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I am the Co-Founder and General Partner of Fitz Gate Ventures which is a network-driven…
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Mark Poag shared thisAmazing Brooks Powell and the entire Cheers team! Fitz Gate Ventures is proud to be an investor and supporter of you.Mark Poag shared thisPop the champagne... Cheers is OFFICIALLY in Target!! This is such a HUGE opportunity for the Cheers team and we couldn't be more proud & excited. We will be doing EVERYTHING we can to make this a massive WIN for Target!! 🍾🥂 We couldn't be more grateful to Caitlin Ulmen, Emily Thompson, & the Target team for this chance!! Target has always been a dream of ours. As it is for so many emerging CPG brands! Now it's our shot to be on shelf and make it a success for everyone. 💪 Shelby & I started Cheers all the way back in 2014 when we were still in college. Cheers can be summed up by people taking a chance on us and us then making good on that opportunity: -My parents gave me $20k early from my grandpa's graduation gift because I didn't have enough for the first inventory MOQ. -Prior to graduation, we raised $200k from an angel investor... back when we were unproven entrepreneurs and the business was only doing $50k/year. -After Shark Tank, we got a $2.1m seed round funding from venture capital investors. -Then we needed more money... so we got a $725k SBA loan. Which we later paid back. -And we've even raised $1.75m in an equity crowdfunding round. Along the way, we've had all kinds of people take a chance on us. Ranging from vendors who were willing to work with us before we were at scale... to retailers taking a chance on us while we were still VERY unproven on shelf... to all the members of the Cheers team that have taken a chance on Cheers with their livelihood and careers. Our goal is that if you work WITH (like a retailer) or FOR (like a employee/contractor) Cheers... you will experience a "WIN-WIN-WIN". In fact, that is one of our 3 core values! (The other 2 being JOY & GROWTH.) The Cheers team is now ~40 people in total. Getting to a place where we can successfully execute and support Target has been such a team effort over the past decade! And not just our team... but all of our partners as well. Like Jordan Gerber & the whole "CPG by MPG" team in Minneapolis! Cheers has been profitable since mid-2019. But we're not resting on our laurels... our goal every year is to be right around $0 EBITDA. We could have more profit if we grew slower... but ~75% YoY growth is what we can achieve and still stay at zero dollars. Pedal to the metal! The majority of that money is going into marketing. We are on pace to do ~$45m in revenue this year (up from $26m last year)... and we're on pace to spend a whopping ~$15m to drive all that growth and new customer acquisition. And we always point these marketing dollars to our retail partners! Ranging from 1) in-store social media videos to 2) ending our social media videos pointing to where it can be found on shelf. We filmed our first session earlier this week and couldn't find a Target set that had been officially reset yet. But that didn't stop us from filming 15-20 videos already! Which are already starting to get posted as early as today!! 📈
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Mark Poag posted thisWe have dry powder in Fund III and are looking to replicate our most recent exits (Celestial AI which sold for $5.5 billion (we led their seed+ round) and Quantum Circuits which sold for $550 million (we were their first VC investor)). If you are a founder or investor in a power law company, please reach out and let us know what you are working on!
