Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape. In today’s show, we have the pleasure of speaking to Braughm Ricke, who has worked closely with emerging managers throughout his career, first serving as CFO of True Ventures, and then starting Aduro Advisors, which started in 2012 originally to focus on the new era of VC. He was also a early Advisor and Investor in Carta and has been an active investor. Thanks to working with over 350 venture fund clients, Braughm has unique insights on effective fundraising, what makes for a institutional back-office, and broad venture trends. In this episode we discuss:01:01    What Braughm saw in 2012 when he started Aduro Advisors to focus on Emerging VC’s 05:49    How the emerging manager space has grown and evolved06:42    What is different today from the early days08:49    The fundraising landscape for emerging managers11:49    Tactics for breaking into family offices13:51    What managers often need to do between rounds 16:19    The workload for solo GPs18:12    The support systems GPs need so they can spend more time on core activities22:56    Common traits amongst successful managers25:22    The most common mistakes he sees managers make26:45    What the future holds for venture29:55    The speed of new firm creationMentioned in this episode:* Aduro AdvisorsWe’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Braughm! Follow @SamirKaji and give your insight and questions using the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape. We’re so pleased to bring you my discussion with Monique Woodard of Cake Ventures, a seed-stage firm investing in demographic change. To date, Monique has invested in startups such as Blavity, Court Buddy, Mented Cosmetics, and Silvernest. Cake Ventures invests in a thesis that is based on a “three-layer” philosophy that the future of technology is being driven by certain major shifts:* The aging Baby Boomer population* The shift of minorities driving culture* The increased spending power of women.Monique herself has a diverse background in government, venture capital and inclusive entrepreneurship. She was previously venture partner at 500 Startups, an investment scout for Lightspeed Ventures, and she is also the co-founder of Black Founders. We chat about a wide-range of topics, from her work in Sub-Saharan Africa, why she chose to start her own fund vs joining a large fund, raising capital, and the importance of building community in venture.A message from our sponsorStandish is the largest provider of fund administration services to Venture Capital funds globally. Currently, we serve approximately 750 Venture Capital funds and have more than $150 billion in committed capital under administration.  Standish has been designed by experienced Chief Financial Officers with a deep understanding of the service needs of both finance departments and General Partners at every stage of the product life cycle.  Standish can handle all of the needs of finance department so General Partners can focus on investing.Standish is an employee owned company.https://www.standishmanagement.com/In this episode we discuss:01:56    Monique’s journey into venture capital04:26    Why she joined 500 Startups06:51    Key insights on the globalization of startups from her time at 500 Startups08:57    Transitioning from 500 Startups to Cake Ventures11:10    The three layers of the Cake that form her thesis13:39    Early days of Cake Ventures17:30    Raising capital in a virtual environment20:32    Institutionalizing yourself and your portfolio22:52    Why Monique decided on being a solo GP28:46    When you should think about bringing on additional partners31:13    The future of diversity in the seed ecosystem35:08    Monique’s biggest learning as an investor37:00    Some missed opportunities38:23    Inspirations in the investment communityMentioned in this Episode* Cake Ventures* Gray New World - 2020 Report on Aging* 500 StartupsI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Monique. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape. Our guest today is Shauntel Garvey, co-founder and general partner of education tech focused Reach Capital. She has a long history investing in ed-tech companies stemming back from her time at NewSchools Venture Fund. What I love about the Reach team is how thoughtfully they’ve constructed their firm and partnership which by far is one of the most diverse in all of venture. Currently Reach has $300 AUM and has invested in companies such as Mystery Science (acq by Discovery Education), Nearpod, Outschool, ClassDojo, and Epic.Shauntel did her undergrad at MIT, and got a MA in Education and MBA from Stanford.Listen to our conversation to learn more about how she’s seen the EdTech market evolve over the last few years and particularly since the pandemic, why they are active with portfolio companies after typical seed funds are, and how she thinks about investing thesis. A message from our sponsorFrank, Rimerman + Co.’s history is closely intertwined with that of Silicon Valley. With humble beginnings similar to so many start-ups, Frank, Rimerman was formed with a desire to serve the entrepreneurial and venture communities of the Valley and the determination to think outside-the-box.When it comes to venture funds, we work with almost 500 VC groups from over 20 states across the USA. We have worked with over 350 fund groups throughout their first year, making us one of the leading providers in the country to emerging managers.No one wants to be bored at work. That’s why we chose to work with some of the most innovative and creative people – people who are changing the world around us every day. Their excitement fuels our passion and determination to grow and serve this special community.Frank, Rimerman + Co, Passion Works Here.www.frankrimerman.comIn this episode we discuss:01:29 Shauntel’s journey into VC03:12 The decision to start Reach from NewSchools04:39 Why they decided to go with a larger partnership in Fund 107:14 The challenges of raising a sector specific fund for a sector not well understood at the time09:50 Pitching impact focused LPs vs return focused LPs11:51 How sector-specific managers answer the question about being too narrow16:18 Why despite being as seed fund, Reach stays with their companies throughout their lifecycle20:06 How they think about hiring at Reach21:51 How Reach looks at talent development as a part of its legacy23:41 Things firms can do early to build a generational legacy25:51 Developing and evolving an investment thesis28:24 Creating systems to allow for proactive outreach and investment30:03 Building strong a back office and operations32:50 Shauntel’s greatest learning as an investor33:55 What she’s learned from her misses36:42 The investor she aspires to be more likeMentioned in this episode:* Reach CapitalWe’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Shauntel! Follow @SamirKaji and give your insight and questions using the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape. Today we’re excited to bring you my recent conversation with Mark Suster, managing partner at Upfront Ventures, a firm that was founded 25 years ago, originally as GRP partners. Mark joined the firm in 2007 and became managing partner in 2011 and helped architect the new era of the firm while also actively evangelizing the now robust LA tech ecosystem. Upfront currently has $1.9B AUM and has invested in companies such as Overture,  Maker Studios, and Ring.Prior to joining Upfront, Mark was a two-time operator, including selling the latter to Salesforce.com. He did his BA at UCSD, and got his MBA at the University of Chicago.This was a fun one and we talked a lot about how they’ve rebranded and evolved as a firm, how raising funds is no different than enterprise sales, and the interesting paradox that faces every VC today.A message from our sponsorFrank, Rimerman + Co.’s history is closely intertwined with that of Silicon Valley. With humble beginnings similar to so many start-ups, Frank, Rimerman was formed with a desire to serve the entrepreneurial and venture communities of the Valley and the determination to think outside-the-box.When it comes to venture funds, we work with almost 500 VC groups from over 20 states across the USA. We have worked with over 350 fund groups throughout their first year, making us one of the leading providers in the country to emerging managers.No one wants to be bored at work. That’s why we chose to work with some of the most innovative and creative people – people who are changing the world around us every day. Their excitement fuels our passion and determination to grow and serve this special community.Frank, Rimerman + Co, Passion Works Here.www.frankrimerman.comIn this episode we discuss:01:43    Mark’s journey into VC04:16    Why he thought GRP was a good fit for him08:22    How the firm transformed its investment focus12:55    The process around the rebranding to Upfront Ventures18:23    Human psychology of decisions23:41    Why you need to be careful on when to share data rooms27:41    How fundraising is like sales33:05 Why creating scarcity is important34:57    Talent retention and acquisition42:26    The current state of the venture market Mentioned in this episode:* The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion* Why You Should Never Have A Data RoomWe’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Mark! Follow @SamirKaji and give your insight and questions using the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

On this week’s show, we’re excited to bring you Satya Patel, co-founder of Homebrew, who he started with his partner Hunter Walk in 2013. Today, the firm is widely considered one of the top seed firms in the industry, counting companies such as Chime, Cruise, Eero, and Gusto as portfolio companies. Satya brings a unique product background to the table as he worked on AdSense in the early days at Google, and later in various product roles at Twitter. He also spent time as an investor at Battery Ventures. Satya and Hunter are incredibly thoughtful and detailed when they think about firm building, and during our conversation Satya and I discuss the hard conversations that potential partners need to have before starting a partnership, the unconventional way they raised their first fund, how Homebrew thinks about consistency with founder relationships, and fund sizing.A message from our sponsorFrank, Rimerman + Co.’s history is closely intertwined with that of Silicon Valley. With humble beginnings similar to so many start-ups, Frank, Rimerman was formed with a desire to serve the entrepreneurial and venture communities of the Valley and the determination to think outside-the-box.Frank Rimerman works with almost 500 VC groups from over 20 states across the USA with 350 fund groups during their first year of existence, making them one of the leading providers in the country to emerging managers.Frank, Rimerman + Co, Passion Works Here.www.frankrimerman.comIn this episode we discuss the following topics:01:13    How he and Hunter became friends and decided to work together again03:12    Personal factors in deciding to start his own firm when there were so many other options for them. 06:50    How he and Hunter sorted through their strengths and weaknesses 09:07    How were able to raise their first fund in 100 days by targeting institutional investors instead of relying on family offices like most Fund 1’s. 12:40    How they used scarcity and a hard close date to drive the process19:11    The thought process behind moving up weight classes in investing21:28    Different stages of investment require different skills 24:10    Number of investments vs. bigger ownership in a smaller portfolio26:38    Interview questions for new hires + how they compensate the team31:04 Homebrew to announce an effort to systematically further diversify VC34:45 The best lesson he’s learned37:08 Best advice for someone starting out in VC38:29 The investors that has been most helpful to his careerMentioned In This Episode:* Homebrew* All RaiseWe’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Satya! Follow @SamirKaji and give your insight and questions using the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

