Thought Leadership Threads

It was amazing to see the reaction to the thread by @dunkhippo33 about “why ownership doesn’t matter for early stage investing”. There are great nuggets in her thread but I have a very different perspective and counter-argument.

The case for why ownership DOES matter:

I asked a number of institutional LPs that invest in VC funds what they thought about the recent rise in exit valuations and if the resulting VC results were going to impact their view of managers and allocations.

You might be surprised about what they said! Unpacked:

It seems to be a trend that’s hit peak levels during the pandemic, but people in the #startup ecosystem are throwing themselves into their jobs to the detriment of everything else in their lives. It reminds me of a funny story.

It’s been 6-months since I posted a thread about the trend of early stage companies raising of 2-3 back-to-back rounds with minimal progress in-between. I asked some amazing VCs whether or not anything has changed since. They think it’s gotten worse. Their thoughts:

One business model I talk about frequently with Founders is underbuilding their software as a strategy.

It’s a really powerful concept that can help a product stand out in a crowded market and turbo-charge growth. Unpacked 👇:

It’s widely believed that “grit” is one of the most important characteristics of highly successful people. I have an emerging (and controversial view) that the YOLO investing behavior that we’re seeing is directly attributable to a societal reduction in grit. Unpacked:

I’ve been asked a lot why there’s so much variance on “valuations relative to traction”. Some companies are getting 100X ARR multiples while others are getting 2X. There’s no simple answer but a big driver is if a company can demonstrate “Multiplicative Momentum”.

Do you want to know a little secret regarding how I build conviction during my #startup diligence process? Do you want to know something that I spend time on that many early stage #VCs brush under the rug as silly and unnecessary? Short thread:

The only way to describe the public markets’ appetite for new Logos is “insatiable”. But why? SPACs vs. IPOs? I’m no public markets expert by any stretch of the imagination but I’m not going to let that stop me from weighing in on what I think is going on. Unpacked: