The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch 20VC: OpenAI's $6BN Jony Ive Deal | YC Is Both Chanel and Walmart—and Has Officially Won | Builder.ai Implodes and Hinge IPOs: Who Wins & Who Loses | Seed Is Easy. Series A Is Brutal & The Dirty Truth About Late-Stage Venture
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May 29, 2025 
Rory O’Driscoll, a venture capitalist at Scale Venture Partners, and Jason Lemkin, SaaS expert and founder of SaaStr, dive into the high-stakes world of late-stage venture capital. They dissect the $500M collapse of Builder.ai and explore the implications of Hinge's IPO. Discussion surrounds Y Combinator’s unique duality as both a luxury and an accessible brand, plus the brutal realities of Series A funding. The duo also debates OpenAI's blockbuster deal with Jony Ive, weighing its potential to revolutionize hardware design against challenges in an evolving market.
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Late-Stage VC Fund Math
- Large late-stage VC funds rarely see balanced portfolios with multiple fund returners.
- Success hinges on backing one or two exceptional companies that can return a substantial portion of the fund.
YC's Accelerator Dominance
- Y Combinator has structurally won the accelerator game by building a global, scalable business.
- Its model converts people worldwide into investable founders for a modest equity cut.
Series A Investing Challenges
- Series A investing is brutal compared to seed because showing money and proof of quality is much harder.
- Focus on spotting companies that demonstrate real traction instead of just telling a good story.