Room 52 @ The Pro: Founders vs. Comedians

🎭 After a sold-out NYC debut, Founders vs. Comedians: An AI Pitch Night is coming to Palo Alto.
A month ago in NYC, we put AI founders in a room with comedians, VCs, and operators - and made them pitch on a comedy stage. Turns out explaining your startup to comedians is way harder than pitching investors, and founders unknowingly write some of the best material out there.
It worked. So this time, we’re bringing the chaos to the West Coast.
Hosted in collaboration with Room 52, The Pro, UpScaleX, and Dev Chandra, this event brings together AI founders, comedians, operators, investors, and ecosystem partners for a night of founder pitches, live reactions, friendly roasts, and high-signal conversations.
🎤👉 Ready to pitch? Click here to apply 👈🎤
🔥 Pitch Format
Each selected founder will have 3 minutes to pitch, followed by 5 minutes of live feedback and roast from comedians, operators, and investors.
Selected teams are expected to arrive on time and attend in person. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis, and we encourage founders to apply early as pitch slots are limited.
💡 The Theme
We’re especially excited about founders building in agentic AI, AI-native applications, and AI-powered commerce - real products that help people and businesses work, create, buy, sell, learn, or operate better.
Come ready to be honest about what’s harder than it looks, share what you think the market is still sleeping on, and survive a friendly roast.
✨ On Stage
🎤 Adam Strauss | Comedian, storyteller, and former tech founder behind The Mushroom Cure, known for turning pain, obsession, and startup failure into brutally honest comedy.
🎤 Abhay Nadkarni | Comedian and creator with 80K+ followers, bringing sharp, offbeat stories from a life that somehow includes propane tanks, vibrator programming, and Brown Jesus.
🎤 Mark Liu | Seed-stage investor at UpScaleX focused on applied AI and agentic systems, bringing a sharp investor lens from his background in software private equity.
🎤 Eric Kovar | Founder of Room52NYC, building the future of AI-powered creativity and live experiences at the intersection of comedy, tech, and culture.
🎤 Dev Chandra | Leading connector in the founder ecosystem, helping early-stage teams raise through investor discovery, warm intros, and high-signal market context.
🤝 Event Hosts & Sponsors
Room 52 is a go-to entertainment venue in NYC featuring creative performances and comedy shows, where stand-up comedians develop sharp material before reaching larger stages and national audiences.
UpScaleX is a San Francisco and Palo Alto-based seed fund and founders’ community investing in AI-native applications, agentic economies, and vertical AI, built to empower the next generation of AI innovators.
Dev Chandra is the founder of Startup Intros, a venture-backed platform helping founders raise capital through investor discovery, warm intros, and high-signal market context.
The Pro is a Palo Alto landmark originally established in 1964 and recently revitalized on Ramona Street, carrying forward its Bay Area sports legacy, Stanford spirit, and community-driven atmosphere.

🎤👉 Ready to pitch? Click here to apply 👈🎤
Come for the drinks and light bites; stay for the pitches, the roasts, the sharp feedback, and the conversations that happen after.
*Photos and videos may be taken during the event. By attending, you acknowledge that event footage may be shared on social media.