João de Saldanha

Principal @ ACE Ventures

📍 United Kingdom🔄 Updated September 2026💼 18 investments📅 5 years investing🗓 Last invested Jun 2026
VC🌍 United KingdomInvested this quarter
18
Total investments
4
Early stage
4
Mid stage
7
Late stage
5y
Years active

Portfolio

18 investments · sorted by recency
All investments
Early stage
Mid stage
Late stage
Investor
Jun 2026
Impulse Space, the in-space mobility company, is accelerating our future beyond Earth beginning with a fleet of cost-effective, high-performance space vehicles. Founded by Tom Mueller and led by a team of industry pioneers, Impulse Space is transforming in-space mobility by reliably and rapidly getting customers where they want to go.
Investor
May 2026
Starcloud is building data centers in space to address the AI energy challenge. Starcloud recently launched the first Nvidia H100 to space. Starcloud was founded in January 2024 and raised a $170M Series A in early 2026, becoming the fastest unicorn in YC history. Their backers include Y Combinator (S24), Benchmark, EQT, NFX, In-Q-Tel, the NVIDIA Inception Program, and the World Economic Forums Technology Pioneers. Starcloud White Paper: Starcloud.com/wp Starcloud Concept Video: Starcloud.com
Investor
Jan 2026
Waabi is pioneering Physical AI – starting with autonomous trucks. Press: press@waabi.ai Business: partnership@waabi.ai
Investor
Dec 2025
Axiom Space is a human space exploration company, building era-defining space infrastructure and delivering technology-driven solutions that will empower civilization to transcend Earth. Beginning with Axiom Station, successor to the International Space Station, the company is pioneering a next-generation orbital settlement that will foster groundbreaking innovation and research in microgravity and drive the global space economy of tomorrow. Today, guided by the vision of leading humanitys expansion off planet, Axiom Space is the principal provider of commercial human spaceflight services and developer of advanced spacesuits for the Moon and beyond. Connect with us: instagram.com/axiom.space/ twitter.com/axiom_space facebook.com/axiomspace/ youtube.com/axiomspace
Investor
Jul 2024
Astranis builds low-cost satellites for high orbits. Our first product, MicroGEO, offers the world’s lowest-cost satellite broadband. Operating in geostationary orbit, each MicroGEO satellite can provide dedicated satellites to small and medium-sized countries, Fortune 1000 companies, and other commercial customers. Astranis has built a $1 billion backlog for 12+ MicroGEO satellites launching over the next two years. Astranis also offers services across orbits and use cases. With contracts in place with Space Force, NASA, and other government partners, Astranis is working across MEO and GEO to support government science, PNT, and communications missions. Astranis has raised $750 million from top global investors and employs a team of over 400 engineers and builders, headquartered at Historic Pier 70 in San Francisco, California.
Investor
Jan 2024
Sinpex offers cutting-edge NLP technologies embedded in a web application that is offered as a cloud or on-premise solution for our customers. We help financial institutions and top management consulting firms to manage regulatory and mandated compliance processes, with a strong focus on KYC processes. We automate unpleasant manual compliance and KYC processes to increase efficiency while reducing risk. With our application, our customers are able to onboard their customers faster, with lower costs, risks and manual efforts. Simple. Fast. Accurate.
Investor
Dec 2023
Gecko Robotics is the pioneer of AI + Robotics [AIR technology], transforming how the world builds, operates, and maintains its most critical infrastructure for a more reliable and sustainable future. Using fixed sensors and robots that climb, crawl, swim, and fly, we combine first-order data layers with the predictive power of AI into a single source of truth for the physical world. Cantilever® is our operating platform, powered by AIR technology, that empowers teams to achieve operational excellence through actionable data for immediate and long-term planning. Improve operations. Optimize capital outlay. Extend asset life. Thats our promise.
Investor
Nov 2023
At Upway, we envision a world where cars are the exception and e-bikes are the norm. Our mission is to accelerate e-bike adoption and reduce waste. This is why we are building the largest platform for reconditioned e-bikes, making electric mobility more affordable, and giving a new life to millions of great products. We are looking for great talents to bring this mission to life!
Investor
Oct 2023
Deed is a workplace giving and volunteering platform that puts people first, because user experience shouldn’t stand between you and doing good. We foster genuine human connection across departments and time zones by empowering employees to support causes they care about together, both in-person and online. We help social impact and DEIB teams alike to centralize all their programming, from emergency fundraisers to fun volunteering events, and engage diverse employee resource groups. Everyone’s passion can be met; Deed showcases over two million nonprofits and counting. Our vast payment infrastructure is backed by trusted names like PayPal, who securely process billions in donations per year—to help you give with ease and confidence. Now imagine all your community’s good deeds happening on a single, exceptionally designed platform—with you at the switchboard, watching an enterprise transform into a more positive force in the world.
Investor
Apr 2023
Roofr is the single roofing software that has all the tools a roofing business needs to effectively run their operations. Manage measurement reports, digital proposals, invoicing, payments and more, all on easy-to-use platform. Roofr streamlines day-to-day operations so you can spend less time on admin and more time growing your business.
Investor
Sep 2022
