Over the past 25 years, we have spent a great deal of time thinking about how to build enduring companies. Increasingly, I find myself thinking just as much about how to build an enduring investment firm.
In addition to developing the exceptional people already at Headline, a big part of that is attracting exceptional people who share our values but bring their own perspectives, relationships, and ambitions. People who don’t simply join what we have built, but help shape what Headline becomes next.
That is why I am particularly excited to welcome Jake Storm as a General Partner on our US Early team.
Jake joins us from Felicis, where he became a General Partner in 2024, following several years at IVP. Earlier in his career, he worked in technology investment banking at Jefferies and enterprise software sales at Qualtrics and Zuora. It is an unusually broad background that gives him a very practical understanding of what it takes to build and sell technology.
But what impressed me most about Jake is a combination that I think is quite rare: a tremendous investment track record and trajectory, a repeatable way of finding and supporting exceptional founders, and an approach to venture and culture that feels completely aligned with ours.
A repeatable engine built on trust
One thing I have learned in venture is that the best investor relationships often begin long before the term sheet.
Jake has taken that idea particularly far. Over the years, he has built an extraordinary network of CISOs and technology leaders, which gives him a direct understanding of customer needs and emerging opportunities. But more importantly, he has turned those relationships into a repeatable way to identify promising founders early and help them build.
That is much more interesting to me than simply having a large network. It is a genuine investment capability.
At IVP and Felicis, Jake worked with companies including Papaya Global, Lyra Health, Whoop, CircleCI, Tines, Revel, Runlayer, C1, and Artemis. And the feedback from founders speaks for itself:
“Jake rocks. He has a huge network, he’s super sharp, and he works really hard for his founders. He had introduced us to more than ten customers before we ever discussed a round. When we were picking a partner for our Series A, we already knew what it was like to work with Jake. That made the decision easy.”
– Dan Shiebler, Co-Founder and CTO of Artemis
“Jake has backed us in every round, and he’s my first call whenever something comes up. When we needed to get in front of security and AI leaders, he pulled together an event with 50 buyers on three weeks’ notice. That’s the kind of partner he is.”
– Andy Berman, Co-Founder and CEO of Runlayer
“Jake backed me as a founder more than four years ago, and he was there through thick and thin. In our hardest stretch, he made sure we had the time to see it through, and he stayed in my corner until our Cursor acquisition. Once I was running security there, I watched him pound the table for other founders because he truly believed in what they were building. Jake will battle for the people he backs, and I’ve seen it from both sides.”
– Travis McPeak, Security Products Leader at Anthropic
I think these reflections say more about Jake than any description I could write.
Exceptional talent, shared values
Of course, investment ability alone is not enough. At Headline, we have always believed that how people work together matters enormously.
We try to combine what I often call European intellectual humility with extraordinary American ambition. We want people who aim very high, move quickly, and act with conviction, but who are also thoughtful, low-ego, willing to challenge their own assumptions and genuinely enjoy building together.
In getting to know Jake, it became clear that he shares that philosophy.
He has described the culture as our product, and talks about combining the highest ambitions with a willingness to seek the truth, all built on trust and low ego.
I could not have put it much better myself.
We want to give exceptional people real agency and the freedom to build. In return, we ask for real accountability. Jake is exactly the kind of investor I am excited to build the next chapter of Headline alongside.
Looking ahead
Jake will invest across our US Early strategy, bringing particularly deep expertise in cybersecurity and AI infrastructure, but with the curiosity and range to look well beyond those categories.
We are living through an extraordinary period of technological change. AI is fundamentally changing how companies are built and what they can accomplish. And we believe this is only the beginning of a much longer cycle.
Finding the exceptional companies that emerge from these shifts requires more than excitement about new technology. It requires judgment, deep customer understanding, and the ability to build relationships with founders that endure over many years.
Jake brings all three.
Just as we ask our founders to think about the long arc, we are doing the same at Headline. We are building the next generation of leadership, with people who can take what we have built and make it even better.
Jake, welcome to Headline. We couldn’t be more excited to have you with us, and I very much look forward to what we will build together.
