@aaref profile picture
Aaref Hilaly @aaref

First a Founder, then a CEO, now @BainCapVC focused on AI seed & Series A. Helping out at @cognition, @DecagonAI, @evenuplaw, @krea_ai, @simile_ai & others.

Joined June 2008
  • Posts 2,070
  • Following 969
  • Followers 9,556
227 Photos and videos
Love this guy! Totally low profile. Quietly went zero to $3.6b in cash in seven years - building a business with real recurring revenue best in class metrics. @CTurlica is one of the best! @BainCapVC is lucky to work with him, thanks to my partner @merritthummer
Bloomberg
@business
May 28
Engineering software maker Autodesk has agreed to buy MaintainX, a firm focused on maintenance tools bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
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Fun night at @trajectorylabs. Congrats @rronak_, @MichaelElabd & @QuantumArjun on pulling off the covers! Just the beginning...
Ronak Malde
@rronak_
May 27
Today, @MichaelElabd, @QuantumArjun, and I are excited to announce Trajectory. We are a research lab and product company building the platform for Continual Learning. Our platform unlocks the signal already sitting in product usage, so companies can continuously post-train large-scale agentic models that outperform the frontier. @trajectorylabs We’ve raised $15M from @Conviction, @BessemerVP, @radicalvcfund, @jeffdean, @drfeifei and more. We’re partnering with some of the best AI-native companies: @ClayRunHQ @Harvey, @DecagonAI, @mercor_ai, @RogoAI to power their agentic systems, some of which we are already in production with. We’ve brought together a world class research team from DeepMind, OpenAI, Apple, Meta Superintelligence, Amazon AGI, Scale AI, and an elite product team from Stripe and Figma. AI will never again start on day one. Every correction, every retry, every edit will make products smarter. This is Continual Learning.
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More fuel in the tank! Just awe-inspiring to support this team as they execute.
Cognition
@cognition
May 27
1/ We’ve raised over $1B at a $26B valuation, led by @Lux_Capital, @generalcatalyst, and @8vc. Our enterprise usage has grown >10x since the start of this year, and our run-rate revenue grew to $492 M. We launched Devin two years ago as the first AI software engineer. Since then, cloud agents have gone from niche to mainstream, and today they are the fastest growing way to create software.
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At this point, it would not even be a surprise
Viv
@Vtrivedy10
May 22
Breaking: Pep Guardiola has joined Anthropic
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Not everything goes to plan...but can still work out for the best
Techmeme
@Techmeme
May 19
Sources: Google DeepMind has reached a ~$100M deal to hire 20 researchers from Contextual AI, including CEO Douwe Kiela, and license its technology (Bloomberg) (Visit Techmeme dot com for the link and full context!)
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Seed/A is about team quality latent demand that’s unlocked by the product. Moats come later.
Bain Capital Ventures
@BainCapVC
May 5
“Moat” might be the most overused word in venture. @aaref thinks it might also be the most irrelevant, at least right now. No one in AI has one. Models get distilled in weeks, yet the best companies continue to grow. Our questions are shifting: Can this team build with enough speed to stay ahead? And is there genuine demand, not just interest? In the current AI era, staying ahead matters more than keeping competitors out.
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Delivering on AI’s promise — work completed, not just tools
Ryan Daniels
@ryanjdaniels
Mar 31
📣 Update: we raised our $60m Series B from @Lux_Capital, @IndexVentures and @01Advisors, with participation from @sequoia, @eladgil and @BainCapVC . When we came out of stealth 283 days ago, we had negotiated contracts worth $30m for our clients. As of last month, that number is over $1 billion. We work with the most ambitious companies in the world, including @tryramp, @clay and @RogoAI. Today, we want you to hear from some of them directly. Contracts are the rails of commerce. @crosbylegal is a hybrid AI law firm that gets them signed 80% faster. We’re announcing our Series B to keep scaling the dream law firm.