We’re thrilled to bring you my recent talk with Jeff Clavier of Uncork Capital, one of the early trailblazers of the emerging manager community. Jeff started investing in seed full time all the way back in 2004 well before the Micro-VC moniker was even conceived (back then we called them Super Angels). Today the firm is one of the most active seed funds in the market with over $500MM in AUM and having invested in companies such as Poshmark, Fitbit, Eventbrite, and Molekule.In this episode is a broad conversation covering the history of VC, raising in a downturn, his thoughts on the hardest things about building the firm, and trends that are influencing the future of venture.A message from our sponsorFrank, Rimerman + Co.’s history is closely intertwined with that of Silicon Valley. With humble beginnings similar to so many start-ups, Frank, Rimerman was formed with a desire to serve the entrepreneurial and venture communities of the Valley and the determination to think outside-the-box.Frank Rimerman works with almost 500 VC groups from over 20 states across the USA with 350 fund groups during their first year of existence, making them one of the leading providers in the country to emerging managers.Frank, Rimerman + Co, Passion Works Here.www.frankrimerman.comIn this episode we discuss the following topics:01:54    Jeff’s start as an investor with $250k of his own capital, and his first investment03:01    The decision to start a fund with third party capital06:10    Fundraising in the global financial crisis of 200809:01    The strategy shift in fund III and the questions it raised from LPs12:10    Why Uncork has kept funds smaller thus far16:45    Thoughts on the service provider model VC’s need to embrace19:16    Building a multi-generational firm with brand recognition 21:36    How to attract high-quality talent23:46    The day-to-day challenges of running a firm25:56    Maintaining culture with remote work30:56    The future of VC after the pandemic34:48    The amount of firms and innovation in the market today and what it means39:24    How the future is so hard to predict40:38    The best advice he’s gotten as a VC42:51    His biggest miss and the lesson he learned from it46:19    The advice he would give to a new managerMentioned In This Episode:* Uncork CapitalWe’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Jeff! Follow @SamirKaji and give your insight and questions using the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Using data to make better investment decisions is a common theme these days, but Nnamdi Okike, co-founder and managing partner of 645 Ventures, a firm that uses unique, data driven methodologies to improve sourcing while helping to eliminate the biases that often present themselves when assessing new opportunities. Using public data that to accompany their own automated systems, they’ve found an interesting way to consistently find undiscovered founders. After leaving Insight Ventures, Nnamdi co-founded 645 Ventures in 2013 with Aaron Holiday, starting with a $8MM proof of concept fund. Since then, they raised a $40MM Fund 2, and most recently closed Fund III at $160M making them one of the largest underrepresented led managers in the United States. The fund focuses primarily on seed and series A and has a portfolio that includes companies such as Iterable, Goldbelly, Eden Health and Squire.Prior to starting his career, Nnamdi got his bachelor’s, JD, and MBA from Harvard. Our wide ranging conversation covers: considerations when growing fund sizes dramatically, the power of using data driven approach to sourcing, and his lessons as a venture investor over the last decade.In this episode we discuss the following topics:01:12    Nnamdi’s journey into venture capital03:37    The opportunity he saw to start 64509:20    How and why they raised $8M for their first fund12:27    Methodology around data that they use to decide on investing16:32    How 645 Ventures weeds out bias in their methodology20:58    The evolution of and growth of 64526:27    Deciding to jumping up weight class in the ecosystem; the value they add30:31    Using their connected network as a strategic advantage32:48    The future of data in VC34:06    His best advice to emerging managers36:22    His biggest portfolio miss40:31    What emerging managers should think about as they are startingMentioned In This Episode:* 645 Ventures* Insight VenturesWe’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Nnamdi. Follow @SamirKaji and give your insight and questions using the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

I’m extremely excited to bring you this week’s episode of Stephen DeBerry from Bronze investments. In addition to being an experienced investor at previous stops at Kapor Capital, Omidyar, The California Endowment, Stephen also developed the “Eastside” thesis which spoke to the inequities that are often present in eastern communities. He presented this thesis in a now viral TED Talk and was a factor in why Stephen decided to invest in change through Venture Capital at Bronze VC.Stephen did his undergrad at UCLA and his masters work at Oxford. He is a British Marshall Scholar and Henry Crown Fellow at the Aspen Institute. He was on the Board of the Dalai Lama Foundation and Ebony Magazine and The Root/Washington Post named one of the 100 most powerful African-Americans in the United States.We had a great conversation on social impact investing, GP commits, and why he feels strongly about helping the next generation of under represented managers.In this episode we discuss the following topics:01:25    Stephen’s journey into VC06:25    How the Eastside thesis came to be13:00    Why venture capital can solve certain social inequities17:35    The difficulty he faced in his first fundraise21:43    Advice to other non-traditional venture managers29:02    How investing in non-traditional companies affects portfolio construction33:00    Addressing the structural problems with the VC system38:15    The problem with anchoring on GP commit as a measure of alignmentMentioned In This Episode:* Stephen’s TED TalkWe’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Stephen! Follow @SamirKaji and give your insight and questions using the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Amplify Partners has quickly become one of the true breakouts from the early emerging manager movement. Led by Sunil Dhaliwal, who started Amplify nearly a decade ago after a 14 year tenure at Battery Ventures, the firm has over $750MM in AUM and has invested in companies such as Datadog and Fastly. This was a fun wide ranging discussion about the current state of VC and where we think the industry is headed now that there are so many new emerging managers and potential LPS.Prior to Amplify, Sunil invested in early-stage IT infrastructure companies at Battery and was named to the Forbes Midas List for 2011, which ranks the top 100 venture capitalists around the world. He was also named to the AlwaysOn Top 100 list of VCs and Business Insider’s 15 Most Powerful Venture Capitalists on the East Coast.In this episode we discuss:1:37    What he learned at Battery and why start a new firm06:54    Decisions around Amplify’s fund one raise10:59    How fund stages and sizes changes competition for deals16:29    Moving between weight classes and the challenges around that19:08    Competing at seed stage against large firms 21:26    How both Samir and Sunil underestimated the size of the venture market22:19    Market forces disrupting early stage venture in 202124:24    Why certain things may never go back to the way they were 30:01    How fear will change the VC market35:45    The luck of timing; downturns are difficult yet provide opportunities37:19    How LPs look at emerging managers and how to differentiate40:22    Institutions and retail players bringing new money into early stage fundingMentioned In This Episode:* Amplify Partners* Battery VenturesWe’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Sunil! Follow @SamirKaji and give your insight and questions using the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me @samirkaji for my ongoing thoughts on the private fund markets. Over the last decade, we’ve seen a surge of VC firms formed by those that spent their entire lives as entrepreneurs. NFX is one of those firms, and in 2016, ex-Trulia founder Pete Flint joined the firm as fourth partner bringing the experience of starting a company, taking it public, before ultimately being acquired by Zillow for $2.5B. This was a fun conversation, not only because of Pete’s insights and interesting background, but because of unique NFX is as a firm in the way they have built their firm, using operational experience, a community driven ethos, team composition, and software to help founders. The fund’s portfolio companies include Lyft, AngelList, and Doordash and has nearly $500MM in AUM. In this episode we discuss the following topics:01:29 Pete’s journey into venture capital04:04 Why he chose to go with NFX instead of a more established firm06:58 Execution vs. Ideas10:38 The origin of NFX Guild13:10 How NFX views venture fund differentiation15:53 The way NFX uses software to help their firm and their portfolio companies20:02 Scalingvalue as AUM and number of portfolio companies increase22:24 Portfolio construction and founder engagement24:32 What drove their increase in fund size27:33 Where NFX fits in the ecosystem28:13 Biotechnology and blockchain as a new areas of investment30:58 The importance of ethos and culture at NFX32:42 The biggest counter intuitive fact he’s learned as an investor33:21 His biggest miss an investor34:35 The main characteristic of a successful investorMentioned In This Episode:* NFX Fund* NFX GuildWe’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Pete! Follow @SamirKaji and give your insight and questions using the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Limited partners come in a few different varieties, one of the largest, but also most opaque groups is that of the Family Offices, and today’s guest Jamie Rhode, CFA, Vice President at Verdis Investment Management, gives us a glimpse into the large family office world. Verdis uses a unique data-driven approach to fund allocating that allows them to optimize on their portfolio and ensure they find the outliers. Prior to Verdis, Jamie was at Bloomberg serving in roles roles in both equity research and credit analysis where she created, managed and leveraged an extensive library of financial and market data for buy and sell-side clients. In this episode we discuss the following topics:01:46    Jamie’s journey to Verdis and VC03:08    How family offices are different from other LPs04:14    The use of data and decision science and why they invest in seed stage07:08    Finding the outlier startups and funds using data08:44    How Jamie ensures diversity of investments12:32    Life Sciences as an investment sector focus16:29    Targeting networks that provide consistent outlier production18:52    Qualitative measures for managers21:54    Thoughts on reserve ratios, and why she prefers lower reserves. 24:43    The emergence of solo GPs27:27     The importance brand and of long term goals when talking with LPs30:39    Making sure their managers hit their minimum viable fund size at first close33:26    Trends in seed over the next five years37:08    Biggest learning as an LP40:10    The common theme amongst successful fundsWe’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Jamie! Follow @SamirKaji and give your insight and questions using the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Contrarian based investing requires extreme conviction, and the ability to consistently invest in founders and businesses that don’t always have mainstream acceptance. Bullpen Capital has long been known as a firm that will not shy away from the overlooked companies, but instead seeks out the undiscovered gems to drive alpha for their investors and founders. This week’s guest Paul Martino, one of the confounders of 2010 founded Bullpen Capital is one of favorite people to talk to given his unique insights and radical transparency. Bullpen was founded in 2010 with Duncan Davidson and Richard Melmon, and was a pioneer in post-seed round funding—the gap between seed and A round. The fund has $383 AUM and invested in several success stories including Life360, FanDuel, and Ipsy, among many others.Prior to Bullpen, Paul was an operator that founded eight companies and he holds over a dozen patents. He was an angel investor in companies like Zynga, TubeMogul, and uDemy. Paul is also a recognized expert on sports betting and gaming, appearing on CNBC and Fox Business regularly.In this episode we discuss the following topics:01:09    Paul’s journey from the operators side to venture03:11    Seeing the post-seed gap in the market05:06    Why fundraising for fund 3 was so tough08:00    Being the only firm “dumb enough” to pursue post-seed09:48    Looking for unloved and undiscovered companies12:52    Getting LPs comfortable with their investing thesis13:24    Why he loves backing underdog founders and why it’s been a successful strategy14:25   How strong conviction gets deals done at Bullpen16:33   Bullpen’s team approach in servicing companies18:24    Keep a culture of contrarianism 20:21    The gap between boutique and larger funds21:55    How Bullpen’s reserve model has evolved over time23:42    SPACs have a certain parallel 27:29    Thoughts on emerging managers that will become institutional 29:57    The best advice he’s gotten as a VC30:55    Paul’s anti portfolio32:43 The investor he admires the mostMentioned In This Episode:* Bullpen Capital* FanDuelWe’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Paul! Follow @SamirKaji and give your insight and questions using the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

