Hooman Radfar

I'm excited to reshare this timeless episode of #Supermanagers featuring David O. Sacks, a member of the PayPal Mafia, founder of Yammer, Inc., and General Partner at Craft Ventures. David offers invaluable advice for CEOs, managers, founders, and anyone looking to elevate their organization. In this episode, David dives into:  - Introverted leadership - Managing hyper-growth - Knowing when to throw out processes  - And so much more. Don't miss out on his unique perspective and leadership journey. Tune in to learn from one of the best in the business! 🎧 Link in comments 👇

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That's why it's often very difficult to recognize new leaders – their ideas go beyond the conventional frameworks we're accustomed to. Keep your mind open. Don't let yesterday's templates define your future. #Leadership, #Innovation, #OpenMind, #FutureThinking, #venturethinking,   https://lnkd.in/eASPGsuu

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An interesting article below, that demonstrates out how San Diego is punching above its weight.  And how Connect's strategy and execution over time, contintues to be central to that success. The article describes the current state of the market in Seattle.  (And i love Seattle.) It's a market that we tend to track with relative to venture fundings.  They used to kick our butts, we outraised them each of the last three years.  This despite the fact they have 3x as many funds there, and 9x the amount of resident capital there. (per pitchbook) Some key takeaways:  * They continue to compare themselves to SIlicon Valley. Instead, we leverage our proximity. *They whine there's not enough local investors (see note above - they have more than us). We bring over 200 VCs to SD annually! * They say founders are not connected with one another. We bring CEOs together regularly, in a variety of ways - private dinners and through our Springboard program. * They say they need to elevate their image on a national & international stage. Why we created and continue to build Five.Ten.Thirty (aka Inno Day).  * And the last paragraph - they need to concentrate on making their region a great place to live. Our mantra: "It's about Better, not Bigger." (See XEO, TL Fund). THANK YOU FOR ALL OF YOUR SUPPORT. WE ARE ON A MISSION TOGETHER!!!  (Comments, whining, suggestions on SD always welcome.) https://lnkd.in/g6Rq_f2Y

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The stats of unitaryHACK 2024 are impressive. 🙌 This hackathon supports existing projects by allowing maintainers to assign bounties to open issues. 🚲Quantum technologies need software to enable them, and supporting projects helps avoiding to reinvent the wheel. The landscape of existing tools is quite complex, from measurement based quantum computing composers to standardize api wrappers. 🦕We’re seeing the evolution of some packages evolving from Python to more effective programming languages, such as quantumtoolbox.jl porting there the quantum optics apis developed in QuTiP or rustworkx, porting to the speed of Rust a graph toolkit like networkx used by transpilers like Qiskit. 📊The event involved more than 800 “hackers” (+10% from 2023) responsible for closing 139 open issues (+ 40% YoY) benefitting 49 projects (+48% YoY). 💯%: Projects that got all bounties awarded: AI inspired classification for QCs, autoQASM, bloqade-python, metriq, autoqasm-parser, pennylane, qadence, quantum universal education, quantumtoolbox.jl, qutip tutorials, tangelo, tensorcircuit, torchquantum. 🎯98% of participating projects got open problems solved. ⚙️ The unitaryhack.dev website is full of information, including tags classifying projects by programming languages, topics, etc. 🧮 A leaderboard ranks winning participants: Congrats to king-p3nguin for closing 15 bounties helping 10 different projects. Many thanks to all mantainers, event sponsors and UF members without whom this event would not be possible. Kudos to the UF team directly involved in running uHack: Nate Stemen, Kallie Ferguson, Ben Castanon, Jordan Sullivan, Frances Joy Poblete. As this fourth edition draws to a close, we can’t wait for uHack 2025 to start!

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It's been a whirlwind of learning since we started digging into the Venture Studio model. First when we started our previous company, Roam, it was "do some consulting so we can launch games & products" and in fact we did launch a couple of products and even released a couple of games. But it was always a constant tension between the siren call of instant revenue with consulting vs the long term return of equity. We sometimes joke that Ryft is the outcome of 10+ years of bootstrapping to get to a place where we can focus as a pure-play Venture Studio. Learn more below.

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Great time on the Embracing Erosion podcast w/Devon O'Rourke! We talked about: 🚀 How to scale a company from concept to 9-figure exit 🔄 How to break away from the traditional consulting model and apply product approaches ⏩ Why it’s important to iterate quickly and often with messaging 💸📈What signals are important to pay attention to when investing in startups and much more!

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His career started when someone said to him, “well, have you thought about venture capital? We don’t think that you’d be any good at it.” The rest is history. Today’s Alt Goes Mainstream episode features one of the legends of the venture capital industry. Peter Barris joined New Enterprise Associates (NEA) in 1992 after a storied operating career as President and COO at Legent Corporation and an executive at GE Information Services. He served as Managing General Partner and Chairman of NEA from 1999 to March 2024. Under Peter's leadership, NEA saw tremendous success, growing into one of the world's largest venture capital firms and raising the largest-ever venture capital fund a number of times. Today, NEA's AUM stands over $25B. Peter was responsible for investing in a number of foundational and industry-transforming technology companies, including Salesforce, UUNET, Groupon, WebMD, Workday, CareerBuilder, Tempus AI, and more. We had a fascinating discussion about the early days of venture capital and how the industry has evolved. We covered: * The inside story of how almost every other Partner said no but Peter's investment turned out to be a 75x return. * What's the “best characteristic and the death characteristic” of an entrepreneur? * In today's hypercompetitive market do VCs have enough time to make good decisions? * Why the world of venture capital is about influence. * What does it mean to earn an entrepreneur’s trust as a VC? * Why VCs with operating backgrounds can bring unique value to startups. * How NEA came up with the term "Venture Growth Equity." * How can a VC tell that a founder is good at experimentation and that they have the good judgment? * Why specialization and domain expertise are prerequisites in today’s venture industry. Thanks to Ultimus Fund Solutions for sponsoring this episode of the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast. Thanks Peter for coming on the show. It was an honor and a pleasure to hear your views on the evolution of an industry and for you to share your wisdom and experiences. https://lnkd.in/eEJGEFWe

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We partnered with Walter Thompson, former TechCrunch editor to create Fund/Build/Scale as a podcast to provide actionable advice to ideation stage AI founders. The final episode of our 10 part series features Manish Chandra and Dheeraj Pandey, two Mayfield serial entrepreneurs who have built iconic consumer and enterprise companies - Poshmark and Nutanix. Their evergreen learnings should be a great guide to founders who are starting their journey: 1. Prioritize reducing friction from every process. 2. Embrace a design-first mentality from Day Zero. 3.It’s tricky, but you need to find the right balance between confidence and humility. 4. You are the face of the company, so “keep it 💯.” 5. Idea-stage founders have more freedom than CEOs of public companies.  6. Building a strong personal network is part of your job. Listen to podcast here: https://lnkd.in/esgqH7y3

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As we dive into 2024, the Series A fundraising landscape is becoming increasingly daunting. Investment standards are soaring, and fewer startups are making the cut. Series A investors are finding many seed stage companies too premature. The median valuation jump from seed to Series A skyrocketed from $19.5 million in Q1 2022 to $28.7 million in Q1 2024. Investors now demand stronger revenue performance, targeting $2 million to $3 million in ARR, up from $1 million to $2 million. Alarmingly, only 12% of Q1 2022 seed startups secured Series A funding within two years, down from 31.8% in Q1 2020. #venture #earlystage #seedtoseriesa #seed #seriesa #inspireglobalventures https://lnkd.in/gW4bkcNy

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A little late, even though this process started in July.... Excited to share our latest investment in Heads Together Health!! We met Steve DeVrieze in October last year, and we think they are poised for impressive growth! Read more here: https://lnkd.in/ecYcqqkn #earlystagestartup #earlystageinvesting #VCinvestment #ncstartups #nctechstartups

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What do you do when a radical new technology puts your main product right in the crosshairs of disruption? Listen to David Okuniev — co-founder of Typeform | Ask awesomely — discuss the challenges of innovation within existing structures. David shared a game-changing insight: Radical innovation is really, really difficult to do inside your own product. He emphasized the need to break free from the constraints of familiarity and embrace change from outside the box. Henrik Werdelin and I have both seen our fair share of this in our respective careers. What struck us most was how David leveraged structure to overcome the innovator’s dilemma. By creating a culture of experimentation and providing space for bold ideas, he propelled Typeform beyond incremental improvements. What other hacks have you seen or employed to help your organization overcome the innovator’s dilemma? Share your stories below! 👇 And if you want to dive deeper into our conversation, click the link in the comments to catch the full podcast episode!

