Mahati Sridhar

Prime Coalition has long taken a different tack to climate finance compared to its for-profit brethren. It makes the usual venture-style investments in startups through Azolla Ventures and also helps philanthropists direct their money to climate-related projects that it deems high impact. Trellis Climate follows the latter model with a focus on middle stages, where capital has grown scarce. #climatetech #climateVC #climatefinance

14

A great The Angel Nest Podcast episode recorded yesterday with Thomas Wisniewski of newark venture partners! Really insightful conversation around trends in Seed stage investing, how metrics matter in communicating traction, and important aspects of financial modeling for early stage startups. Many thanks for your time Tom and thanks David Hemenway as always for hosting. Look out for the release of the episode soon! #angelinvesting #seedstage #startups #financialmodeling #venturecapital #startups

35

Summary: Co-founder of Collaborative Fund, Craig Shapiro speaks about their unique investment strategy in sectors like climate, health, and food and their impressive fundraising success in a tough market. Key takeaways: Collaborative Fund invests in non-traditional sectors like climate, health, and food, rather than the popular SaaS business model. The firm's sixth flagship fund raised $125 million in just over 90 days, despite the current challenging fundraising environment. The firm focuses on seed stage companies and emphasizes on addressing changing consumer spending habits and climate sustainability in their portfolio. Counter arguments: Some may argue that Collaborative Fund's focus on non-traditional sectors may not yield as high returns compared to popular sectors like SaaS. The difficult fundraising environment and lower interest from LPs could potentially affect the firm's future investments and success. #venturecapital #vc #venture #startups #fundraising

6

Summary: The article discusses the current venture firm fundraising market and the success of emerging VC firm A* in raising $315 million for its oversubscribed Fund II. It highlights the firm's focus on early-stage investments and its experienced founding partners. Key takeaways: Venture firms raised $9.3 billion in Q1 and it is unlikely that 2023's record-breaking total of $81.8 billion will be surpassed. A* has been successful in fundraising due to its focus on seed rounds and backing breakout companies in its portfolio. The firm's founding partners have a strong track record and diverse experience in different industries. Counter arguments: The article mentions that emerging managers are feeling the frost in the fundraising market, suggesting that not all emerging VCs may be as successful as A*. While A* has found success in raising institutional investors for Fund II, this may not be the case for all emerging VCs. #venturecapital #vc #fundraising #startups #innovation

10

3 Comments

Summary: Industry Ventures has raised a $900 million early-stage hybrid fund for investing in emerging managers and directly backing growth-stage companies. This is their seventh hybrid fund and is larger than their previous one. The fund will be split between backing VC funds, direct investments, and acquiring stakes from emerging managers. Key takeaways: Smaller, newer funds are finding it more difficult to raise capital, but this fund from Industry Ventures offers hope for emerging managers. The fund will be split between various investments, including backing VC funds and buying secondary interests. Industry Ventures may have an advantage due to their ability to invest in both emerging and more established managers. Counter arguments: Some may argue that it is still difficult for emerging managers to raise funds. The success of Industry Ventures may not be indicative of the overall climate for emerging managers. #venturecapital #venture #startups #fundraising

10

1 Comment

If I was to do a monthly podcast epiosde segment called This Month in VC 1) Who should I invite as a guest for this segment? 2) Any VC's who would be down to come on and share their stories + insights on this? Basically recapping what happened in that month in VC - It would be an under 30 minute discussion - Recorded remotely using Zoom, Riverside DM me or reply to this if interested Inspired by Harry Stebbings This Week in SaaS to try out a different format

1

On this week's Andreessen Horowitz Raising Health podcast, Vijay Pande, PhD and I interviewed Tom Hale, CEO of ŌURA. Our conversation spans lots of fun topics, including: -- Our love for our Oura rings, despite them being literal “buzz kills” in revealing the ruinous effect of alcohol on sleep  -- How the worlds of consumer and healthcare are merging, as consumers essentially now have access to clinical-grade wearable devices  -- How AI algorithms are deployed in wearable devices & what wearables might look like 20 years from now (implanted into our bodies and clothes)  -- How the sexiest people sleep in earplugs and eye masks Check it out! https://lnkd.in/eTAsX_sY

83

9 Comments

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!

