Glenn Solomon

Background

Glenn Solomon is a Managing Partner at Notable Capital (formerly GGV Capital), where he leads the Cloud Infrastructure & AI practice ¹. He joined the firm in 2006 and has spent nearly three decades in venture capital ².

Solomon earned a Bachelor of Arts in Public Policy from Stanford University, graduating with distinction, and was a member of Stanford’s NCAA championship-winning tennis team ²³. He went on to earn an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business, where he was named an Arjay Miller Scholar ².

Before joining GGV, Solomon spent roughly a decade in venture investing and finance. He began his career as a financial analyst at Goldman Sachs (approximately 1991–1993), then worked as an associate at SPO Partners, a San Francisco-based private investment partnership (approximately 1993–1995) ³. From approximately 1997 to 2006, he served as General Partner at Partech International, where he led investments in Broadbase Software (acquired by Kana), Datacenter Technologies (acquired by Veritas/Symantec), Digital Island (acquired by Cable & Wireless), Pentasafe (acquired by NetIQ), and Vignette ³.

In 2006, Solomon joined GGV Capital as Managing Partner in the Menlo Park office ². GGV Capital rebranded its U.S. operations as Notable Capital in March 2024, following the firm’s separation from its Asia business (which became Granite Asia), a process driven by the geopolitical environment around U.S.–China investment ⁴.

Solomon has been recognized on the Forbes Midas List multiple times since 2009, including a ranking of #56 in 2011 ⁵.

He is co-founder and active supporter of The Spotlight Foundation, a nonprofit funding social entrepreneurs focused on educational opportunities for at-risk youth ¹².

Stated Thesis

(Self-reported: These represent what Solomon says publicly about his approach. See Inferred Thesis for analysis of actual investment behavior.)

Solomon’s publicly stated focus is enterprise and cloud infrastructure: security, developer tools, commercial open source, DevOps automation, application monitoring and optimization, and SaaS business applications ². He describes himself as identifying founders who are “creating new technology categories” ¹.

He has articulated a broad software market thesis publicly, stating: “Every company in the world is becoming a software company” ⁶. He has described his conviction that software investing is still early: in a podcast appearance, he characterized the opportunity as being in “inning two of the trillions to be created in infrastructure and development software” ⁶.

In a 2020 blog post on capital allocation, Solomon has written that “as a founder, there is no variable more important to manage adeptly than momentum,” and he advises founders that capital decisions should protect market leadership rather than follow formulas ⁷. He has advised: “I typically advise founders to raise cash when you can get it, but always have a plan to live off your current round that you can implement if the market turns downward” ⁷.

On board membership, Solomon has said publicly: “I think being a board member is a full contact sport, especially as you invest earlier and join boards that are of young companies” ⁸.

On the developer-focused software opportunity, Solomon has stated: “The people who build, deploy, and connect software are the tip of the spear for every company. If you can serve those constituents, you can build a big business” ⁹.

Inferred Thesis

Based on 34 verified investments in the portfolio table below:

Sector concentration (34 verified investments): - Security / cybersecurity: 9 companies (26%) — AlienVault, BitSight, Nozomi Networks, Orca Security, Synack, Torq, Patronus AI, Clover Security, Token Security - Developer tools / infrastructure: 7 companies (21%) — Coder, Browserbase, HashiCorp, LocalStack, Streamlit, Vercel, Neon - SaaS business applications: 6 companies (18%) — Tray.ai, Crosschq, Restless Bandit, Drata, Monte Carlo Data, Zendesk - Data / AI infrastructure: 5 companies (15%) — fal, StarTree, Unravel Data, Anthropic, Jam - Marketplaces / consumer: 3 companies (9%) — Airbnb, Opendoor, Square - Other enterprise software: 4 companies (12%) — Kong, NS1, Slack, Conviva

Stage distribution (34 verified investments): - Seed/Series A: 14 companies (41%) — HashiCorp (Series A), Nozomi Networks (Series A), Orca Security (Series A), Streamlit (Series A), Coder (Series B led), Drata (Series A led), AlienVault (Series D/early GGV), Tray.ai (Series A led), Restless Bandit (Series A), Neon (Series A-1), Crosschq (Seed), Patronus AI (Series A), Clover Security (Series A), Token Security (Series A) - Series B-C: 13 companies (38%) — BitSight (Series C), Synack (Series B), Opendoor (Series B), HashiCorp (Series B), NS1 (Series B1), Kong (Series C), Vercel (Series C+D), Monte Carlo Data, Torq (Series B), fal (Series B+C), Browserbase (Series B), StarTree (Series B), Jam (Series A) - Growth: 7 companies (21%) — Airbnb, Slack, Square, Zendesk, Conviva, Pandora, Anthropic

