Jordan Nof (Tusk VP) - Regulated Industries, The Importance of Timing, and Good Growth vs. Bad Growth

Jordan Nof is a Managing Partner and the Head of Investments at Tusk Venture Partners, where he oversees all aspects of the firm’s venture capital investment practice and is a member of the Investment Committee. Jordan has led many of the Fund’s capital investments including Lemonade, Bird, Alma, and Sunday. He currently serves on the board of directors of Alma and Sunday.

Prior to Tusk Venture Partners, Jordan spent six years as a Director at Blackstone, where he focused on the development of the firm’s corporate venture capital portfolio. During that time, Jordan focused on investing in early-stage technology companies that could accelerate operations across Blackstone and the firm’s underlying portfolio companies. He led Blackstone’s first real estate technology investment and worked within the Innovations team to execute investments in financial technology and cyber-security startups.

You can follow Jordan on Twitter @jordannof.

A book that inspired Jordan both personally and professionally is Zero To One by Peter Thiel

In this episode, you will learn -

1. What made Jordan leave Blackstone in order to go into Venture Capital with Tusk? Tusk’s thesis and why they invest in regulated industries. The difficulties when it comes to investing regulated industries and the Tusk advantage?
   
2. What makes him excited about investing in consumer companies in today’s landscape? What are some consumer verticals that he is most excited about and are ripe for disruption?
   
3. At the early stage when a company doesn’t have a lot of data, what are some qualities that he look for in a founder? When does a company need to find product market fit in their fundraising stage? How he thinks about the future of regulation in certain industries? How do you think about good growth vs. bad growth today? Does he think Nike announcing that they are not selling on Amazon a big deal?
   
4. What is something that you would change when it came to venture capital? What is his most recent investment and why is he excited about it? What is one piece of advice that you have for founders of consumer companies?