Gil Canaani

Gil earned his MBA from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University and a BA in computer sciences from Tel Aviv-Yaffo Academic College. 

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Gil serves at the Managing Director of the Young Venture Capitalists Forum (YVCF) in Israel. He is an Advisory Board Member at StartHub, the Tel-Aviv Academic College entrepreneurship accelerator. Gil is a frequent guest lecturer and panelist at BizTech, 3DS, StartTAU, 8200 EISP, and StartHub.

Venture capital investor and Managing Director with 15+ years investing in and building technology companies across AI, data management, consumer subscriptions, and media. I invest at the intersection of frontier technology and global markets, combining institutional VC discipline, corporate/strategic investing, and hands-on operating experience.

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Most recently, I served as Managing Director at Hearst Ventures, the strategic investment arm of Hearst, where I launched and led a new investment office connecting one of America's largest media and information companies to a global pipeline of early-stage startups. I led investments across AI, data, and consumer/media technology — including Simply, Loora, Snappy, Instant Commerce, Vault AI, Duality and Otonomo - and served as Board Director or Observer across the portfolio. I also led Hearst's LP commitments into seed stage venture funds. I connected closely with Hearst's operations divisions and C-suite executives, connecting them directly with the companies and ecosystems we invested in.

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Earlier, I was a Partner at 2BVC, where I led investments in IMGN Media (acquired by Warner Music) and Rollout.io (acquired by CloudBees). I started my career in venture with Canaan Partners as a Senior Associate and later on as a Principal, part of the global tech investment team. With Canaan's endorsement, I was selected as a Kauffman Fellow (Class 17), joining an elite global network of 700+ venture leaders across 40+ countries.

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My technical foundation comes from service in the IDF's elite 8200 intelligence unit and years in R&D and product marketing at AudioCodes (NASDAQ: AUDC). I hold a B.A. in Computer Science and an MBA from Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management. Raised between Israel and the United States, I bring bi-cultural fluency and a global network to every investment I make.

As a member of Class 17, Gil served his fellowship at Canaan Partners under the mentorship of General Partners Izhar Shay and Brent Ahrens (Class 5).