Hoshi Corp where we invested in the first round and that was just a huge win. I think it was like the 25k turn into something like 30 35 million
bucks while combine these 20 VC with me Harry stabbings. Now, stay show is my favorite type of show. Two managers sharing War Stories in deep discussion and there's no one better than Samuel shot. Join me in the hot seat for this one. For those that do not know. Samuel is the founder of haystack. One of the leading priests Eden seed firms of the last decade amongst animals. Incredible portfolio is doordash in staccato.
Open Door figma, Carter. And many more samples. First fund is more between a 30 and a 40 x. And I want to say a huge thank you to Satya Patel and Hunter walk at home, brew and and I are and mackel Mandan. Some amazing questions. Suggestions stay a real team effort on the schedule, but before we move into the episode, stay Harvard management company is constantly see here the next generation of great investors and entrepreneurs. HMC has managed Harvard University's Endowment for nearly 50 years and was one of the First Institutional investors in.
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Calm and check out their YouTube channel Market X vanishes but that's enough for me. So now I'm so excited to hand over to Samuel. Shaw found add Haystack, 10
You are now arrived at your destination. Samuel, this is gonna be the best podcast you've ever done. You've done a few with me. You've done a few other people so this is going to be the best we've started before that. How you got into that Anja. So for anyone that hasn't listened to that fuck it they can listen to the last episodes. I want to go deep with you, my friend we're going to go with we're all a function of our histories and so we're all running towards something and we're running away from something. What are you running away from first and then what are you running
towards you?
In a professional context when I'm running from, is just the fear of not being able to participate in the way I want. Tuna ecosystem. We before we met, there was a long period of time where I would even confide in my wife and say like, hey, I don't know if we'll live in the Bay Area and make it here. So, over those ten plus years, I've had lots of Industry friends, move out of the Bay Area when I say like involuntarily and a lot of personal friends, especially through covid than the fires move and I do love living in California.
I feel like it's the only place I can live and do what I want to do.
When did you start to believe that would be possible and that you would be able to do it
kind of like 2015, 2016? But there was probably like a two to three-year period where I just wasn't sure. And then you see other people drop off again. People drop off voluntarily, but it's when you have people who leave involuntarily and you start to see that and it builds up. I sort of run away from that. What are you running towards my friend? Someone that you and I have talked about someone like Roger here.
In Burg where you can try to become the investor of record and an important company and an important partner to have found her early. And then you show up on the s-1. People are surprised that's just a running towards as like a lot of us as investors for the most part we can't do what entrepreneurs do we choose not to do what entrepreneurs do we have the best job in the world and so to get a chance to be close to one to sort of steal a line from the Reagan speech and touch the face of God is an amazing opportunity. I then they agree. My favorite is the ruse.
Man in the arena. Quote is one of the best cheering. Yeah, totally. I want to dive straight in today. I spoke to as
many mutual friends which was great fun and my oldest daughter with the firm itself being Haystack and Hunter walk. Obviously from home brew. He asked how do you decide what each Fun Size for haste at will? Be that start there.
We'll remember the first four. I was never able to reach the target of what we wanted to raise. There were always underwhelming in that sense or was the opposite of over subscribing. The pot is it?
You're subscribed. And so for the last two, they were just marked at 50. And so the answer Hunters question, I thought of 50 and the first 50 million dollar fund is enabling us to get to a 10% position and proceed seed rounds. And then in covid, I fell like a lot of LPS were going to support us regardless of what we're doing and fun five at that 15 million state was working. So I just thought, let's not complicate things, that's literally use the same documents, the same size. It's a rinse and repeat strategy in a clear.
Communicated that to everyone because the model was working. I just took the path of least resistance, there rather than introducing more variability. We probably could have raised a lot more, but I just felt, hey, it's an easier pitch to go back to people when they can't meet you and can't meet the portfolio or next funds. By the way, it will modestly grow. But I still think for what we do, it's got to be under 100 million
dollars precede rounds have gone. I never see around that's less than three on 15. Do you agree? Which what do you do? See something
different? I think there are classes
Around him in this kits, into this black hole of what is around and what do you call it? Where I've sort of given up. I think that one thing we can talk about is these precede rounds where they're traditionally 458 million dollar, cap rounds or people are raising under a million. I think over the last 10 years just simply because of inflation. Those are old double. So to your point that three on 15 does feel like a medium entry point and then if you want to do the math and you want to own 10% of everything and have 25 names, you quickly, get above with reserves over a hundred million dollars,
And I've tried to keep it under 100 million for a variety of reasons. One as we don't want to make a promise to LPS and Founders that we have to own 10 plus percent of every company or lead every deal. And then also just the percentage that we would hold that exit. If we're lucky enough to be part of an exit, it may not be meaningful enough. If the fun is over a hundred million dollars, I
totally got you. So, if we think about a 50 million dollar funds, what's the average ownership in those
funds? We've been able to get close to 7% initial entry ownership in the last.
Two funds rents been going up. I would say it's like a slow March. When I call it is like we slowly creep up the cap table, but one of the things I'm really proud of with Haystack is if you look at the activity of all the deals for over 10 years, I would say there's a tight clustering between 8 and 15 million dollars as the entry point and the rounds being three million dollars or less. So, to your point Harry, I think that is a sweet spot. Maybe and deal for the good founding team. I think the problem comes in as like how much evidence is there on the 3 and 15. I think we went through this period where
A lot of entrepreneurs are getting credit for having done nothing yet and getting 3 and 15 to start. The problem is now the Gap to get the 10 million dollar check is so wide. So, what's right entry point at seed and I would argue that's changing teams that already have a product in Market, where there's some D risking their, where you can bridge the gap from the seed to a, I was
analyzing the bullfight here that I have the other day. I knew two thieves and I know to those that haven't really worked and all of those haven't really worked at often been head of product, Twitter had a product it
Which had a product ID amazing company, the hottest of hot seed rounds with Andre, since the coil honest. And you name it, and they all just moved really slowly. They were very competitive five on 25 rounds. None of them really went anywhere. Have you found the same with that profile of deal?