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Episode 338 of The VentureFizz Podcast features Tasneem Dohadwala, Founding Partner at Excelestar Ventures LLC. It’s a lot more common to find VC firms that are investing into deep tech or hard tech, but when Tasneem started Excelestar Ventures in 2010, it was far from the norm. Not only was it abnormal to invest in companies building highly advanced engineering products, but it was also a very challenging time in the tech industry in general. So, to start a new VC firm was very rare. Excelestar Ventures is a bit different than most VC firms as they operate an evergreen fund which gives them flexibility, especially during different economic cycles, in terms of the types of investments they can make versus having to raise a new fund every 2-3 years. The firm is also passionate about funding disruptive businesses led by under-represented founders. Across Excelestar’s entire portfolio, 61% of their companies are minority-led and 50% are female-led. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * Fundraising advice for women or minority founders and why you should always be thinking about asking for introductions. * Tasneem’s background story and how she got her career starting in finance, plus her decision to go back to B-school at HBS. * All the details about Excelestar Ventures in terms of the companies they are targeting, including her interest in personalized medical devices, as well as how their due diligence process works. * Tasneem’s involvement with Golden Seeds, a firm focused on investing in women-led companies. * Advice for pitching your company and the importance of being able to properly articulate the value proposition of your company, having the right market size for that investor, and another factor that she calls the confirmatory mindset. * And so much more. #podcast #venturecapital #startups #medicaldevices

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🎉 I am so proud and pumped to be speaking at Demo Day for Cohort 11 of the Conscious Venture Lab on June 25th, 2024, at 6 p.m.! This is not just an event—it's a movement towards a more just, joyous, equitable, and prosperous society, led by some of the most visionary founders around. When Jeff Cherry and I first connected back in 2015, his vision was clear: talent is everywhere, but opportunity is not. This resonated deeply with me. Jeff and his incredible team have worked tirelessly to bridge this gap, fostering mission-driven entrepreneurs right here in Baltimore. As a General Partner in Conscious Venture Partners, I’ve had the privilege to witness firsthand the transformative power of business as a force for good. Jeff’s unwavering conviction and relentless pursuit of this vision have been nothing short of inspirational. The theme of this event ties perfectly with my upcoming book, "Who Says." It's all about challenging the status quo and proving that just because someone says you shouldn’t, doesn’t make them right. It’s about believing in the impossible and making it happen. Join us, in collaboration with UpSurge Baltimore's Equitech Tuesday, to celebrate these extraordinary founders and the future of conscious capitalism. With a keynote talk by yours truly, this is an event you won’t want to miss! #ConsciousCapitalism #Entrepreneurship #Innovation #Baltimore #DemoDay #WhoSays

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🚀 AlleyCorp Closes $250M Fund to Fuel Tech Innovation in NYC and Beyond🗽 🌟 Founded by NYC internet entrepreneur Kevin Ryan, AlleyCorp incubates and invests in transformative companies across diverse verticals including Diversified Technology, Healthcare, Robotics, and Impact. 💡💰 🤝 The fund, backed by a select group of LPs, supports AlleyCorp's mission to originate ideas, hire teams, provide initial funding, and maintain integral leadership throughout the company’s lifecycle. 🌱🔍 💼 With about 20–30 new investments and 5–8 incubations per year, AlleyCorp has a track record of nurturing early-stage tech pioneers. 📈🌐 🦄 Notable investments include MongoDB (NASDAQ: MDB), Business Insider, Gilt Groupe, Zola, and Nomad Health, shaping the landscape of tech innovation in NYC. 🌆🌟 🔬 AlleyCorp also announces the incubation of Radical AI, pioneering AI-driven materials design, and Conduce Health, revolutionizing access to personalized healthcare specialists. 💻🏥 ✅ Looking to raise capital for your #fund and increase the international pool of your LP #investors?   🤝 Need warm #LP introductions?   📝 Selling #secondaries to increase liquidity?   🧐 Looking for co-investments?   ▶ G+QUANT's link for inquiries and fund decks: https://lnkd.in/gjC_EuTE #VentureCapital #TechInnovation #NYCTech #StartupInvestment #Incubation #AlleyCorp #ImpactInvesting #HealthTech #AI #Robotics #DiversifiedTechnology #InvestmentStrategy

