Two children of alleged Kremlin allies work on the investment team at 8VC, the firm led by Palantir cofounder Joe Lonsdale.
By David Jeans, Forbes Staff
Venture capital firm 8VC, which has invested in U.S. defense contractors like Palantir and Anduril, employs two children of sanctioned Russian oligarchs, Forbes has learned, at a time when the U.S. government is increasingly concerned about the proximity of foreign adversaries to Silicon Valley.
In 2022, the firm hired Denis Aven, the son of Petr Aven — a Russian banker worth an estimated $4.4 billion who at the time had been sanctioned by the European Union and the U.K. The senior Aven was later sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury in 2023 for his role operating one of Russia’s largest commercial banks.
Also on the investment team is Jack Moshkovich, who joined in 2018, and is the son of billionaire Russian oligarch Vadim Moshkovich, a founder of the agriculture conglomerate Rusagro. After Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, the elder Moshkovich was sanctioned by the EU, U.K., Switzerland, Canada and Australia over his alleged ties to the Kremlin and Russian president Vladimir Putin (he has not been sanctioned by the U.S.).
There is no indication that either of the sanctioned fathers have any financial relationship with 8VC. But their sons’ roles at the venture capital firm come as the U.S. government is paying more attention to foreign connections to the tech industry. Last month, the National Counterintelligence and Security Center issued a bulletin warning Silicon Valley startups about foreign adversaries using investment firms to access sensitive data and threaten national security.
“There’s nothing illegal about hiring the son of somebody sanctioned,” said Daniel Fried, a former sanctions coordinator at the State Department, and longtime Russia policy veteran. But “if you’re hiring the children of people that are reasonably assumed to be supporting the [Russian] regime — even if they might have had private doubts at one point — you better have done due diligence.”
Responding to an interview request for this story, 8VC’s managing partner and cofounder Joe Lonsdale posted a 950-word essay on X, saying 8VC has “a strict compliance and legal framework and always makes sure to respect and follow the law. We haven’t taken any money from their fathers or their fathers’ friends, and don’t need it.”
8VC did not respond to a request for an interview with Aven and Moshkovich. Petr Aven and lawyers for Vadim Moshkovich didn’t respond to a comment request.
In the X post, Lonsdale characterized this story as a “pathetic hit piece…looking to paint our two Russian colleagues at 8VC as a ‘scandal.’” He described Moshkovich as “a superstar,” Aven as “a talent,” and said Moshkovich’s sanctioned oligarch father is “a successful agricultural leader,” noting that “if you’re a businessman in Russia, and their leader says to meet, you go, regardless of your views.” (Both the elders’ Aven and Moshkovich met with Putin and other business leaders the day Russia invaded Ukraine.)
Several 8VC employees echoed Lonsdale’s support for Moshkovich and Aven on X. “People like @jack_moshkovich and Denis are what make 8VC and America great,” wrote 8VC cofounder Drew Oetting. Palmer Luckey, the founder of 8VC’s portfolio company Anduril, also responded, stating: “How dare we take the best people away from dictatorships!”
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Started by Palantir cofounder Lonsdale in 2015, 8VC invests in an array of industries but has emerged as a prominent defense tech backer, alongside other major firms like Andreessen Horowitz and General Catalyst. With investments in Palantir and Anduril, which collectively have generated billions in government contracts, 8VC has broadened its portfolio with other military-focused unicorns, including the drone boat company Saronic and the counter-drone systems startup Epirus. On podcasts and blogs, Lonsdale has pointed to China’s rise as a reason for backing military startups. China is “building really advanced things that they’re starting to compete with the U.S.,” Lonsdale said at a conference in March. “That became a very scary realization to us about 10 years ago so we went hard into defense.”
8VC now employs more than 70 people, including 10 investment partners. Moshkovich joined the firm in 2018 as an analyst, while completing his studies at Stanford University, where he’d arrived after growing up in Moscow and attending boarding school in the U.K. While at Stanford, he’d returned to Moscow to complete multiple summer analyst roles at McKinsey’s office in the Russian capital, according to his LinkedIn page.
Moshkovich, who received a green card and became a U.S. permanent resident over the summer, has worked on a portfolio of investments as a principal, typically focusing on seed and series A funding rounds. He holds multiple board observer roles, including with the AI company FieldGuide, which provides software for audit firms, and collaboration software company Rocklane. He does not appear to have been involved in any defense-related deals.
After Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, the EU sanctioned the elder Moshkovich, accusing him of supporting “actions or policies which undermine or threaten” Ukraine; he has disputed alleged ties to Putin and the Russian government, saying he is not involved in politics. In June, he dropped an appeal to remove the EU’s sanctions.
A long-time friend of Jack Moshkovich’s, Aven left Moscow when he was 12 and also attended boarding school in the U.K before arriving in the U.S. He attended Yale, and then completed an MBA at Harvard in 2022. According to Lonsdale’s X post, he hired Aven after learning that he’d lost a potential job opportunity at a private equity firm over concerns about the sanctions against his father.
His father, Petr, previously led Alfa Bank, but stepped down from that role after Russia invaded Ukraine and he was sanctioned by the EU due to his alleged position in Putin’s inner circle. While the EU later annulled some sanctions, the U.S. imposed sanctions on Aven last August, citing his role “having operated in the financial services sector of the Russian Federation economy.” Announcing the sanctions against Aven and several business associates, Treasury deputy secretary Wally Adeyemo said at the time: “Wealthy Russian elites should disabuse themselves of the notion that they can operate business as usual while the Kremlin wages war against the Ukrainian people.”
Aven has disputed the sanctions; last month, in seeking to lift U.K. sanctions, a lawyer representing Aven said his personal beliefs put him in “a position of opposition to the current regime.”
The younger Aven is now working with 8VC to launch an undisclosed venture as a so-called entrepreneur-in-residence, according to Lonsdale. In his post on X, Lonsdale said that while he detests Putin, “I happen to disagree that it’s a good strategy for us to isolate the smart, wealthy Russian people themselves.”
Fried, the former State Department sanctions official, agreed that “there are lots of talented Russians around the world, and the United States.” But, he added, “most of them are not the children of sanctioned individuals.”