We avoid a lot of those, to be honest. By the way the logic for doing them for these big funds is applicable like it makes sense to me but I think for a fun like ours which is small and constrained they'll get to take those type of
Odds we may be say we do three or four of those. If we have a relationship / fund but we're not able to do that. As a matter of just normal business, what you're saying, we can unpack a lot which is are those hot seed. Rounds necessarily indicators of entrepreneurial value creation probably not or they best suited to like understand what's at The Cutting Edge of product development or infrastructure. Probably. But I think it goes back to this or philosophical question, which is are talented. People also entrepreneurial
Al and I don't believe that I believe there's tons of talented people who are not entrepreneurial. And there are a bunch of entrepreneurial people who don't have the requisite Talent. Really? What we're trying to do is trying to find that overlap of who has the Talent, Plus it, entrepreneurial ability. I'm sure you've seen in some of these rounds Harry because the rounds are so competitive and people are finding over them, and people believe that they're going to create the next big thing. There's sometimes lack of urgency, there's lack of direction, there's lack of passion,
either. The last things, but the trouble is, when you have the head of product at your Twitter, so we will
Companies, when they talk about products each, you just talked with such gravitas and experience and wisdom compared to a first-time found or any kind of last domain experience founder, where you're just like holy shit, back up the truck on these people. So my question to you is and it's such a shit question. But how do you try and identify the overlap of talent and
entrepreneurialism? Again, this is just a very philosophical point and I could be entirely wrong, Roger, we both want to University Michigan. So he just
Recently, about a month ago, invited me back and interviewed me which was surreal for like three hours and we talked about this point and I said, which was possibly like a politically incorrect. Way of saying this, but I just felt the bottom of people that knock on our door with this amazing product experience or amazing experience. You don't get the sense that they sometimes. Again I'm not trying to cast all of them this way that they really want it that they're really hungry. And I also believe again. This is just personal that most people who have an entrepreneurial Gene in their sort of
Hard-coding have expressed that in some other way before they've knock on our
doors, Brad gas, and on the show you said the other day. I asked everyone how did you make money the first time?
Yeah and that's what I'm getting towards where we try to interview the person to get to know them and how they got here and then you're testing for overcoming adversity. It doesn't need to be in business, enduring pain, passion that they've devoted. There's a hundred things you could evaluate where you could say. OK, this person expressed
Some bit of hustle, some bit of grit some bit of handling adversity. Again, it's not all that you need to get there, but it feels, you need to feel a little bit of that as an investor. Because what you're doing is, you're kind of trading off Talent sophistication, Artistic Endeavors with grit and hustle. You can't just have a hundred on one end and 0 on the other or vice versa. There needs to be a bit of a blend.
David, go getting sad that you want to back people who uncivilized and the trouble is with your heads of products at Twitter, that often quite
civilized, a lot of
People will say also now that like once you make it through to like certain organizations and you are in this p.m. roll, you do have more of like a political job. Then you do a Breaking Glass job.
Now, I completely agree, I politicization of Vader ship out, she's fetch Bronn, Armstrong about it. The other day on the show, that was like the seed Trend that I noticed. The series h on that, I noticed it was the whole case. Absolutely. Do correlate to hot bees. Weirdly the hot seeds often don't hot A's very commonly moved to hop beat
He's what you seen as
well? Overall, I think your observation is correct. I think there's a ton of cap at all that wants to follow the signal and validation of like a premium poor competitive series, a
wee man's dream that you could have raised more. I'm going to push your thinking here. You should raise more 50 and 100, it is a difference, but it's not a huge difference at this stage, it gives you more lines of diversification igad. If it's 50 versus 200 or 250 than were talking about big band with different. It is
But I actually 50 to 100 and still in the same ballpark. Why have you
youngsters holding a? Um, I think it comes down to like ownership and exit where I've done enough of these small funds on a small base that have been wildly successful and creative. And I just see how much dilution comes in, how long it takes what the return profile is. It leads me to just think that we would need to start out. If we had 100, 150 million dollar fund, owning 15 percent of everything that we do, there's
Possibility, where Harry your question is right on, where you'd say, okay, in this environment now why don't you wait? Do the three million dollar checks for the 15% ownership and do the small ways and compete? I think it also changes what you need to bring be have to lead every deal. If you're competing for that entrepreneur, you have to bring a certain set of things to the table, and I'm not sure I'm ready to make that promise versus leading a few deals and then also what we tell entrepreneur sometimes, as we can send the driver seat and leave the deal, we can sit in the passenger seat and be a cold.
During the second biggest truck or we can be in the back seat, as the third check. But that's basically it, we don't, do partying rounds and things like that. So I like that flexibility and it enables us to play with the entrepreneurs, we want to play with what percent of deals to you lead. I would say if you look over the last three years, we've maybe LED ten
deals, tannish Tails. If I was competing against you, I would say to the found at which we don't because we're wonderful. The answer really compete with anyone so that's all game, right? I was into the founder. Samuel is
Um, I love Semel but look at these deals. He can be a passenger and so let me lead it and that's put him as the passenger. Do you worry that by being willing to do both? You put yourself in a position where you can be pushed to the passenger seat by anyone. You're competing against
not really because I kind of had a Zen approach about it which is our job is to teach the founders how to interact with investors and raise Capital over successive rounds and part of that should be to choose the best partners for you. I kind of learned
In this, for my Brad, Feld and review. Any just said, like, I mentioned some deal that they did that. They lost maybe the true and he was like, I thought it was great. He was like, I'm friends with everyone at ruin. The entrepreneur is really happy, so we're fine with that. I'm also fine with
that, why? I think this is the game of it and it's competition. I remember, Peter Phantom, telling me the best. People are hypercam passive and Hyper. Curious number, I lose money. I should be upset. Yeah, I mean you
don't want to, but I think of it as like flipping in a little bit, which is if we tried to lead everything we
Lower the quality of the portfolio that we're in being able to be flexible suits my personality. So it fits me. But then, it also enables us to move around. So we've been tracking someone to do a deal. It's actually one of these three on 15 that you mentioned pre everything but it's someone who's a known quantity and a really interesting sector. We actually had a friend who's just going to fund based in that sector and so we sent it to them and we totally entrepreneur like will give you a term sheet if you want to term sheet from us. But we think you should talk to these.
Groups because they're right in the Wheelhouse of what you do. The entrepreneur was super happy with that and it's probably going to work with one of them by being flexible. We get to work with who we want to work with, on the cases where we do lead to come back to your original question here. E, I think speed winds and convictions so we will lead deals that we want to lead and we're just Closing one. Now we're technically leading but someone else is putting in a bigger check and we cut back a little bit to bring in a friend. Who really wanted to come in. I think in this is like we're always trying to co-invest of people that we know and these are repeated games.
He's it's better over the long run to pick the entrepreneurs you want to work with and collaborate with those syndicates over time rather than trying to box out your territory on each one. I think, going back to your previous question of, if I had 100, 150 million dollar fund, that whole collaboration layer of how we work would change, which would then set off a chain reaction of how the deal flow would change, and how we would have to operate with the companies would change. Then you look back over 10 years, where there's tons of DPI, tons of IPOs one paper. Haystack. Looks like, I can't believe it. Would you?
