Who Were Freshman Roommates in 2001,” accessed May 2026. https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/podcast/knowledge-at-wharton-podcast/mobile-payments-pioneer-venmo-was-the-brainchild-of-two-university-of-pennsylvania-graduates-who-were-freshman-roommates-in-2001-andrew-kortina-and-iqram-magdon-ismail-with-venmo-users-receive-and/↩↩↩

  2. Andrew Kortina, “Origins of Venmo,” kortina.nyc, June 2, 2014. https://kortina.nyc/essays/origins-of-venmo/↩↩↩↩↩↩↩↩↩↩

  3. The Daily Pennsylvanian, “2005 College graduate switches paths to create Venmo,” April 2013. https://www.thedp.com/article/2013/04/2005-college-graduate-switches-paths-to-create-venmo↩↩↩

  4. Entrepreneur, “5 Lessons Venmo’s Co-Founder Learned While Building a Twice-Acquired Company,” August 2016. https://www.entrepreneur.com/growing-a-business/5-lessons-venmos-co-founder-learned-while-building-a/274949↩↩

  5. TechCrunch, “Sam Lessin and Andrew Kortina on their voice assistant’s workplace pivot,” July 2, 2019. https://techcrunch.com/2019/07/02/sam-lessin-and-andrew-kortina-on-their-voice-assistants-workplace-pivot/↩↩↩↩↩

  6. TechCrunch, “Inside ‘Fin,’ the elite human/AI assistant,” December 22, 2017. https://techcrunch.com/2017/12/22/fin-assistant/↩

  7. Crunchbase, “Fin — Company Profile and Funding,” accessed May 2026. https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/betterwithfin↩↩

  8. Andrew Kortina, “fin assistant faq and archives,” kortina.nyc, accessed May 2026. https://kortina.nyc/notes/fin-assistant-archives-and-faq/↩↩

  9. Andrew Kortina, “Experiments and Essays” (homepage), kortina.nyc, accessed May 2026. https://kortina.nyc/↩↩

  10. Andrew Kortina (@kortina), Twitter/X profile, accessed May 2026. https://x.com/kortina↩

  11. Y Combinator blog, “Andrew Kortina of Venmo and Fin on Technological Determinism and Work’s Relationship to Dignity,” accessed May 2026. https://www.ycombinator.com/blog/andrew-kortina-of-venmo-and-fin-on-technological-determinism-and-works-relationship-to-dignity↩↩↩↩↩↩↩↩↩↩

  12. CB Insights, “Andrew Kortina Portfolio Investments,” accessed May 2026. https://www.cbinsights.com/investor/andrew-kortina↩↩↩↩

  13. Tracxn, “Andrew Kortina — Portfolio & Founded Companies,” accessed May 2026. https://tracxn.com/d/people/andrew-kortina/__MkY-iYn7Em_ybof2X3eBTyEsiMhPAmUQeMVguu8AxAg↩↩↩↩↩↩

  14. TechCrunch, “Tiger Global-backed Axis launches digital payments platform for Egyptian SMEs months after its $8.25M seed,” May 17, 2023. https://techcrunch.com/2023/05/17/tiger-global-backed-axis-launches-digital-payments-platform-for-egyptian-smes-months-after-its-8-25m-seed/↩↩↩↩↩↩

  15. PitchBook, “Andrew Kortina investment portfolio,” accessed May 2026. https://pitchbook.com/profiles/investor/222535-72↩↩

  16. Crunchbase, “Storyboarder — Company Profile & Funding,” accessed May 2026. https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/storyboarder↩↩

  17. Acquired podcast, “Season 3 Episode 7 — Venmo (live with Andrew Kortina),” accessed May 2026. https://www.acquired.fm/episodes/season-3-episode-7-venmo-sf-live-show-with-andrew-kortina↩↩↩