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Hands-on investing with @slaterstich & @tonyzzhao
Bain Capital Ventures
@BainCapVC
Mar 12
Memo is a robot that uses AI to perform household tasks effectively. Today @sundayrobotics announced its Series B, and we’re proud to be investors. Training robots for the home is hard — the environment is messy, dynamic, and full of edge cases. So Sunday is training robots directly on real households. Founders @tonyzzhao and @chichengcc built a glove-based system that lets hundreds of contributors record everyday tasks in their own homes, creating high-fidelity demonstrations that feed directly into robot learning. Home robotics will be defined by the companies that learn fastest from real homes. Sunday is building that loop. More here: baincapitalventures.com/insi… @aaref @amandamhuang
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Beta coming this year!
Tony Zhao
@tonyzzhao
Mar 12
We raised $165M at a $1.15B valuation to stop doing demos. 2026 is about 1) deployment and 2) research. We will start shipping Memo with our new frontier models in a few months. Our series-B is led by Coatue, with Thomas Laffont joining the board. ->🧵
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Clear vision and unbridled ambition, coupled with deep humility and genuine empathy -- a rare combination. That’s @joon_s_pk and Team @simile_ai. Another perfect example of companies we back.
Joon Sung Park@joon_s_pk
Feb 12
Introducing Simile. Simulating human behavior is one of the most consequential and technically difficult problems of our time. We raised $100M from Index, Hanabi, A* BCV, @karpathy @drfeifei @adamdangelo @rauchg @scottbelsky among others.
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People ask what kind of companies we back…
Cully Cavness
@Electron_Cowboy
Feb 12
Instead of a Series Seed pitch deck, we showed this video to @foundersfund @BainCapVC and @LongJourneyVC and they invested $4.5 million in us a few weeks later. This was the first data center that @ChaseLochmiller and I ever built way back in 2018 when we founded @CrusoeAI with a crazy dream to mine bitcoin with wasted gas across the oilfields of America. We’ve come a long way, but the roots of energy-first, vertically-integrated digital infrastructure started here in NE Wyoming with a <0.5MW deployment and geosynchronous satellite internet.
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Aaref Hilaly
@aaref
24 Sep 2025
Whatever it takes
Rak Garg
@rak_garg
23 Sep 2025
You're in his DMs He's in my decagon We are not the same
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Aaref Hilaly
@aaref
8 Sep 2025
So happy to be working with @ScottWu46, @russelljkaplan and the entire @cognition crew. An incredible journey -- and they're just getting started!
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Aaref Hilaly
@aaref
7 Apr 2025
We just backed @krea_ai, one of the most delightful GenAI image creation platforms. Why? 🎨 Gives creators superpowers ⚡ Built for pros—fast, flexible, personal 🚀 A team with taste wild velocity More below 👇
Bain Capital Ventures
@BainCapVC
7 Apr 2025
Krea is providing creatives with a powerful app layer for design with the world's AI models. Co-founders Victor & Diego are brilliant coders, students of the design craft, artists and streetwear enthusiasts. We're enthusiastic to lead this round & continue to share POV on where design is heading (& where the next DJ set worth checking out might be).
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Aaref Hilaly reposted
Slater Stich
@slaterstich
10 Feb 2025
Very excited to share our interview with @jaschasd on the history of diffusion models — from his original 2015 paper inventing them, to the GAN "ice age", to the resurgence in diffusion starting with DDPM. Enjoy!
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Aaref Hilaly
@aaref
31 Jan 2025
Talent is everything in venture investing. Thanks to @kevinzhang, we met Han when he was in college and instantly knew we had to work with him. Amazing (but unsurprising) to see the incredible product and business he’s built since.
Han Wang
@handotdev
30 Jan 2025
Thank you to @BainCapVC for being an amazing partner in our journey through it all. I am certain that we wouldn't have gotten to where I am today without their support and guidance. Especially to @kevinzhang who's been there since day 0.
