# Ben Lerer

> Ben Lerer is a seed investor at Thrillist Media Group (New York) backing E-Commerce and Software. See 40 investments, check sizes, portfolio. Updated Aug 2026.

- Type: Angel Investor
- Fund: [Thrillist Media Group](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/thrillist-media-group)
- Location: New York, United States
- Total investments: 40
- Last investment: Oct 2025
- Lead investor: 45%
- Last updated: Aug 2026
- LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/benlerer
- X (Twitter): http://twitter.com/BenJLerer
- Website: https://x.com/BenJLerer

Ben Lerer is a Managing Partner at Lerer Hippeau and the CEO of Group Nine Media, a digital media holding company consisting of Thrillist, NowThis, The Dodo, Seeker, and PopSugar. He is the co-founder and former CEO of Thrillist. He chairs the Board of Directors for Urban Upbound and is an Associate Member of the International Academy of DigitalArts & Sciences (IADAS). Ben sits on the Board of Directors for Casper and the Board of RaisedByUs. Ben previously worked at Group Nine Media as a Chief Executive Officer. He attended the University of Pennsylvania.

## Investment focus

### Industry

| Industry | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| E-Commerce | 6 | 15% |
| Software | 4 | 10% |
| Health Care | 4 | 10% |
| Artificial Intelligence | 4 | 10% |
| Beauty | 2 | 5% |

66 industries tracked in total.

### Stage

| Stage | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Seed | 26 | 65% |
| Series A | 5 | 13% |
| Series B | 5 | 13% |
| Venture - Series Unknown | 2 | 5% |
| Series C | 1 | 3% |

### Country

| Country | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| United States | 24 | 60% |
| Canada | 1 | 3% |

## Investments

| Company | Description | Amount | Stage | Date | Website |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Magic | Magic is an AI-based firm that merges personalization with experiences to bring real-world experiences. | $10M | Seed | Oct 20, 2025 |  |
| Le Walk | Le Walk is an AI-powered app that provides guided experiences through on-demand audio tours, offering users personalized and immersive explorations. | $4.1M | Seed | Aug 14, 2025 |  |
| Journey | Pioneering the World's Best Hospitality Rewards Program exclusively for the World's Best Independent Operators.​ The first rewards program tailored for the vacation rental market and boutique hotels, enabling guests to accumulate points with each stay, offering a novel way for hosts to drive direct bookings and engagement across a vastnetwork of alliance properties and a growing CRM of loyal guests and travel enthusiasts accessible for small-scale operators. | $7.7M | Seed | Mar 26, 2025 |  |
| Air | Air brings your content and collaborators together in a space designed for visual work. By giving your team back those hours previously lost each day on menial tasks, Air not only fundamentally changes team efficiency, but also enables more moments of creativity. Air was designed by creators for creators with the hopes of getting more peopleinvolved in your brand experience. | $35M | Series B | Jan 09, 2025 |  |
| MOTORMIA | MOTORMIA blending passion with innovation can create unique and high-quality solutions for automotive enthusiasts whether it's through cutting-edge technology, personalized experiences, or top-notch performance parts, there's so much potential to elevate the aftermarket scene. | $8M | Seed | Oct 31, 2024 |  |
| Lil Snack | Lil Snack is building a consumer platform for daily games! Our team has collectively built some of the most beloved gaming and digital entertainment experiences of the past decade. The company is headquartered in Los Angeles. | $3.1M | Seed | Apr 02, 2024 |  |
| Capitalize | Capitalize provides a marketplace to search and list out lenders proving a platform for comparative study. | $4M | Seed | Mar 12, 2024 |  |
| TollBit | TollBit is a content monetization platform that allows AI bots and data scrapers to pay websites directly to license their content and protects the health of the entire content ecosystem. | $7M | Seed | Mar 05, 2024 |  |
| Haven Energy | Haven Energy is a climate technology company that is accelerating home energy storage adoption. Haven walks homeowners through the process of selecting, quoting, and financing a home battery system, and then connects them with vetted, qualified electricians to complete the installation. Haven works with homeowners after installation to integratetheir batteries into an aggregated virtual power plant, allowing customers to monetize grid participation and significantly reduce their electricity costs. | $7M | Series A | Jan 30, 2024 |  |
| Companion | Companion creates technology that simplifies how owners interact with and train their dogs. Companion's proprietary technology communicates with dogs through audio, and 3D sensing systems detect and analyze the dog's movement and behaviors. With machine learning, it can adapt in real-time, calculating the best way to engage with a dog.Companion rewards the dog for desired behaviors such as sit, down, stay, and recall using positive reinforcement techniques and proprietary data and algorithms. | $6M | Venture - Series Unknown | Apr 12, 2023 |  |

10 of 40 investments shown.

## Co-investors
- [VaynerFund](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/vaynerfund) — VC Fund, 6 deals together
- [Costanoa Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/costanoaventures) — VC Fund, 4 deals together
- [Slow Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/slow-ventures) — VC Fund, 4 deals together
- [Sugar Capital](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/sugar-capital) — VC Fund, 4 deals together
- [Advancit Capital](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/advancit-capital) — VC Fund, 3 deals together
- [Bullish](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/bullish-co) — VC Fund, 3 deals together

## About Thrillist Media Group

VC Fund · New York, United States

Seamlessly blending content and commerce, TMG digs deep to inform guys how to best spend their time and money across the lifestyle categories they care about most. The TMG network consists of three brands: food, drink and travel property Thrillist; tech-meets-lifestyle site Supercompressor; and style and grooming destination JackThreads.

3 contacts available at Thrillist Media Group.

| Name | Title | Profile |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Adam Rich | Co-Founder | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/adam-rich |
| Ben Lerer | Co-Founder and CEO | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/ben-lerer |
| Meghan Kirsch | Chief Content Officer | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/meghan-kirsch-83cc |

## Similar investors

### Similar stage
- [Antler](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/antler-be9c) — VC Fund
- [Alumni Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/alumni-ventures-group) — VC Fund
- [Right Side Capital Management](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/right-side-capital-management) — VC Fund

## FAQ

### What does Ben Lerer invest in?

Ben Lerer invests primarily in E-Commerce, Software and Health Care startups, most often at Seed and Series A stage. Most of the 40 investments tracked by Shizune back companies in United States. The Investment Focus section breaks down every industry, stage and country in the portfolio.

### When did Ben Lerer last invest?

The most recent investment recorded for Ben Lerer closed in Oct 2025. Shizune tracks 40 investments in total for this profile, including round sizes, stages and portfolio companies, all sourced from confirmed public funding rounds and refreshed monthly.

### Is Shizune's investor data accurate?

Yes — every stat on this profile is calculated from confirmed public funding rounds monitored across hundreds of sources since 2020. This profile was last refreshed in Aug 2026 and is updated monthly. Spotted something off? Use the “Suggest an edit” link near the top of the page.

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