Risk all that magic of meeting entrepreneurship early in order to have more money. It's just better to raise the next fund and go for it. Again, I get
you. My question is, how low will you go on ownership? I would say we
stop around 5%. So if you look at like what we tell the entrepreneur is look, we're trying out on five and ten percent to start. We want to earn the right to maintain that over a few rounds and we'll never owned more than you as a Founder. Will always give you advice, you will be voting or shares. That's kind of a
threatening way of sort of coming out an
entrepreneur in Europe. That's an uncomfortable position if I'm honest. Because you have the leads excel in that Sukhoi Europe and they always want 15 minimum and then they have normally that 5% for Angels. You're very much in no man's land in that position. Do you find the same for
you? No. Because I think like the US market. There's so many seed funds are so many series, a funds that are so many top-tier funds, our job isn't to invest when
Excel like to be Greylock invest, our job is to invest around before
that, I mean multistage move out of here. Now the Hawaii that doing preceeds Griffin,
they are but the reality at the same time, is there more attracted to the more experienced people coming on in these big orgs? Whereas most of all we do our first time Founders maybe not as startup pedigreed as those in. Also These funds are really big and slow so they're not going to be able to move and prosecute the things in the same way that they say on Twitter, I find
because the chest
sizes are so
small to them, they didn't really give a shit and they do it in seconds. We have tons of examples of once where they didn't move fast. I got this
from one of your teammates. They listened to all our shows and they said about you saying, three-year deployment cycle for the fund. Did you stick to the three-year deployment cycle?
Samuel and Yaga Lloyd. I knew an estate that and I was thinking about it. So would I kind of concluded over that time? And when I told our LPS is that for the seed Market, I felt that thing we could probably
Mrs. 24 to 30 month deployment and then doing new funds. And I would say that since we last spoke, I would say it's closer to 24 than 30, but I didn't try to make a promise of 36. I didn't think it was possible,
it's a millet 24. You'll still 12 months longer than most managers in the last cycle. So
Devon white and wealth as relate, that's crazy to me. I don't know how you go back to help ease unless you have a really deep relationship or history of returns, when you deploy that fast and this environment,
I think it's a challenge.
Given that a lot of people regret the speed of their investing that as we said doing it in 12 months, too. Many what investing mistakes do you think you made over the last three years that you wish you hadn't
made? I think in fun for I always worry about the Carnage in that fund and I knew there was going to be turbulence because it was the first time was really going for ownership. And I knew when going for ownership to our earlier, part of the conversation that there is a trade-off in quality when you're trying to make a move on, just getting into a round versus getting a certain percent of ownership. We made a
A lot of Errors of selection me in
that file is hidden are of selection being picking or access being adverse selection. You just chose what you could get the ownership in. I think
it's a mix in that fun. I would say 20 percent over some 80% poor selection that really course-corrected in the next two phones, where I feel boom, but just hit again. I remember an LP telling me a long time ago. Just when I was starting that typically they stay with good managers 45 funds and they assume that three of them will be so, so,
Maybe two to three x funds. One of them will be a complete turd and one of them will be spectacular. I kind of knew going into that one that this was going to be a change in motion. This is 2017 to 2019. That's a fun. I look back on as were mistakes, were
concentrated. What do you put that van that I knew had? Is that a 2X? It's
reacts. The good thing about all of this is that we have five to ten percent positions in three or four really amazing companies that all could be
public. Actually, at some point there's
a ladder
To get out of this. That's pretty exciting, but if I look back on it as a player, looking over the game film, that's a fun. I look over and say, oh, I wish I had made this play different. I wish I had done this
different. Do you give a shit about loss horatius
mL? No, I think it's see that's just par for the course where that's going to happen. That's virtue being in this position
is Venture more game of picking one more game of access. Do you
think for the early stage, I think it's both. You need access to creative people. You need to select from the ones that come your way.
I think it's really hard to generate that axis and repeatable way and it's super hard to select. So I think it's equal,
I spoke to many eval friends again before and the specifically it was not cool who told me about the instrumental impact you have on his fundraise for audacious and so I want to kind of go through the lifecycle of raising. The fund. Knakal told me, you introduced him to 50-plus LPS. I love that most, people did two or three, Samuel gave me 50. So my question to you is, what's your biggest advice to emerging managers on just finding
LPS, what works, what doesn't because it is a game of
Discovery people in the last three or four years and I miss this wave. Looks like I got married, right? When Tinder was taking off bought two cars, right? When Uber was taking off and I didn't live in the city. So I just miss these waves and I started my fun before Angeles, but I think in the last three years with the capital acceleration, you have people who their first debut fund or their. Second funds are actually pretty big and they don't have investing experience. A lot of people didn't go through the proof of
Concept funds. Like I went through then they go knock on the door of Notre Dame or somebody else and you sort of wonder why are you doing that again? My advice may not really click with people because they don't want to go through that but I think one is on AngelList now. There's really no excuse not to have some kind of track record before you go. Talk to an Institutional will
try and take his time. Seminole like the truth be told like you're not going to know if you're a good invest of ten years so I could show you a not a note of great logos that I've built through AngelList, it doesn't really show much. It just becomes
Specific thing. You can point to that, you can have a richer conversation with you can say, hey, look for two years. I've made the least, 20, Angel Investments. Here's how much money I put in. Here's how much money other people gave me? Here's who followed on, it's just a richer conversation with an LP and a more substance of conversation than saying, hey I just want to deploy 50 million bucks so that would be. Number one is using angel list again for people who don't want to wait and go. I would just say you have to have other GPS bow.
Ouch for you. The only way they vouchers if they see work. The only way to see work is if you're an executive and one of their companies or you're around the deal with them. So it was easy for me to let you in mentioned on, on ir and knuckle Mandan and me making like a lot of impactful intros for them. That was easy to do because I worked with them a lot but it's hard for me to do that with someone to
haven't worked with as opposed to things like, whenever an LP committed to my first funds. I'll be like the seminal thank you, because you like it, who are three people with a similar mindset to you that you think?
