Venture firm in listed AI tools
A* (A-Star)
A* (A-Star) has backed 4 companies behind 8 listings on Anchor Terminal.
Companies on Anchor Terminal
Cartesia Seed, December 2024, Series A, March 2025, through A*
- Cartesia Ink B · Speech-to-text
- Cartesia Sonic TTS API + MCP B · Text-to-speech
- Cartesia Voice Cloning API + MCP C · Voice cloning & custom voices
Source cartesia.ai/blog/seed
Cognition AI, Inc. Series E, September 2026, through A* Capital, valued at $48B as announced (the source doesn't say pre- or post-money), Series E, September 2026
Source cognition.com/blog/series-e
Photon Seed, October 2026, led a round, through A*
- Photon C · Messaging APIs
Source pulse2.com/…
Ramp Series C, August 2021, through A* Partners, valued at $22.5B as announced (the source doesn't say pre- or post-money), Funding round, July 2025, July 2025
Source ramp.com/blog/ramp-series-c
Where they invest
Model APIs & inference 2 Speech-to-text 1 Text-to-speech 1 Voice cloning & custom voices 1 Agent harnesses 1 Messaging APIs 1 Spend management & procurement 1
Founders they backed
- Karan Goel Cartesia
- Albert Gu Cartesia
- Arjun Desai Cartesia
- Brandon Yang Cartesia
- Scott Wu Cognition AI, Inc.
- Steven Hao Cognition AI, Inc.
- Walden Yan Cognition AI, Inc.
- Eric Glyman Ramp
- Karim Atiyeh Ramp
Connections
Invests beside
- General Catalyst 3 companies: Cartesia, Cognition AI, Inc., Ramp
- 137 Ventures 2 companies: Cognition AI, Inc., Ramp
- Avenir 2 companies: Cognition AI, Inc., Ramp
- Neo 2 companies: Cognition AI, Inc., Ramp
- Definition Capital 2 companies: Cognition AI, Inc., Ramp
- D1 Capital Partners 2 companies: Cognition AI, Inc., Ramp
- Lux Capital 2 companies: Cognition AI, Inc., Ramp
- 8VC 2 companies: Cognition AI, Inc., Ramp
- Greylock 2 companies: Cognition AI, Inc., Ramp
- Altimeter Capital 2 companies: Cognition AI, Inc., Ramp
Every link here comes from a source: an investor and a company from the round's announcement, a partner and a company from the page linked beside the name. "Invests beside" counts the companies two investors both backed. How the connections are made.
Questions
Which AI tools has A* (A-Star) invested in?
Anchor Terminal lists Cartesia, Cognition AI, Inc., Photon and Ramp backed by A* (A-Star).
How are A* (A-Star)'s companies graded?
On Anchor Terminal's benchmark, Cartesia Ink (B, 69.2), Cartesia Sonic TTS API + MCP (B, 63.7), Cartesia Voice Cloning API + MCP (C, 58.9), Devin (C, 58.5), SWE-2 Flash (F, 37.6), Photon (C, 54.5), Ramp (C, 61.2) and Router.com (Ramp Router) (C, 56.2).
Investors are named from the companies' own announcements, the investors' own pages, Y Combinator's company pages, public filings and news reports of a round, each with its source and the date it was researched. An investor isn't a sign of quality, and nobody can pay to be listed or to change a grade. To correct something or have a page removed, write to privacy@anchorterminal.com.