Nvidia's Sydney Sykes on Winning Corporate Venture Capital Deals

Building a great product is one thing. Getting a company like Nvidia to put its name behind it is something else entirely.

In this episode of Build Mode, host and Startup Battlefield lead Isabelle Johannesen sits down with Sydney Sykes, who leads global venture capital alliances and partnerships at Nvidia, to unpack how startups break into the Nvidia ecosystem and what a corporate venture capital partnership actually looks like once they're in.

Sydney explains how founders can get on Nvidia's radar through programs like Nvidia Inception, why strategic alignment matters more than a slick pitch deck, and how corporate venture capital differs from traditional venture capital when it comes to fundraising, diligence, and deal terms. Drawing on her experience as an investor at NEA and Lightspeed Venture Partners, and as co-founder of BLCK VC, she also discusses access and representation in venture capital and how the AI boom is reshaping who gets funded. She closes with practical fundraising advice for founders hoping to build lasting relationships with corporate VCs like Nvidia.

They get into:

How a startup can "enter the Nvidia orbit" through the Nvidia Inception program

What Nvidia looks for before offering its stamp of approval to an AI startup

Corporate venture capital vs. traditional venture capital: what founders need to know

Why a corporate VC checks for strategic relevance, not just financial upside

How to pitch the same startup differently to a corporate VC vs. an institutional VC

Why founders should build their cap table like a puzzle, not a popularity contest

How the AI boom is lowering barriers to entrepreneurship — and where old barriers remain

Why Sydney believes VCs should pay closer attention to energy and data center infrastructure