Scott Belsky

Who they are

Scott Belsky is Partner at A24 overseeing technology and innovation — founder of Behance (sold to Adobe) and creator of A24 Labs, the studio's internal tech and product initiative.

Person

Scott graduated from Cornell with a BS in Environmental Economics in 2002, then went straight to Goldman Sachs as a European Markets Associate — an unusual starting point for someone who'd spend the next two decades obsessing over creative productivity. He left Goldman for Harvard Business School, and came out the other side founding Behance in 2006, an online portfolio platform for creative professionals that he ran as CEO for years before Adobe acquired it. Post-acquisition he stayed inside Adobe, rising to Chief Product Officer and ultimately Chief Strategy Officer and EVP of Design & Emerging Products — a decade-plus arc inside one of the world's largest creative-tools companies. Along the way he was a General Partner at Benchmark, where he made early bets on Uber and Pinterest, and he serves on the Atlassian board and has been an early advisor and investor in Airtable, sweetgreen, Ramp, and Good Inside. He founded Behance, A24 Labs, and Kindling Holdings (which oversees the Action Method line of organizational products for designers). The through-line is a sustained interest in how creative people get things done — not abstract creativity theory but the organizational, product, and technological infrastructure that makes creative work ship. He writes at scottbelsky.com, publishes the Implications newsletter at implications.com (monthly, covering tech advances and culture shifts), and has two books: 'Making Ideas Happen' (2010) and 'The Messy Middle' (2018).

Company

Belsky joined A24 in January 2025 when the studio was valued at $3.5 billion following a $250 million Thrive Capital-led raise in 2024. His mandate is running A24 Labs, the studio's technology and innovation initiative. The most significant recent development is a November 2025 Google DeepMind partnership — Google put in $75 million, marking Alphabet's first stake in a film studio, to explore how AI can support filmmakers and creative professionals. A24 also closed its documentary division in May 2025, resulting in five layoffs. The 2AM management and production company, a long-running A24 partner, ended its run in November 2025.

Market

A24 sits at the premium end of independent film and TV — known for filmmaker-driven work like 'Moonlight,' 'Everything Everywhere All at Once,' 'Hereditary,' and 'Euphoria' — competing most directly against Neon, Annapurna Pictures, Focus Features, Bleecker Street, and MUBI. The studio swept six top Academy Awards in 2023 and commands a cult following among younger audiences, but faces structural pressure from rising digital ad costs, international streaming quotas compressing distribution margins, and the labor-action vulnerability exposed by the 2023 SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes. The broader AI content-creation market saw a 50% funding increase in 2025, making the Google DeepMind deal a pointed strategic move to stay ahead of how AI reshapes production workflows.

Network

No direct edge data is available from the network probe. From the claims, Belsky's most visible institutional connections include Ben Thompson at Stratechery (who interviewed him in 2023 on Adobe's strategy), his Atlassian board seat, and his Cornell Tech Council membership (joined September 2025). His investor and advisor relationships — Uber, Pinterest, Airtable, Ramp, sweetgreen, Good Inside — represent a broad network across consumer, fintech, and enterprise software.

Ben Thompson· Founder, Stratechery
Thrive Capital· Lead investor, A24 2024 funding round
Google DeepMind· AI research partner and investor in A24 (Nov 2025)

How they likely show up

Long tenure across Behance → Adobe (founder through decade-plus exec track) → likely thinks in multi-year arcs and is comfortable with slow compounding bets rather than quick pivots.
Hybrid role-type pattern (operator + investor + author + board member simultaneously) → high context-switching tolerance; probably runs multiple threads in parallel and expects meetings to be dense, not meandering.
Prolific public writing across two books, a newsletter (Implications), and scottbelsky.com → comfortable being the named voice on a position; likely responds well when you've read something specific and can engage on it.
Founded Behance to serve creative professionals, then spent a decade inside Adobe building tools for the same audience → his frame is almost always 'what does the creative practitioner actually need,' not abstract strategy.
Early investor in Uber, Pinterest, Airtable, Ramp — diverse consumer and enterprise bets → pattern-matches fast on product-market fit signals; not a single-thesis investor.
Moved from the world's largest creative software company to an indie film studio to build its tech arm → drawn to context shifts where his specific stack of skills (product + creativity + tech) is genuinely novel, not just imported.

Conversation tips

→ Reference a specific essay or Implications newsletter issue — he publishes regularly and will immediately know whether you've actually read it or are faking familiarity.
→ Ask about 'The Messy Middle' framework in the context of A24 Labs — he wrote the book on navigating the hard middle of bold ventures, and he's now living it inside a film studio; the parallel is rich.
→ Don't treat him as a pure VC or pure operator — he's genuinely both, and conversations that try to put him in one box tend to miss what's most interesting about his perspective.
→ He has a stated appreciation for highly crafted things (see his Tokyo posts) — if your work has craft and precision, lead with that; he notices the difference between something built carefully and something shipped sloppily.
→ Come prepared with a view on where AI and creative production intersect — the Google DeepMind partnership is live and he's running point on it; having a take will matter more than asking a generic question.

Toolbox

Openers

Open on A24 Labs and the Google DeepMind deal — he's the person running A24's AI and technology initiative, and Google's $75M bet (Alphabet's first stake in a film studio, November 2025) is the clearest signal of what he's actually building toward.
Bring up Implications, his newsletter at implications.com — it covers the intersection of tech advances and culture shifts, and citing a specific recent issue immediately signals you've done the work and opens a real exchange.
Reference 'The Messy Middle' in the context of film production — the book is about navigating the hardest part of any bold venture, and he's now applying that framework to A24 Labs from inside an indie studio; the meta-narrative is compelling.

Discovery questions

You spent a decade at Adobe building product tools for creative professionals — what assumptions from that world turned out to be wrong once you got inside a film studio?
The Google DeepMind partnership frames AI as supporting filmmakers rather than replacing them — how do you actually enforce that framing operationally inside A24 Labs when the technology keeps pushing the other way?
Kindling Holdings and the Action Method line have been a long-running side project focused on tangible creativity — how does that sensibility about physical, crafted tools shape what you're building digitally at A24?

Avoid

Don't pitch generic 'AI will transform Hollywood' framing — he's running the studio's AI initiative himself and has a specific, considered view on where the tech helps versus harms creative work; surface-level takes will land flat.

Make it yours