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Mark Poag shared thisFitz Gate Ventures is proud to support Trener Robotics (formerly T-ROBOTICS) and the awesome team there led by Asad Tirmizi and Lars Tingelstad developing truly revolutionary tech!Mark Poag shared thisBig announcement! Trener Robotics (formerly T-ROBOTICS) has raised $32M in Series A funding. 🚀 This round was co-led by Engine Ventures and IAG Capital Partners, with strategic support from Cadence and Geodesic Capital through Nikon’s NFocus Fund. We are also joined by Shanda Group, Emergent Ventures, Fitz Gate Ventures, Techable VC, Raisewell Ventures, and Radius Capital Ventures. We are starting this chapter with a new identity that matches our ambition. Formerly T-ROBOTICS, we are now Trener Robotics. Our platform, previously ActGPT, has also transitioned to Acteris as we continue to build the standard Physical AI platform for industrial robots. This capital will fuel our next stage of growth as we scale our partner ecosystem globally and expand our library of production-ready skills through T-Labs, our internal R&D engine. We keep building. Read the full press release on our website: https://lnkd.in/gYbJiSSy Watch the Series A announcement video from our CEO, Asad Tirmizi: https://lnkd.in/gArjS47N #SeriesA #PhysicalAI #Robotics #IndustrialAutomation #TrenerRobotics
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Mark Poag shared thisCongrats David Lazovskyand the Celestial AI team! We at Fitz Gate Ventures are very happy for you (and us)!Mark Poag shared thisToday, we announced the close of our acquisition of Celestial AI. Celestial AI brings innovative optical interconnect technology designed to support high-bandwidth, low-latency connectivity as AI systems scale beyond individual racks into large, tightly integrated platforms. Together with Marvell’s leadership in high-speed connectivity, switching, and optics, this strengthens our ability to deliver more integrated, power-efficient solutions for next-generation AI and cloud data center infrastructure. We’re excited to welcome the Celestial AI team to Marvell and to build on this momentum as AI architectures continue to evolve. We look forward to working with our customers to build the connectivity foundation for the next era of AI infrastructure. Read the full announcement: https://mrvl.co/4anUZM5
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Mark Poag shared thisCongratulations Ray Smets, Robert Schoelkopf and the entire QCI team! Well done! Fitz Gate Ventures is proud to have been the first institional investor in Quantum Circuits, Inc.Mark Poag shared thisQuantum Circuits, Inc. has officially completed its merger with D-Wave in a $550M transaction. This marks the close of one remarkable chapter and the beginning of a far more ambitious one for quantum innovation. COURAGE What first drew me to Quantum Circuits was a team bold enough to do what few others would do: build a new kind of superconducting gate-model qubit from the ground up. In an industry often obsessed with scale, we stayed true to a "correct-first" philosophy. That courage reached its "moment of truth" in 2024 when we brought the world’s first 8 dual-rail QPU to life. Demonstrating error detection at the qubit level wasn’t just a technical milestone, it opened up a new path from NISQ to fault-tolerant computing. We built a QPU that shows a glimpse of quantum’s future. GRATITUDE It has been an honor to lead Quantum Circuits. Every member of the team made a huge impact through extraordinary teamwork and technical skill. To Robert Schoelkopf, your vision as co-founder and Chief Scientist has been the North Star of this journey - and you will keep improving the science and the lives of everyone on this planet. To my exec team-Harvey Moseley, Andrei Petrenko, Stephen Horton, Allen Dinh, Mowaffak Midani, & Neil Wu Becker-thank you for your brilliance and perseverance. To Ann Perry, your leadership in Corp Dev was essential to completing this complex transaction. Congratulations to Alan Baratz and the D-Wave team for the vision to bring our companies together. The combination of talent and technology positions us to lead the industry forward. WHAT NEXT We made history at Quantum Circuits. Not only by building a novel qubit, but by proving that courage, skill and visionary thinking matter in breakthrough science. That work now continues on a broader platform with D-Wave. I’m proud of what we built together and I look forward to seeing this technology keep pushing boundaries, challenging assumptions, and, in its own way, leaving a lasting dent in the universe. 🙌 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Our success was fueled by exceptional investors and partners, including our board members Bill Coughran of Sequoia Capital, Brendan Dickinson of Canaan, Stephen Knight of F-Prime, Corey Ritter of ARCH Venture Partners, and valued investors at Tribeca Venture Partners, Hither Creek Ventures, Fitz Gate Ventures, Connecticut Innovations, Tao Capital Partners, and IQT. Special thanks to Needham & Company's Steven Camp, Managing Director, Co-Head of Boston Investment Banking, and team for catalyzing this outcome with strategic advice and support. Also thanks to DLA Piper's Jeff Lehrer, Partner Chair, Emerging Growth and Venture Capital and team for outstanding legal collaboration. A shout out to Michael Crair at Yale University, Josh Geballe at Yale Ventures, Albert Green, at QuantumCT & Daniel O'Keefe at State of Connecticut DECD for supporting our efforts to transform New Haven, CT into the quantum epicenter! READ HERE!! https://lnkd.in/gZxmcb4S
