Etienne Segal

I'm Etienne — founder, investor, and technologist. I'm currently building Mellies, a new-format functional snack brand based in New York.

Before this, I founded consumer brands across the UK, built AI tools for operators through Ontara, and worked at venture firms Contrary and Autopilot covering vertical AI and serial acquirers.

→ Read more about my thesis here

buildouts

• Monarch Caviar — founded a DTC luxury food brand sold online, and through retail and hospitality partners
• AniVC — built brand and operational systems for a venture fund investing across animal health
• PolicyBot — built an AI tool to navigate London’s real estate regulations, adopted by developers
• BirdsEye — built an AI-enabled PMS for small multifamily portfolios
• Uncle Yoshiro — founded Japanese-inspired healthy snack brand
• esma foods — founded a retail distribution platform for CPG in the UK

deep dives

• the vertical AI playbook
• from brick to click
• attorney v machine
• to humanoid or not to humanoid

company breakdowns

• Crusoe
• Ramp
• QXO
• Stripe
• CloudKitchens
• Klarna
• Perplexity

→ all company breakdowns