DOGE Guys Get VC Funding to Back Their Latest Ventures

Former members of so called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) they have started to start, they say, to bring “DOGE for the private sector.” Their company, called Special, is backed by a billionaire Biography of Marc Andreessen venture capital firm a16z and several other former DOGE members.

In post on Substack of a16z, Nate Cavanaugh and Justin Fox, who led DOGE efforts in several government agencies, write that their startup will build “a strategic plan to transform American industries with AI,” and say that “Main Street,” like the federal government, is not doing well. The plan, according to Fox and Cavanaugh, is “straightforward integration,” buying businesses in critical sectors and running them using Special’s operating systems. Their first goal is advanced care, called vertical FigureHealth. In a interview on TBPNCavanaugh said that Special is also looking at “markets like construction, manufacturing, other high-performance, highly regulated markets where a lot of what we learned from DOGE can be applied to the special sector as well.”

Their work also aims to eliminate waste, and references recent Republican policies blue states are a scam. “One need look no further than daycare centers in Minnesota or hospice businesses in California to find massive waste in businesses that benefit from tax dollars,” Fox and Cavanaugh write. Allegations of waste and fraud were essential to the DOGE’s self-justification to cut government contracts, jobs, and even close government contracts. US Agency for International Development (USAID). Fraud lawsuits against Minnesota daycare centers created grounds for President Donald Trump’s executive order thousands of participants to the government earlier this year.

“These words rely on DOGE-y tropes, about fraud in Minnesota. It’s a very bro-y view of government and what’s wrong,” said Don Moynihan, a professor of public policy at the University of Michigan. “If you think the biggest problem in American government is welfare fraud, then that shows a little perspective on the bigger problems we’re facing right now.

With Andreessen Horowitz leading the fund, Cavanaugh and Fox also say that some of their “friends at DOGE” were supporting the project, including Steve Davis, billionaire Elon Musk’s right-hand man who served as DOGE’s operations coordinator; Antonio Gracias, the founder of Valor Equity Partners and a close friend of Musk who worked on the DOGE project at Social Security Administration; Barry Akisa Turkish citizen who worked as a recruiter at DOGE; Anthony Armstrong, former chief financial officer at Musk’s xAI; Donald Parkwho was part of the DOGE’s activities to Small Business Administration; and Adam Ramada and Brooks Morgan, who founded the Austin-based BANNER VC after leaving DOGE in August 2025. Coinbase was founded by Brian Armstrong, and Shyam Sankar, chief technology officer at Palantir, a security contracting firm co-founded by the billionaire and Musk ally Peter Thiel, also participated in the investment round.

Cavanaugh and Fox did not respond to requests for comment; even people who seemed to have money.

During the DOGE session, Cavanaugh and Fox presided forcible seizure of the Congressionally funded non-profit organization, US Institute of Peace (USIP). After being installed as director of USIP, Cavanaugh tried to make gifts his house in the governmentthe move that is currently the subject of the case continues in court. Cavanaugh was also appointed director of the Interagency Council on Homelessness. At both agencies, Cavanaugh placed nearly all employees on administrative leave.