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Mark Poag shared thisAt Fitz Gate Ventures we are very proud of having been the first instituional investor in Quantum Circuits, Inc. and the terrific job that Robert Schoelkopf, Ray Smets and the entire QCI team have done in growing the company. I'm excited to see what's next and appreciate the ride!Mark Poag shared thisI’m thrilled to share that Quantum Circuits, Inc., has signed a merger agreement to be acquired by D-Wave. Together, we are establishing a unique powerhouse in the quantum industry, with the technical potential and know-how to accelerate progress in our field. Our work at Yale University and Quantum Circuits has always been focused on finding the best path forward by building a practical and scalable approach to quantum computing. This approach dramatically lowers the physical resources needed to build logical qubits and shortens that path to quantum advantage. Our "dual-rail" qubit design with built-in error detection is, in our view, what is needed to build larger and more performant quantum systems. Combining our universal gate QPU with D-Wave’s expertise in scalable control and readout creates a nearer-term path to large-scale error-corrected systems. As one company we will be well-positioned to address the full spectrum of quantum computing — both annealing and gate-model. I look forward to growing our R&D center in New Haven as we bring our first dual-rail systems to market. https://lnkd.in/efckGu6m
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Mark Poag reposted thisMark Poag reposted thisFund III has already made four investments and is looking to do a lot more: https://lnkd.in/gJDsks3nFitz Gate Ventures Launches Third Venture Capital FundFitz Gate Ventures Launches Third Venture Capital Fund
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Mark Poag shared thisAmazing outcome for a terrific company! Congratulations David Lazovsky and the entire Celestial AI team! We at Fitz Gate Ventures have been proud to be invested in and support you.Mark Poag shared thisCouldn’t be happier for my friends @ Celestial AI on their super impressive 5.5bn$ exit to Marvell Technology! 🚀🚀🚀🚀🚀🚀 Feels like yesterday that David Lazovsky, Preet Virk, Daniel Franke and I were debating ADC power budgets and what a certain Nikos Pleros said in that one conference during our Seed Round DD 😉 Fast forward 5 years and the company is delivering one of the largest semicon exits in history!💲💲💲 What an amazing achievement by the team around Dave, Preet and Phil! 💪 Being a part of this journey from the very beginning all the way to this Grande Finale has clearly been the most rewarding thing I’ve experienced in my career so far. More importantly though, we made some amazing friends along the way 🤝 🤝 A special shout out here to Isaac Sigron, our best investor buddy and by now co-investor with us in 3 other companies (Lucidean, Polaris Electro-Optics, Inc. & PxE Holographic Imaging), Alonso Galvan IAG Capital Partners (other co-investments yet to come😉), Cyril Vančura, Phil Inagaki, Reed Sturtevant, David (Dede) Goldschmidt, Stefan Weber, Liz Stein, to only name a few, as well as our amazing current and former independent board directors Diane Bryant, Bethany Mayer, Alexis Black Bjorlin and Lip-Bu Tan. Thanks to all of you for making this incredible success possible! 🚀 🚀 🚀 🚀 https://lnkd.in/eU6g4RdU David Lazovsky: you know that there was no way not to use this pic on this occasion 😉
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Mark Poag shared thisCongrats to Sarah Hein and the March Biosciences team! Great news!Mark Poag shared thisWe are proud to announce a major regulatory update today. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted Regenerative Medicine Advanced Therapy (RMAT) designation to our lead asset, MB-105, for the treatment of patients with relapsed/refractory CD5-positive T-Cell Lymphoma. This designation recognizes the significant potential of our first-in-class autologous CD5-targeted CAR-T cell therapy to address a critical, high-unmet medical need. For patients facing this aggressive cancer, RMAT provides us with a framework for expedited development and review, including all the benefits of the FDA’s Breakthrough Therapy and Fast Track programs. We are highly encouraged by the clinical activity observed in our ongoing Phase 2 trial. This designation is a strong validation of our team’s dedication and the promise of MB-105. We look forward to working closely with the FDA to advance this therapy as efficiently as possible for patients. Read the full details here: https://lnkd.in/gQUyJNAQ #RMAT #CellTherapy #Oncology #TCMLymphoma #FDA #Biotech #MarchBio #MB105March Biosciences Receives FDA Regenerative Medicine Advanced Therapy (RMAT) Designation for MB-105 in Relapsed/Refractory CD5-Positive T-Cell LymphomaMarch Biosciences Receives FDA Regenerative Medicine Advanced Therapy (RMAT) Designation for MB-105 in Relapsed/Refractory CD5-Positive T-Cell Lymphoma