Would share your excitement for what I'm doing and then they commit to names and once you compute two names, I'm going to Hound you for intros to the his
name's you know at one I'll die will I also think that's the hustle part but I think closing the deals are harder for what I coach. A lot of emerging managers on is like okay if you go meet an Institutional P, they're predisposed to passing on your first fund, primarily out of the fact of, they probably don't think you're going to raise your first for under deploy. Well, if you do, so they just want to wait for the second one to just. Make sure you've actually raise the first one that you stuck with it that you like,
Kit because it is kind of a lot of busy work is painfully. So we call logically makes sense. That a lot of the people, for example, introduce knuckle to. I was like think of them as a fun to LP because they're probably don't even think you're going to raise your target for this
fund. Hygena, I meet two new LPS every single week even when I'm not raising because I think if you have a meet them, when you're raising for the first time, you've got no chance,
that is smart to do because I do think relationships matter. And then obviously, the diligence you go through, I go through is
More than what an entrepreneur goes through. That's the other thing, too. Just having all of your ducks in a row, you have to have some kind of reputation where people call around and name-check you. Do
you have Dex? Do you have blobs? Do you have? What do you have supporting material wise?
I think all of that is your mix of collateral that you're going to use to convey messages to different people. At different times. I have a one-pager for every new fund we raised which is on one page, everything you would want to know and linked to that's like not super sensitive. Obviously we have a deck in a data room.
But now we're at a point where we just copy and paste a new data room, it's a Dropbox and him do all that. We try to reduce all the friction.
What do you think of the biggest mistakes that GPS make and
fundraises? You alluded to some right? Which is just talking to people when they're raising, not really having the Richer conversation about what they're trying to do. And why again the decks or the presentation just show a lot of pontification so I think people most species or emerging managers especially or not good fundraisers because they don't really have an
Starve to where they're going and why and it kind of makes sense because it takes a while to develop that but at the same time, it's not as inspiring for someone to let go of their dollars.
I I've done a lot of our PI, then she peed. I see it. Just shit why. Now? No one, I'll take you days that why specifically now is the right time, you much more than me would be 10g compared to me, but like, in the light solo capitalists with me was like George barking. Lucky groom. So this was the personalization of capital. There was strategic shifts in Van. Sure that led to this. I think I
Clearly articulate. Why now I see a tunnel? So which is oh I got into pipe Series. Be I got into hop in series be named your company surgery and now I'm doing a seed fund as a former operator and it's a lack of correlation between prior track and where you want to go. And then the advisor page, brilliant advice of age Gap, fucking rid of it. None of these advisor pages may any difference like ridiculous.
I think that if you're not getting named Chuck by institutional LP use,
And other people aren't talking about what you're doing. It's almost impossible to raise institutional Capital whether it's a 3 million dollar check or 30 million dollar check from an LP. So really, that should be the first for an emerging manager is. How do I get in the chatter zone of these, LPS and that's different than just having a deck. So you could argue the deck is one of the least important things in the hierarchy of things you would need to do, which is do good deals, help, entrepreneurs, and other investors in the ecosystem. Have people talk about you as a unique person or someone
Who's uniquely helpful or uniquely insightful and then it's okay, they want to meet you and then you could be like, oh well here's my little deck, honestly, for like an emerging manager. The deck probably doesn't need to be more than five to ten slots. I've never done a deck. Yeah, well I mean again your body of work is different. So your deck is all the to that out here flow that
enters the his.
Yeah, yeah. People wanted to support you, you were in that chatter zone, so you showed the ability to help ability to connect with people, the ability again.
Chatter Zone again. I don't think people can extrapolate from what you did.
I was really lucky. I had track really pre in situations like he said that my first film was I 8 million? It was like your proof of concept fund. Can I ask the big challenge that I hear from a lot of GPS has as a lot of people around the hoop but they're not quite getting in the hoop. How do you create a urgency with LPS? To get them to a conclusion, she have any tips on this. I wouldn't say I'm great at this. So green
and soul. I think we're going to certain point in your
Your career. And as an adult, you have to just be willing to walk away and accept a no in different formats. One way we do it, is we kind of just say, hey Julie, Smith LP. Hey if we don't hear from you pass this day, we're just going to assume this is not a fit for you. That's okay. But it's not waiting around the phone for someone to call it's more. We're going to move in this direction. Most LPS have plenty of time to decide you. Don't wait for a response, you just sort of move forward on your own
timeline.
A lot of people kind of like a sales cycle, I guess. And Enterprise sales thing that it might help to offer and preferential terms and terms of caring or in terms of fees, have you ever done that and how do you advise managers on preferential terms for first close second
clothes? I haven't done ever and not a lot of people have suggested that, so it's not probably something I would advise people to do only because it could set a weird precedent over time. That being said, I think to get off the ground, sometimes people have to make deals. And so, what I would just say is think about
About it in the sense of how do you survive and thrive? So the first point of how do you survive and get off the ground? You probably need to do what it takes to get the plane Off The Runway at wouldn't sit here and say do it this way. I did that way. It's just like okay if you don't take off and leave the runway then we don't have anything to talk about once you're in the air and can stabilize, I would move away from preferential terms. Basically, if you're trying to offer preferential terms to get the jet Off The Runway and get some thrust that's fine. But just don't have it be success.
In future funds, gave it to that one front very tough to do. I totally agree.
That's a challenge because you're right, it does set of Preston Castle. What do you advise managers? Who say, I've got a big check but they do also want to buy part of the GP. How do you advise those managers? Where it's also a bit of a sailor? The GP is part of it.
It really depends on who that person is and what the timeline is let's say really well respected and dominant Foundation, came to, you hit a tree in 2018 and said we want to put you in business with the
A million dollar fund and will do 75 of it and we'll introduce you to everyone. We know if they take part of your carry as a GP, not the management company where the scene come goes through right and you could say Well normally I was going to have 20 points of carry but now maybe I'll have 16 but to get the 200 million dollar fund that name and all the network you could say yeah. For One Fund, okay. Now the problems could be the other 125 million that come with the 75 may also want that same thing. And so you'd have to operationally tell them.
Hey, we're just doing this for our anchor, right? And some other people may say, well, I don't like that or whatever. I think the problem comes in is when that's in perpetuity to get off the ground, you may have to spend some the jet fuels, more expensive, but
Tom's to go out with. And how do you feel about kick is on funds?
We haven't done those. You have, although, thinking about that now, but I don't have
a little too much, but I did do the me that I would say like this. And if we do a great 5, x 4 16, x fund, we shall make a load of money, that's not be greedy and I find institutions really appreciate that.
That but more and more people do it and they don't seem to get
pushback. It's on a topic. I know. Well, to be
honest, did you go out with two and twenty? I follow a lot
of honesty. What u.s. vetoes are like try to learn. I think they're the best pound-for-pound Fund in the world, both operationally. And in every way and I think Fred has been on the record of just saying. They just do a standard tune 20 and every font. So I'm a really seeing the need to deviate from that when you look
at your fundraising journey in hindsight and with the many years of wisdom that you have now some help. What?