On this week’s show, we are joined by Ashmeet Sidana, founder and chief engineer at Engineering Capital, a seed stage firm with $139.5M AUM. Prior to founding Engineering Capital in 2015, Ashmeet spend nearly 10 years at Foundation Capital which he joined after various technical roles at companies such as VMware and Silicon Graphics. His investments include Azure (NYSE: AZRE), Netsil (acquired by Nutanix), Palerra (acquired by Oracle), Freewheel (acquired by Comcast), InQuira (acquired by Oracle), Altor (acquired by Juniper), Appurify (acquired by Google), PrivateCore (acquired by Facebook) and StackStorm (acquired by Brocade).Ashmeet received an MBA from Wharton, MS in Computer Science from Stanford University and a BS in Computer Science summa cum laude from USC. I’ve long considered Ashmeet to one of the most versatile and thoughtful GP’s in the market and his comments on this week’s show illustrate that. In this episode we discuss the following topics:01:14    Ashmeet’s accidental journey into VC02:16    Learnings from the late-great Kathryn Gould when he was thinking about starting his own firm.05:37    The goals he set forth to the type of firm he wanted to build 07:22    Choosing to be a solo GP versus another partnership11:53    Managing time effectively as a solo GP14:26    What he believes to be the trigger point to adding a partner17:56    How fund size relates to strategy20:11    Why Ashmeet chose to grow his fund size over time21:22    Technical risk and how it relates to capital needs24:01    What the rush of capital means to both founder and investors27:03    Competition between specialist seed firms and multi-stage large firms29:55    Trends coming out of the pandemic34:04    Why data is the new oil, but also has asbestos type of properties 35:52    His biggest learning as a VC36:54    Ashmeet’s biggest miss38:24    The people he has learned from the mostMentioned in this episode:* Engineering Capital* Foundation Capital* Kathryn GouldI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Ashmeet. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Non-traditional paths into venture have been a common theme among many emerging managers, and our guest this week, Katie Jacobs Stanton, founder of Moxxie Ventures, is no exception. Katie started her career as a Banker at JP Morgan, but subsequently worked within the Obama White house as special advisor to the office of innovation, and she had operator roles at Twitter, Google, Yahoo, and Color Genomics. She was also named by Forbes as the #56 on the most powerful women in the world. Prior to Moxxie, Katie also co-founded the #Angels investment collective along with other former Twitter executives, and invested in 40 early-stage companies including Airtable, Cameo, Carta, Coinbase, Literati, Modern Fertility, Shape Security and Threads. Katie started her career as a Banker at JP Morgan and she had operator roles at Twitter, Google, Yahoo, and Color. In addition to her startup career, Katie worked in the Obama White House and State Department. She is also on the board of Vivendi.In this episode we discuss the following topics:01:24    Katie’s journey into investing05:38    The decision to start her own fund rather than joining an established firm07:49    Why she went the solo GP route09:51    Adaptation process of not having a team around her11:39    How she optimized her fundraising process14:08    Learning to deal with LPs who ghost and how “no’s” can be helpful15:54    Patterns she noticed in LPs the believed in her18:04    The types of questions LPs ask off sheet contacts during their reference checks19:39    Thinking about future fund sizes when raising your fund I22:15    How Katie works to diversify her deal sourcing25:35    The edge she believes Moxxie has in the marketplace28:28    The need to keep evolving to maintain competitive edge29:49    Breaking down the time commitments needed to run a fund31:21    The advice she would give to a new manager32:32    The big miss of her career34:00    The experience that prepared her the most for being a manager Mentioned In This Episode:* Moxxie Ventures* #AngelsI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Katie. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

In venture, many people speak about being contrarian, but very few investors truly are comfortable with consistently thinking outside of mainstream consensus. One exception is Daniel Leff, co-founder of Waverley Capital. Waverley was founded in 2019 with Edgar Bronfmann, Jr. and is focused on investing in media start-ups.Prior to Waverley, Daniel founded Luminari Capital, a top-performing media fund. During his career Daniel invested in companies such as Roku, FuboTV The Athletic, Headspace, and Matterport. As he’s built his firms, he’s taken a very unique approach in portfolio construction and LP composition, both of which have been very successful. Prior to founding Luminari, Daniel was a Partner with Globespan Capital Partners.  Earlier in his career, Daniel worked for Sevin Rosen Funds and Redpoint Ventures.  He also previously held engineering, marketing and strategic investment positions with Intel Corporation. Daniel earned a B.S. Chemistry from The University of California, Berkeley and a Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from the University of California, Los Angeles. Daniel also earned an MBA from The UCLA Anderson Graduate School of Management, where he was an Anderson Venture Fellow and where he currently serves on the Board of Visitors.Today's Venture Unlocked is brought to you by Aduro Advisors.Aduro Advisors is the premier fund administrator for venture capital and private equity firms. Led by a team of industry veterans and powered by proprietary software, FundPanel.io, Aduro pairs best-in-class service with the robust and flexible technology that the industry demands.From emerging managers just starting out to seasoned firms looking to supplement an internal team, Aduro’s back-office solution rises to the challenge of supporting your firm’s specific needs.Listeners of Venture Unlocked receive the first quarter of management company services free with promo code UNLOCKED.To redeem, email [email protected] this episode we discuss the following topics:02:03    The opportunity Daniel saw when he started Luminari05:57    Why media tech is such a hard thing for mainstream investors to understand09:19    The inherent edge of a strategic LP base11:51    How Daniel activates his LPs systematically and strategically15:40    The decision to partner with Edgar Bronfmann, Jr. versus someone that was already deeply working within the startup or venture world. 21:10    Why media startups have trouble accessing capital, and how this can be mitigated. 27:16    His thoughts on reserves. 27:24   How relationships with strategic & high net worth investors has helped their portfolio companies raise rounds30:33    How Daniel’s venture career helped him develop conviction in his investments 35:51    Advice for emerging managers36:48    Daniel’s anti-portfolio39:33    The investors he admires the most Mentioned In This Episode:* Waverley Capital* Luminari CapitalI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Daniel. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Today, we’re seeing major startup hubs emerge across the US (and globally). Up until fairly recently, LA was not considered a major US technology and venture hub. My guest on this week’s episode, Brian Garrett, has been in the LA venture ecosystem for two decades now. He also co-founded Crosscut Ventures, one of the very first seed funds in LA (if not the first). Today LA has claims companies such as Snap, TrueCar, Maker, Honey, Dollar Shave Club, Honest Company as examples of companies that reached scale in the now rapidly growing ecosystem. Crosscut began as a very small vehicle of $6MM, but now has over 120 investments and is one of the largest seed fund platforms in LA with $300MM+ AUM. In our episode we discussed everything from the rise of LA and non SV tech hubs to fundraising during a recession to the importance of self-discovery and mental wellness. Today's Venture Unlocked is brought to you by Aduro Advisors.Aduro Advisors is the premier fund administrator for venture capital and private equity firms. Led by a team of industry veterans and powered by proprietary software, FundPanel.io, Aduro pairs best-in-class service with the robust and flexible technology that the industry demands.From emerging managers just starting out to seasoned firms looking to supplement an internal team, Aduro’s back-office solution rises to the challenge of supporting your firm’s specific needs.Listeners of Venture Unlocked receive the first quarter of management company services free with promo code UNLOCKED.To redeem, email [email protected] this episode we discuss the following topics:01:54    Brian’s journey into venture03:48    Why they started Crosscut in 2008, initially as a part time project06:31    Crosscut’s conviction on why LA would become a strong startup ecosystem08:28    The strategy for Crosscut’s early funds11:55    How they scaled to a true institutional sized fund in Fund III; did anything change?14:30    Mental model for investing based around ownership 15:13 Why Fund IV is the best indication of Crosscut and what is happening in LA17:22    Why big companies can be built outside SV20:00    Thoughts on sector focused funds22:36    Being local as an advantage29:22    Brian’s journey into wellness32:02    How being centered has made him a better VC, and how it’s shaped Crosscut’s culture34:02    The best piece of career advice he’s received35:53    His anti-portfolio37:50    The investor he admires the mostMentioned In This Episode:* Crosscut I’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Brian. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

