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Mike Heller

Mike Heller

Partner·Floodgate

San Francisco Bay Area
LinkedIn Bio source

Bio

Professional summary

Mike Heller is a Partner at Floodgate. His official Floodgate profile says he helped define an early product-led-sales motion at Dropbox and later joined Clearbit as its first business hire, leading sales, post-sales, and partnerships during a period of major revenue growth before Clearbit’s exit to HubSpot. More recently, he built a consulting practice helping more than 30 seed-stage startups adapt sales best practices for their paths to product-market fit. Public profiles describe Floodgate as a pre-seed and seed investor and associate Heller with AI application-layer companies and distribution advantages.

Investment focus

Stage, sector, and overall fit

Stage

Pre-seedSeed

Sector

AI applicationsB2B softwareProduct-led growthGo-to-market infrastructure

Thesis

Pre-seed and seed startupsProduct-market fitProduct-led sales and early GTMCreative distribution advantages

Notable companies

Selected portfolio companies the partner has backed

DropboxClearbit

How to approach

Framing and angles for outreach

Pitch framing

Lead with why the startup has a non-obvious distribution advantage and how early sales or product-led adoption can create momentum before the market is obvious. He appears especially relevant for pre-seed or seed founders who need help turning early customer pull into a repeatable go-to-market motion.

Partneralization hooks

  1. 1Reference his Dropbox product-led-sales background if the company has bottom-up adoption.
  2. 2Mention Clearbit if the company has a data, GTM, or B2B sales motion angle.
  3. 3Frame the pitch around product-market fit and early repeatability rather than only vision.
  4. 4Call out any creative distribution advantage, such as API embedding, founder-led audience, or bottoms-up usage.

Recent signals

What the partner has said or done recently

  • Official profile highlights his Dropbox product-led-sales experience and Clearbit business leadership before its exit to HubSpot.

  • Official profile says he advised more than 30 seed-stage startups on sales best practices and product-market-fit paths.

  • Public investor profiles describe his focus as pre-seed and seed companies, especially AI application-layer startups with distribution advantages.

Other partners at Floodgate

4 more profiles

View firm →
Ann Miura-Ko

Ann Miura-Ko

Co-founding Partner

Floodgate

Ann Miura-Ko is a co-founding Partner at Floodgate, a repeat Forbes Midas List investor, and a Stanford entrepreneurship lecturer known for backing highly technical early-stage companies.

AICompany buildingConsumerEarly-stage pre-seed/seedEnterpriseMVC/PMF
Iris Choi

Iris Choi

Partner

Floodgate

Iris Choi is a Partner at Floodgate who works with portfolio companies on corporate relationships, business development, and financings.

Broad tech sectorsCorporate relationshipsEarly-stage pre-seed/seedPortfolio company support
Mike Maples, Jr.

Mike Maples, Jr.

Co-founding Partner

Floodgate

Mike Maples, Jr. is a co-founding Partner at Floodgate and an early-stage investor known for backing category-defining startups including Twitter, Twitch, Okta, Chegg, Demandforce, Applied Intuition, Clover Health, and Outreach.

AIConsumerEarly-stage pre-seed/seedEnterprisePattern-breaking founders
Sam Beskind

Sam Beskind

Associate

Floodgate

Floodgate associate and Mike Maples Jr. chief of staff with climate and hard-tech founder research experience.

climate techearly-stage startupsfounder researchhard techsocial impact

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