Former Snap Executives Launch Ghost Angels Fund to Back Next-Gen Social Media Startups

Former Snap Insiders Unite to Fund the Future of Social Media

A coalition of 20 former Snap employees has formally introduced a new investment vehicle called Ghost Angels, with a clear mission: to fund the next wave of social media and consumer technology companies. While the fund has not publicly disclosed its total capital raised, it has already invested in at least five startups and intends to deploy the remainder of its funds into at least 15 more companies over the coming year.

How Ghost Angels Came to Be

The fund was established in 2025 by Max Rivera, formerly the head of global partnerships at Snap, who sought to give structure and purpose to an already-thriving informal network of Snap alumni angel investors. Rivera, who currently holds a position within Microsoft's AI division, serves as the fund's primary operator.

Alongside Rivera, approximately 20 founding members and investors are involved in the initiative. The group includes a select number of current Snap employees as well as prominent alumni such as Alexandra Levitt, who previously led Snap's corporate accelerator program, and Will Wu, one of the original members of Snap's product and design team.

A Deliberate Mix of Experience

"We were intentional about the mix," Rivera explained, noting that Ghost Angels was designed to blend seasoned senior executives with investors earlier in their professional journeys. "That diversity of thought and experience is core to how we evaluate deals and support founders."

The Evolving Startup Landscape

Rivera, who first joined Snap nearly a decade ago, observed that the environment for building companies has shifted dramatically. Today's founders are operating with leaner teams, launching products rapidly, and iterating openly in public view.

Monetization strategies have also broadened considerably. "We're seeing experimentation with different monetization models beyond ads — with subscriptions, token-based, usage-based, or even outcome-based approaches," Rivera noted. He also highlighted the growing importance of founder-led go-to-market strategies as a defining characteristic of modern startups.

Portfolio Companies Are Already Feeling the Impact

Molly DeWolf Swenson, co-founder and CEO of Ghost Angels portfolio company Mozi, emphasized the unique value of the Snap alumni network. "The Snap alumni network is full of brilliant, influential people who inherently understand the problem space I'm playing in," she said.

Investing at the Intersection of AI and Social Media

Ghost Angels is primarily focused on pre-seed and seed stage AI startups operating within the social media and consumer sectors. One of Rivera's most compelling observations about the next generation of social platforms is the growing divide between "social" and "media" as distinct concepts.

The social media platforms consumers use today are largely built around advertising revenue, algorithmically curated content, and passive content consumption — a far cry from the original vision of genuinely connecting people with one another.

"A lot of people are disillusioned with that relative to the original promise of connecting people in your life," Rivera said.

Two Distinct Investment Tracks

Ghost Angels approaches its investment thesis along two separate but complementary tracks:

• The Social Track: Backing founders who are leveraging AI in inventive ways to fulfill the original promise of social connectivity — building tools and platforms that bring people meaningfully closer together.
• The Media Track: Supporting AI-native content formats and generative creative tools that span music, gaming, sports, and fashion — technologies that are significantly reducing the barriers to both creation and distribution.

This dual focus reflects a broader industry shift that TechCrunch has previously documented: the next generation of social media is moving away from sprawling, generalized platforms and gravitating instead toward tightly focused niche communities.

Why Ghost Angels Matters

The launch of Ghost Angels signals a maturing of the Snap alumni ecosystem into a formalized force in venture capital. With deep domain expertise in consumer technology and social platforms, the fund is well-positioned to identify and support founders tackling the most pressing challenges in how people connect, create, and consume content in the AI era.