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The state of venture capital is wild right now. We are witnessing a surge of innovation across the spectrum: - Funds merging - VC doing PE - PE doing VC - Secondary funds - Buyout funds - Spin-out funds - Debt funds - Continuation funds - Infrastructure funds - GP turnover - Hard Tech surging - Family Office uptick

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Hi Linkedin -- I've been a bit MIA lately, heads down building something truly special at elvex with our amazing team and incredible customers. But whenever I do pop my head up to catch up with folks, there are always two big questions: - What the heck is elvex anyway? - With so many AI models out there, how do I pick the right one? Valid questions! While there's a ton to share about elvex and our vision (more on that soon), I want to focus on #2 and provide real value to all of you. Join me and my co-founder Mike Sukmanowsky next Tuesday as we dive DEEP on the current AI model landscape. We're talking: - GPT 4 vs. GPT 4o vs. GPT 4 Turbo - A breakdown of the Claude family - Opus, Sonnet, Haiku - The scoop on up-and-comers like Mistral and Llama3 But we're not just comparing specs. We'll showcase these models in action, using real-world examples right in the elvex platform. No fluff, just practical insights to help you make smarter decisions. PLUS, for those still scratching their heads about elvex, we'll do a proper intro to elvex and how it empowers companies to harness the full potential of AI, minus the headaches. Let's geek out on AI and finally answer the burning questions. Save your seat now and would love a like or repost on this: https://lnkd.in/g2XQCBKz PS - Drop a comment below if you have any burning AI questions you want us to cover! 👇

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🌟 Navigating Venture Capital: Valar Ventures' Evolution and Successes 🌟 In the dynamic world of venture capital, even seasoned players like Valar Ventures LLC face the winds of change. Founded by the visionary Peter Thiel in 2010, Valar Ventures, under the stewardship of Andrew McCormack and James Fitzgerald has navigated the complexities of fundraising with both resilience and adaptation. 💼 💰 **Fundraising Dynamics**: Valar's recent $300 million Fund IX marks a strategic pivot amidst a shifting fundraising landscape. With valuations in flux and LP sentiment evolving, the fund size represents a deliberate recalibration, reflecting the firm's commitment to prudent growth and strategic alignment. 💡 🚀 **Investment Strategy**: Beyond the numbers, Valar's investment ethos remains rooted in foresight and agility. From pioneering ventures in cryptolending with BlockFi to transformative successes like Wise, Valar's portfolio mirrors a blend of strategic foresight and calculated risk-taking. 💼 🔍 **Performance and Challenges**: Like all ventures, Valar has faced its share of challenges. Despite notable successes, such as Wise's monumental IPO, setbacks like BlockFi's Chapter 11 filing underscore the inherent volatility of the startup ecosystem. Nonetheless, Valar remains undeterred, forging ahead with conviction and resilience. 📉 🌱 **Evolving Focus**: From its origins in New Zealand to its current specialization in fintech worldwide, Valar's journey reflects a constant evolution driven by market dynamics and strategic imperatives. Adaptation and expansion have been hallmarks of Valar's trajectory, positioning it as a global player in the fintech landscape. 🌍 💬 **LP Perspectives**: While LP sentiment may vary, Valar's commitment to delivering value remains unwavering. Despite critiques from some LPs regarding returns, Valar's track record speaks to a blend of perseverance, innovation, and strategic acumen. 💼 🌟 **The Journey Ahead**: As Valar Ventures charts its course amidst an ever-changing landscape, one thing remains certain: the spirit of innovation and the quest for transformative impact continue to drive its endeavors. With each investment, Valar reaffirms its commitment to shaping the future of fintech and beyond. 🌟 ✅ Looking to raise capital for your #VCfund and increase the international pool of your LP #investors?   🤝 Need warm #LP introductions?   📝 Selling #secondaries to increase liquidity?   🧐 Looking for co-investments (Series A/Series B)?   ▶ G+QUANT's link for inquiries and fund decks: https://lnkd.in/gjC_EuTE #VentureCapital #Fintech #Innovation #StartupSuccess #ValarVentures #PeterThiel #InvestmentJourney #investments #vc

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