Key patterns:

Security-first concentration: Security is the single largest segment of Solomon’s verifiable portfolio — 9 of 34 investments (26%). This is well above what his stated thesis would predict. He has backed across the security sub-stack: network security (Nozomi), vulnerability assessment (Synack), security ratings (BitSight), cloud security (Orca Security, Clover Security), compliance automation (Drata), SOC automation (Torq), AI safety evaluation (Patronus AI), and machine identity security (Token Security).

Commercial open source as a recurring model: Several of Solomon’s most notable wins are built on open source foundations: HashiCorp (Terraform, Vault), Kong (API gateway), LocalStack (AWS emulation), and Streamlit (data app framework, acquired by Snowflake). This pattern predates the mainstream “open core” thesis by several years and represents a consistent investment signal.

Developer infrastructure emphasis: Even outside security, Solomon’s portfolio concentrates around infrastructure used by developers: Coder (cloud dev environments), Vercel (frontend deployment), Browserbase (browser automation for AI agents), Neon (serverless Postgres), LocalStack (AWS emulation). These companies sell to developers, not enterprise buyers.

Geographic concentration: Overwhelmingly San Francisco Bay Area and Silicon Valley, with some exposure to Israel-based companies (Nozomi Networks, Orca Security, Torq).

Co-investor patterns: Frequent co-investors across Solomon’s portfolio include Khosla Ventures (Opendoor), Mayfield (HashiCorp Series A), Redpoint Ventures (HashiCorp Series B, Orca Security), ICONIQ Growth (Orca Security, Drata), and Kleiner Perkins (Synack).

Recent AI pivot: Post-2024, Solomon’s new investments — Anthropic, Browserbase, fal, Patronus AI — signal a clear expansion into AI infrastructure and AI agents. This is a shift from the DevOps/security core of his earlier portfolio.

Founder profile: Solomon gravitates toward technical co-founders building infrastructure companies, often with an open source go-to-market component. Many portfolio founders are repeat entrepreneurs or have deep engineering backgrounds (Mitchell Hashimoto and Armon Dadgar of HashiCorp; Guillermo Rauch of Vercel; Paul Klein IV of Browserbase).

Note: This analysis covers 34 independently verified investments. Solomon has led many more investments over his 20-year GGV/Notable Capital career that could not be individually verified with sourced dates. Percentages should be treated as indicative based on the verified sample.

Portfolio

This table represents a partial view of Solomon’s portfolio. Solomon has led GGV investments in additional companies including Isilon Systems (acquired by EMC for $2.25B), Nimble Storage, Domo, QuinStreet, VDOO (acquired by JFrog), and others. Years marked “~” indicate approximate dates where the exact investment year could not be independently verified.

In Their Own Words

On the opportunity in developer-focused software:

“The people who build, deploy, and connect software are the tip of the spear for every company. If you can serve those constituents, you can build a big business.” — Glenn Solomon, Going Long blog, 2019 ⁹

On the scale of the software market:

“Every company in the world is becoming a software company.” — Glenn Solomon, Panic with Friends podcast with Howard Lindzon ⁶

On price discipline in venture:

“Price is a lazy way to pass on investments.” — Glenn Solomon, Panic with Friends podcast with Howard Lindzon ⁶

On the best companies:

“The best companies surprise you.” — Glenn Solomon, Panic with Friends podcast with Howard Lindzon ⁶

On board membership:

“I think being a board member is a full contact sport, especially as you invest earlier and join boards that are of young companies.” — Glenn Solomon, 20VC podcast with Harry Stebbings ⁸

On portfolio construction and concentration:

“I’ve gotten much more focused as an investor myself. If you look at what I’ve done over the last decade, 99% of my activity has been in and around application level software applications that solve really modern business problems brought about by cloud and mobile.” — Glenn Solomon, 20VC podcast with Harry Stebbings ⁸

On how to think about winners:

“In the case where you have a winner, there is almost no price that’s too high to pay relative to where outcomes can be.” — Glenn Solomon, 20VC podcast with Harry Stebbings ⁸

On startup momentum:

“As a founder, there is no variable more important to manage adeptly than momentum.” — Glenn Solomon, “To Burn or Not to Burn,” Going Long blog ⁷

On fundraising strategy:

“I typically advise founders to raise cash when you can get it, but always have a plan to live off your current round that you can implement if the market turns downward.” — Glenn Solomon, “To Burn or Not to Burn,” Going Long blog ⁷

On investor alignment:

“Make sure your investors are in alignment with your strategy. If you face unexpected challenges, you’ll need their support more than ever.” — Glenn Solomon, “To Burn or Not to Burn,” Going Long blog ⁷

On the Opendoor investment thesis:

“The value proposition just really resonated with me. And yes, there is a lot of skepticism about it. We like skepticism.” — Glenn Solomon, 20VC podcast with Harry Stebbings ⁸

On BitSight’s market:

“Bitsight has created what Gartner is now recognizing as the Security Ratings Services market.” — Glenn Solomon, BitSight Series C press release, September 2016 ¹⁶

On the HashiCorp investment:

“HashiCorp’s ability to deliver complete, stable open source DevOps software over the past five years shows the dedication, excellence, and productivity of this team.” — Glenn Solomon, HashiCorp Series A press release, December 2014 ¹⁷

On investing in Jam:

“Product managers and engineers love Jam because it speeds feedback cycles with extremely high fidelity. Across the GGV Capital U.S. portfolio, product velocity and product quality are extremely important success factors.” — Glenn Solomon, Jam Series A announcement, February 2024 ³²

On Browserbase and the AI agent opportunity:

“The future is software doing work on your behalf. But if it’s going to do work for you, it needs to do the same types of actions that you do.” — Glenn Solomon, Browserbase Series B announcement, June 2025 ³⁴

On the Vercel opportunity:

“Tens of millions of developers — anyone who knows JavaScript — could feasibly use Vercel in the future.” — Glenn Solomon, Going Long blog, June 2021 ²⁹

On Nozomi Networks investment thesis:

“Our investment thesis derives from the team, the technology and the market.” — Glenn Solomon, Nozomi Networks Series A blog post, October 2016 ¹⁹

On Notable Capital in 2025:

“2025 was a year of unprecedented momentum for @NotableCap. We backed ambitious founders building at the frontier of AI, infrastructure & cybersecurity, from @AnthropicAI to @Browserbase & @fal.” — Glenn Solomon, post on X, January 2026 ³⁵

What Founders Say

No independently sourced founder testimonials found. Solomon’s portfolio company founders have appeared on his Founder Real Talk podcast but their statements there do not include assessments of him as an investor. No founder testimonials were found on Twitter/X, Product Hunt, or press coverage after dedicated searching.

Connections

Board seats (current, per Notable Capital website): BitSight, Browserbase, Coder, Crosschq, fal, Jam, LocalStack, Netbox Labs, Nozomi Networks, Patronus AI, StarTree, Synack, Torq, Tray.ai, Unravel Data ¹

Board observer roles (current, per Notable Capital website): Vercel, Drata, Kong, Monte Carlo Data, Tonic.ai ¹

Prior board seats (exited): HashiCorp (until IBM acquisition 2024) ³⁶, Opendoor (as of Form 4 filings 2025) ³⁷, AlienVault (until AT&T acquisition), Streamlit (until Snowflake acquisition)

Co-investors (by frequency across verified portfolio): - Khosla Ventures — Opendoor ¹⁴, Neon ³¹ - Redpoint Ventures — HashiCorp Series B ¹⁸, Orca Security Series B ²⁵ - Mayfield — HashiCorp Series A ¹⁷ - ICONIQ Growth — Orca Security Series B ²⁵, Drata Series B ²⁸ - Kleiner Perkins — Synack ¹⁵, Browserbase ³⁴

Prior employers: Goldman Sachs (analyst, ~1991–1993), SPO Partners (associate, ~1993–1995), Partech International (General Partner, ~1997–2006) ³

Community: Host of Founder Real Talk podcast (Notable Capital) ³⁸; contributor to Forbes.com on enterprise technology ³⁹

Sources