“We have been fortunate to work with several strategic investors, yet no other investor gave better feedback or direction on how to fine tune our products for the real world than Ryan.”

— Luke Schoenfelder, Founder & CEO, Latch

“You evaluate great investors by how they react when things go badly. We lost 70% of clients in COVID, and one of the key reasons we were able to rebuild to growth and a successful exit is through the trusted advisory, strategic navigation and heartfelt support of David and the Alpaca team.”

— Trevor Sumner, Perch

“Alpaca has exceeded all my expectations as our lead investor. Aubrie acts as a real partner and has been able to do things outside of what a typical investor does. She helps with our business development, pokes holes in our product and documentation and challenges us in ways that allow us to grow.”

— Cory Cummings, Co-Founder & CEO, Pack Digital

“Daniel has been a true mentor, confidant and cheerleader who genuinely cares about Acelab’s success. His strategic insights and hands-on involvement have made him a pivotal partner in our journey.”

— Vardhan Mehta, Co-Founder & CEO, Acelab

Team

Ryan Freedman

General Partner

Investment Interest Areas

PropTech, FinTech

Journey

Ryan Freedman is a trailblazing real estate entrepreneur and investor with a passion for marrying innovation with efficiency in the Built World. At the helm of Corigin, a real estate investment firm with $600 million AUM, Ryan’s forward-thinking leadership pioneered the co-living space, introducing a community-centric approach to multi-family real estate well ahead of the curve. He also spearheaded the adoption of transformative real estate technologies to elevate operational and investment excellence. In 2008, he co-founded Coral Capital, a forward-thinking commercial finance platform that has facilitated over $1.5 billion in financing to small businesses. His relentless drive for progress and efficiency led him into venture capital and PropTech investment, where his foresight continues to shape the future of real estate. Ryan received his BA in Business and in Real Estate & Urban Land Economics from the University of Wisconsin – Madison.

Board Seats

Zeel, Prevu, Nectar

Aubrie Pagano

General Partner

Investment Interest Areas

Commerce Enablement, Supply Chain, Consumer, with recent themes in Returns, Liquidation, Personalization, and what Aubrie has coined “The Aquarius Economy”

Journey

Aubrie brings Commerce experience from both sides of the New York City startup ecosystem as both an operator and investor. Most recently, she built and sold cult-favorite apparel and gifting brand Bow & Drape, acquired by Win Brands in 2019. Aubrie drove the omni-channel brand to profitability by retailing direct-to-consumer online and in over 350 Nordstrom, Bloomingdale’s, Macy’s and Hudson’s Bay stores globally. Toward the end of her Bow & Drape journey, she began angel investing out of XFactor Ventures, an early stage fund of female operators backing startups with at least one female founder. There, she led investments in Commerce brands and platforms including Maude, Ceremonia, Foodology, and August. Prior to startups, she started her career in the internal strategy group at Fidelity Investments, where she became the fastest-promoted Analyst to a post-MBA role. She is a 2008 Harvard graduate. Aubrie lives in Brooklyn with her partner and still creates art (right-left brained) in her spare time.

Board Seats

TapStitch, Intramotev, Pack, Mayple, Optiversal

David Goldberg

General Partner

Investment Interest Areas

Commerce, Consumer, Marketplaces, Vertical AI, Web3

Journey

David cofounded Alpaca in 2014 after his own entrepreneurial journey as Founder and CEO of FreshNeck, a subscription-based men’s neckwear exchange service. Focused on Commerce, including Consumer and Marketplaces, David enjoys partnering with startups on high-level strategy and building scalable ‘operating systems’ rooted in structured priorities and OKRs. Drawing on the knowledge that comes with traversing the startup founder path himself, he relies on empathy and personal experience to form deep bonds with founders and add value where it matters most. Before getting the startup bug, David spent three years as an Assistant District Attorney, representing the people of New York, and, following that, three years across Merrill Lynch and Jefferies & Co. He holds a B.A. in Marketing and Sports Management from the University of Miami (where he now teaches “Intro to VC”), an MBA from Fordham University and a JD from Fordham University Law School. David now lives with his family in Miami, where he champions the emerging tech ecosystem.