1

1 Comment

Southeast VC Update: Q2 2024 PitchBook Venture Monitor Highlights The Southeast continues to hold its position in the VC regional landscape #5 in dollars raised for Q2 2024 🥉 #3 in deal count (just behind the West Coast and the Mid-Atlantic) H1 2024 Southeast Breakdown:  📊 10% more deals than Northeast  📈 30% more deals than Mountain region, 20% more than South  💰 5% more dollars raised than Mountain region  💸 23.5% more dollars raised than South YoY Funding Trends:  📈 Southeast: Up 29% 📈 Mid-Atlantic: Up 136%  📉 Midwest: Down 67%  📉 New England: Down 11%  📈 West Coast: Up 59% Key Trend: While closing in on Mid-Atlantic numbers, we are seeing more deals but smaller rounds. This could indicate strong activity occurring in the seed & early-stage funding, despite the macro challenges. (Pitchbook classifies the Southeast as AL, FL, GA, KY, MS, NC, SC, TN, Puerto Rico, & Virgin Islands) #BuildInSE

19

Are you better off being an angel investor or an S/EIS fund investor? When you’re thinking about making early-stage investments for the first time, you have a choice of two main options: Invest directly into startups or invest into funds that invest a portfolio of startups for you. * Direct (Angel) Investing: You select and invest in individual startups, taking on the tasks of sourcing, decision-making, and managing your investment. * Fund Investing: You invest in a fund that invests and manages a portfolio of startups for you, handling the sourcing, investing, and management on your behalf. There’s a romantic notion attached to the idea of investing in startups - we can play Dragon’s Den and discover the next Reggae Reggae Sauce. For every Reggae Reggae Sauce, though, there are 100 other startups that fail along the way. The first rule of startup investing, whether you do it directly or through funds, is that you need to build a portfolio of companies to cope with inevitable losses. Investing directly into startups as an angel investor suits those with access to credible, high-potential startups. It’s a hands-on role that requires active involvement to source the startups. Further, most of the best startups have minimum investment amounts of £10k or £20k, which means direct investors often need a lot of available capital to properly manage risk by investing in a portfolio of companies. This doesn’t need to be done all at once, but that is the mindset every good angel investor should have when setting out on the journey. Fund investing, on the other hand, suits those who prefer to invest indirectly, relying on the access, experience, and skill of the Fund Manager to invest and manage the investments for you. It’s a hands-off approach, with investors not involved in management and simply kept updated on a regular basis. Because funds pool your money with others to invest in a portfolio of startups in one go, this can be a more effective way of managing risk while investing smaller amounts. Most SEIS and EIS funds have £10k minimums for investors, meaning you could build a portfolio of 10-20 companies for just £10k, rather than needing to invest £10k into 10-20 separate companies as a direct angel investor. Whichever approach you choose should depend on your resources, access, interests, and time. Regardless, though, a key principle to follow is to not be reliant on the success of just one or two companies; instead, build a portfolio of startups to manage risk and cope with inevitable losses along the way. Which one is best for you? Let me know if you’d like to chat. Capital at risk. For professional investors only.

45

21 Comments

At Costanoa Ventures, we pride ourselves on identifying and supporting exceptional founders poised to create impactful, lasting change. Hona is a shining example, driven by a trio of extremely talented founders: Manny Griffiths, Joshua Christensen, and Matt McClellan. They each bring unique, differentiated expertise to the table, and Amy Cheetham and I are extremely excited to partner with them. There are approximately 450,000 law firms in the United States, with half of those firms being B2C - think personal injury, mass tort, or immigration law as opposed to BigLaw. One of the reasons we love how Hona is tackling this market is their focus on B2C law firms and product excellence - B2B firms are historically difficult to sell brand new software products into, but B2C firms are completely different buyers. Oftentimes there's just a handful of lawyers and paralegals in a partnership, and any piece of technology they can use to give them an edge would be valuable. 44% of negative Google reviews on law firms directly reference poor communication as the reason for a negative experience, and the number 1 reason for Attorney Bar complaints in the U.S. is "lack of communication". On the lawyer's side, attorneys, paralegals and legal assistants spend an average of 7.4 hours per week on unnecessary updates, redundant communication, and activities that aren't directly contributing towards getting a client's case solved. Manny and the team at Hona are working to change all of that. Hona delivers a tightly-integrated communications platform to help facilitate better communication between law firms and their clients. During legal proceedings, client communications tend to be a large resource-stressor for law firms. Clients will frequently call firms for case updates, legal explanations, or general administrative questions that tend to eat away at firm resources without providing any additional progress toward case resolution. Hona exists to ease that burden - it’s a platform that allows law firms to efficiently communicate with their clients over text, easily build customizable web pages and embed videos, and share information on case status and basic legal process education. This crucial communication processes allow attorneys to focus on their job – moving cases forward, while keeping their clients informed and educated. If you're a lawyer dealing with these problems - don't hesitate to reach out to us or the Hona team! It's a privilege to work with Hona on this journey. The company has been growing at a rapid pace, and they're delivering meaningful technology to help people get through legal proceedings in a much more fluid, transparent, and easy process. Manny, Joshua, and Matt are exceptional founders whose combined skills and dedication to continuous learning position them perfectly to lead Hona to success. They're just getting started, and we can't wait to see what they'll achieve.