The use of data is playing a bigger and bigger role in our everyday lives. Venture is no exception, but most of data use in VC is related to sourcing, picking, and helping founders. My guest today, Kelsey Chase, co-founded a company called Aumni that uses granular level data contained in deal docs to help managers have a much better understanding of their portfolio positions and offer accurate, robust reporting for LPs. It was interesting to hear his perspectives on the problems that lie in reporting, and the rising bar LPs are expecting of emerging managers. The company has raised $13MM to date, with their most recent round led by SVB. Prior to Aumni, Kelsey was a venture lawyer at Wilson Sonsini and more recently DLA Piper.In this episode we discuss the following topics:02:55    What was the main problem they saw in deal reporting04:53    New age of expectations for emerging managers07:04    How data that can be used to drive all aspects of investing and fund management. 08:55    The rise of secondary markets, and the important of data. 11:18    Analytics for LPs13:18    How role of automation in GP/LP relationships15:31    The use of software to help managers focus on investing vs. other admin. 17:40   How managers need to think about accuracy of ownership position?Mentioned in this episode:* AumniI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Kelsey. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

On this week’s show, we’re lucky to have on Clara Brenner, co-founder of the Urban Innovation Fund which provides seed capital and regulatory support to entrepreneurs shaping the future of our cities. Along with her co-founder Julie Lein, their story is very compelling, from how they raised their first fund (from primarily strategic investors and special interest investors) to how they help founders unlock large businesses by helping them navigate regulatory hurdles. Prior to starting Urban Innovation Fund, Clara was the co-founder and CEO of TUMML, an accelerator and startup hub focused on urban technology which invested in Chariot which was acquired by Ford and Hitch, which was acquired by Lyft.  In 2014, Forbes listed Clara as one of its “30 Under 30” for Social Entrepreneurship and her urban entrepreneurship work has been featured on MSNBC and TechCrunch. She serves on the Board of Tumml, as well as the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) Bay Area Local Advisory Committee. Clara earned her MBA from MIT Sloan and BA from NYU.Today's Venture Unlocked is brought to you by Aduro Advisors.Aduro Advisors is the premier fund administrator for venture capital and private equity firms. Led by a team of industry veterans and powered by proprietary software, FundPanel.io, Aduro pairs best-in-class service with the robust and flexible technology that the industry demands.From emerging managers just starting out to seasoned firms looking to supplement an internal team, Aduro’s back-office solution rises to the challenge of supporting your firm’s specific needs.Listeners of Venture Unlocked receive the first quarter of management company services free with promo code UNLOCKED.To redeem, email [email protected] this episode we discuss the following topics:01:53    Clara’s journey into venture05:15    On their thesis, and thoughts on impact funds07:01    Why their first fundraise was so different than most first time managers09:15    Finding “impact curious” aligned LPs who typically don’t target first funds10:00    Building a great institutional foundation early 12:11    Ways to stay in front of LPs between raises. 14:22    The value they drive in helping founders navigate regulatory hurdles 18:17    Staying close and adding value, regardless of investment size. 20:20    Why keeping things simple on portfolio construction and terms are the right way to go. 22:17    LPACs and best practices24:24     How the Urban Outcomes report has helped them evangelize their story25:01    Providing peer networking opportunities for their LPs via their LPAC27:26    How Julie and Clara’s unique talents complement each other 30:19    Best career advice she’s received32:10    Biggest pre-seed deal they missed and later invested in after a lot of work34:08    The investor that has inspired her the mostMentioned In This Episode:* Urban Innovation Fund* TUMMLI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Clara. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Our guest today is Lindsay Lee, managing member of Authentic Ventures. Lindsay has over 20 years of investing experience in technology. Prior to starting Authentic, he served as CIO for an investment management firm to which he helped grow to almost $1B in assets and also managed a family office where he focused on seed and early-stage investments. He brings a unique combination of operating experience, public market investing experience, and early stage investing experience. Authentic Ventures was founded in 2015 and focuses on Seed and Early-stage companies. One of their core differentiators is the “Authentic Network” which is a managed community of like-minded entrepreneurs, founders, investors and growth hackers. Indexed heavily toward diversity, the network is operationalized and focused on helping portfolio companies solve the most meaningful issues. Today's Venture Unlocked is brought to you by Aduro Advisors.Aduro Advisors is the premier fund administrator for venture capital and private equity firms. Led by a team of industry veterans and powered by proprietary software, FundPanel.io, Aduro pairs best-in-class service with the robust and flexible technology that the industry demands.From emerging managers just starting out to seasoned firms looking to supplement an internal team, Aduro’s back-office solution rises to the challenge of supporting your firm’s specific needs.Listeners of Venture Unlocked receive the first quarter of management company services free with promo code UNLOCKED.To redeem, email [email protected] this episode we discuss the following topics:02:09    After so many different experiences, why focus on seed investing?03:23    How public market investing skills can translate to privates06:50    The inspiration behind Authentic11:57    What the Authentic Network, and how to operationalize it.16:39    Their focus on indexing their network heavily toward women and People of Color. 18:14    Portfolio construction methodology27:03    Differences between investing at various stages of investments30:37    The markers LPs look for between fund I and fund II33:46    Lindsay’s biggest career mistake35:20    The investors he admires37:00    His best piece of advice to new managersMentioned In This Episode:Authentic VenturesI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Lindsay. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

One of the key benefits of the shift in the venture landscape has been the ushering in of more diverse funding sources to entrepreneurs. In this week’s Venture Unlocked episode (available both on Spotify and Itunes) I’m excited to bring you Ryan Hoover, founding partner of Weekend Fund. Ryan grew up in Oregon and worked in the gaming industry prior to launching technology product discovery platform Product Hunt in 2013. Backed by some incredible angel and institutional investors, the company built the largest platform for new products, and ultimately was acquired by AngelList a few years ago. Ryan continued to act as CEO post acquisition and just recently stepped down to focus on Weekend Fund, which he manages with Vedika Jain. At Weekend they focus on co-investing in pre-seed and seed companies.  Weekend Fund’s LPs includes Marc Andreessen, Chris Dixon, Jana Messerschmidt, Chris and Crystal Sacca, Hunter Walk, Kevin Rose, and Garry Tan.Today's Venture Unlocked is brought to you by Aumni.Truly stand out to Institutional LPs with Aumni.  Before your next fundraise, get Aumni’s best-in-class fund analytics and reporting platform powered by our team of venture experts and AI. LPs are demanding better reporting which can be a significant challenge for smaller firms. Aumni can automate fund analytics to quickly answer the toughest questions from current and prospective investors.In this episode we discuss the following topics:01:49    Ryan’s journey into tech03:49    The launch of Product Hunt and the sale to AngelList07:48    Weekend Fund’s origin story11:04    What growing from $3M in Fund I to $10M in Fund II has meant 14:40    How Weekend differentiates itself from other funds19:30    Maintaining NPS for portfolio companies22:10    Competitive landscape amongst funds creating experimentation in venture24:01    Systemizing the fund’s deal flow operations 28:35    Tactical considerations for raising Fund III 31:38    LP composition and building relationships with Institutional investors34:26    Ryan’s anti-portfolio37:48    The best piece of investing advice he’s gotten39:30    The investor that inspires him the mostMentioned In This Episode:* Product Hunt* AngelList* Weekend FundI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Ryan. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked.If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

