With Elon Musk playing such a high-profile role in Donald Trump’s transition team, Musk’s buddies, many of them Silicon Valley venture capitalists, are reportedly being tapped to help out.
For instance, VC firm Andreessen Horowitz, and in particular co-founder Marc Andreessen, is repeatedly being mentioned. He, along with Antonio Gracias and Joe Lonsdale, are reportedly being asked to help with Musk’s advisory panel, the Department of Government Efficiency, which is examining ways to overcome the technical challenges of collecting data about federal programs, reported the Washington Post on Sunday.
They are among a handful of other Silicon Valley moguls being tapped.
Gracias is co-founder of Valor Equity Partners, which has done well backing Musk companies over the years, including SpaceX and Tesla (the latter where he was on the board of directors from 2007 to 2021). Lonsdale is co-founder of VC firm 8VC and an active backer of defense tech (like Anduril) and other government tech, like financial software provider OpenGov. Lonsdale worked under billionaire VC Peter Thiel and helped co-found Palantir. Andreessen Horowitz has been a big-time investor in SpaceX since around 2022 — and buys more stock as it can, TechCrunch previously reported, and Andreessen has been a vocal supporter of Musk.
The DOGE committee hopes to recommend cuts to programs and to reduce the number of federal employees, Musk and former presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy explained in a Wall Street Journal editorial last week. They also expect to face legal pushback, they wrote. In the immediate future, the group plans to launch a podcast, the Washing Post reports.
Meanwhile, Andreessen Horowitz is also said to be in the running for a position on a promised Trump administration crypto advisory council. It will be staffed with a number of execs from the crypto industry who seek to help the U.S. establish crypto policy, industry executives told Reuters last week. Brian Quintenz, head of policy for a16z crypto, has already been advising Trump’s team, Reuters reports.
Another VC being discussed for a spot on this committee is Paradigm, an investment firm co-founded by Fred Ehrsam, previous co-founder of Coinbase. Paradigm specializes in crypto/blockchain investments. Coinbase, which is not a VC firm but does fund its own corporate firm, Coinbase Ventures, is also interested in the committee, sources tell Reuters.
Meanwhile, former Thiel disciple Michael Kratsios, who served as chief tech officer under the first Trump administration, has reportedly been tapped to handle tech policy for Trump’s transition team, Politico reported last week. Kratsios was known for authoring Trump’s 2020 pro-AI investment executive order. Prior to his role in government, he worked for Thiel Capital. Kratsios, however, isn’t currently a VC. He’s been working at AI company Scale AI since 2021, according to his LinkedIn.
Lonsdale and a16z could not be immediately reached for comment. They also did not respond to request for comment by the Washington Post.