Christopher Manning, one of the most influential figures in AI and world’s most-cited NLP researcher, has officially joined AIX Ventures as a General Partner, the firm announced.
Manning, long recognized for foundational work including GloVe, attention mechanisms, and the Stanford CoreNLP toolkit, has been an investing partner at AIX since its founding in 2021. He now takes a full-time role, going on leave from Stanford University where he led the Stanford AI Lab (SAIL), founded the Stanford NLP Group, and co-founded the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI (HAI).
AIX Ventures, which counts Manning among its founding partners alongside Richard Socher, Shaun Johnson, and Anthony Goldbloom, is doubling down on its bet that the next decade of AI innovation will be shaped by researchers-turned-builders.
“We’re entering a new era where deep AI systems will fundamentally reshape how we interact with technology and knowledge,” Manning said. “Joining AIX Ventures as a General Partner allows me to support the next generation of founders building the tools and infrastructure that will define that future.”
At AIX, Manning will focus on sourcing and supporting startups at the edge of machine learning and natural language reasoning. His previous investments through the firm include Wispr, Workera, Workhelix, and Perplexity, one of the most closely watched search startups in the generative AI boom.
“Chris has been one of the most influential minds in AI over the past two decades,” said Shaun Johnson, Co-Founder and General Partner at AIX. “His ability to spot foundational shifts early and guide them with both technical depth and practical insight makes him an incredible partner for the kinds of ambitious founders we back.”
The addition further solidifies AIX’s identity as a VC firm led by AI insiders. In addition to Manning, AIX’s leadership includes Socher (former Chief Scientist at Salesforce and founder of MetaMind) and Goldbloom (founder of Kaggle), Johnson (ex-VP of Product at Lilt), Krish Ramadurai (ex-Harvard and MIT bio researcher), and Jason McBride (former Microsoft M12 investor).
The firm has backed startups across consumer, developer tools, healthcare, and enterprise infrastructure. Its portfolio includes Hugging Face, You.com, Weights & Biases, and Perplexity, AI-native companies building core infrastructure for the next wave of computing.
“I’ve seen firsthand how Chris has shaped the entire field thinking about NLP and intelligence,” AIX co-founder Richard Socer added. “Having him as a GP at AIX Ventures brings unmatched research depth to our team and gives founders direct access to one of the pioneers behind modern NLP.”
With AI entering a phase where science and product are inseparable, Manning’s move to full-time venture is both symbolic and strategic. He’s betting that researchers should not just publish the future of AI, but help fund and build it.