28

⛳ Emerging fund managers pulse check. PitchBook tracks over 10,000 funds that are raising money, with 45% being emerging fund managers (defined as firms with less than 3 funds). Despite a dip in available capital—down to 16% from the pre-pandemic 23%—these managers are finding creative ways to stay competitive, like partnering with larger firms. 💼 Joanna Drake (founder turned investor) shared how "wildly different" it is raising a fund versus for a startup. One key datapoint she shared on the fund side was how little feedback you get along the way (and the years you can wait for it). The “long-winded and challenging process to raise capital” inspired Drake and Ben Black to create RAISE Global, a community for emerging fund managers and the “forward-thinking LPs” who back them. (A decade later, several hundred emerging managers with AUM under $200m are on the platform) They've found the newest emerging managers are more diverse and geographically dispersed than Silicon valley, and more were able to crack the ceiling and raise larger $100m funds (although this is still a small % of the market, requiring partnership with larger funds at the late stage). ▶ And not a hugely surprising datapoint: A lot of action is in the sub $49 million range, where roughly 50% of emerging managers are raising. Theresa Sorrentino Hajer, Head of U.S. venture capital research at Cambridge Associates warns that past success isn't actually a strong indicator on it's own to assess emerging managers. We've had a valuation reset. And newer managers with investments during the 2019-2021 "party days", need to build relevant track record and play to their strengths. A lot of emerging managers are specializing (70% who applied for Raise had a thematic focus), and betting on getting in as early as possible in the startup's lifecycle (Raise: 31% at accelerator/ pre-seed stages, and 47% at seed stage). “Emerging managers have to compete on a different dimension,” Nick Moran from New Stack Ventures. You're no longer just dealing with capital. Emerging VC's need to be as innovative and nimble as the startups they invest in, having a unique thesis and insights. They also play a role at the top of the deal-flow funnel: helping larger firms find promising companies, so finding a thesis, sector or philosophy aligned partner at a larger firm is helpful. Onwards! #EmergingManager #Startups #VC

24

1 Comment

Dan Primack of Axios has some choice words for VCs in this post. If you are an investor, LP or a founder raising money from VCs - worth the read. I tend to agree with Dan here and have some thoughts... 1) Private Equity is an ecosystem that relies on flow not a one-way transfer of assets. VC is semi-broken right now because no one wants to sell off a portfolio below performance targets. Could mean game over for the GPs. Seems like public, private and venture are all trying to remain optimistic while waiting for a drop in interest rates and an uptick in IPOs or PE buyouts to start the liquidity flow again but Fed and inflation data keep frustrating this kicking off. 2) VC have one core job as far as LPs are concerned....Create a magic black box that is a cash multiplier. Not a black hole! When and how early investments become liquid need to change also. 3) We have an 80 year old VC fund model that requires wild, best-case scenario power-law returns to generate the performance numbers the asset class promises to investors. This handcuffs GPs to staying in deals for a very long time as the early exits or lower deal multiples can drag funds performance and then their job security, fee structure, etc as I alluded to above. This also drives companies to "go big or go home" and operate with inherently more risk than stability. 4) Dan talks about the need for liquidity and to get back to the money flow. This is easier said than done as a minority investor. Incrementally easier if you and your co-investors are able to steer the company at the board level but its still "not your company" and the "market is the market" re comps/multiples and demand. 5) So - what can we, as an industry, do about this? We have to evolve. We have to have some hard conversations around the table and not let staid endowment funds and Goldman Sachs dictate how our industry looks at the future...feel like this becomes a new post or a series so I'll leave it here for now. #venture #VC #startups #privatequity