The biggest mistakes that you've
made. This was actually, the one question I was thinking about in the shower this morning where I was. Okay, I know Harry will ask
this question. I think you learn from mistakes. Yes, I think there are
two and one was a minor little warning and one was a major shift in my own psychology so the minor one is. I remember that not to out this person but I would say a major leader of a major successful fund who spent a lot of time with me who's been on your show who
Reduce me, they only have 24, LPS, and they're all endowments and Foundations. And introduce me personally to the head of this one Eugene, diversity, and I thought, holy cow, this is for the Fun For That was supposed to be about 30 million and up being like 22. I thought, oh my god. I've never gotten an introduction like this. I've already had three funds. They do smaller funds. I had met this person before. I knew that this GPS annual meeting is every year in q1 at the Rosewood. So I have all this stuff on my count.
Under because I know when these meetings happen and I sent her an email, I was literally across the street at a meeting and I was like hey I know you're across the street we great to get together while you're here in five minutes she wrote back sorry really busy sent from my iPad that was sort of a warning of you can have really good track record, an amazing introduction. You've already met this person and they've already done small funds and this person literally doesn't give a shit.
I find that very rat. Amazing try.
Rach met them before blah blah. The thing that I find really gets it, I wouldn't choose the other day. Biog of oh, geez, to one of the biggest that basically done in. So, I'm surprised that with the great intro, she was still
like that. Yeah, I appreciate the response and I appreciate the brevity. But for me it was one
of the warning. What do you take away from that day? That like fuck it does, you know, luckily that happened because it was in
January, they host. Sorry, no meaning in January and I had just started that campaign in January. So I felt like I got this. Oh,
In early, whereas like I was probably in my head thinking, oh yeah, I'll meet her on the strip and so and when 180 real quickly, okay, this will be difficult because I felt it was kind of a gift. In terms of the timing, the bigger mistake is thinking naively that all LPS will. Once they've committed to, you want to see you succeed and want to just be along for the ride. If you stay true to what you said you're going to do. It's interesting because I've had to fire is the wrong word. I don't think of it that way but I've
Locked to LPS from investing in future funds and I think both of the behavior in what they did and how they did it. I just felt. Hey, I don't work like that. What did they do? One person asked for a phone call asked before we were raising the next fun for all these terms. I remember I was driving along the Embarcadero and I was like, hey sounds like you really want all this stuff. Now I'm happy to talk about it when we race on five and he was, we won't even be in it unless we get all this stuff now. And I was like, okay. And then I just
Thought about it. And then I talked to the colleagues and there were like, yeah, he doesn't change his mind, he just went rogue. And he wants all these things and I just thought, yeah, I just don't work like that, but I just feel these things are gifts because then you end up cherishing and validating more the LPS, who treat you. Well, and I guess the point I'm trying to make areas at once. People get the funds and go in. You just think that everyone's going to support you and people can have very different motives or ways of revealing information or asking for things a mistake. I think that I made was not being open-minded
Added to that. So there was more of a surprise if you had LPG on. Know these two, we let go of really for Behavioral reasons, everyone else has been super great, but I think everybody in our position should expect churn moving forward for a variety of reasons. So turn is
coming. Okay, told him about that. Why is China and coming? And then also for emerging managers today, moving to today, why is it going to be harder to
raise? Turn is coming because I think one, most GPS don't understand how different LP b as long as
To begin with. But right now the liquidity profiles of these endowments foundations. Family offices Etc, could be wildly idiosyncratic, certain endowments, and Foundations could have gotten really liquid in nineteen twenty Twenty-One. A number of them haven't gotten liquid and they don't know where their portfolio sit. So I think it's going to end up becoming too kind of opposing forces clashing, you'll see a lot of institutional Capital constrict out of conservatism and the lack of visibility until what.
They own that's already on the ground because they have been able to see it. But then on the same side you'll also see a realization that a lot of their capital. In these larger funds will be stranded Capital that they may not see a return on
astronomy. Capital is what capital how do you define
that? It's either stuck in a portfolio company, that doesn't have product Market fit or it's stuck in a fund that will deploy it, but the fun size may be so large that it's impossible to get over the hurdle. And one
of the things that concerns me is the misalignment of incentives within the
LP landscape whereby they say, hey, we'll do on driessen. I'm will take agreed lower multiple because we won't get fired for doing Andresen, but we will get fired for putting 10 million into Haystack. If Samuel suddenly goes off, support,
that worries me. That hasn't been my experience. I think most people have bar bailed and so the people who get caught or the people in the middle now that was what I would say. A year ago, I think right now, most help ease. I've talked to feel like the bigger funds that they're in. They're more worried about those positions.
And because of the market contraction, whereas, I think for you, for example, your own fun too. Now, right? Yeah, fun, two, and three, we raised two at a time, they in series A and B. So when you go out for your third vintage, assuming your funds are similar size, you're going to be more in demand because these LPS. Now are now down shifting to the smaller Vehicles because they realized that they would rather incinerate ten million dollars with you than a hundred million dollars and a larger front
people forget, is they we seeing this whole new generation of LPS
We see it in Europe with a huge amount of European corporates with huge balance. She's wanting to enter Venture realizing bluntly, the lack of innovation. They have within their incumbent structures are more controversial one but with commodity prices changing, the way they have done. I've seen a massive rise in Middle Eastern interest from Tau D Kuwait, Qatar with Bunny World prices than 34-hundred Sun. Hi, I
think we are saying here is, it's true. There's lots of capital that's hungry to go into Venture and I think the question is, how do those people do?
Decide where to put it or how do you as GP go grab it? I think historically the case has been that the endowments and Foundations who have been in venture capital for the longest period of time. Are your stickiest? Partners that being said for you, for me, for a lot of those people, they haven't even lived through a recession. You have to be well over 40. 50 years old to actually live through a recession as an adult. All the dips that we've had have been pretty narrow in terms of their duration.
This Mo, he struggles in this environment moving forward,
She's
the cohort that struggles which is the cohort that
thrives on the fun side, people who can pair the magic of meeting entrepreneurs early and getting the ownership early with the Firepower of putting enough wood behind the arrows at work. It's probably These funds that are in the billion, 24 billion range. So to speak, where they'll have a lot of Firepower. If they have that magic, I also think you'll see a lot of hundred to two hundred million dollar seed funds start to fill that seed series a gap and
A more pronounced way, they'll obviously be winners in that. Like if you think about an initial lives in the last decade, there's probably one starting now that will have a rise like that. Now Thrive started in the last decade. So I think there are opportunities for these folks. To go make deals and put it on the
one. I think the winners will be Chanel and I will be Walmart Chanel. It's a very Boutique product for a very specific customer base. It makes you feel a certain way and you either opt in or opt out and that is your us V, it's your benchmark.