If you enjoy the show, please subscribe at Itunes or Spotify or if you already have, leave a rating or review, as it really helps us out!!I’m excited to bring you another duo interview, this time with Renata Quintini and Roseanne Wincek, co-founders and managing partners of Renegade Partners. They are without a doubt two of my favorite people in the industry as despite their incredible backgrounds, they remain humble and committed to staying scrappy to help founders through what they consider the “super critical” stage of development. Just prior founding to co-founding Renegade with Roseanne, Renata was a Partner at Emerging Science and Deep tech inclined Lux Capital. Prior to joining Lux in 2017, Renata was a General Partner at Felicis Ventures, which as many know is one of the most successful seed entrants in venture history. Before becoming a venture capitalist, Renata was an investment manager (LP) at Stanford University’s endowment. Roseanne has deep roots in VC; she got her start at Canaan Partners and then became a Partner at historic late stage firm IVP. At IVP, she invested across enterprise and consumer in companies such as Glossier, Compass, MasterClass, TransferWise, Looker (Acquired by GOOG), and KeepTruckin. Roseanne holds an MBA from Stanford University, as well as a MA in Biophysics and a BS in Chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley. Today's Venture Unlocked is brought to you by Aumni.Aumni has helped well over 100 venture firms of all sizes unlock the truth of their portfolio holding. Using a combination of a team of expert lawyers and AI, Aumni’s platform extracts the key granular level detail contained in deal documents to give managers absolute visibility into their portfolio holdings.As a manager using Aumni, you’ll be able to make portfolio management decisions quickly, accurately, and with more confidence.In this episode we discuss the following topics:01:58    Renata’s journey into venture05:24    Roseanne’s journey into venture10:59    What’s in the name Renegade?13:03    The opportunity to disrupt venture itself by using the startup incentive model18:16    What they did to navigate and foster the right partnership dynamics21:08    Thinking like a startup when building a venture team24:08    Scaling portfolio companies with the right team29:40    What venture outcomes need to be today31:42 Renegade’s focus on the “supercritical stage”. What does it mean and why this was a thesis. 34:20    Can investment thesis act as a moat?38:37    Successfully fundraising during COVID by finding your believers + investors who understand the long-term nature of venture42:32    Building lasting relationships with your LPsMentioned In This Episode:* Renegade PartnersI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Renata and Roseanne. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

As the Emerging Manager world continues to grow, so does the importance of providing these managers with key education, resources, and community. Enter Oper8r, founded by Welly Sculley and Winter Mead, which is looking to become the “Y-Combinator for venture fund managers”.Prior to launching Oper8r in 2020, Winter worked as a fund-of-funds manager at both Sapphire Capital and Hall Capital Partners, While Welly most recently worked at venture backed fintech Ripple. Oper8r selects seasoned mentors to advise the cohorts and provides them with the knowledge, networks, and tools necessary for launching (or growing) a venture firm. They completed their first cohort in the fall (to which I had the pleasure of speaking at).Listen in to hear their observations and tips for emerging funding managers!Today's Venture Unlocked is brought to you by Aumni.Aumni has helped well over 100 venture firms of all sizes unlock the truth of their portfolio holding. Using a combination of a team of expert lawyers and AI, Aumni’s platform extracts the key granular level detail contained in deal documents to give managers absolute visibility into their portfolio holdings.As a manager using Aumni, you’ll be able to make portfolio management decisions quickly, accurately, and with more confidence.In this episode we discuss the following topics:02:07    What inspired creating “a YC for fund managers”03:33    How the program works05:30  The profile of emerging managers Oper8r is looking to attract12:05    The criteria for successful first-time fund managers16:42    How different types of LPs evaluate emerging managers24:43    Ways to jump start a first fundraise. 31:47    Should you start with focusing on an anchor investor?34:25    What’s Minimal Viable Fund size and what percentage you can first close on41:42    Viable tactics for getting to a first close43:43  LP communication and courtship processMentioned in this episode:* Oper8r* Y CombinatorI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Welly and Winter. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

On today’s show we have Beezer Clarkson, Managing Director of Sapphire Partners, the LP arm of Sapphire Ventures. Not only does Beezer have tremendous depth and insight into the world of VC, but she catalyzed the #OpenLP movement, which looks to bring transparency within the LP world. She’s someone I’ve known for nearly a decade and one of the smartest minds in the LP world. Beezer began her career in financial services over 20 years ago at Morgan Stanley in its global infrastructure group. Since, she has held various direct and indirect venture investment roles, as well as operational roles in software business development at Hewlett Packard. Prior to joining Sapphire in 2012, Beezer managed the day-to-day operations of the Draper Fisher Jurvetson Global Network.Additionally, she is a judge for 100&Change, a MacArthur Foundation competition that provides funding to solve critical challenges of our time. In 2014, she was named to the Forty Over 40 list of women to watch.Today's Venture Unlocked is brought to you by Aumni. Aumni has helped well over 100 venture firms of all sizes unlock the truth of their portfolio holding. Using a combination of a team of expert lawyers and AI, Aumni’s platform extracts the key granular level detail contained in deal documents to give managers absolute visibility into their portfolio holdings. As a manager using Aumni, you’ll be able to make portfolio management decisions quickly, accurately, and with more confidence. In this episode we discuss the following topics:01:51    Beezer’s journey into VC03:50    Launch of Sapphire Partners as a fund for predominantly Series A funds05:46    What’s changed (or not changed) in Venture over the last 15 years?06:56    What “value-add” means in today’s marketplace11:27    How she evaluates managers and performance. 14:40    Does past performance really act as an indicator for future fund success?17:25    Her thought process in bringing on a new manager (or not following on an existing manager)21:22    How to get Sapphire’s attention to invest24:41    What is Minimum Viable Fund size and when to do a first close27:33    Giving away economics to get early LP’s; the pros and cons33:29    What is the diversity audit and OpenLP35:35  Diversity in emerging manager firms vs. established. 39:03    Best career advice she heard as an LP. 40:45    Her biggest missed fund opportunity42:15    The best advice for GPs pitching her for the first timeMentioned in this episode:Sapphire PartnersI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Beezer. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

This episode was particularly a fun one to record in that we moved a bit away from our traditional interview format to more of a water-cooler format with Mac Conwell of RareBreed Ventures and Roy Bahat of Bloomberg Beta for a wide-ranging chat about the state of emerging venture capital. As many may now, Mac is using the seldom used 506C provision of Reg D to publicly solicit capital for his new fund (RareBreed VC). While many rolling fund managers use the 506C provision, Mac is not conducting his raise on the AngelList platform. Previously to starting RareBreed, Mac was an investor at the Maryland Technology Development Corporation’s Minority Business Pre-seed Fund, a partnership between TEDCO and Harbor Bank Community Development Corporation to address the needs of minority entrepreneurs in Maryland, who often lack access to Friends and Family rounds. He also has operating experience from his time as co-founder and CEO at Redberry Mobile and of Given. Roy Bahat is the head of Bloomberg Beta, which invests in the main category of the future of work and has a portfolio that includes Slack, Kaggle (acq. By Google), and MasterClass. They occasionally also invest directly into emerging managers to help drive financial performance. Prior to his life as a VC, Bahat founded start-ups, served as a corporate executive at News Corp., and worked in government in the office of New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg. In this episode we discuss the following topics:01:18    The unique structure of RareBreed Ventures03:09    How a Twitter following and new venture software made it possible for Rarebreed to launch a 506(c) structured fund07:00    Roy’s view on investing 16:18    Raising a fund versus raising capital for a company. Is it different?18:45    How the fundraising process helped Mac find his own unique brand. 22:01    Using LP feedback to your advantage23:32    Searching not selling when looking for LPs25:25    Is LP capital really scarce? 26:48    Questions LPs often ask to first time managers29:22    What makes an exceptional GP33:45    Giving up economics to early investors36:40    Is the notion of a GP commit outdated when assessing GP-LP alignment? 42:08    What post-COVID VC will look likeMentioned in this episode:* RareBreed.vc* Bloomberg Beta* Charles Hudson Interview* Elizabeth Yin interview* How LPs should really think about GP commits in Emerging ManagersI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Mac and Roy. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

