2min chapter

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch cover image

20VC: Thrive Capital's Kareem Zaki on The One Rule That Drives Investment Decision-Making and Focus at Thrive, Why Every Large Institution Will Enter Venture Capital Over the Next Decade and How To Create a Firm Culture That Attracts The Best Young Talent

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

CHAPTER

From Medicine to Venture: A Journey of Transformation and Inspiration

This chapter explores the speaker's unexpected transition from a medical career to the venture capital arena. It delves into their experiences at Blackstone and Thrive Capital, highlighting the shift from traditional investment views to a focus on innovative, future-oriented healthcare solutions.

00:00
Speaker 2
I've wanted to do this for a very long time. And I'm also very cognizant that this is probably one of the first times that a Thrive team member has been on a podcast. So thank you so much for joining me, Stey Kareem.
Speaker 1
Of course. Super excited. Big fan of
Speaker 2
the show, Harry. That is very kind of you. And as I said to you beforehand, I emailed many of your founders and every single one of them responded, which is the first time ever that has happened. And I would tweet that if you were on Twitter, but you're not. But I do want to start with a little bit on you. So tell me, how did you make the way into the world of venture and come to be at Thrive Today?
Speaker 1
Actually, I grew up pretty far from it. When I was younger, I was very focused on being a doctor, and I was on my way to med school. And I had this realization that I just knew very little about how the world worked. I got anxious about the idea of actually becoming even more narrow and focused over the next decade, going to medical school, residency, and all the things that followed from that. Deferred my decision to go to med school, ended up applying to a lot of places last minute, was fortunate to get a job in private equity at Blackstone, spent a lot of time regulating industries like healthcare and financial services. After a few years, I started to get a bit disillusioned with, even though these were amazing businesses and doing really well by all objective measures, they were investing so little into the future. And they're really relying on either the regulatory capture they had or the inertia of the market to continue to propel them forward. And don't get me wrong, they were amazing businesses, but I just left a little bit less inspired. And around this time, Josh, who's the founder of Thrive, was starting to think about Oscar Health. And we'd known each other from school. And I started spending time with him and the team unofficially around this. And I just got so inspired by the problems, the spaces, and the ambition of the team, which reached well beyond the $40 million fund they had at the time would suggest. And even with that small fund, they were taking big swings. You know, be a big investor in a growth round in Instagram right before Facebook bought it all with a small fund. And the craziest idea of all was Oscar, this health insurance company, at least to me, someone who spent a lot of time thinking about insurance and healthcare. And I remember coming home from one of those conversations, modeling it out and thinking about how it would work from all these conventional lenses. And I just realized the math didn't work unless you really believe that we were at the beginning of a new movement, really ushered actually by the Accountable Care Act, where for the first time you could create a direct-to insurance company that you could build real relationships with your members. You could drive engagement. And if you did that, you'd actually flip the whole economics of the insurance industry. And I was just so energized by these conversations. I just knew I had to be a part of it.

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