San Francisco-based Base10 Partners has closed two funds totaling $850 million to invest in automation across real economy sectors. The firm's fourth seed and Series A fund, along with its second Series B fund, will target logistics, payroll, construction and other traditionally non-tech-heavy industries.

Co-founder Adeyemi Ajao describes Base10's thesis as bringing technology capabilities reserved for the top 1% to the broader market. Portfolio companies include Nubank, Motive, WeTravel, Happy Robot and Blank Street Coffee. The firm is exploring vision models and world models - essentially LLMs for visual understanding - to unlock robotics applications in construction and manufacturing.

Base10 takes a research-first approach, spending months analyzing sectors before investing. Their internal AI system, Base11, helps classify companies and automate research. Each year, the firm plans 10-15 seed investments and 2-3 Series A deals from its early-stage fund, while the Series B fund targets 3-4 investments annually.

Despite AI-driven research tools, Ajao emphasizes that decision-making remains fundamentally human, requiring deep founder understanding and customer conversations. The firm competes by articulating clear partnership value. Through its Advancement Initiative, Base10 donates up to 50% of carried interest to underfunded universities, supporting financial aid programs.