We have a special treat of an episode this week with one of the top first generation seed investors in Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate. After leading two successful startups, Mike started Floodgate (formerly Maples Investment) in 2006, and has since invested on companies such as Twitter, Lyft, Twitch, and Okta. As is always the case when I speak to Mike, he provided many nuggets of investing, firm building, and went deep into his early days of Floodgate. In this episode we discuss the following topics:04:54    How Mike raised his first fund from Austin Ventures07:27    Explaining seed investing to LPs in the early days13:58    Why he decided to bring on Ann Miura-Ko as a partner early on 20:25    His view on what a “Thunder Lizard” is23:45    Defining the mental models Floodgate uses for Seed Investing24:40 Why great entrepreneurs are like time-travelers 31:18   How thinking about “Thunder Lizards” helps inform his portfolio construction. 37:38   How he’s changed his portfolio construction over time. 48:00   The lessons he learned from missing out on companies such as AirBnB. 52:15   Who Mike admires most in the VC worldMentioned in this episode:* Floodgate* Austin VenturesI’d love to know what you took away from my conversations with Mike Maples, Jr. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Remember to subscribe here on substack, Spotify, or Itunes to get notified as soon as new pods are released. Also follow me @samirkaji on Twitter to get my ongoing thoughts on venture. Welcome back to another episode of Venture Unlocked. This week we have Apurva Mehta, Managing Partner at Summit Peak Investments. Apurva and his partner Patrick O’Connor founded Summit Peak in 2018 to invest both in emerging venture funds, and alongside them through direct co-investing. As you’ll hear on the interview, they are very comfortable and excited about backing solo-GP funds. Summit Peak has backed such solo emerging managers such as Josh Buckley, Raymond Tonsing, and Lachy Groom while making direct investments in Airtable, Virta Health, and Sourcegraph. Prior to starting Summit Peak, Apurva and Patrick led venture investments for the Cook’s Children Health System. In this episode we discuss the following topics: 03:36    Why Summit Peak was created to investing in funds05:52    What it’s like trying to raise a fund of funds. 07:04    Why they though investing in next-gen managers was the right approach. 09:01    The big risk they took at the start of their fund.10:29    The framework they use to evaluate GPs to invest in.14:07    Why they believe network can be a killer competitive edge. 16:41    What they view as the intangible factors GPs must have and how try and measure it. 19:20    How they think about founder reference calls. 22:42    The importance of speed in their diligence process.24:34    How a podcast interview and LinkedIn led to one of their best deals.29:08   Thoughts on the solo GP model.34:07    What is an LPAC, and what does it do?37:54    The pace of new emerging managers entering the market.44:02    His biggest piece of advice for newer managers. Mentioned in this episode:Cook’s ChildrenI’d love to know what you took away from my conversations with Apurva Mehta. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

We’re excited to release our newest episode with another great guest, Jaclyn Freeman Hester, Partner at the Foundry Group. Founded in 2007 by Brad Feld, Jason Mendelson, Ryan McIntyre, and Seth Levine The Foundry Group has $2.4B under management and has invested in startups such as FitBit, SendGrid, Beeswax, and Notion. Several years ago the firm, led by Jaclyn and Lindel Eakman, started investing in interesting emerging manager firms, and have acted as LP’s in firms such as Forerunner, K9 Ventures, Founder Collective, IA Ventures, Homebrew, and Ludlow. Jaclyn got her MBA/JD from the University of Colorado and practiced corporate law advising startups and private equity firms as well as buyers and sellers in M&A transactions. She also worked closely with her husband and his family on their SaaS startup, FareHarbor, from the earliest stages through acquisition.In this episode we discuss the following topics:04:59   The catalyst for Foundry starting to invest in Emerging Managers 08:54    Her view on emerging manager trends and opportunities11:42    What she looks for when evaluating new managers 20:59    Do competitive moats in venture exist?24:51    What type of characteristics she’s sees a critical for successful VC’s and teams31:06    How they evaluate managers that are going from proof of concept to raising the first institutional fund. 35:37    Common mistakes emerging managers make pitching38:45    The best questions that GPs have asked her41:08    Jaclyn’s biggest career mistake43:26    Her best advice to new managersMentioned in this episode:* Foundry Group* TechStars* MuckerI’d love to know what you took away from my conversation with Jaclyn Freeman Hester. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Happy New Year! I’m thrilled to announce that Avidan Ross is our first guest of 2021 Avidan is the Founder and managing partner of Root Ventures and one of the most thoughtful newer seed stage managers in the market. Like many that have appeared on the show, Avidan took a non-traditional path into venture. After graduating from Columbia, Avidan spent time in various engineering roles before becoming CTO at CIM Group, L.P., a private equity firm currently with $30B under management. After nearly 7 years at CIM, Avidan moved on to become a host a Food Network pilot and also co-write a book on the best coffee in the U.S. In 2013 Avidan founded Root Ventures. Today, he and his partners Chrissy Meyer, Kane Hseih, and Lee Edwards each bring strong engineering backgrounds and a passion for taking a very hands-on roles with their portfolio companies which incline toward very technical in nature. In this episode we discuss the following topics:00:35    Avidan’s journey into venture capital04:15   Getting comfortable with investing in early-stage deep tech companies out of a small fund09:01   What is the most important thing they look to bring to founders11:38    Portfolio construction and why they reserve more than most seed funds16:44    Portfolio sizing18:54    His thoughts on generalist funds vs. specialists21:32    How they think about value-add. 25:54    The hiring model Root uses 30:06    The difference fundraising Fund I and Fund II, and building relationships with LP’s. 39:46    Avidan’s biggest career mistake.41:02    His biggest investing miss.42:30    The people in the industry he’s inspired by. Mentioned in this episode:* Root VenturesI’d love to know what you took away from my conversations with Avidan Ross. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

As we wrap up what’s been perhaps the most interesting and difficult year in modern history, the holidays still remain a time to to spend with family and reflect on the things we all still do have. I’m incredibly grateful for what I do have, and am looking forward to brighter days ahead for all of us as we move to 2021. On our final episode of the year, I’m thrilled to share my conversation with Marlon Nichols, Managing General Partner at MaC Ventures. After graduating from Northeastern University, Marlon spend several years in various consultant and operational roles before joining Intel Capital in 2011.After five years at Intel, Marlon co-founded Cross Culture Ventures along with Troy Carter, a successful media manager that managed the careers of artists such as Lady Gaga and John Legend, and made investments in startups such as Uber and Spotify.  Given the shared vision of Marlon and Troy, Cross Culture Ventures made a name for themselves with their cultural investing thesis that focused on companies centered in the convergence of global popular culture and technology.In 2019, Cross Culture merged with M Ventures to create MaC Ventures, one of the few venture partnership “mergers” we’ve seen, where he and the team invest in “ technology companies that create infectious products that benefit from shifts in cultural trends and behaviors in an increasingly diverse global marketplace”. In this episode, Marlon and I discuss the following topics:00:54 - Marlon’s winding journey into venture05:23 - The opportunity he saw to invest in diversity07:40 - How he prepared to launch Cross Culture 8:07 - His unique point of view and value proposition in the venture industry10:12 - What led to Marlon’s decision to merge Cross Culture with M Ventures16:29 - How did his LPs react to the merger of the firms? 17:52 - What are the primary things he sees LPs care about the most?23:02 - The MaC view toward adding values to portfolio founders. 28:11 - How to drive value to LP’s outside of just returns. 30:05 - Why firms struggle to invest in diversity37:20- Marlon’s biggest career mistake in ventureMentioned in this episode:* Mac Ventures* The tangible benefits of diversity in venture* Study on women in leadership rolesI’d love to know what you took away from my conversations with Marlon Nichols. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Deena Shakir is a General Partner at Lux Capital, a firm founded in 2000 and has since raised $2.5 billion. Lux invests in emerging science and deep technology startups such as Auris Health, Cerulean, Zoox, and Bright Machines. Deena graduated from Harvard undergrad and began her career as a presidential management fellow at the US Department of State, where she built partnerships with tech companies and helped launch President Obama’s global entrepreneurship summit in 2010. She then joined Google, where she led business development and strategic partnerships for their global civic innovation portfolio before shifting to the investment side at Google Ventures (GV). In 2019 Deena joined Lux Capital and focuses on companies that are seeking to provide solutions to improve human & environmental health, and productivity.We covered several topics on the show, including: 01:12- Deena’s background as the daughter of Iraqi immigrants in California and her early career in journalism and government08:17 - What prompted her move to GV to Lux12:35 - What is the behavior trait that drives Lux as a firm16:39 - How Lux makes decisions as a partnership 18:30 - Why portfolio management is a team sport at Lux. 22:12 - Establishing a company culture and hiring employees that will fit within it.25:46 - What growth in fund size means in dictating strategy and mindset. 31:12 - Data on diversity in venture is the first step in overcoming unconscious bias 37:03 - Deena’s biggest career mistake and what she learned about it. 38:38 - Her advice for starting your own fund40:29: Why Maha Ibrahim of Canaan Ventures is one of Deena’s role modelsMentioned in this episode:* Lux Capital* Deena’s article in Forbes, Unlocking a Post-COVID Start-Up “She-Covery”I’d love to know what you took away from my conversation with Deena Shakir. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