It's even your Ribbon in terms of the specificity of the product and then I think the Walmart is Sequoia Andreessen, derossett tiger T walls of cash which are relatively infinite and Karen Carey life cycle. And in the ones where I might is when your 702 1.5 no
brand or middle tier brand, lots of Partners bloated decision
making structures there, I think you have the real pain.
I guess, the reason may be
I would have a slightly different perspective here is and I think so much of this can pin on One deals. You probably had do boson and he and famously talked about getting off the Excel trained in the preface book fund, they were going through a lot of hard times or repeat offenders given interviews about this. So I think it just takes one deal to completely change the trajectory of some of these funds and so I always keep that in mind. It's too hard to predict what's going to happen. We can predict in the fundraising sense. What will happen? But in the deals and what's going to work? Like I think about around that's happening now.
This company replica, right? Very unique, exciting company. A lot of people are talking about it. I don't think a lot of people thought about the seed or Andreessen to the a was like a four million dollar, seed paycheck, whatever you want to call it. It only was started for five years ago. In terms of the sorry, the investment going in some of this can change over time. How much they raising? Oh, I have no idea. But it's just such a unique company that people are talking about. I'm not close to it. I'm just saying, it's an interesting company and what if you're the series be investor in that?
Company in a no-name billion dollar fund, they could totally change the trajectory of your franchise.
I'm riding at night now to Ping. I'm job to see what we can do. That's no money. As sounds like a good place and I'm hoping it's reprice given where we are lock it. So, yeah, absolutely
Savage. I'm only calling that out to just illustrate that we can pontificate about who will have fundraising success or pain with. I think some good Precision. I think it's impossible to know who can catch a tiger by the tail.
Dragger the I think we'll see. The interesting thing is
Getting like track is a lagging indicator and I mean this nicely, but you look at maybe older firm Brands like Mayfield where you may look and think a slightly more challenged brand for a firm and not a hot brand. But as she lifts her, she caught tonal, they're going to be sure some pretty great
distributions. We know, a couple whole piece of been longtime Mayfield investors who are extremely happy. This
is my book with a burning returns Berlin or tons. And so you also have that, which is the 10 year lag on the numbers, which will give
Give you another 10 years, moving forward and forward. Indicators,
totally agree with you. Look at Crosslink. I mean, no one really talks about Crossing. I don't even know if you had an investor from Crosslink on 20-minute VC, but they ended up owning over, 20% of chime, through like a pretty modest deal because no one was looking at it. Wow,
I did not know that but no, I haven't had anyone from Crossing on the show, but fuck. 20% chime, what? Well done, retirement is coming quite question for you. Tell me while developes have GPS fucked up a lot over the last year's as we said. Where did
Please make mistakes thermal. I think the everyone in the ecosystem has committed sins. We can talk about what those mean sins are. I think on the lp side, this scene was going along with fun-size escalation and allowing an enabling, those firms to allocate within those funds. So I believe in having separate vehicles, four separate activities because that's the best governor. And so, I think, when you have the blind pool of capital going all over the place, it really puts a burden on
The management of that firm to allocated properly and I think it's really hard to do. So I think that's the biggest sin that LPS have committed. So I'm
just playing Devil's Advocate. Hey, that's Pretend We're on a punch. A wall. Can we do we want to continue being in this franchise? Were either in or out if we're out that stuff for the relationship. So I get you but I don't see what can be done to remedy it in a
very boring environment. I agree and it's easier to say that today than a year or two ago. I think what I've heard from LPS of some of
You picked a few to go, stay on the train and the number of them last year, dropped off, a number of endowments foundations fund-to-funds who were longtime investors and like top-tier funds that have gone really big hand for a variety of reasons. Just said, hey we're great. Thank you for all the returns. Thank you for the partnership. It's time to move earlier for us. I'm not saying that LPS should have abandoned all those but I think they probably stand on too many trains than they should have.
I find that they often actually have adverse selection because of rigidity of bucket. Allocation and what I
Mean by that is we need a series, a fund in New York. That's what we're missing. So they find a series, a fund in New York in that quarter. That is Raising at that time. And it's crap. Maybe you should have just allocated to the best managers that you see. And I find that kind of bucket thinking really, you know, big problem
often. It's funny when you mention it that way because I know where you're talking about and never heard it put that way. Oh, I have often. Yeah, maybe the canonical example of this is the sector Focus. One is like, hey I
To play this sector because I think it's going to work out that way, I think, in some cases and make sense for early stage, because you're filtering more at early. But I tend to believe in again, this could be not true in the future, but I feel like if you look at the big important companies and outcomes when they go public, they have three or four Venture Capital firms that we recognized on the cap table and I don't think that's an accident. I think that there are a set of funds maybe 50 to 75 that in partnership with other funds and entrepreneurs, know how to guide a company towards a big.
Outcome or a public offering. I would just say to the bucket approach unless it's really early in bespoke it probably doesn't really make sense because you would assume that the best investors will catch the best things that seed A or B. That's the flypaper that you're balling.
The other truth is, I think as a utility body to board members that resembles a ball Bell which is fantin girly. The a Alfred Lynn. At the a root of Bowser, the, a amazing pack great at the, a great and then your pre IPO people who are
For setting you up for getting on the public markets, I find actually the middle, I'd rather have amazing operators who are functional leads at the best companies in the world than having, like a series C or D investor that doesn't.
But remember if she ran our Pian thing about this bucket approach most LPS don't live in the Bay Area for they're not in the market, they're not talking the founders, you're not talking to be seized all the time and they just have to map it out. Most of them have to present a strategy, or a map of how they cover, what they want.
To cover. So it kind of makes sense why they do that. It doesn't make sense to you. And I because we know all the
people and that is why they listen to 20 VC and that's why I have a job. I got paid so much money. Fantastic. Thank you guys. I do want to ask a sam'l. I'm starting Shaw endowment fund and you're in charge. How do you run the Venture allocations for sure.
And almond, I'd probably do it the way you alluded to earlier, which is if I were an LP, not living in the Bay Area or New York. I probably go spend a month in each location.