Board Seats

Foyer, AllUp

Daniel Fetner

General Partner

Investment Interest Areas

PropTech, ConTech

Journey

Daniel is a two-time co-founder turned investor with family roots in real estate. His deep focus on PropTech is driven by his thesis that real estate is both the largest asset class in the world and also its most antiquated industry, a juxtaposition signaling immense white space for opportunity. With real estate builders, developers, owners, and investors in his family, Daniel has seen the pain points and opportunities from numerous major stakeholder perspectives firsthand. This knowledge informs his work as an investor and his previous journeys into entrepreneurship. Daniel spent the early part of his career in Real Estate Private Equity and Investment Banking and then joined J.P. Morgan’s Private Bank, where he built a book of business focused on Silicon Alley entrepreneurs and investors. Daniel then co-founded a Construction Tech company, Soil Connect, which is the leading marketplace for soil and aggregates. Daniel received his BBA from the University of Michigan and received his MBA from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Daniel lives in South Florida with his wife, two children, and dog, Bueller.

Board Seats

Bonus Homes, Acelab

Ray Updyke

Senior VP Operations & Finance

Journey

Ray leads the operations, finance, and compliance functions for Alpaca. Prior to joining Alpaca, Ray was the CFO and CCO of Ampfield Management, an investment management firm. He previously worked at Jefferies Financial Group, a publicly traded company, where he worked on budgets, projections, and automation projects for the parent company. He began his career in hedge fund accounting & reporting with ALPS Alternative Investment Services in their Boston office. He graduated with high honors from the University of Maine with a BS in Business Administration with a major in Accounting and he also graduated from the University of Connecticut with a MS in Accounting. Ray is a Certified Public Accountant and a CFA® charterholder.

Josh Jagota

Principal

Investment Interest Areas

Foundational Industries, Agent-to-Agent Infrastructure, Agentic Coordination for SMBs, and Emotional AI or Consumer bets that preserve Human Agency as we enter The Aquarius Economy.

Journey

Josh combines company-building experience and economic acumen to identify transformative companies at the intersection of AI and scientific advancement. His investments span from nuclear and critical minerals to creative computation and scientific superintelligence.Most recently, Josh received his MBA from The Wharton School while leading a team of 12 investors writing pre-seed investments at The MBA Fund (incl. Vulcan Elements, Starlab Space, Paradigm, and others). Prior to Wharton, Josh was recruited as the first employee and Chief of Staff at Dwelling, where he shipped software and operating playbooks to make homeownership more accessible while helping close the company’s seed round from Kleiner Perkins, SV Angel, FJ Labs, Jack Dorsey, Not Boring, Banana Capital and others in 2022 directly with the CEO.Josh started his career at Analysis Group, where his quantitative casework with the Department of Justice exposed him to deeply embedded risks across economic systems. He took that exposure to Betterment’s lean operations team in NYC, building playbooks that supported the company’s growth to $50B in AUM and unicorn status to help people build and protect wealth so they can live easier.

While he never thought he’d be a venture capitalist, he is convinced risk capital needs to better understand technology to preserve agency as we approach AGI. This is inspired by the “craziest days of Josh’s career” which included his team protecting billions in equity portfolio rebalances during the 2020 pandemic related stock market crash, helping an underserved single mom close on her first home with a underutilized grant program, and the summer of 2025 where he once had 5 LLMs talk to each other about whether or not they were conscious.Josh also holds a BA of Economics from UCLA, where he was recognized as a William F. Sharpe Fellow.

His recent investments include Earth AI, Applied Atomics, Symbiotica Inc, Autopoesis Biosciences.

Lorraine Sanders

Head of Content

Journey

Lorraine drives content and communications at Alpaca VC. A longtime journalist and podcast host, she spent nearly 15 years covering startups and small businesses at the forefront of innovation. During that time, she focused primarily on the connections among fashion, tech and sustainability for media outlets including the San Francisco Chronicle, Fast Company, Women’s Wear Daily and many others. Counting more than 400K downloads, her previous podcast, the Spirit of 608, featured weekly interviews with female founders working at the intersection of fashion, entrepreneurship, sustainability and tech. She cut her teeth as a writer creating content for Kayak and, prior to that, Travelocity. She holds double Bachelor of Arts degrees from Brown University (English and Religious Studies) and a Masters in Communications from Stanford University.