For daily thoughts on the venture landscape, follow me @samirkaji on Twitter. Chris Douvos is the Founder of Ahoy Capital, a boutique Fund of Funds that focuses primarily on allocating into early-stage venture capital funds, while selectively co-investing directly into companies. Chris started his career at Morgan Stanley while still at Yale earning his MBA. From there he worked at Princeton University’s endowment fund where he got his start in venture before moving onto The Investment Fund for Foundations (TIFF). At TIFF he decided that the right strategy was to make “heroic investments” and invest in very early stage, and often unproven managers. This method paid off as Chris was one of the first institutional Limited Partners to back First Round Capital (and remains so). Chris then went on to Venture Investment Associates  (VIA) prior to spinning out to start Ahoy Capital in 2018. Ever engaging, Chris covers a whole host of emerging VC topics and he and I discuss the following:6:20 Why Chris started a fund that invests in emerging managers and how he’s arbitraging people’s inattention to get to true outsized returns.9:00 The process for raising a FoF, and what his LP’s are looking for. 10:59  Ahoy’s portfolio model on managers, and why he thinks concentration is the right avenue for them. 11:54 Why looking at past performance shouldn’t always be the leading indicator in evaluating firms, and why he looks at other specific factors. 13:35 His thoughts on GP/Thesis fit 16:51 How he was introduced to Josh Kopelman of First Round Capital 22:13 Why you need to be able to articulate a sustainable competitive advantage; funds that are good examples of this25:21 Why Chris looks to invest in Venture business builders, not option seekers28:18 The “return the fund” mental model managers should use. 33:00 Why there’s currently a need for liquidity in the ecosystem and why SPACs and direct listings are helpful37:25 Why he’s excited about the diversity, equity, and inclusion GP investments 39:25 Thoughts on Rolling Funds42:18 Chris’ missed investment opportunities43:11 How to pitch Chris (and Fund of Funds in general). Mentioned in this episode:* Ahoy Capital* David Swenson’s Pioneering Portfolio Management* Chris’ blog post: “All About the Benjamins”* Micro VC - Smaller is better, but the math is hard. I’d love to know what you took away from my conversations with Chris Douvos; Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

In this episode, we speak with Nate Williams, Co-founder and Managing Partner at UNION Labs. Nate Co-founded UNION Labs in 2018 with his partner, Chris Kim while an Entrepreneur in Residence (EIR) at Kleiner Perkins.Nate is a seasoned Operator and angel investor including August Home, where he served as Chief Revenue Officer and Head of Business. Following their acquisition in 2017, he went on to join KPCB as EIR where he spent time helping entrepreneurs and sourcing investments including Proxy. While EIR, Nate formed a thesis on the opportunity in verticalized IoT which he published in TechCrunch and began to see a lane for a new type of fund.UNION Labs is an early stage firm that both backs and builds companies. They deploy venture investments, as well as manage a structured EIR co-creation program to incubate companies. The core firm focus is on the commercial application of deep technology in artificial intelligence, machine learning, and robotics, that solve real-world problems in smart cities, intelligent homes, or connected transportation. Since its inception, UNION has made five investments, been the lead on three deals, and averages 11% ownership across its current investments.In this episode, Nate and I discuss the following:03:04 - What it was like being an EIR at Kleiner Perkins, and what he learned.06:51 - The dramatic changes in the venture capital industry over the past decade.13:16 - The venture studio concept and when and why it makes sense for a seed firm like theirs to co-create a company.16:47 - Why growth in new corporate venture capital funds may signal a lack of alignment between Fortune 500 companies and Sand Hill Road.17:47 - Nate’s three-pronged approach to raising funds, aka “The Sandwich Strategy.”23:51 - Why transparency is so important both for both Limited Partners and General Partners26:11 - A key observation UNION made early in fundraising from LPs.33:18 - The structural advantages of being a small and specialized fund35:40 - Why deep tech doesn’t automatically mean capital intensive and doesn’t have to include hardwareMentioned in this episode:·       UNION Labs·       Nate’s thesis on the opportunity on verticalized IoT in TechCrunch·       Elizabeth Yin on Venture Unlocked·       OpenLP·       Charles Hudson’s podcast·       Laurence Toney’s post on Quora, “What Is An Entrepreneur in Residence? What Do They Do? How Does It Work?Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

In this episode, we speak with Soraya Darabi, Co-Founder and General Partner of TMV.  The firm primarily focuses on investing at the seed stage through Series A and is active in areas such as the future of work, education tech, logistics and mobility, and sustainable solutions. While not specifically diversity-focused, the firm’s portfolio is nearly 2/3rd comprised of female or minority-led companies.Earlier in her career, Soraya served as the Manager of Digital Partnerships & Social Media at The New York Times, where she spearheaded social media and digital partnerships. In 2009, she co-founded Foodspotting, named “App of the Year” by both Apple and Wired (later acquired by OpenTable, then Priceline). Over the years, she has been named one of Fast Company’s “100 Most Creative People in Business” for which she was featured on the cover of the magazine. Additionally, Soraya founded and manages Transact Global, a community for female investors to share ideas on firm building and investing.Soraya founded TMV in 2016 with her business partner Marina Hadjipateras. Each utilized their unique backgrounds  -- Soraya in social media and entrepreneurship and Marina in working for her family’s global shipping business. TMV is committed to investing in diverse, purpose-driven founders serving large markets, and leverages a strong operating team to help drive value well beyond what typical seed firms might be able to provide.In this episode, Soraya and I discuss the following:07:46 - Soraya’s definition of a purpose-driven fund10:49 - Key lessons she learned in raising her first, proof of concept fund12:46 - Why TMV and venture is really a services business13:56 - How they prepared themselves between fundraises for scale17:03 - TMV’s deal structure and process for mentoring investments20:35 - The benefits of the TMV’s Venture Partner program27:43 - Why she thinks there will soon be diversity mandates from LPs31:10 - The story of Transact Global34:49 - The GP she most respectsMentioned in this episode:* TMV* Soraya’s podcast Business Schooled* The Venture Hacks Bible* The Operator Collective* All Raise* Darshan Somashekar of TMV’s TechCrunch post on why he left ed tech to go into gamingI’d love to know what you took away from my conversation with Soraya Darabi. Follow me@SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

In this episode, we speak to industry veteran Greg Sands, who founded Costanoa Ventures after spending 13 years at Sutter Hill Ventures. Prior to Sutter Hill, Greg serves as the first product manager of Netscape (where he wrote the initial product plan and coined the name “Netscape”). He founded Costanoa Ventures as a boutique early stage firm to solve for a gap he saw between seed stage funds and larger lifecycle firms. The firm primarily invests in B2B seed stage companies in categories such as the Future of work, Fintech, Data/Machine learning, and security. Although the firm employs a traditional craft approach to venture capital investing, their model is unique in many ways including the incubation/co-creation of companies and the use of in-house operating partners to add value to portfolio founders. In this episode, Greg and I discuss:* What was it like leaving Sutter Hill and raising a fund for the very first time as a solo-GP. * The role of having mentors and champions around you when starting off.* How he thinks about hiring team members. * What it means to build and maintain a culture designed for durability. * Why they take a relatively concentrated approach to investing, and how this translates to portfolio construction theory. * Why venture is a service business. Mentioned in this episode:* Costanoa VenturesI’d love to know what you took away from my conversation with Greg Sands. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

In just a few short years, Fifth Wall Ventures, which focuses on investing in companies in the “built world” economy, has quickly become one of LA’s largest venture firms with over $1.2B in committed LP capital. I met Co-Founder Brendan Wallace when he and Brad Greiwe started Fifth Wall nearly five years ago and the trajectory of the firm has been nothing short of astounding.  Brendan started his career at Goldman Sachs in real estate investment banking after graduating from Princeton. What’s always struck me over the years is Brendan’s unique vision on how he thinks about building a consistent alpha generating firm. In this episode, Brendan and I cover:* How to manage a LP based with both corporates and financial LPs. * Providing value add and driving synergies between his LPs and portfolio companies. * Why the conventional wisdom that large fund sizes are a direct line to weakening performance isn’t always the case if certain characteristics are present in the firm’s model. * How he thinks about developing and managing a platform that includes advisory, operations and investing. * Why he doesn’t think the traditional venture model is well constructed for outsized returns at scale.* How different type of fund products under one roof can drive cross-over value and improve return profiles. Mentioned in this episode:* Fifth WallI’d love to know what you took away from my conversation with Brendan Wallace. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Leo Polovets is one of the Founding Partners of Susa Ventures, which launched in 2012. Over the last 8 years, Susa has established itself as one of the premier seed funds in the world, and have made more than 80 investments in companies like Robinhood, Flexport, Andela, and Expanse (recently purchased by Palo Alto Networks for $800MM). Leo began his career as a software engineer, first at LinkedIn when it was a start-up, and later at Google and Factual. I always enjoy speaking with Leo as he’s always introspective, insightful and stays highly curious about all aspects of venture (check out his great blog, “Coding VC”). In this episode, Leo and I discuss the following topics:* Why Susa had 4 partners for a $25MM fund. * Leo’s acronym for building a venture thesis: C.A.S.H. (Constraints, Actionable, Special, Helping).* Can VC firms truly differentiate, and if so, how? * The importance of being helpful to founders and building those relationships early.* Portfolio construction: Going all-in on one investment vs. many small investments.* When to grow fund sizes, and how to think about this. * The role of opportunity funds and why they raised one alongside Fund III. Mentioned in this episode:* Susa Ventures* Leo’s blog Coding VC* Patrick O’Shaughnessy’s podcast, Invest Like the BestI’d love to know what you took away from my conversation with Leo Polovets. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Please share Venture Unlocked with others who want to learn about venture capital: This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