You should get an apartment or Airbnb for the entire month, hang out with lots of people, after-hours name-check, lots of people and place money with the people that the network told me where the most interesting now that's for early. And then I would probably recruit somebody who has BC deal experience to help go do directs on top of it and to stay close to the winning graduating companies. And then I would probably try to get into using my network 5210 franchises where I feel
you want to be part of their ecosystems, I
didn't get access to the bass. I have so many all I want to put it in 10 million jacking to score and I might, well, if you can write 250 in 24 hours, then you might get a chance. I will be split across all the different funds. Otherwise, good luck. There are amazing people, though, in a load of big franchises who are Sitting On Carry. That's just been hauled if not more, in pretty tough Partnerships with politics. I would say, hey, you are a rockstar. Let's put an anchor in the ground. I'm going to hang
Chi Yu, I'm going to put 30 of your hundred million fund. Let's go do this and build a franchise. I do that with five people and put people in business. I think that's a much better one and then on top of that I get a young hungry Hustlers, not like BC. Direct people to just go get drunk on up with the GPS and team members of these funds to know exactly what is happening. I find there's this complete wrong, they've LP conception that the bigger your chatter sighs, the closer you are to. The direct deals is not us who I'm sure you and me are the same
Mmmmm. It's just if you have a great relationship with them, and if you respect and like them, you show them the deals. Do you know what I
mean? Yes, I agree. One thing. I think we should talk about. Before we wrap up to as like, when I mentioned we all committed sins, right? Okay. We talked about the sins and LPS committed. What are the sins? VC committed. I think the biggest one in addition to like fun sized escalation for feed grab and aom is this lowering the threshold for having each financing be an actual true checkpoint for an entrepreneur. A lot of people just deployed
Up at all like a speculative real estate and it's just stranded in these companies. Now, I'm sure you've seen this too. There's probably multiple multiple companies with like, over 50 million dollars of cash with no product Market. Fit. This
is wild, but I'm saying now I've seen for this month, why? The series bees are saying hey preemptively, we fucked up, but give us all cash back and we'll give you a million each. So you'll get a million secondary but give us our money
back. I mean, no should happen more. I think a lot of
of traditional Reese's are loath to do that for reputational reasons. I would just say from the founder side, their cost of time right now is probably pretty great. So like we may start to see that and then what are the original sins of the founders committed here is I think that a lot of them didn't have their own discipline about reading the checkpoint in milestones for themselves. They didn't get into a habit of bringing certain investors along for the journey or keeping them updated but we have a few entrepreneurs over the years who really want to get better at their updates and Metric.
And really tune that every month and we have somewhere. They just don't think it's important and don't think it's important to bring us along for the ride and then they don't realize it's really hard to socialize it with other people if we're not part of the story. So I think that is a sin that will come home to roost for a lot of Founders,
what happens at and these companies just slow die. I think it's kind of darwinian
honestly, is if you can't respect the dollars that you've taken, and you can't give those people a transparent brief view into what.
You're doing and allow them to guide you in a polite way, then you're probably not set out for the journey and I think we've had a lot of people who on both funds and as founders of companies or hopeful founders of companies, do that take the money without really thinking about. How do I respect the investment that someone made in me and that manifests in a lot of different ways reporting is
one way. How many of you have come a percentage wise? Give you company up
base? I would say the overwhelming majority but we talked about that in the diligence.
Last night process and then we actively try to get them on a Cadence like early part of the month, first of the month thing because in that triggers a conversation for the month, right? And so people frankly, it's impossible to get them to do it again. It's okay. It's not like required but then it's hard for us to advocate for you. If we're not in the know, I
totally got you and I agree. I think if you don't send the updates and you'll halt in terms of re commitments for nice round, so totally with you.
So that's an example of not respecting the money just to put a finer point on it. The sin that certain
GPS have made, or certain founders of made that I think will cost them. Now in this new environment, as if you didn't respect, where the money came from and treat it like a, some sort of light partnership. It's going to be really hard to advance. And that's why I think it's sort of darwinian which is the new environment now calls for not only Capital efficiency product, LED growth, hustle, Integrity grit all of that. I think it also calls for this as well.
We want you to grow faster than Eva and spend less than ever very. Simple rule rule of
In this, from the VC, I can't reach you all day Samuel. So I'm going to move into a great fire arm for. I complete. Your he'll 20-minute, we should just rename it like 80 minute. VC
is ridiculous. Great of the conversation, you know, go for it. That's start,
we've done this many times whilst the new favorite book and white, any that you've read recently in loved
nor merely, you know, when I'll see her, I shared an article with a lot of people recently that is available on the internet. So it's an article but it's about one of the famous game creators on the New Yorker from Nintendo, and it talks about how he grew up.
Up in the woods in Japan, and saw all these amazing natural things in the wild, and that ended up becoming the landscape in which he painted on for his video games. And I thought that was really interesting, because so much of people playing on computers like us or working online. We forget about that and like so many people are Gamers and love gaming as well, more casual gaming. But it's just interesting that this guy's whole inspiration came from being outside what worries you
most about the Venture landscape. Today,
the thing that worries me the most is
The portfolio of risks that are around us. In addition to like the lower money supply. I saw Scott Menard, who's the Guggenheim CIO, said that this is the lowest M2 since the depression, so there's less cash around and much more risk around. And so, it feels like we're just in the early Innings of this, I can ministration of pain or the game. Hasn't, even really started. So feels like, it'll be quite
prolonged. How much did you cut your butt back to your LPS in the remarks?
We're doing that right now, I would say doing that.
That literally in Q3 for the Q3 report Harry, where we have, as virtue of our LPA, we obviously have to have a professional third party audit. So we're doing that audit with the firm and remarked in the portfolio. Now, if we had talked two weeks later, I probably could give you like a firmer
answer, how much do you think they should be remote? 20% 30%? 50% 70%. Yes. And a lot of time talking to a
variety of LPS and GPS about this. There is no consensus on this. I think I would just bucket it which is get seed and early where
You don't really know yet, even if you have a great Series be that you've seen it where it is, you do have to pick some methodology and stick with the number and go, but I don't think I could say this is the right number or not. That being said, let's say you're a growth fund Ameritech where your entry, they're great fun. Everything they're investing in, has product-market fit their larger checks. They probably need to comp everything they have against public comps to go Company by company. And so I think it just really depends what your portfolio mixes. Like, you have a career in politics, my
And you know, but I mean it's I'm not trying to give a political answer. It's just like, I don't know what it is. Is it 25%? Is it? 50%? Is that 80% of
50/50? You go to cool. I
think if you and I were in the bar and we would say, oh, you have a 3X fun simula, what is it? Now, I'd probably say it's one and a half. Excellent. I don't think that's out of
bounds. He's the most underrated angel in the ecosystem. Do you
think maybe you know him? Charlie song
Hearst. Yeah, love Charlie. I
think he has an amazing ability to find interesting entrepreneurs.
