Motivate

Motivate

David Wieland and Lauren DeLuca, who met as Notre Dame undergraduates, co-founded Motivate in 2019 after each had built and exited multiple operating companies. Wieland sold InnFlux (hotel Wi-Fi) and RIVS (video hiring platform) to private equity, and co-founded IrishAngels, a Notre Dame-affiliated angel group deploying $10M+ annually. DeLuca co-founded Oxford Intelligence Partners (sold to Q4 in 2015) and Victory Networks (sold to QuantHouse in 2017), and ran Sumo Capital, a multi-strategy prop trading firm. Motivate targets pre-seed and seed investments, writing $250k–$1M at pre-seed and $1.5M–$3M at seed. The firm focuses on fintech, enterprise software, and AI/ML, with confirmed portfolio companies including Mesh (earned wage access), Ensemble AI (multi-modal AI models), and Clyr (manufacturing OS). Past GP investments include Chime, Public.com, Home Chef (acquired), Hallow, and TradingView. Geographically, Motivate backs founders across the US, with offices in Chicago, Palo Alto, San Antonio, San Francisco, Boulder, and Fairfield. The firm has six professionals, including General Partners David Wieland, Lauren DeLuca, and Andy Will (who joined via the acquisition of his firm Willpower VC). Andy Will previously led investments at Zeal Capital Partners and Listen Ventures, and is a Kauffman Fellow (Class 28). Motivate also maintains an emerging VC fund support program, investing in early-stage VC funds alongside direct deal activity. Motivate's structural differentiator is its operator-rooted partnership: all three GPs have built and sold their own companies, giving them direct experience in company-building. The firm also co-creates startups with founders, leveraging its own network and domain expertise to incubate ideas from concept through seed.