Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape.This week we are joined by Geoff Lewis, Co-Founder and Managing partner of Bedrock Capital. Many in the industry know Geoff and Bedrock for their investing in non-consensus companies and founders, and in particular, for popularizing the notion of investing in narrative violations.Founded in 2018 with Eric Stromberg, Bedrock has $1B+ in AUM. Their portfolio companies include Cameo, Plaid, Flock Safety, among others.About Geoff Lewis:Geoff was named as one of the Top 100 Venture Capitalists in the world by CB Insights and The New York Times.Before Bedrock, Geoff was a Partner at Founders Fund for over five years. He was amongst the first to lead sizable early-stage venture rounds in companies including Lyft (NASDAQ: LYFT), Wish, Privateer Holdings (NASDAQ: TLRY), Nubank, and RigUp. Geoff was also an operator as Co-Founder and CEO of Topguest, a loyalty software platform that counted United Airlines, Hilton Worldwide, and Virgin America as clients. Geoff received his Bachelor of Commerce degree from Queen’s University at Kingston, Canada.Our sponsors:At Brex, we build financial software and services to help startups scale faster. We understand that founders need to focus on building, not banking. So we’ve reimagined traditional financial systems to enable greater speed and productivity — no matter where founders and their teams are working.We offer a smart corporate card, business account, and mobile app that are easy to use from day one. No manuals needed here. Within minutes, you can deposit funds, send free wires and ACH worldwide, separate investor funds from operating expenses, earn great rewards, automate expenses, and more. Everything we do at Brex is to help founders spend less time managing expenses and reporting on your runway — and more time building your business.Get started at brex.com/ventureSydecar is on a mission to enable anyone to be a capital allocator by creating tools built specifically for today’s venture investor. Their powerful software removes the headache of organizing private investments — so that you can focus on making deals, not spreadsheets.Whether you’re syndicating your first or fiftieth deal, Sydecar acts as your silent operating partner, handling all back office functions in a single place. Sydecar always has your back, so that you never have to worry about chasing subscription docs, lost wires, or late K-1s.Visit our website to learn more and join the waitlist for Sydecar’s limited beta. In this episode we discuss:03:29 What Geoff and Eric wanted to build when they founded Bedrock06:51 How they decided on working together09:17 How Geoff defines a narrative violation when investing in early-stage startups13:53 How to find companies that are narrative violations?17:10 How investment decisions are made internally at Bedrock21:36 How Geoff views LPs (Clients) and why an interpersonal fit is more important to him than other funds. 25:32 The factors that go into consistently winning deals as a firm29:02 How large players entering the earlier investment stages is affecting Bedrock and the market in general31:52 How healthy is the market right now?34:18 Advice to anyone looking to invest in VC funds today37:13 How the Bedrock playbook has evolved over the years39:26 Can overthinking deals create issues for firms?42:22 What Geoff has learned about firm building45:53 The most impactful piece of career advice he’s received46:35 The most under-estimated quality of a good VC47:47 The people that have inspired him in his careerI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Geoff. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape.This week I’m happy to share my conversation with David Cohen, Co-Founder and Chairman of Techstars, which along with YC has paved the path early-stage capital formation through the accelerator model.  Since its founding in 2006, TechStars has had 2600 companies graduate its programs and those companies have raised $16.5B in investments across all stages. In 2021 David stepped back from day-to-day operations to become Chairman.About David Cohen:David has been an entrepreneur and investor for his entire life. He has founded several companies and has invested in hundreds of startups such as Uber, Twilio, SendGrid, DigitalOcean, Pillpack, Classpass, Zipline, Scopely, Outreach, Remitly, SalesLoft, and DataRobot. In total, these investments have gone on to create more than $210B in value.Prior to Techstars, David was a co-founder of Pinpoint Technologies which was acquired by ZOLL Medical Corporation in 1999. He was also the founder and CEO of earFeeder, a music service that sold to SonicSwap. David is the co-author (with Brad Feld) of Do More Faster; Techstars Lessons to Accelerate Your Startup.Our sponsors:At Brex, we build financial software and services to help startups scale faster. We understand that founders need to focus on building, not banking. So we’ve reimagined traditional financial systems to enable greater speed and productivity — no matter where founders and their teams are working.We offer a smart corporate card, business account, and mobile app that are easy to use from day one. No manuals needed here. Within minutes, you can deposit funds, send free wires and ACH worldwide, separate investor funds from operating expenses, earn great rewards, automate expenses, and more. Everything we do at Brex is to help founders spend less time managing expenses and reporting on your runway — and more time building your business.Get started at brex.com/ventureSydecar is on a mission to enable anyone to be a capital allocator by creating tools