Before becoming a venture investor, Haven Allen led manufacturing strategy at World Business Chicago, worked on infrastructure and electricity markets as a Mayoral Fellow, and did community economic development with the Peace Corps in Panama, giving him a policy and economic development background that's uncommon among VCs. He was writing and building around hardtech years before it became a popular investment category, and his focus has stayed specific: he argues that the real opportunity in AI is the physical backbone behind it—things like cooling, robotics, grid, and power systems—while also pushing for hardtech commercialization as a way to rebuild manufacturing capacity in Chicago and the broader Midwest.