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Mark Poag liked thisMarvell Technology end-to-end networking solutions built on decades of proven innovation and execution. The technology, the products, the team and the supply chain partnerships to deliver industry-leading AI infrastructure solutions to our customers at scale!Mark Poag liked thisAI infrastructure is only as strong as the network connecting it. As clusters scale to tens of thousands of accelerators, XPU-to-XPU communication becomes a defining constraint. In a new article, Senior Vice President and General Manager of the Photonic Fabric Business Unit Preet Virk outlines how Marvell delivers end-to-end connectivity, from co-packaged copper and optical chiplets to a switch portfolio spanning PCIe, UALink, ESUN, and NVLink-compatible solutions. Marvell connects compute end to end—from inside the package to across data centers. That’s how AI scales. Read more: https://mrvl.co/4cUbHE8
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Mark Poag liked thisMark Poag liked thisDie‑to‑die interconnects play an increasingly critical role in AI performance and efficiency. In a new Marvell blog, John Ma examines how advances in next‑generation die‑to‑die interfaces are enabling faster, lower‑power data movement between compute and memory inside XPUs. The article and video highlight recent Marvell demonstrations at OFC, including a 3nm 40 Gbps interface and progress toward higher‑bandwidth, bi‑directional designs that improve scalability, reliability, and total cost of ownership. Learn how scale‑inside connectivity is shaping the future of AI infrastructure: https://mrvl.co/4sFIiCr
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Mark Poag liked thisMark Poag liked thisOptimal Dynamics is proud to sponsor the 2026 Trucking Profitability Strategies Conference. For over 30 years, this event has brought the most important industry topics to the forefront for leaders from across the country to discuss. This year’s event will take place April 19–21 in Athens, GA, and the agenda is once again packed with the most prominent and essential topics in trucking today (AI, network design, market conditions, plus more). We’re honored to support this gathering of leaders and the essential conversations that will take place across these three days in Athens. Learn more about the Trucking Profitability Strategies Conference and its mission here: https://lnkd.in/eQN-aF7G #UGAExecutiveEducation #TPSConference #ai #artificialintelligence #decisionintelligence #decisionautomation #trucking #transportation #supplychain #logistics #freight #freighttech
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Mark Poag liked thisMark Poag liked thisThrowback Thursday to when FreightWaves host Charles G. found our own Benjamin Marks on the floor at Manifest Vegas. They discussed how dispatchers make hundreds (if not thousands) of decisions every day. One bad decision on Monday can snowball into serious consequences later in the week. Ben explained how Optimal Dynamics arms dispatchers with the right tools and right information to make the best decisions possible. Watch the video below, and then get in touch with us to learn more: https://lnkd.in/gAsPEvJ8 #manifest #freightwaves #loadplanning #dispatchplanning #ai #artificialintelligence #decisionintelligence #decisionautomation #trucking #transportation #supplychain #logistics #freight #freighttech
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Mark Poag liked thisMark Poag liked thisAs we head into the holiday, I’m feeling grateful & optimistic about humanity — despite all the noise around AI apocalypse, political polarization, and war — because of one 6 million pound object: Artemis II Americans — and humanity — reach for the impossible. Yesterday’s launch proves it. Four astronauts. Three Americans. One Canadian. The first woman and person of color heading to the Moon. All of us — represented. This is what happens when innovation meets belief. When diverse teams come together around a singular, powerful mission. I believe we can achieve big dreams. I believe in collaboration — like this diverse, multinational team. I believe in unity. On a personal note — my relative Bob Citron was one of the earliest space pioneers (and built the predecessor to SpaceX). So while I may feel some imposter syndrome given that lineage, I don’t take moments like this lightly. My hope: - A safe return for these brave astronauts. - That Artemis is a moment that brings us together — not further apart. - A reminder that we are capable of more than we think. Because when we align around something bigger than ourselves… we don’t just reach the Moon — we redefine what’s possible. God bless these astronauts. God bless their families. God bless the teams behind this mission. God bless America. Let’s keep dreaming big. 🚀 #Artemis #Unity #Innovation #Leadership #Future #Pledgetodogood #USA #Humanity #Space
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Mark Poag liked thisMark Poag liked thisAI is no longer just algorithmic. It’s architectural. And it’s being built now. Marvell leaders are taking the stage at ISIG Executive Summit USA 2026 to discuss the hardware innovations driving the next era of AI infrastructure. Across April 20 and 21, four Marvell executives will present at the summit in sessions covering co-packaged optics, HBM adoption, advanced packaging and the evolving role of memory in accelerated computing. See how Marvell is leading the transformation of AI infrastructure, from silicon to system. Register for the sessions here: https://mrvl.co/4bZEE1b
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Mark Poag reacted on thisMark Poag reacted on thisSmith ended Q1 with sales in excess of $3B. Our stated goal was to get to $10B/year by the end of the decade but we now expect it to happen this year. We have the best traders in the industry backed by the best ops team. Smith has never been better than it is right now.
