Venture Capital

Lux Capital

Lux Capital is a New York City-based venture capital firm founded in 2000 by Josh Wolfe, Peter Hebert, and Robert Paull that backs entrepreneurs building companies at the frontier of science and technology, turning "sci-fi into sci-fact." The firm systematically mines academia and government research labs for breakthrough technologies that have matured beyond proof-of-concept but have not yet attracted mainstream venture attention, then makes long-term bets on contrarians and outsiders challenging the status quo. Lux invests primarily at early stage across three focus areas: AI and technology, defense/space/ manufacturing, and biotech/healthcare, with an emphasis on deep tech, robotics, and emerging science. The firm manages roughly $7 billion in assets under management across nine core funds, closing Lux Ventures IX at $1.5 billion in January 2026, and has invested in over 200 companies. Through Lux Labs, launched in 2024, the firm has also helped create more than 20 new companies. Notable portfolio companies include Anduril, Applied Intuition, Databricks, Cognition, Ramp, Runway, Recursion Pharmaceuticals, Planet, and Saildrone. Lux is headquartered in New York City with an additional office in Silicon Valley.

102 portfolio companies 101 publish APIs here 12 properties
Venture CapitalDeep TechEarly StageArtificial IntelligenceDefenseBiotechSpaceRoboticsNew YorkScience
Portfolio Strength across 99 profiled portfolio companies on the network
2 top-rated API companies 0 exemplar · 2 strong
7 agent-ready companies 0 agent-native · 7 agent-ready
Average quality of the book:
Composite emerging 17.1
Agent-Readiness human-only 6.7

Firms are ranked by cumulative portfolio strength — how many highly-rated API companies they've backed, weighted by tier across composite quality and agent-readiness. The averages below are a secondary read on the typical company in the book.

Lux Capital has 102 portfolio companies tracked on the APIs.io network, of which 101 (99%) publish APIs indexed here.

Its highest-rated API providers on the network are Databricks, Rigetti Computing, Ramp, Primer, Phonic.

Portfolio on the Network

Portfolio companies that publish APIs indexed on APIs.io, grouped by their API Evangelist rating. Exemplar and Strong are expanded by default.

Strong 2 Solid coverage with minor gaps
Developing 9 Usable, with meaningful gaps to close
Thin 15 Limited public surface area
Emerging 22 Early or largely undocumented
Minimal 51 Almost no public developer surface
Unrated 2 Not yet scored

Rest of Portfolio

1 further portfolio companies that don’t yet have a provider page on the network.

Paradigm

Scroll for all 1

Properties

Portfolio

Where the firm publishes its investments

Team

Partners and investing staff

Content

Blog, podcast, newsletter, and research

Firm

The firm itself

Cohort brief

Auto-generated

The 99 portfolio companies with APIs in the catalog, backed by Lux Capital, scored on the Kin Score. Every figure below is computed from the catalog — nothing here is written.

Providers
99
of 101 on the roster
Mean Kin Score
16.8
-3.9 vs catalog 20.7
Mean Agent Readiness
6.5
-3.2 vs catalog 9.7
Spread
1.3–59.1
median 10.6 · σ 15
How the 99 split by band
Exemplar 0Strong 2Developing 10Thin 13Emerging 22Minimal 52
Facet averages, against the whole catalog
FacetThis cohortCatalogDifferenceScored
Contract Governance 4.6 6.4 -1.8 99
Discoverability 58.2 60.4 -2.2 99
Operational Transparency 8.4 11.3 -2.9 99
Developer Ergonomics 14.8 17.9 -3.1 99
Access Clarity 18.8 22.3 -3.5 99
Contract Quality 11.6 17.5 -5.9 99

A facet is averaged over the members that carry it, not over the whole cohort — the “Scored” column is that count. Averaging an absent facet as zero would score our own coverage gaps as the providers’ posture.

What this cohort publishes
ArtifactThis cohortCatalogDifference
MCP server (any) 14% 16% -2
MCP server (first-party) 3% 7% -4
Agent Skills 0% 0% 0
OAuth scopes 4% 9% -5
Security 87% 88% -1
Arazzo workflows 3% 2% +1
Governance rules 8% 13% -5

mcp_pct counts any mcp/ artifact including ones API Evangelist derived from the provider OpenAPI; mcp_first_party_pct counts only servers the provider publishes. Prefer the latter.