And connect with them
very quickly. Iowa sitting Charlie and vasin 500 or 800 or 1,000. Entrepreneurs diversification makes picking
easier. Yes, yes. But he isn't true angel. That way has he been on his show?
No, I love Johnny daily. I would love to have him on the show. He's always pray Coy and shy about it, but I'd love to make it happen. And then
this is more of a is a close friend for many years, but I think Scott belsky if I were an early start and they'll yeah, that would be my
topic, love about the and Fidel,
Ali, Tony fadell is fantastic and I'm sure
mine. What's been the single
hardest moment of the haystack Journey, my
friend. I think the first four fundraisers were really hard because it just were continuous. I think, in those first four I only took like six months off and I was too naive to know like the AngelList syndicates were not there, wasn't this Rush of people and there was the only real option I really had. That's probably been the toughest part. We're finally in fun. Five got over that
hurdle. Did you doubt that you'd be able to do it every
fund? Oh, I see.
I think that way I still paranoid about being able to raise capital and deploy well, every day,
what's been your single biggest
return just in terms of pure gross volume? Yeah, gross cash back. It's in file coin. Wow. Yeah, we have the multiple, I don't know what the exact multiple is, because it fluctuated a lot, but I can give you some of the atoms of do the multiple, because there were like so many cells, but essentially met the founders. When they were in YC, remember meeting him asking for a couple meetings. He's obviously brilliant.
Um, I didn't understand everything he was doing. I had some friends coming besting so we invested 50 k at the 8 million cap or something then he didn't raise for a while and then us V and I think blue yard invested I think three million dollars total and a small seed round and then in 2017 I think there was the Ico so they had raised its public all this is public like 150 plus million in the IPO and then they went on a journey to build their
As part of that we got tokens as part of being Equity investor so all the equity investors got tokens and then basically in the first year of the pandemic when they were about to release they like completely shot up and so a lot of equity token holders were able to every month. So those tokens because we had such a huge position, we would sell the max every month for months to go. Now the price of that has gone down. I mean the return would have been absolutely see but it was still been probably the most accretive
Thing, how much were you able to take out? I
have to look at the number but I want to say it's
over 10, pretty good for a 50k check. That is that's tasty, my friend.
It was a three million dollar fun, but I don't know the exact numbers, but it was pretty asymmetric, probably the other one is Hoshi, Corp where we invested in the first round, and it was just a huge went. That was a 50k, Jack 25, 25 years, whatever that 10 into, well, we distributed the shares, right? A lock-up that's when the market crashed, but I also felt we weren't trying to juice our numbers at that point. I think
It was like the 25k turn into something like 30 35 million bucks.
Whoa. How big was the fund a million? Ha ha. Ha. What? That is insane?
Yeah, that fund had instacart doordash Hoshi Corp and it still has two billion dollar companies and are still growing in there. So it's crazy.
Was that fun? Most that do you think somewhere between 30 and 40?
Something no one cares because the base is super small and you get lucky. And then as a funds eyes, get bigger the multiples will go down.
On right unless you had something I think it's like going back to the jet fuel comment that was a jet fuel to get off the Runway. But in a way of the people, I talk to you today, they don't really care about that today. Like what are you going to do tomorrow?
Tell me. My friend was the biggest Miss and how did it change your
mindset? The biggest Miss was open sea. I'd know Nick tomato for a long time, like not calling Anand, I helped him raise some of his fund and introduce him to tons of LPS. Because I thought Nick was doing a fabulous job. He's opposite of a tourist in crypto because we were so helpful.
It's end. All the deals he was doing to us and he sent us open c 3 times. Now, I don't know if Open Sea will end up, who knows what it'll be right? But for a period of time by it, spend time with Devin, I looked at the numbers, I didn't understand. I just thought it was about gaming. We didn't talk about in a tease earlier and it was just sitting right in front of me. Like why is this working? I think the last run I looked at was like a 28 post extension and because it didn't understand it. I just let it go rather than just looking at what was working.
I think we can overthink things sometimes eat. I need
To understand it just go where it's working our customers using and loving, of course, this
was during my fun for vintage, which was littered with mistake. So, there were many mistakes of commission that I mentioned and this was a mistake of
omission. I didn't have any sympathy for you off to hearing about fall coin and how she cool. There is zero. Sympathy that is, you know what's funny, though? Is like,
athletes on the field I end up and I'm sure you do too. We end up thinking more about that than the Hashi Court.
100%, I think we should. Yeah, I know, I mean, I lost money out of this year for the first,
Farm and I told one of my hobbies, I was like, it should hurt it. Really does. If it ever becomes okay to lose money or to miss something, you need to wise
up again. Yeah, that goes back to my respect for the
dollar penultimate one. My friend was the best investment advice. You've received,
Paul, Martino dgd do, good deals. I think the business is that simple, and I think we can complicate it with all sorts of different things, but it all comes down to
that. And that game from Martino. I'm rocking it. I love pool. The man is obsessed with poker.
Every time he's in London is like, where are you saying the W near the casino? That's
where I got these chips. Erie. I love that all Martina. And so, I made these poker chips for shares that we get in companies through Acquisitions. At this one, this company, where I passed on the seed round in a friend that was going to be a huge mistake, but we ended up getting. Can you see that? What is it rubric rubric? Then there was in fun one, we had an acquisition to date a dog and then this is one of my favorites. We own chairs and we work but not at the 40 billion price, but I created the poker
Mr. Martino to show like, how random the business can be
tell me my friend, final one. What was the most recent publicly announced investment and why did you get so
decisis? Wow, we haven't been a part of publicly announced ones. Recently, I think o in part security, which is a team that left signal sciences, that was doing a new way of collaboration across security teams, and we like this idea of collaboration, but again, it was a bet on the people, right? And so they may take it in a different direction, but we just thought they had a Mastery of product. They weren't trying to raise too much money.
Any, they were the hunters, we like to work with which is they use us for very specific advice and then they sort of move accordingly and they reference really well. So we're really excited about that category overall, and just working with the in part team family.
I love you. I love this. This was so much fun. Thank you so much, a up waywardness, but you're here are my
friend. All right, well, I hope you enjoyed it. I did as well.
What I hear that was so much fun. Just if you want to see more from us, you can check out our YouTube channel by searching 20V. See. You can go 220v c.com to see more. But before we leave you today, Harvard management company is constantly see here. The next generation of great investors and entrepreneurs. HMC has managed Harvard University's Endowment for nearly 50 years and was one of the First Institutional investors in Venture Capital their experience and long-term investment Horizon. Met some ideal Partners to get world-changing ideas on a
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For you on Wednesday. And I hope you love the show. Stay with Samuel.
