Intro

My guest today is Hemant Taneja. Hemant is the CEO and Managing Director of General Catalyst, the global venture capital firm you’ll hear us refer to as GC. GC has set out to build resiliency across critical industries worldwide. The firm leverages technology to retool sectors such as healthcare, energy, defense, and manufacturing and explores innovative capital structures to support founders and businesses. Hemant discusses how the firm is positioned to respond to the aftermath of crises, including the pandemic, wars, energy issues, and beyond. We also discuss the building of a category-defining healthcare company, Livongo and much more. Please enjoy this conversation with Hemant Taneja. 

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For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page here.

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This episode is brought to you by Ramp. Ramp’s mission is to help companies manage their spend in a way that reduces expenses and frees up time for teams to work on more valuable projects. Ramp is the fastest growing FinTech company in history and it’s backed by more of my favorite past guests (at least 16 of them!) than probably any other company I’m aware of. It’s also notable that many best-in-class businesses use Ramp—companies like Airbnb, Anduril, and Shopify, as well as investors like Sequoia Capital and Vista Equity. They use Ramp to manage their spending, automate tedious financial processes, and reinvest saved dollars and hours into growth. At Colossus and Positive Sum, we use Ramp for exactly the same reason. Go to Ramp.com/invest to sign up for free and get a $250 welcome bonus.

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Invest Like the Best is a property of Colossus, LLC. For more episodes of Invest Like the Best, visit joincolossus.com/episodes. 

Past guests include Tobi Lutke, Kevin Systrom, Mike Krieger, John Collison, Kat Cole, Marc Andreessen, Matthew Ball, Bill Gurley, Anu Hariharan, Ben Thompson, and many more.

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Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant (https://thepodcastconsultant.com).

Show Notes:

(00:00:00) Our Partners: Ramp and Tegus

(00:03:00) Welcome to Invest Like the Best

(00:03:57) Introducing Hemant Taneja and General Catalyst

(00:04:17) Global Resilience and Innovation Post-Pandemic 

(00:05:56) Re-Globalization and Manufacturing 

(00:07:03) Building Livongo: A 20-Year Overnight Success 

(00:13:23) Aligning Incentives in Healthcare 

(00:15:40) Re-imagining the Investment Business 

(00:20:54) Evolution of General Catalyst

(00:27:04) Succession and Trust in Asset Management 

(00:35:00) Founder-Centric Capital Goals 

(00:36:32) Balancing Growth and Liquidity 

(00:41:39) AI and Onshoring Productivity 

(00:47:10) Defense Investments and Ethics 

(00:50:11) Geopolitics and Regulation 

(00:53:16) Reflections on Leadership and Strategy 

(01:01:14) Hemant's Future Plans 

(01:02:55) The Kindest Thing Anyone Has Ever Done for Him