Entrepreneurs wonder what it’s like to be a VC. And VCs without an operating background often don’t understand the grit required to turn an idea into a successful business. The best investors have been successful operators first.

Today’s guest is one of those. Nick Adams founded Differential Ventures in 2017 to invest in B2B, data-first seed-stage companies. Since then, Nick and the team have invested in an impressive group of companies including Private AI, Ocrolus, and Agnostiq.

Before Differential, Nick helped grow companies like OPower and RAGE Frameworks in sales, marketing, and product leadership roles. Today we get to learn about how to innovate and grow a startup when the product is a venture fund.

Listen and learn...

1. How being an investor and entrepreneur are similar
2. The most outrageous pitch Nick has heard... and how it involved porn
3. How being a baseball player trained Nick to be a venture capitalist
4. Nick's advice for what to do after closing a big sales deal
5. Where there are opportunities for generative AI entrepreneurs to get funded
6. How AI is being used to design circuit boards
7. Nick's most recent investment... and what made him decide to write the check
8. What Nick is telling Congress we need to do to regulate AI

References in this episode...

• Why generative AI is desperately in need of regulation
• Metafold, new Differential investment
• Dan Grunfeld from Lightspeed on AI and the Future of Work