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Aaref Hilaly
@aaref
26 Jan 2025
True then, even more true now (post R1)
Jason ✨👾SaaStr.Ai✨ Lemkin
@jasonlk
25 Jan 2025
"How many models will end up dominating and winning? Probably 5-6. Like the airlines. Like airlines, they'll compete at being good at slightly different things." @aaref @BainCapital @JD_Weinstein
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Jared S. Taylor
@jaredstaylor
1 Dec 2024
🔥 I had a fascinating interview with @aaref Hilaly (Partner at @BainCapVC) that completely changed how I think about AI investing. Here are the golden nuggets: The most fascinating insight? "𝗜𝘁'𝘀 𝗴𝗼𝗹𝗳, 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗳𝗼𝗼𝘁𝗯𝗮𝗹𝗹." Let's break this down - it's not about tackling competitors or playing defense against others in the market. Instead: • Focus purely on your own game and execution • Stay true to your North Star vision • Screen out the noise about competitor fundraising and hype • Excel at your own path, not someone else's As Aaref puts it: if others are raising big rounds or getting hyped up, that noise ultimately doesn't matter. What matters is your execution. 𝟯 𝗸𝗲𝘆 𝗽𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗰𝗶𝗽𝗹𝗲𝘀 Aaref uses to evaluate AI companies: 1. 𝗜𝗻𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝗪𝗲𝗱𝗴𝗲: Has the team identified something others haven't? At seed/Series A, it's all about finding that unique foothold in the market that could expand into something bigger. 2. 𝗧𝗲𝗮𝗺 𝗜𝗺𝗮𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻: Can the founders grow with a rapidly evolving opportunity? In AI, the business will likely transform completely over 5-10 years. The founder's ability to adapt and reimagine is crucial. 3. 𝗜𝗻𝗱𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗿𝘆 𝗙𝗼𝗰𝘂𝘀: The sweet spot? Industries where humans process lots of information to produce specific outputs (healthcare, legal, sales). Example: doctors creating SOAP notes or paralegals drafting demand letters. 🤯 Most surprising take: Aaref's not losing sleep over AI regulation. Instead, he's excited about 𝘁𝘄𝗼 𝗺𝗮𝘀𝘀𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗼𝗽𝗽𝗼𝗿𝘁𝘂𝗻𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗲𝘀: • 𝗠𝘂𝗹𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗼𝗱𝗮𝗹 𝗔𝗜 (text image video) • 𝗥𝗲𝗮𝘀𝗼𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀 The biggest mindset shift in enterprise AI adoption? Stop trying to overhaul entire industries. Instead, 𝗹𝗮𝘆𝗲𝗿 𝗔𝗜 𝗼𝗻 𝘁𝗼𝗽 𝗼𝗳 𝗲𝘅𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸𝗳𝗹𝗼𝘄𝘀 to dramatically improve end-user experience without forcing systematic change. Aaref gave a special shoutout to three companies impacting different AI layers: • @ContextualAI: Enterprise LLM platform • @CleanlabAI: Data quality infrastructure • @evenuplaw: Vertical AI for legal workflows What I learned: 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗯𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗔𝗜 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗻𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗮𝗿𝗲𝗻'𝘁 𝘁𝗿𝘆𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗼 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗲 𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴 - 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝘆'𝗿𝗲 𝗺𝗮𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗰𝘂𝗿𝗿𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝘀𝘆𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗺 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸 𝟭𝟬𝟬𝘅 𝗯𝗲𝘁𝘁𝗲𝗿. 🎯 For founders: When VCs pass on your round, keep the relationship warm. Aaref passed on Even Up initially but stayed in touch and invested in later rounds. The fundraising journey is a marathon, not a sprint. Thoughts? Would love to hear your perspective on AI investment strategies. ***Links in the comments. Follow @SliceofTC to never miss an episode. #VentureCapital #AI #SoTPodcasts
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Aaref Hilaly
@aaref
16 Oct 2024
Privileged to support the journey
Jesse Zhang
@thejessezhang
15 Oct 2024
Beyond excited to announce Decagon's $65M Series B led by @aaref from Bain Capital Ventures, with @eladgil, A*, Accel, BOND Capital, and more. 🎉 This brings our total funding at @DecagonAI to $100m. Huge thank you to everyone who continues to support us!
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Aaref Hilaly
@aaref
5 Sep 2024
Fun chatting with @AnimaAnandkumar @rauchg & @lauramandaro earlier
Bain Capital Ventures
@BainCapVC
5 Sep 2024
We're watching @aaref live onstage at @theinformation's AI Summit. "What we're close to is reasoning. Beyond that, I think agents follow very rapidly... Put that together [with tooling] and we'll open up all sorts of new possibilities." #sfaisummit
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