Getting capital is hard. Getting the right capital is harder.
For founders building in AI the difference between a good VC and a great one can decide whether a company merely survives or becomes category-defining. That is why we are continuing a series on the investors who sit on the Forbes Midas List.
We began with Shaun Maguire, Sequoia’s loudest partner. This is the other seat at the same firm: Luciana Lixandru, Sequoia’s first partner in Europe.
How Did Luciana Lixandru Get to Sequoia?
Her own words on Sequoia’s site are the cleanest origin story. “[I] grew up in a small city in Romania and didn’t travel much. My image of the U.S. came from reading and sitcoms. But for some reason, I got this idea that I wanted to study there, and I got a scholarship to Georgetown.”
She took a BS in economics and mathematics at Georgetown, then jobs at Morgan Stanley in London and New York, Summit Partners, and Accel from late 2011. Accel made her a partner in January 2017. TechCrunch carried the announcement. She has said she did not take recruiting coffees with other firms. The exception was Sequoia: “I always told my husband, ‘If Sequoia ever calls, I owe it to myself to at least have the conversation.’ When they did, it was to open up a new geography.” She joined in September 2020. Sequoia’s welcome note is still live.
Forbes now describes her as co-lead of Sequoia’s US and Europe early-stage investing, alongside Alfred Lin.
What Companies Has Luciana Lixandru Backed?
The public record splits in two. At Accel she was close to Deliveroo, UiPath and Vinted. At Sequoia the names that now define the profile are Stripe, Pennylane and STARK.
Deliveroo is the deal she still tells as a miss. In a later podcast she said a friend called: “my friend Will is moving back to London from business school and he wants to start a company in food delivery.” She passed. “So wrong,” she called it afterwards. Accel still led the $25 million Series B announced on 29 January 2015. Fred Destin took the board seat; Lixandru joined as an observer and stayed with the company through the 2021 London IPO.
UiPath was the Romanian software bet. Accel led the $30 million Series A in April 2017 and the $153 million Series B the following year. The April 2021 IPO priced the company at about $35 billion. Forbes later put the market capitalisation at $5.5 billion as of May 2026.
Vinted put her on the board in 2016, during the Accel years; the same Eastern European conviction, before “CEE tech” was a slide title.
Stripe is the Sequoia inheritance, not her origination. Sequoia first partnered with the company in 2010. Lixandru has been the firm’s board representative since December 2023, after Michael Moritz left the seat. Forbes put Stripe at $159 billion in February 2026.
Pennylane is the live European software example. She has been on the board since May 2021. On 20 January 2026 the French accounting platform raised $204 million at $4.25 billion, led by TCV, with Blackstone joining and Sequoia as an existing investor.
STARK is the defence bet. Sequoia led a $62 million round in August 2025, Sifted reported. In June 2026 the company closed a €500 million Series C with Sequoia and Founders Fund. Stark put the valuation at €3.2 billion; other accounts of the same round used a figure closer to €3.5 billion.
How Does Luciana Lixandru Choose Founders?
People over markets, her stated evolution on the Sequoia site explains: “When I started investing, I didn’t fully understand people who said it was all about the founder. My first questions were always about business model and market. But over the years, I’ve come to turn that around, and I now make more investments than ever at the seed, when the founding team is all that matters.”
The test she repeats is pushback. “Investors often ask if a founder listens. But honestly, a founder who says ‘yes’ too much concerns me. When they push back, and it’s clear they’ve already thought three steps ahead, those are the smart, independent thinkers I’m most drawn to.”
On AI, in the FT interview with Tim Bradshaw, she said she looks for a founder obsessed with a particular customer and a particular vertical, because the model labs will keep building applications.
What Did Doug Leone Teach Her About Noise?
In November 2022, days after the FTX collapse, Lixandru interviewed Doug Leone at Slush. She noted that European startups used not to announce valuations. His answer is the operating system she appears to have kept. “Startups have two advantages, stealth and speed. Why would you ever give up any one of them? My advice as a board member is shut the hell up unless there’s a reason to be loud.”
When she does speak at length, it is about the continent. After the Financial Times interview with Tim Bradshaw on 17 June 2026, she posted a short thread on X:
Did STARK’s Failed Drone Trials Matter?
The Financial Times reported in October 2025 that Stark drones failed to hit a single target across four attempts, one exercise with the British Army in Kenya and one with the German Army near Münster. One drone landed in woodland. Another battery caught fire on impact. A person familiar with the German trial called it “a disaster for Stark.”
The company said the exercises were experimental. A spokesperson told Militarnyi that more than a dozen missions were flown successfully in Kenya. In February 2026 the Bundestag approved a loitering-munition package that included Stark. In April the firm said a Bundeswehr swarm exercise with its Virtus munition had worked. The €500 million round closed eight months after the FT piece. Sequoia and Founders Fund put more money in after that coverage existed.
German politicians separately asked about Peter Thiel’s stake. Defence minister Boris Pistorius said the influence question had to be cleared. Stark told the Bundestag that Thiel held “significantly less than 10 percent.”
Lixandru’s own framing, posted after the 17 June 2026 FT interview, was not about the trials. It was about why Sequoia was there at all: “When we partnered with Uwe and the team at Stark, our thesis was simple: great team, strong ‘why now’. Today, the smartest people in Europe aren’t avoiding defence companies — they’re actively seeking them out, for ethical reasons.”
What Is Europe’s Act Two?
Her own line, after Italian Tech Week: “15 years ago we were asking what it takes to build a $1B company in Europe. Today we are asking what it takes to build multiple $100B companies.” After the FT sitting she asked whether Europe can build companies “worth $100bn, or, let’s dream, a trillion dollars.”
The market underneath her is the one we have already mapped. AI took 60.3 percent of European venture value in the first half of 2026, in Which VCs Are Actually Backing European AI in 2026?. Helsing raised $1.8 billion at $18 billion in July.
The newest fact arrived in late August. Mario Draghi and Patrick Collison launched the Rhine Group to turn the competitiveness report into pressure on governments. After criticism that Central and Eastern Europe was missing, Lixandru was added. She now sits on Stripe’s board and in a group co-chaired by Stripe’s founder.
The approach clearly works. The record needed no daily feed to become formidable. Does the ecosystem need louder champions, or is the quietest seat at Sequoia already its most consequential? Her closing line, from Italian Tech Week: “Go solve a hard problem… Have patience, have resilience, and hopefully good things will happen.”
Author: Ákos Szima
