David Yakobovitch
About David Yakobovitch
David Yakobovitch is Founder and General Partner of DataPower Capital (also called DataPower Ventures), based in New York. He hosts the HumAIn Podcast and runs events for the Data and AI ecosystem. Crunchbase lists his DataPower role as starting in December 2020.
Before and alongside investing, he worked in data and product roles. Crunchbase lists him as Principal Data Scientist at Galvanize (2018 to 2020), Senior Manager of Technical Enablement at SingleStore (2020 to 2022) and Global Product Lead at Google (2022 to 2023). He also co-founded and was General Partner of DataFrame Ventures from December 2020 to October 2021. Crunchbase shows 2 companies founded and 1 exit, Grin Gaming.
NFX Signal lists a B.A. from the University of Florida, an M.S. in Computer Science from the University of Illinois Springfield, and an AI fellowship at Columbia University. The HumAIn Podcast ran from 2019 to 2024 and has 132 episodes on Apple Podcasts.
Crunchbase shows 1 personal investment, a pre-seed round in Tabula, with 0 lead investments. NFX Signal shows a larger record, with 19 investments on record and several named seed and Series A rounds from 2020 to 2025. The two sources differ, so founders should treat counts as approximate.
In a 2021 interview summarized on LinkedIn, he said he began investing after meeting founders through Founder Fridays and Techstars and helping them on the data and technology side.
DataPower describes its thesis as backing founders who build software products at the intersection of Applied AI or DeepTech in the Data, ML and AI ecosystems. A 2026 podcast bio describes the firm as investing across Applied AI, Inference Infrastructure and DeepTech. NFX Signal tags him under Generative Tech/AI at pre-seed and seed.
That podcast bio also says he is an investor in frontier companies including OpenAI, Anthropic, xAI, Databricks and Groq. It does not give details of how or when those investments were made.
Stage: pre-seed and seed, with some Series A rounds listed on NFX Signal. In 2021 he said DataPower aims to help startups move from the accelerator stage to Series A, and that its portfolio was mostly in NYC.
Sectors: Applied AI, inference infrastructure, DeepTech, data, and machine learning.
Check size: NFX Signal lists a range of $100K to $250K with a sweet spot of $175K. In the 2021 interview, the average DataPower check was described as $250K. These figures come from third-party profiles, not his own statement.
- Tabula: pre-seed round listed on Crunchbase.
- Polygraf: listed on NFX Signal with a pre-seed round in April 2025 and a seed round in October 2025.
- Dataplor: seed round in December 2022 listed on NFX Signal.
- Fakespot: Series A rounds in November 2020 and October 2022 listed on NFX Signal.
- Sumatra: seed round in July 2022 listed on NFX Signal.
- Ash: seed round in May 2022 listed on NFX Signal.
- AppliedXL: seed round in March 2022 listed on NFX Signal.
- crunchbase.com/person/david-yakobovitch
- crunchbase.com/organization/datapower-ventures
- signal.nfx.com/investors/david-yakobovitch
- linkedin.com/pulse/episode-101-how-invest-modern-data-startups-david-y
- sparkofages.buzzsprout.com/2257244/episodes/18761611-the-data-moat-a-g
- podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/humain-podcast/id1452117009
- github.com/davidyakobovitch
- linkedin.com/posts/davidyakobovitch_intro-book-with-david-yakobovitch-
Investing activity
David Yakobovitch has made 1 investment according to Crunchbase across 1 portfolio company, and has seen 1 exit and founded 2 companies.
Deals
Frequently asked questions about David Yakobovitch
Who is David Yakobovitch?
He is Founder and General Partner of DataPower Capital in New York and host of the HumAIn Podcast. He previously worked at Google, SingleStore and Galvanize.
What is David Yakobovitch's check size?
NFX Signal lists a range of $100K to $250K with a sweet spot of $175K. A 2021 interview put the average DataPower check at $250K.
What stage does David Yakobovitch invest in?
NFX Signal lists him at pre-seed and seed, mainly in Generative Tech/AI. DataPower has said it helps startups get from accelerator stage to Series A.
What kinds of AI startups does DataPower Capital back?
It backs founders building software in Applied AI, inference infrastructure and DeepTech, including Data and ML products.
Where is David Yakobovitch based?
He is based in New York, New York. In 2021 he said most DataPower portfolio companies were in NYC.
How can founders reach David Yakobovitch?
His public channels are LinkedIn, X (@dyakobovitch, as listed on his GitHub profile) and datapower.vc. He has also taken founder calls on the Intro platform.
Is David Yakobovitch an angel investor?
Yes. David Yakobovitch invests personally as an angel and is Founder, General Partner at DataPower Capital. Crunchbase counts 1 investment and 1 exit.