Michael Mignano is an American entrepreneur and venture capitalist. He is a venture capitalist at Lightspeed,[1] the co-founder of the podcasting platform Anchor, and former head of Spotify's talk audio (podcasts, live, and video) business.[2][3] In 2019, Mignano was regarded by Fortune Magazine as one of the most influential young people in business in their annual "40 under 40" list.[4] Mignano studied Computer Science at the University of Delaware.[5]
Mignano began his career in the music industry at Atlantic Records before transitioning into tech, first at photo-sharing platform Aviary and then Adobe.[6] In 2016, after struggling to produce podcasts on his own, he started Anchor to make it easier for aspiring creators to broadcast audio with co-founder, Nir Zicherman.[7] The pair received financial backing from a variety of venture capitalists, including Accel, Google's venture arm GV, and the co-founders' former boss from Adobe, Scott Belsky.[8]
In February 2019, Anchor was acquired by Spotify[9] for more than $150M[10] and Mignano became responsible for overseeing the Swedish audio streaming company podcast tech business, as well as their expansion into video and live audio.[11] Under Mignano's leadership, Anchor has grown to power more than 75% of all podcasts.[12] In 2022, after announcing he'd be leaving Spotify to focus on early stage tech investing,[13] Mignano introduced a new feature enabling users to create, edit, and share podcasts directly in the Spotify app.[14]
In 2022, it was announced that Mignano would be joining the Silicon Valley venture capital firm, Lightspeed.[15] He has invested in AI companies including Pika Labs,[16] Granola,[17] and TollBit.[18]
In 2024, Mignano and his former Anchor Co-Founder launched a new AI education company, Oboe.[19]
Speaking
In 2019, Mignano was featured as one of the main keynote speakers at the South by Southwest festival in Austin, TX.[20]
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