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20VC: Kleiner Perkins' Mamoon Hamid on The Strategy Behind The New $600m "Back To The Future" Fund, The Truth To Price Sensitivity at Series A & Why Venture Team Building Is Like Basketball Team Building

May 13, 2019

Mamoon Hamid, a Partner at Kleiner Perkins and a venture capital veteran, dives into the strategies behind his firm's new $600 million fund. He discusses the importance of sector specialization and a bottom-up approach to portfolio construction. Price sensitivity in early-stage funding is also explored, revealing pivotal moments that shaped his investment beliefs. Additionally, Mamoon highlights the nuances of venture team dynamics, comparing them to basketball strategies, and offers insights on effective board membership and transformative innovations in healthcare.

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ANECDOTE

From Engineer to VC

Mamoon Hamid's interest in Venture Capital started when he was a young engineer, noticing successful tech companies backed by VCs.
His company Xilinx, along with Sun Microsystems and Netscape, were all early Kleiner Perkins investments, sparking his interest.

INSIGHT

Back to the Future Fund

Kleiner Perkins' new fund focuses on early-stage investments, returning to their roots of partnering with founders early.
Their historical success across major tech shifts informs this "back to the future" approach.

ADVICE

Focus with Flexibility

VCs should have both major and minor focus areas to maintain expertise while staying intellectually curious.
Focus is key for a coherent strategy and consistent returns, but serendipity also plays a role.

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Mamoon Hamid is a Partner @ Kleiner Perkins, one of Silicon Valley's most prestigious venture firms counting Google, Airbnb, Amazon, Spotify, Square and many more $Bn companies among their portfolio. As for Mamoon, he has invested in and served on the boards of some of the most innovative software companies of recent times including Box, Figma, Intercom, Netskope, Slack and Yammer. Prior to joining Kleiner Perkins, Mamoon was a Co-Founder and General Partner at Social Capital and before that Mamoon was a Partner at U.S. Venture Partners (USVP), where he spent six years.

In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How did Mamoon make the transition from electrical engineer to VC and how did that translate to his role today as Partner @ KPCB?

2.) With Kleiner's new $600m early stage fund, Mamoon had a blank canvas, how does Mamoon think about portfolio construction from a bottom-up perspective? Why is that strategy optimal? How important does Mamoon believe it is for VCs to have a sector focus today? What does he mean when he says, "VCs need to have both majors and minors"?

3.) In today's heated early stage ecosystem, how does Mamoon analyse and reflect on his own price sensitivity? What deal has changed the way he thought about price and he either regrets not paying it or is thrilled he did pay it? How does Mamoon feel about the compressed fundraising timelines we are seeing today? Is this a concern?

4.) How does KPCB think about reserve allocation with the new $600m fund? How do they approach the opportunity cost of dollar deployment in terms of when to stop following on? How does the investment decision-making process change when comparing initial to reserve investment?

5.) Where does Mamoon believe that founders need the most help from their venture investors? Where does Mamoon see the commonalities in founders struggles to scale themselves with their role? What are the biggest mistakes Mamoon sees being made when initial traction has been hit and they start to scale? How can founders avoid these?

6.) How does Mamoon think about and address what it takes to build the most successful and efficient venture partnership? How does Mamoon compare this to a basketball team? Is venture really a team sport today? what are some of the biggest challenges in scaling venture firms over time?

Items Mentioned In Today’s Show:

Mamoon’s Fave Book: Principles: Life and Work by Ray Dalio

Mamoon’s Most Recent Investment: Viz.ai

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Mamoon on Twitter here!

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.