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Mark Poag reacted on thisMark Poag reacted on thisPop the champagne... Cheers is OFFICIALLY in Target!! This is such a HUGE opportunity for the Cheers team and we couldn't be more proud & excited. We will be doing EVERYTHING we can to make this a massive WIN for Target!! 🍾🥂 We couldn't be more grateful to Caitlin Ulmen, Emily Thompson, & the Target team for this chance!! Target has always been a dream of ours. As it is for so many emerging CPG brands! Now it's our shot to be on shelf and make it a success for everyone. 💪 Shelby & I started Cheers all the way back in 2014 when we were still in college. Cheers can be summed up by people taking a chance on us and us then making good on that opportunity: -My parents gave me $20k early from my grandpa's graduation gift because I didn't have enough for the first inventory MOQ. -Prior to graduation, we raised $200k from an angel investor... back when we were unproven entrepreneurs and the business was only doing $50k/year. -After Shark Tank, we got a $2.1m seed round funding from venture capital investors. -Then we needed more money... so we got a $725k SBA loan. Which we later paid back. -And we've even raised $1.75m in an equity crowdfunding round. Along the way, we've had all kinds of people take a chance on us. Ranging from vendors who were willing to work with us before we were at scale... to retailers taking a chance on us while we were still VERY unproven on shelf... to all the members of the Cheers team that have taken a chance on Cheers with their livelihood and careers. Our goal is that if you work WITH (like a retailer) or FOR (like a employee/contractor) Cheers... you will experience a "WIN-WIN-WIN". In fact, that is one of our 3 core values! (The other 2 being JOY & GROWTH.) The Cheers team is now ~40 people in total. Getting to a place where we can successfully execute and support Target has been such a team effort over the past decade! And not just our team... but all of our partners as well. Like Jordan Gerber & the whole "CPG by MPG" team in Minneapolis! Cheers has been profitable since mid-2019. But we're not resting on our laurels... our goal every year is to be right around $0 EBITDA. We could have more profit if we grew slower... but ~75% YoY growth is what we can achieve and still stay at zero dollars. Pedal to the metal! The majority of that money is going into marketing. We are on pace to do ~$45m in revenue this year (up from $26m last year)... and we're on pace to spend a whopping ~$15m to drive all that growth and new customer acquisition. And we always point these marketing dollars to our retail partners! Ranging from 1) in-store social media videos to 2) ending our social media videos pointing to where it can be found on shelf. We filmed our first session earlier this week and couldn't find a Target set that had been officially reset yet. But that didn't stop us from filming 15-20 videos already! Which are already starting to get posted as early as today!! 📈
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Member Board of Directors
Houston Grand Opera
- Present 4 years
Arts and Culture
Vice Chair of the Endowment Board for Houston Grand Opera, an award-winning opera company based in Houston, Texas.
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Schools Committee Co-Chair
Princeton Alumni Association of Houston
- Present 19 years
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Co-Chair of 300+ volunteers who interview every applicant to Princeton University from the Houston region every year.
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President
Princeton Alumni Association of Houston
- 4 years 2 months
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The Princeton Alumni Association of Houston has 200+ dues paying members and hosts social and educational events and speakers. I am the twice-elected former President of the PAAH.
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Senior Fellow
American Leadership Forum - Houston/Gulf Coast Chapter
- Present 11 years
For more than 30 years, ALF has brought together over 1,100 Senior Fellows from Houston/Gulf Coast corporations, government, media, education, criminal justice, medicine, nonprofits, philanthropy and religious sectors to envision effective solutions and take coordinated action to address the community’s pressing issues.
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Matt Ocko
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Paul Perrett
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Chris Gonzales
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Sean Smith
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