Ashot Arzumanyan is co-founder and partner at SmartGateVC, a Los Angeles- and Armenia-based venture firm making first-check investments in science-driven companies, backing the hardware, security and neural-interface layers that AI needs as it moves into the physical world. Since co-founding SmartGateVC in 2017, Ashot has co-led early investments in 40+ deep-tech companies originating from innovation engines such as Harvard, MIT, Caltech, EPFL, Meta and Bosch. These companies have gone on to attract capital from NVIDIA, a16z, Khosla Ventures, Bessemer, and others. Ashot holds a PhD in economics from Yerevan State University.