36

1 Comment

Super fun way to start the morning at the Everywhere Ventures #NYTechWeek pre-seed founder breakfast bringing together some of the best early stage builders in the ecosystem. Always a joy to team up with Tai Hutchinson, Richard Kerby and Scott Hartley - who are long time supporters of NYC tech. A few themes we heard from the founders: ✔ Fundraising benchmarks are a moving target and that makes runway and planning tough. ✔ Stacking Safes and cap table mess keeps on getting messier with VCs less inclined to actually price rounds. ✔ Hiring is getting slightly easier as early employees have reset expectations on comp and equity. ✔ NYC is still super expensive and the city / institutions can be doing more! #LongNYCTech

362

22 Comments

Big things on the horizon, we are motivated and blessed to be at the dawn of a new age for the internet. Read more about our journey below or listen to the podcast: https://lnkd.in/eJeNhvVa

13

1 Comment

Turns out half (most?) of the people who are in the venture business are not in the risk business. They are look for guarantees, momentum, safety in numbers, short-term career goals, etc. I think VCs should be in the risk business: understanding risk, reducing risk where possible, and ultimately taking calculated risk in search of outsized return. Turns out this is just too scary for a lot of people that call themselves VCs.

323

35 Comments

I’ve aggregated a list of 50+ VC roles in one spreadsheet. It’s updated weekly and can be filtered by location, position, firm, etc. Check out the latest list here (as of June 24th) 👇 https://lnkd.in/dRC3XtjS Tag someone who needs this in the comments 💭 — Want a quick snapshot? Here are a few of my favorite postings: Associate, M12, Microsoft's Venture Fund Link: https://lnkd.in/eNFaaSBy Associate & Principal, Wischoff Ventures Link: https://lnkd.in/gu6Mun7p Consumer Investor, Stripes Link: https://lnkd.in/eZdRk6jV Venture Lead, Struck Studio Link: https://lnkd.in/exGcNHJ5 New Ventures Associate, Live Nation Entertainment Link: https://lnkd.in/e3mBYGCt — I’m creating more tools, guides, and other free resources for Junior VCs to (1) 2x their network and (2) carve their path to partner. If you found this helpful, check out the Venture House website for more 👇 https://venturehouse.xyz/ #venturecapital #startup #recruiting #hiring

17

1 Comment

In a recent episode of H/L Ventures' For Starters, we pointed out that 70% of unicorns have at least one founder from an underrepresented group. As we said then, it highlights how having diverse viewpoints involved can spark innovation and growth. Despite this, new research shows a major funding gap for diverse women and minorities. Racially diverse, all-female startup founding teams with minorities spent the longest time fundraising in 2023 at an average of 25 weeks, a 67% increase from 2022. By comparison, all-male teams secured more funding and at a faster pace. What can be done to address this gap? #Investing #Diversity #Startups

55

7 Comments

Last week at Stripe Sessions, we at OMERS Ventures, in partnership with Recall Capital and Gusto Embedded, hosted a few founders, builders and investors to chat about current and future trends in embedded fintech and vertical software. A few of my big takeaways from the evening: 🤖 A lot of us on the media and content side see AI as an existential threat, but many of those on the SMB and entrepreneur side actually view it as a solution to the 'cold-start' problem of 'wtf do I actually put on my website?' when they sign up for a Shopify, Squarespace, Wix, whatever and have to actually populate a customer-facing surface for the first time 🥞 Point solutions are increasingly losing out to full-stack offerings, even in vertical markets where requirements up and down the stack are unique. Everyone building a point solution is looking at how and when to expand. I think the differentiator will be in what the starting line was and how that cascades through the company's DNA as it adds additional features and capabilities. 👩‍💻 Technical integration of embedded solutions remains a complex and frictionful process, even for so-called 'two lines of code' 'simple' plug-ins (they end up not being this when they encounter complicated, aging legacy codebases). Is this a place for AI to excel – can agents handle heavy lift codebase stitch-ins without the time and effort it takes devs on either or both sides now? All in all a fantastic evening with great discussions and a terrific panel hosted by Somrat Niyogi! Thanks to Fred (Fady) Helou, Elizabeth Olveda, Charity Hudnall, Jackson Reynolds, Jeremy Butteriss, Lucy Wang, Isabelle Cole, Sarah Tierney Niyogi, Matt Bocci, Yi Liu, Yanett Burgueño and many more for provoking the above thoughts and many more!

65

8 Comments