Whitney Lemmon

Whitney leads venture capital fund investing across Next Legacy’s established and emerging manager strategies and has helped commit $2B across four fund cycles. She joined the firm in 2018 as an analyst and has spent nearly a decade building the rigorous, data-driven diligence process Next Legacy uses to evaluate thousands of venture opportunities, along with the systems that support it.

While earning her MBA, Whitney broadened her experience with direct early-stage investing at Pear VC and the Stanford GSB Impact Fund, and as Chief of Staff at Formally, a legal-tech AI company.

She came to Next Legacy from Portola Partners, a Menlo Park-based wealth management firm, where she served on the Impact Investing Committee and advised philanthropic families with foundations and impact portfolios. Several of those clients invested in the Legacy funds, which is how she came to know the model and why she joined: maximize returns on the front end and give 100% to charity on the back end. Today her work centers on identifying the managers worth backing, taking them through diligence, and building lasting relationships with investors across the ecosystem.

Whitney earned her BA in Economics from Stanford University as well as her MBA and Certificate in Public Management and Social Innovation from Stanford’s Graduate School of Business. She has a longtime passion for the intersection of business and social impact, which has led her to serving in various volunteer roles for nonprofits advancing equity in education and economic empowerment. She is currently an advisor to Rise University Prep, a Bayview-based middle and high school, and has co-authored their Annual Report every year since 2020.

A Bay-Area native, Whitney grew up in Menlo Park and currently resides in Oakland with her husband. She enjoys reading cookbooks for fun, hiking, and has recently gotten into film photography.