built specifically for today’s venture investor. Their powerful software removes the headache of organizing private investments — so that you can focus on making deals, not spreadsheets.Whether you’re syndicating your first or fiftieth deal, Sydecar acts as your silent operating partner, handling all back office functions in a single place. Sydecar always has your back, so that you never have to worry about chasing subscription docs, lost wires, or late K-1s.Visit our website to learn more and join the waitlist for Sydecar’s limited beta. In this episode we discuss:03:08 What led David to founding TechStars04:47 The 15-minute meeting that sparked TechStars and its initial vision06:05 The first cohort of TechStars and how it was funded07:57 How the first fundraise went and the journey of moving from high net-worth individuals to institutional LPs12:15 Portfolio construction advantages of larger portfolios 18:23 How TechStars was able to launch across geographies 21:48 Common characteristics of successful founders30:05 What type of people they key on for hires33:02 How TechStars has maintained its culture as it has scaled35:29 Advice for people looking to start their own fund39:34 How portfolio companies are emerging from the TechStars programs41:56 The view on VC today43:35 How startups should approach their raises today46:33 The advice David gives to the GPs he’s invested with49:54 The TechStars Foundation and who it servesI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with David. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape.This week I’m excited to bring you my conversation with Peter Barrett, Co-Founder and General Partner of Playground Global, a firm that has raised over $800MM to invest in deeply technical and transformative technologies. Founded in 2015, the firm has invested in companies like eero, Canvas Technologies, and Owl Labs, among many others.This week’s show was a bit of a departure from our normal episodes that are more focused on firm and fund management, as I was really excited to talk to Peter about new technologies and investing in these types of hard science companies. About Peter Barrett:Peter has been writing code since he was a teenager, and at 19, his first security program caught the attention of the NSA. He went on to create the first widely used video codec in the early-90s, he built the world’s most popular IPTV platform at Microsoft, worked on cloud intelligence for automotive at CloudCar, and now is pioneering quantum and optical computing, robotics, and artificial intelligence at Playground. He holds over 100 patents.Our sponsors:At Brex, we build financial software and services to help startups scale faster. We understand that founders need to focus on building, not banking. So we’ve reimagined traditional financial systems to enable greater speed and productivity — no matter where founders and their teams are working.We offer a smart corporate card, business account, and mobile app that are easy to use from day one. No manuals needed here. Within minutes, you can deposit funds, send free wires and ACH worldwide, separate investor funds from operating expenses, earn great rewards, automate expenses, and more. Everything we do at Brex is to help founders spend less time managing expenses and reporting on your runway — and more time building your business.Get started at brex.com/ventureSydecar is on a mission to enable anyone to be a capital allocator by creating tools built specifically for today’s venture investor. Their powerful software removes the headache of organizing private investments — so that you can focus on making deals, not spreadsheets.Whether you’re syndicating your first or fiftieth deal, Sydecar acts as your silent operating partner, handling all back-office functions in a single place. Sydecar always has your back, so that you never have to worry about chasing subscription docs, lost wires, or late K-1s.Visit our website to learn more and join the waitlist for Sydecar’s limited beta. In this episode we discuss:02:57 He Peter got his start and what lead him to become an investor03:52 Gaps he saw in the venture model that he wanted to address with his own firm05:48 How Peter thinks about mitigating risk when investing in hard science and deep tech startups09:02 How the pandemic has changed his due diligence process11:36 Initial check size versus follow-on in the deep tech space14:07 The difference between improbable and impossible and what makes a great company for Playground Global17:19 Common traits amongst successful deep tech founders19:37 How Peter uses his deep technical knowledge as an asset for his founders22:20 The argument that the computing revolution and the industrial revolutions still haven’t happened25:37 Limiters that are inhibiting true science innovation in startups28:24 Area to invest in where capital will be most transformational31:44 The definition of meaningful AI35:58 Finding and working with LPs that are comfortable investing in the deep tech space37:54 How Covid changed his deal-flow and why more investors are looking for meaningful transformation in technology40:03 The most transformative career advice Peter has receivedI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Peter. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape.This week I’m excited to bring you my conversation with Eurie Kim of Forerunner Ventures, which without a doubt is one of the world's top VC firms formed over the last decade. Forerunner invests in entrepreneurs who are redefining culture and consumer experiences in today’s digital world and has invested in companies such as Jet, Birchbox, Warby Parker, and Curology. It currently has over $2B in AUM, and they recently closed a $1B fund. This was such a treat for me as I’ve known the Forerunner team since their launch of Fund 1, and it was fun to go back in time to relive the evolution of Forerunner. About Eurie Kim:Eurie joined Forerunner Ventures in 2012 and has invested in a wide array of lifestyle and health-focused companies. She sits on the Boards of Oura, The Farmer’s Dog, Curology, Attabotics, Eclipse, and Juni, among others, and was featured on the Forbes Midas Brink List in 2020. Eurie is also a founding member of the female mentorship collective, All Raise, and champions women in the technology industry.Prior to joining Forerunner, Eurie founded MAVN, a luxury accessories brand, and worked with Bain & Company. She got her MBA at Wharton and her undergrad at Berkeley.Our sponsors:At Brex, we build financial software and services to help startups scale faster. We understand that founders need to focus on building, not banking. So we’ve reimagined traditional financial systems to enable greater speed and productivity — no matter where founders and their teams are working.We offer a smart corporate card, business account, and mobile app that are easy to use from day one. No manuals needed here. Within minutes, you can deposit funds, send free wires and ACH worldwide, separate investor funds from operating expenses, earn great rewards, automate expenses, and more. Everything we do at Brex is to help founders spend less time managing expenses and reporting on your runway — and more time building your business.Get started at brex.com/ventureWhy does signing up for Robinhood take 2 minutes but investing in private funds takes hours? Meet Passthrough. The subscription document process is a nightmare. Investors receive 100-200 question questionnaires, answer the wrong questions, miss ones they're supposed to answer, and spend hours on revisions.How can you effectively manage your raise when you don't know where your investors stand?Passthrough takes any subscription document and builds a custom workflow so that your investors only see the questions that matter to them, shrinking the time to completion to minutes instead of hours. 80% of investors don't even require revisions. Plus, you can see where your investors are and coordinate them, your law firm, and fund admin to close capital quicker.At Allocate, we have used Passthrough for our various funds, which has significantly increased the efficiency of our closings while providing our investors with a delightful user experience.Go to passthrough.com/samir to learn more about how to simplify fund closing.In this episode we discuss:03:01 The creation of Forerunner and why she jumped into venture capital full-time06:45 How she saw the obvious opportunity in dommerce when most investors were still skeptical 11:04 Overcoming early objections from LPs when raising early funds21:32 Hiring the initial team and firm building28:48 The most effective tactic for building a cohesive culture of success33:51 Why deal attribution can be a hindrance to firm growth37:22 Looking back at the inflection points that changed Forerunner42:03 How the last few years have changed the market47:46 Advice for smaller fund managers competing at early stages50:55 Why having a strong, but nimble point of view is so important in investing 52:48 The most impactful career advice she’s receivedI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Eurie. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape.This week I’m delighted to bring you my conversation with Packy McCormick, founder of Not Boring, a biweekly newsletter that now has over 100K subscribers and covers tech, strategy, finance, economics, and everything in between. In July 2021, Packy launched the Not Boring Capital which closed at just under $10MM and has invested in over 50 companies. Packy also started the Not Boring Club, a social and “extracurricular” community for like-minded individuals, and he also serves as a Web3 advisor for Andreessen Horowitz.About Packy McCormickPacky McCormick started his career in Investment Banking at Bank of America/Merrill Lynch, which lead him to Breather, an on-demand network of over 80 beautiful meeting spaces in New York City. In April of 2020, he started writing Not Boring, and his analysis, insight, and wit quickly grew to be one of the most-read newsletters in the startup and web3 space. He has been a big proponent in DAOs and has recently been helping to raise awareness and orchestrate how crypto investors can help the Ukrainian cause. Packy did his undergrad at Duke University.Our sponsors:At Brex, we build financial software and services to help startups scale faster. We understand that founders need to focus on building, not banking. So we’ve reimagined traditional financial systems to enable greater speed and productivity — no matter where founders and their teams are working.We offer a smart corporate card, business account, and mobile app that are easy to use from day one. No manuals needed here. Within minutes, you can deposit funds, send free wires and ACH worldwide, separate investor funds from operating expenses, earn great rewards, automate expenses, and more. Everything we do at Brex is to help founders spend less time managing expenses and reporting on your runway — and more time building your business.Get started at brex.com/ventureWhy does signing up for Robinhood take 2 minutes but investing in private funds takes hours? Meet Passthrough. The subscription document process is a nightmare. Investors receive 100-200 question questionnaires, answer the wrong questions, miss ones they're supposed to answer, and spend hours on revisions.How can you effectively manage your raise when you don't know where your investors stand?Passthrough takes any subscription document and builds a custom workflow so that your investors only see the questions that matter to them, shrinking the time to completion to minutes instead of hours. 