Top by Kin Score
  1. 1 Databricks 59.1
  2. 2 Rigetti Computing 57.2
  3. 3 Ramp 53
  4. 4 Primer 50.5
  5. 5 Thatch 49
  6. 6 Phonic 45
  7. 7 Runway 44.7
  8. 8 Tines 43.6
  9. 9 Cognition AI 41
  10. 10 Planet 40.6
Top by Agent Readiness
  1. 1 Phonic 40.8
  2. 2 Databricks 40.1
  3. 3 LangChain 31.7
  4. 4 Cognition AI 31.3
  5. 5 Primer 29.8
  6. 6 Rigetti Computing 29.3
  7. 7 Ramp 27.5
  8. 8 Instock 27.2
  9. 9 Shapeways 26.1
  10. 10 Rivet 23.7
This roster declares 101 members; 99 resolve to a provider in the catalog and 99 carry a score (100%). The figures above describe the scored members only.Generated from the catalog build of 25 August 2026, across 26891 providers, using the same computation served by the APIs.io cohort API. Briefs are published for rosters of 5 or more scored providers; below that a distribution is not meaningful.

Source (apis.yml)

apis.yml Raw ↑
aid: lux-capital
name: Lux Capital
description: >-
  Lux Capital is a New York City-based venture capital firm founded in 2000 by
  Josh Wolfe, Peter Hebert, and Robert Paull that backs entrepreneurs building
  companies at the frontier of science and technology, turning "sci-fi into
  sci-fact." The firm systematically mines academia and government research labs
  for breakthrough technologies that have matured beyond proof-of-concept but
  have not yet attracted mainstream venture attention, then makes long-term bets
  on contrarians and outsiders challenging the status quo. Lux invests primarily
  at early stage across three focus areas: AI and technology, defense/space/
  manufacturing, and biotech/healthcare, with an emphasis on deep tech, robotics,
  and emerging science. The firm manages roughly $7 billion in assets under
  management across nine core funds, closing Lux Ventures IX at $1.5 billion in
  January 2026, and has invested in over 200 companies. Through Lux Labs, launched
  in 2024, the firm has also helped create more than 20 new companies. Notable
  portfolio companies include Anduril, Applied Intuition, Databricks, Cognition,
  Ramp, Runway, Recursion Pharmaceuticals, Planet, and Saildrone. Lux is
  headquartered in New York City with an additional office in Silicon Valley.
x-type: venture-capital
x-category: Venture Capital
deliveryModel:
  model: unknown
  open_source: false
  commercial: false
  callable_host: false
  label: Delivery model not determined — needs a product licence on record
  confidence: low
  source:
  - none
  generated: '2026-08-28'
  method: derived
accessModel:
  pricing: unknown
  onboarding: unknown
  trial: false
  try_now: false
  public: false
  label: Unknown
  confidence: low
  source: []
  generated: '2026-07-22'
  method: derived
image: https://www.luxcapital.com/favicon.ico
created: '2026-07-17'
modified: '2026-07-17'
specificationVersion: '0.23'
tags:
  - Venture Capital
  - Deep Tech
  - Early Stage
  - Artificial Intelligence
  - Defense
  - Biotech
  - Space
  - Robotics
  - New York
  - Science
apis: []
common:
  - type: Website
    url: https://www.luxcapital.com/
  - type: Portfolio
    url: https://www.luxcapital.com/companies
  - type: Portfolio
    url: portfolio/lux-capital-portfolio.yml
  - type: Team
    url: https://www.luxcapital.com/people
  - type: Team
    url: team/lux-capital-team.yml
  - type: News
    url: https://www.luxcapital.com/news
  - type: Podcast
    url: https://www.riskgaming.com/podcast
  - type: Newsletter
    url: https://www.riskgaming.com/
  - type: Contact
    url: https://www.luxcapital.com/contact
  - type: Crunchbase
    url: https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/lux-capital
  - type: LinkedIn
    url: https://www.linkedin.com/company/lux-capital/
  - type: Twitter
    url: https://twitter.com/Lux_Capital
  - type: Features
    data:
      - 'Stage: Early stage (seed to Series A), select growth'
      - 'Sectors: AI and technology, defense/space/manufacturing, biotech/healthcare, deep tech, robotics'
      - 'Geography: United States (primary), global'
      - 'AUM: ~$7 billion (self-reported)'
      - 'Latest fund: Lux Ventures IX, $1.5 billion (closed January 2026)'
      - 'Funds: 9 core funds'
      - 'Companies: 200+ invested; 20+ created via Lux Labs (est. 2024)'
      - 'Founded: 2000'
      - 'Founders: Josh Wolfe, Peter Hebert, Robert Paull'
      - 'HQ: New York City, NY (additional office in Silicon Valley)'
    sources:
      - https://www.luxcapital.com/about
      - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lux_Capital
    updated: '2026-07-17'
maintainers:
  - FN: Kin Lane
    email: kin@apievangelist.com
    url: https://apievangelist.com
  - FN: APIs.json
    url: http://apisjson.org
  - FN: Lux Capital
    email: info@luxcapital.com
    url: https://www.luxcapital.com/

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