Leah Solivan

Engineer, Entrepreneur, Venture Capital Investor, Public Board Member

Leah is currently a General Partner at Fuel Capital, where she manages three high performing funds boasting top quartile performance. With a portfolio of over 150 companies that span a variety of sectors including consumer technology, hardware, education, marketplaces, and retail, she is an investor in Figma, Flexport, Lattice, Upwards, Bark, Pacaso and more. She’s passionate about finding founders and teams who are taking on world-changing ideas, and providing the support they need to maximize their potential.

Leah relates so well to founders because she is one herself. She created one of the most widely recognized new consumer technology brands of the past decade with TaskRabbit, the pioneering on-demand marketplace company she founded in 2008. TaskRabbit became a revolutionary concept that transformed the future of work and laid the foundation for the gig economy. As TaskRabbit’s CEO for eight years, Leah scaled the company into an international business with operations in 44 cities and more than $50 million in venture capital funding, from many of the top firms in Silicon Valley. In 2016, Leah transitioned into the role of executive chairwoman, and in 2017 oversaw TaskRabbit’s successful sale to IKEA, the multinational home decor corporation.

Prior to founding TaskRabbit, Leah began her career as a software engineer at IBM, where she worked for seven years on products including Lotus Notes and Domino. She earned a B.S. in Mathematics and Computer Science from Sweet Briar College, where she has served on the Board of Directors.

Leah serves on the Board Directors for PetMeds (NASDAQ: PETS), the San Francisco Ballet, and is Chair of the Board for the YPO Pacific US Region.

Proud of her Latina heritage, Leah is devoted to increasing diversity in technology and business. She has been a frequent speaker on topics such as entrepreneurship, the future of work, and women in technology at events such as the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland and Tina Brown’s Women in the World Summit. Leah’s achievements have been featured in publications including the Wall Street Journal, Wired, and Time, and Fast Company named her one of the “100 Most Creative People in Business.” She's a frequent guest on nationally ranked podcasts, top media outlets, and an in demand keynote speaker globally, represented by the Washington Speakers Bureau.