Fazz is a digital financial services group on a mission to make finance fair and inclusive for businesses in Southeast Asia. Started as a YC-backed company in 2016, we empower micro and small businesses in Indonesia by offering affordable payment services. Weve now expanded our mission to serve underserved businesses in Southeast Asia, providing easy access to essential financial services, including payments, savings, and loans. Our group owns the following brands: Fazz Business (Neobank for business), Fazz Agen (Financial Agent Network), StraitsX (Payments infrastructure for digital assets) Headquartered in Singapore and Indonesia, we have more than 600 dedicated employees extending across our regional offices in Malaysia, Taiwan and Vietnam. We are also backed and supported by prominent investors including Tiger Global, Insignia Venture Partners, B Capital, BRI Ventures.
Investor
Sep 2022
At Invofox, were transforming the way businesses handle document processing. 🚀 Our Intelligent Document Processing (IDP) platform automates data entry, and data validation tasks liberating companies from the struggle of manual data processing. 📑 📦 Our platform seamlessly extracts and validates data from unstructured documents, regardless of file format, all while efficiently sorting and classifying documents.📂 With lightning-fast processing capabilities, advanced automated allocation rules, and streamlined workflows, Invofox will enhance operational efficiency of your company. Expect granular data to supercharge your financial reports and enable a faster decision-making process. 💼 Visit our website today to book a demo with our specialists and experience a smarter approach to document processing. 💡
Investor
May 2022
Helping thousands of veterinary professionals get home on time. The first cloud-based Practice Information Management Software (PIMS) with built-in AI capabilities, Digitail consolidated multiple tools into a single solution, allowing your team to manage operations from any location. Automating routine administrative tasks like client intake and records to reduce your staffs workload to increase employee satisfaction and retention while letting them focus on what they do best—providing exceptional care. At the same time, the Digitail app puts essential pet care information into the hands of pet parents, improving communication, increasing compliance, and modernizing the client experience from start to finish. Elevate your veterinary care with Digitail—where efficiency and quality go hand in hand. Book a demo today!
Investor
Apr 2022
Compra Rápida is checkout made easy. With our headless experience, we bring a local and mobile-first purchase experience through a 1-click checkout, making it easier for merchants to sell and consumers to buy online.
Investor
Apr 2022
Shaped is a fully managed search and recommendation system that simplifies deploying real-time personalization to production applications. We combine state-of-the-art model libraries with advanced features such as online evaluation tooling, a real-time feature store, and continuous training to improve engagement, conversion, and revenue while providing high performance and reliability at scale. No more hassles of complicated data engineering, benchmarking and tuning models or maintaining infrastructure. Whether you’re an expert in recommendation systems, a casual machine-learning practitioner or a novice developer, Shaped is built to be easy to use and as configurable as you need it to be, for developers and enterprises alike.
Show all 18 investments ↓
Experience · 20 entries
All (20)
Investments (18)
2026
Investor
Jun 2026
Impulse Space, the in-space mobility company, is accelerating our future beyond Earth beginning with a fleet of cost-effective, high-performance space vehicles. Founded by Tom Mueller and led by a team of industry pioneers, Impulse Space is transforming in-space mobility by reliably and rapidly getting customers where they want to go.
Investor
May 2026
Starcloud is building data centers in space to address the AI energy challenge. Starcloud recently launched the first Nvidia H100 to space. Starcloud was founded in January 2024 and raised a $170M Series A in early 2026, becoming the fastest unicorn in YC history. Their backers include Y Combinator (S24), Benchmark, EQT, NFX, In-Q-Tel, the NVIDIA Inception Program, and the World Economic Forums Technology Pioneers. Starcloud White Paper: Starcloud.com/wp Starcloud Concept Video: Starcloud.com
Investor
Jan 2026
Waabi is pioneering Physical AI – starting with autonomous trucks. Press: press@waabi.ai Business: partnership@waabi.ai
2025
Investor
Dec 2025
Axiom Space is a human space exploration company, building era-defining space infrastructure and delivering technology-driven solutions that will empower civilization to transcend Earth. Beginning with Axiom Station, successor to the International Space Station, the company is pioneering a next-generation orbital settlement that will foster groundbreaking innovation and research in microgravity and drive the global space economy of tomorrow. Today, guided by the vision of leading humanitys expansion off planet, Axiom Space is the principal provider of commercial human spaceflight services and developer of advanced spacesuits for the Moon and beyond. Connect with us: instagram.com/axiom.space/ twitter.com/axiom_space facebook.com/axiomspace/ youtube.com/axiomspace
2024
Investor
Jul 2024
Astranis builds low-cost satellites for high orbits. Our first product, MicroGEO, offers the world’s lowest-cost satellite broadband. Operating in geostationary orbit, each MicroGEO satellite can provide dedicated satellites to small and medium-sized countries, Fortune 1000 companies, and other commercial customers. Astranis has built a $1 billion backlog for 12+ MicroGEO satellites launching over the next two years. Astranis also offers services across orbits and use cases. With contracts in place with Space Force, NASA, and other government partners, Astranis is working across MEO and GEO to support government science, PNT, and communications missions. Astranis has raised $750 million from top global investors and employs a team of over 400 engineers and builders, headquartered at Historic Pier 70 in San Francisco, California.
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Investment activity
2021–2026 · 18 investments
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