Shade Secures $14M to Simplify Creative Media Workflows
New York-based startup Shade has secured $14 million in a funding round led by Khosla Ventures, Construct Capital, and Bling Capital. The company, which aims to overhaul how agencies, sports teams, and brands manage massive media libraries, has now raised a total of $20 million since its inception four years ago.
Founded in 2024 by CEO Brandon Fan and CTO Emerson Dove, the startup emerged from the duo’s personal frustration with traditional cloud storage services. Relying on fragmented tools like Dropbox and stacks of physical hard drives proved inefficient, particularly as generative AI continues to inflate the volume of digital media files that creative teams must organize daily.
A New Architecture for Media
Unlike standard storage solutions that treat files as static data, Shade is built to integrate with creative workflows. Keith Rabois, managing director at Khosla Ventures, noted that while other platforms merely layer search features onto existing storage, Shade rebuilt the entire stack from the ground up.
The platform distinguishes itself through two primary technical capabilities:
- AI-Powered Natural Language Search: Users can query their library in plain English. The system identifies specific moments within videos—such as searching for “a person holding a laptop in snow”—and provides exact timestamps. It also utilizes automatic transcription and facial recognition to make assets instantly discoverable.
- Streamable File System: Shade allows users to mount cloud storage directly to their local filesystem. This eliminates the need to wait for large files to download before editing, enabling immediate access even in low-bandwidth environments.
Future Outlook and Collaboration Tools
Beyond storage, the platform functions as a collaboration hub where teams can pin feedback to specific video timestamps and manage granular access roles. For final client deliveries, users can generate branded, password-protected collections with expiration dates.
The startup currently offers a $20-per-seat monthly plan for smaller teams, which includes 500GB of active storage per user, unlimited AI indexing, and support for up to 150 collaborators. Looking ahead, the team plans to expand its search capabilities to encompass a broader range of documents and images, while developing a no-code platform that allows teams to automate complex file-based workflows.
