Kevin Novak joined Uber as its 21st employee its seventh engineer in 2011, and by 2014, he was the company’s head of data science. He talks proudly of that time, but like all good things, it ran its course and by the end of 2017, having accomplished what he wanted at the company, he left. At first, he picked up the pace of his angel investing, work he’d already begun focusing on during weekends and evenings, ultimately building a portfolio of more than 50 startups (including the fintech Pipe and the autonomous checkout company Standard Cognition ). He also began advising both startups and venture firms — including Playground Global, Costanoa Ventures, Renegade Partners and Data Collective — and after falling in love with the work, Novak this year decided to launch his own venture outfit in Menlo Park, Ca., called Rackhouse Venture Capital . Indeed, Rackhouse just closed its debut fund with $15 million, anchored by Uber’s first head of engineering, Curtis Chambers; Steve Gilula, a fo...