80% of investors don't even require revisions. Plus, you can see where your investors are and coordinate them, your law firm, and fund admin to close capital quicker.At Allocate, we have used Passthrough for our various funds, which has significantly increased the efficiency of our closings while providing our investors with a delightful user experience.Go to passthrough.com/samir to learn more about how to simplify fund closing.In this episode we discuss:02:44 Why Packy started the Not Boring newsletter07:17 Is investing a side hustle or a full-time commitment for smaller solo-GPs?09;13 How writing helps his investing12:28 Why it’s hard to understand and underwrite to exponential growth14:34 How he creates personal scale to be able to help 50+ portfolio companies17:11 Managing top of the funnel deal-flow20:02 The non-obvious trends that get him excited in web322:17 How can firms should think about de-commoditizing themselves27:27 Sizing your firm correctly and narrowing your focus29:33 Deciding when you need to change swim lanes as an investor31:11 Not Boring’s portfolio construction theory34:03 How the market continues to evolve so dynamically, and the opportunities for solo-capitalists36:45 Why do later-stage investing as a solo capitalist41:05 The speed of growth in modern startups43:58 Packy’s view on LPs50:38 The best piece of career advice he’s receivedI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Packy. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape.This week, we have friend-of-the-pod Guy Perelmuter, founder of GRIDS Capital, a firm based in Sao Paulo, Brazil that invests in deep tech focused venture funds and startups.  GRIDS, whose tagline is “Science is our Business. Business is our Science” has invested in funds such as Lux Capital and Root Ventures as well as directs into Desktop Metal, Recursion Pharmaceuticals, Instrumental, Matterport, Esper, and Momentus Space.About Guy Perelmuter:Guy began his career in Banking as Chief Risk Officer at Banco Pactual (acquired by UBS), one of the largest banks in Latin America. He went to Vinci Partners, an investing platform for alternative investments in 2009 as Chief Risk Officer. He and his partner, Isabelle, Co-Founded GRIDS Capital in 2016.Guy made a memorable appearance on Venture Unlocked with the LP round table discussion and he is the author of the acclaimed book "Present Future: Business, Science and the Deep Tech Revolution.” Guy got a BS in Computer Engineering and an MS in AI from Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro.A word from our sponsor:Why does signing up for Robinhood take 2 minutes but investing in private funds takes hours? Meet Passthrough. The subscription document process is a nightmare. Investors receive 100-200 question questionnaires, answer the wrong questions, miss ones they're supposed to answer, and spend hours on revisions.How can you effectively manage your raise when you don't know where your investors stand?Passthrough takes any subscription document and builds a custom workflow so that your investors only see the questions that matter to them, shrinking the time to completion to minutes instead of hours. 80% of investors don't even require revisions. Plus, you can see where your investors are and coordinate them, your law firm, and fund admin to close capital quicker.At Allocate, we have used Passthrough for our various funds, which has significantly increased the efficiency of our closings while providing our investors with a delightful user experience.Go to passthrough.com/samir to learn more about how to simplify fund closing.In this episode we discuss:02:25 Guy’s path into investing in Deep Tech08:39 What is Deep Tech and why other investors have historically avoided investing in it12:12 Risk mitigation strategies Guy uses to help decide to invest into early Deep Tech startups17:53 What makes a fund manager a good Deep Tech investor?20:30 How GRIDS thinks about competitive moats and winning deals24:46 What’s more important in a fund manager, track record or technical chops?30:00 How Guy is focusing on growing as an LP and how he adds value to his GPs36:56 Why today’s market is “extraordinary” and his case for both a bull and bear view44:10 How new investors in the venture capital market can mitigate risk and capture upside in today’s market50:37 The best career advice he’s ever receivedI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Guy. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided byAgent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape.This week I’m excited to bring you my conversation with Elizabeth Weil of seed-focused Scribble Ventures.Elizabeth and her Scribble VC partners, Annie and Kevin, raised an oversubscribed $50M Fund I, all during the COVID Pandemic. Before starting the firm, she previously invested as an angel into companies such as Postmates, SpaceX, Mainstreet, Clubhouse, and Figma.About Elizabeth WeilElizabeth is a relationship-driven fund manager and technology investor, startup advisor, and entrepreneur. She has built a reputation for accelerating growth by tirelessly helping her investments with introductions and advice around company culture and employee experience.Previously she was a Managing Director at 137 Ventures, a Partner at Andreessen Horowitz, and an executive at Twitter during a period of hypergrowth as it scaled from 50 to 3000 people. Elizabeth has invested in more than 60 technology companies across all stages, including Slack, Whatnot, SpaceX, Coinbase, Clubhouse, Gusto, Digits, Envoy, Grab, Daily.co, Hipcamp, Titan, and Calm.Elizabeth graduated from Stanford University with a BA in Economics and a Masters in Engineering. She is also an entrepreneur having started Paperwheel (paperwheel.com), a design and letterpress company.A word from our sponsor:Why does signing up for Robinhood take 2 minutes but investing in private funds takes hours? Meet Passthrough. The subscription document process is a nightmare. Investors receive 100-200 question questionnaires, answer the wrong questions, miss ones they're supposed to answer, and spend hours on revisions.How can you effectively manage your raise when you don't know where your investors stand?Passthrough takes any subscription document and builds a custom workflow so that your investors only see the questions that matter to them, shrinking the time to completion to minutes instead of hours. 80% of investors don't even require revisions. Plus, you can see where your investors are and coordinate them, your law firm, and fund admin to close capital quicker.At Allocate, we have used Passthrough for our various funds, which has significantly increased the efficiency of our closings while providing our investors with a delightful user experience.Go to passthrough.com/samir to learn more about how to simplify fund closing.In this episode we discuss:01:48 What launched Elizabeth into the world of venture capital04:21 The lessons from being an operator and early investing that led to Scribble10:50 Why Elizabeth views herself as a hybrid between a super-angel and an institutional investor14:07 How Scribble scales internally to help its founders16:37 Working with founders in sprints on specific needs18:41 How Scribble gets into competitive deals22:04 Strategies around consensus versus non-consensus investment decision making24:48 Best practices around conviction based investing29:01 Building a healthy culture of effective risk-taking 31:36 How her first fundraise went and lessons learned36:59 The difference between pitching institutional investors versus high net-worth individuals40:01 The most impactful investing advice she has receivedI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Elizabeth. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape.This week we have Rebecca Kaden, General Partner at Union Square Ventures, who are with a doubt one of the very best venture firms in the world having backed companies such as Stripe, Twitter, Etsy, LendingClub, and Coinbase.The firm is also very thesis and mission-driven, including investing in the future by addressing issues like the climate crisis. It was founded in 2003 by Fred Wilson and Brad Burnham and currently has $1.9B in AUM.About Rebecca Kaden:Rebecca Kaden is a managing partner at Union Square Ventures. She began her career as a journalist and prior to USV was a General Partner at Maveron, a consumer-focused early-stage fund. She studied English and American Literature at Harvard and received her MBA from Stanford.A word from our sponsor:Invest in innovation. Allocate is a digital platform that enables investors of all types to invest and manage private alternatives within the technology sector.Despite the enormous growth of the private markets and the rapid increase of retail demand for private alternatives, investing in the highest quality private assets within the innovation sector remains inaccessible and opaque.With Allocate, wealth advisors, banks, family offices, and other qualified investors can have a streamlined way to responsibly invest in the highest quality technology centered private alternatives.Go to allocate.co to find out more and please sign up to the waitlist to learn more and get early access to the platform.In this episode we discuss:01:13 Rebecca’s journey to becoming a full-time investor from journalism04:15 The skillsets that most translated from journalism to VC06:08 The things she was most looking for when joining a VC firm. 08:45 Construction a true venture investment thesis12:45 What thesis-driven investing means in practice, and the application for it when evaluating companies. 15:12 The primary benefits of having a defined thesis (but also why it must evolve)18:55 How USV thinks about fund size in today’s market22:09 Why adjusting fund size significantly upward was something they decided against25:47 Why USV has decided to avoid the run faster, chase more mentality in today’s market27:49 Why risk management is a critical, but underrated part of VC. 30:03 The adjustments that USV has made in response to the market climate in the last few years33:19 What she thinks has made USV such a great firm over the last two decades36:07 How Rebecca thinks about generational succession, and how to get it right39:02 How USV avoids a deferential culture and how new partners find their voices42:17 the most transformational career advice Rebecca has receivedI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Rebecca. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape.This week I’m thrilled to bring you my conversation with Brianne Kimmel, founder and managing partner of Worklife Ventures, a San Francisco-based firm that invests in seed-stage companies focused on the future of work. Worklife started in 2019 with a $5M fund (which included 7 unicorns), and is now investing out of Fund II. One interesting point about the fund is that she intentionally was very strategic about building an LP base and has LPs that include Marc Andreessen, Chris Dixon, Matt Mazzeo, Alexis Ohanian, Garry Tan, and others.About Brianne Kimmel:Business Insider recently named Brianne a top angel investor that every startup should know alongside Ellen Pao and Cyan Bannister.She previously worked on the go-to-market team at Zendesk focused on self-serve growth, technology integrations and built Zendesk for Startups.Started with SaaS when she was Head of Social Media at Expedia leading paid acquisition, customer support, and community.Brianne runs an invite-only program called SaaS School for startup founders to learn from the fastest-growing companies like Airtable, Drift, Dropbox, Slack, and more. A word from our sponsor:Invest in innovation. Allocate is a digital platform that enables investors of all types to invest and manage private alternatives within the technology sector.Despite the enormous growth of the private markets and the rapid increase of retail demand for private alternatives, investing in the highest quality private assets within the innovation sector remains inaccessible and opaque.With Allocate, wealth advisors, banks, family offices, and other qualified investors can have a streamlined way to responsibly invest in the highest quality technology centered private alternatives.Go to allocate.co to find out more and please sign up to the waitlist to learn more and get early access to the platform.In this episode we discuss:01:09 Brianne’s life prior to investing and what led her to become a full-time investor03:39 Her motivation for becoming an investor rather than staying an operator08:51 Experiences that led to Brianne’s investing thesis12:39 How she spends her time as a solo GP17:40 What she’s found to be the most valuable use of her time as a solo GP21:14 The difference between investing in Fund I and Fund II28:16 The importance of building community within her LP base and learning by investing alongside other investors32:55 Non-negotiables she looks for in founders and founding teams37:40 The importance of founder/investor fit and personality traits she thinks attracts top-talent41:41 How culture is conveyed through remote work44:14 The best piece of career advice Brianne has receivedI’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Brianne. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com

Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape.This week I’m absolutely thrilled to bring you my conversation with Frank Rotman, Founding Partner of QED Partners, one of the top Fintech firms in the world. Founded in 2007 alongside Nigel Morris, QED has invested early in companies such as Credit Karma, Klarna, SoFi, and Nubank. They currently have $3B in AUM.As many of you that follow Frank on twitter, and if you don’t you should right away, you’ll know he’s one of the most insightful thinkers in the industry. As such, I wanted to take this opportunity to have a more global dialogue about the state of the venture market today, including a close evaluation from both a risk and return perspective.About Frank Rotman:Frank was one of the earliest analysts hired into Capital One and spent almost 13 years there helping build many of the company’s business units and operational areas. With two decades in consumer & small business finance, Frank is widely known in the industry as a Credit Risk and Portfolio Management Expert.His responsibilities have included turning around underperforming business units, building new businesses from concept to market leadership positions, overseeing the credit performance of Capital One as a whole, and creating a Student Lending company after leaving Capital One in December 2005. Frank graduated from the University of Virginia with degrees that included Applied Mathematics (BS) and Systems Engineering (MS).A word from our sponsor:Invest in innovation. Allocate is a digital platform that enables investors of all types to invest and manage private alternatives within the technology sector.Despite the enormous growth of the private markets and the rapid increase of retail demand for private alternatives, investing in the highest quality private assets within the innovation sector remains inaccessible and opaque.With Allocate, wealth advisors, banks, family offices, and other qualified investors can have a streamlined way to responsibly invest in the highest quality technology centered private alternatives.Go to allocate.co to find out more and please sign up to the waitlist to learn more and get early access to the platform.In this episode we discuss:01:45 Frank’s journey from banker to investor05:23 What the current investing market looks like from QED’s perspective09:10 How should investors be underwriting to future exits?13:50 Assessing how liquidity has fueled the market, and what it means for startups. 18:28 Predicting narrative violations and who the winners will be in the next 10 years22:58 The maturation of financial markets for technology 32:32 How the QED model has adapted to respond to higher pricing and faster decisions39:20 Signals Frank looks for when evaluating a new investment44:56 The problems entrepreneurs face when raising at a higher valuation48:41 Risks that VCs can help entrepreneurs mitigate against54:38What would Frank do if he was the CIO of an endowment? How would he build his VC portfolio?I’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Frank. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.Podcast Production support provided byAgent Bee Agency This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ventureunlocked.substack.com