This episode is a fun one as I had the pleasure to interview Sahil Lavingia, founder of Gumroad, an online platform that allows creators to sell directly to their consumers. The company has facilitated the sale of $356 million in products since its launch in 2011 and now helps over 70,000 creators.Gumroad raised capital from legendary angels like Ron Conway, Chris Sacca, Naval Ravikant, and from distinguished venture firms such as First Round Capital, Accel Partners, and Kleiner Perkins. After a failed series B in 2015, Sahil was forced to lay off the majority of his staff and pivot his company building strategy to one atypical to the traditional venture model, but in the last year Gumroad doubled its ARR to $10MM. Drawing on his experiences as an angel investor backing companies such as Hellosign, Figma Design, and Lambda School, Sahil decided to raise his own venture vehicle and using the nascent AngelList Rolling Fund product, quickly secured $1MM/quarter in LP funding. Today’s he’s the most prominent AngelList Rolling Fund Manager with nearly $10MM of annual commitments. In this episode, Sahil and I discuss the following:* Sahil’s start at Pinterest and how he applies his founder experiences in investing.* His learnings from working with VC’s and his thoughts on what he believes makes for a great VC partner. * Why he decided to go down the investment route, and what was it like raising LP capital through a Rolling Fund. * Why founders may be more inclined to raise early capital from other founders rather than traditional institutional investors, and how Sequoia has created a savvy model to combat this trend. * Thoughts on the early stage funding market moving forward. * How he thinks about portfolio construction as a Rolling Fund investor. * His hopes for innovation in the venture: Expansion of rolling funds, buyers and sellers being directly connected, and the breaking of the geographical privilege bubble.Mentioned in this episode:* Gumroad* My blog post on rolling fundsI’d love to know what you took away from my conversation with Sahil Lavingia. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Also subscribe to Venture Unlocked on Itunes to ensure you’ll get each episode when it’s first released. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

On this episode, we speak with Ted Maidenberg, co-founding partner of Tribe Capital, which he launched with his partners Arjun Sethi and Jonathan Hsu. I’m especially excited to bring this episode to you as Ted draws from experiences working within a Corporate VC (Time Warner), a traditional VC (USVP), and now has co-founded two firms known for their innovative approaches to investing —- Social Capital in 2011 with Chamath Palihapitiya and Mamoon Hamid, and most recently Tribe. Ted has also been part of investing teams that count investments such as Slack, Carta, and Survey Monkey. In this episode, Ted and I discuss the following topics:* Starting Social Capital after the global financial crisis* Starting and fundraising for a new firm (Tribe) in a very noisy market.* The importance of trust in venture teams, the role of partnership dynamics, and maintaining culture. * Their use of a data driven quantitative framework to evaluate companies through Cohort behavior and how this gives them an edge relative to heuristic only methods.* The importance of getting ownership of a company early, and how it impacts reserve strategy. * Their productized use of SPV’s in driving portfolio construction strategy, adding value to companies, and providing a unique return model for SPV and Fund LP’s. * Are there any other innovations that can/should happen in VC? * Ted’s advice for those that are just launching firms today. Mentioned in this episode:* The Magic Eight Ball* Social Capital and Tribe CapitalI’d love to know what you took away from my conversations with Ted Maidenberg; Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Jon Sakoda is the Founding Partner at Decibel, a venture firm that was created in partnership with Cisco (but independent in nature) in 2018 to invest in early-stage companies. Hear how Jon, who describes himself as a “recovering entrepreneur,” started his first company, Imlogic, Inc. which was eventually acquired by Symantec, and then joined New Enterprise Associates (NEA) in 2006 where he served as a partner for 12 years. During his time at NEA, NEA clearly established itself as the largest venture firm in the world and had raised a $2.5B fund well before the current mega-fund boom. In this episode, Jon and I cover the following topics:* Jon’s trajectory from being a technical operator to a VC. * The bundling and unbundling of venture capital, and what we should see going forward. * Do VC’s really add value? What leads to the belief by founders that they might not?* The role of Cisco and how it helps them differentiate and punch above their weight in helping founders. * How traditional economic LPs view corporate LPs and how GPs can navigate the discussions.* What new GPs often underestimate when starting a fundMentioned in this episode:* Decibel website, and their partnership with Cisco.I’d love to know what you took away from my conversations with Jon Sakoda; Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Jodi Sherman Jahic is a managing partner of Aligned Partners, a Silicon Valley-based venture fund investing in early-stage, enterprise technology companies that are have a lean toward capital efficiency. Jodi has nearly 20 years of venture experience and started Aligned Partners in 2011 with her co-founder Susan Mason. A meticulous designer of market strategies and a fierce ally of entrepreneurial founders, Jodi is recognized for her thought leadership in go-to-market strategies. Aligned has raised a total of $125 million across three funds.Prior to co-founding Aligned Partners, Jodi led the wireless sector for Voyager Capital and was co-founder and Managing Director of SCG, a pledge fund headquartered in San Francisco focusing on capital-efficient investments. Jodi was selected as an early Kauffman Fellow during her time at Battery Ventures. Previously, Jodi was on the founding team of three startups in North America and Europe, and she worked in the technology industry group at Andersen Consulting (now Accenture). Jodi is co-author of a 2007 book on venture capital investing. She is also a proud founding member of All Raise, focusing on fostering gender diversity in venture capital and tech. In this episode Jodi and I cover the following topics:* How working at larger funds motivated her to start a small fund focused on capital-efficient startups.* How she and her co-founder discovered that they’d work well together and how managers should think about partner selection* Her thoughts on portfolio construction and why they use a concentrated strategy. * The market incentives and social pressure to raise a large fund, and why they are committed to stay small. * Why it is critical to maintain transparent communication with LPs, and how they do it. * What could threaten the modest gains in gender equality in venture capital.Mentioned in this episode:* Aligned Partners* Kauffman Fellows* All RaiseI’d love to know what you took away from my conversations with Jodi; Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest, or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me on Twitter @Samirkaji to get my ongoing and frequent updates on the early stage venture landscapeRoger Ehrenberg is the founder and Managing Partner of IA Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm based in New York City. In this episode, Roger gives a master class on all aspects of starting and building a venture firm. IA is managing $475M across four funds, and is currently investing out of its $160M fourth fund. Fund 1 was a $50MM fund raised during the global financial crisis, with a first close of $17MM. Earlier in his career, Roger served as CEO of DB Advisors, was Global co-head of Deutsche Bank’s Strategic Equity Transactions Group, and was an investment banker at Citibank in derivatives, capital structuring and Mergers & Acquisitions.Roger currently sits on the Boards of Ethyca, Gospel Technology, Mighty, Octane and TransferWise, and was an early lead investor in both The Trade Desk (NASDAQ: TTD) and Datadog (NASDAQ: DDOG). Formerly, he served on the boards of Buddy Media (sold to Salesforce for $800M), Recorded Future (sold to Insight for $780MM), and Simple Finance (sold to BBVA for $120M). In this episode, Roger covers the following:* His background from going from M&A banking and hedge to early stage investing. * The opportunity and vision he saw for IA during the global financial crisis. * The amount of diligence he went through for choosing a partner. * How he made some unconventionally sized portfolio bets early in Fund 1 when the fund was still raising. * IA’s philosophy on fund sizing. * How he thinks about portfolio construction and recycling. * How he thinks about staying disciplined on ownership and valuation targets and when to have some flexibility.* The role of pattern matching and how IA tests and re-tests this. Here are some resources to learn more about Roger:* IA Ventures website* Roger’s Information Arbitrage blog. The following posts should be required reading for emerging managers:* Building a Seed Stage Venture Fund* Working to Build a Better Mousetrap* Thoughts on distribution strategy * A presentation Data-Driven Business Models for The Research Board’s Global CIO Conference This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Charles Hudson is the Managing Partner and Founder at Precursor Ventures, one of the first and most active pre-seed focused venture firms in the world. Precursor seeks to invest in a company’s first round of institutional investment and focuses on investments in B2B software applications, B2C software and services, and connected hardware. Prior to founding Precursor Ventures, he spent 5 years as a Partner at Uncork Capital (formerly known as SoftTech VC). Charles was also the Co­Founder and CEO of Bionic Panda Games, a mobile games startup. Prior to this he held Business Development roles for Serious Business (acquired by Zynga), Gaia Interactive, and Google. Prior to joining Google, Charles was a Product Manager for IronPort Systems, and he worked at In-Q-Tel, the venture capital fund backed by the Central Intelligence Agency. Charles holds a BA and an MBA from Stanford University.In this episode, Charles and I cover the following topics:* What his thought process was of spinning out of an established seed firm to start his own firm. * Why positioning your fund correctly represents such a critical part in fundraising successfully.  * His experience raising his first two funds relative to what he expected. * How he manages his time as a solo GP. * Why running a venture firm is actually multiple businesses in one. * The role of diversity in venture, and the opportunity ahead. Mentioned in this episode:* Precursor Ventures* Diversity & Inclusion in the VC Industry study by the NVCA and DeliotteI’d love to know what you took away from my conversations with Charles; Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to considered as a guest, or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com