Moritz is a lifelong gamer who spent the majority of his teenage years competitively playing Blizzard’s Diablo II—culminating in a global #1 ranking among over 12 million players in 2003. The first person in his family to graduate high school, he traded the digital swords and armor that he earned in-game to afford his college tuition—approximately two decades before NFTs entered the mainstream.
These formative experiences are part of what led Moritz to join Lightspeed in 2022, to guide the firm’s investments in game studios as well as gaming-related platforms and technologies, such as the industry’s intersections with artificial intelligence, extended reality, and web3. In other words, startups that are enabling the creation of immersive, interactive, and social virtual worlds; or what’s generally referred to as the ‘Metaverse.’
Prior to Lightspeed, Moritz was a partner and management team member at BITKRAFT Ventures. Together with the founders, he scaled the firm to become the most active gaming VC and lead investor of 2020, 2021, and 2022. Moritz led many of the firm’s marquee deals including Inworld AI, Theorycraft Games, Raid Base, Lightforge Games, Horizon Blockchain Games, and TRIPP.
Previously, Moritz was a Vice President at Goldman Sachs, where he built and co-led the firm’s global gaming practice. During his tenure, he advised many of the world’s leading gaming and technology companies across PC, console, and mobile platforms such as Google, Meta, Microsoft, Activision, Electronic Arts, and Take-Two on over $300 billion in transaction volume across over 40 M&A, IPO, VC, and other strategic transactions—including Dell’s $67 billion acquisition of EMC and IBM’s $34 billion purchase of Red Hat.
Beyond his interests in gaming and technology, Moritz’s passion for investing also stems from a deep appreciation for partnering with exceptional entrepreneurs—many of whom have led the creation of popular games like Fortnite, Call of Duty, League of Legends, Apex, Overwatch, Valorant, StarCraft II, and Warcraft III.
As an investor and board director, he helps emerging game studios and interactive technology companies with everything from strategy to hiring, sales and marketing, and financing. “We’re constantly challenging ourselves to be thoughtful in our work with founders: prioritizing deep domain expertise and connectivity across relevant sectors, building a global and multi-stage investment platform that can support companies across the world and through their entire lifecycle—and upholding a culture that puts founders first,” said Moritz.
“For hundreds of thousands of years, humans have been illuminated by the infinite openness and creativity of play. Gaming instilled in me an innate sense of constantly looking for an opportunity to ‘break the meta’—to chase global, not local optima; to tear down preconceived notions by arguing from first principles; to explore new frontiers.”
Outside of investing, this philosophy is embodied by his participation in marathon, Ironman, and ultra-distance races, including the 251 km long, self-sufficient ‘Marathon des Sables’ through the Moroccan Sahara—where runners are equipped with a venom pump to combat snake bites and scorpion stings—and the ‘World Marathon Challenge,’ in which athletes face 7 marathons on 7 continents in 7 consecutive days.
Moritz lives in Los Angeles and holds an M.B.A. and M.A. from Stanford University, where he graduated as Arjay Miller Scholar. For his work at the intersection of gaming and finance, he was recognized among the ‘30 Under 30’ (Forbes) and ‘40 Under 40’ (Capital).
