The Exchanges

Q And then let's move to friends round. And this is from our mutual friend, Tiffany, uh, the world's youngest VC. Thank you for that, Justin. You bastard. Um, anyway, what are your, what are your biggest misses? Tiffany asks.

A My biggest miss far and away was Uber. Far and away. I mean, I met Ryan when the company was 10 people, and I just, I didn't get how people could afford to be paying 50 dollars for rides that were, you know, eight, 10 blocks, and at that point, there was no notion of UberX, period, right? It was, it was Uber black car. Who knows if we would have won or not, but I often look back and say, gosh, yeah, it's a classic example of getting so hung up on market size and Versus focusing on just how extraordinary the founder and the product experience is, and really trying to take a step back and think, where can this go beyond the initial market? And that is a very painful mess. There's no doubt about it.

AI assessment note: “My biggest miss far and away was Uber.”

Q And then let's move to friends round. And this is from our mutual friend, Tiffany, uh, the world's youngest VC. Thank you for that, Justin. You bastard. Um, anyway, what are your, what are your biggest misses? Tiffany asks.

A My biggest miss far and away was Uber. Far and away. I mean, I met Ryan when the company was 10 people, and I just, I didn't get how people could afford to be paying 50 dollars for rides that were, you know, eight, 10 blocks, and at that point, there was no notion of UberX, period, right? It was, it was Uber black car. Who knows if we would have won or not, but I often look back and say, gosh, yeah, it's a classic example of getting so hung up on market size and Versus focusing on just how extraordinary the founder and the product experience is, and really trying to take a step back and think, where can this go beyond the initial market? And that is a very painful mess. There's no doubt about it.

AI assessment note: “My biggest miss far and away was Uber.”

Q Now, Justin, this is a very special episode, as you know, so I'm adding a new round today called the friends and family round. So I'm going to start with one from your brother and previous guest, Ryan at CircuitUp, and excluding the basketball question, what VCs do you most respect and admire?

A I'd say there's two, the two best that I've, I've worked with who I really respect for different reasons are, uh, I would say Chris Saka and Bill Gurley. Very different styles, uh, very different stages, but both I think have been incredible, uh, partners when I've been on boards with them. Chris has extraordinary pattern matching at the early stage, uh, incredible product instincts, go to market instincts, very, very helpful to, to seed stage companies. And I just think can articulate the A vision in a way that very few, very few others can. I mean, I think he, having worked with a lot of seed investors, I think he is far and away the best that I've worked alongside. And Bill, I really admire and respect a lot as well. I think Bill is extraordinarily analytic. He is very, very direct. I think he does a good job of avoiding hype cycles. I think he focuses on a lot of the stuff that, that candidly I find important around unit economics and That I think, candidly, a lot of investors can, can ignore when getting caught up in the hype cycle of growth. I, those two, for a bunch of reasons, I think are, are the two that I, I most, uh, admire and enjoy working with.

AI assessment note: “I'd say there's two... Chris Saka and Bill Gurley.”

Q Another question from your brother, Ryan, and he asks, what makes one board member a better board member than another, and what makes a truly great board member?

A You know, I think to be a great board member, I think there's a few things. I think, first of all, is empathy, right? Like, have empathy for the founders, right? It is a extraordinarily scary, Hard business to be a founder. You've got incredible ups and downs, and I think it's, it's disappointing when I see VCs, you know, parachute in and not just give advice, but really kind of try to direct and mandate certain things without empathy for all of the work that the founders have been doing over the previous weeks and months and years, right? I think secondly, you gotta be, you gotta be low maintenance, right? I think there's some kind of degree of, you know, Hippocratic oath, right? Do no harm. Don't try to change the date of the meeting. Come prepared. Put away your phone. I think right away that, you know, that eliminates a bunch of VCs candidly. Be engaged in and out of the meeting. Don't just come in to the meeting with your perspectives. Read the materials ahead of time. Be engaged with the founder on a more frequent basis around ways that you can help him or her, right? And I also think that leads into the last point, which is know where you actually can add value and can't. Every VC can add a lot of value in terms of team building and recruiting, and most don't because it requires work. Like, don't take the, don't take the shortcut and start, try to, you know, give your pr…

AI assessment note: “I think to be a great board member, I think there's a few things.”

Q Can I ask, would you not consider Uber to be, to be one, As such, where kind of people without much money have the ability to generate revenues using their skills and their assets?

A So, absolutely, they have the ability to generate money. Now, now the challenge is that money is taxed. What they don't have the ability to do today is say, you know what, I'm going to drive you from San Francisco to the airport in exchange for, uh, for a Spanish They, they earn 25 dollars for the ride. They pay some of that in taxes, and then they've got the remainder to try to spend on maybe what is a partial Spanish lesson, right? And so the notion of much more fluidless, moneyless commerce and transactions, and really the building of a barter economy is, is what we, and again, I know it sounds crazy, but we absolutely believe that that should exist. So, so what you are seeing, Harry, though, you know, in Uber and Airbnb and, and other Platforms is people offering up that excess capacity and their skills for money, and we want to take it to the next level where people have the ability to transact those, those types of skills or experiences for other skills or experiences without the idea of an exchange of actual money.

AI assessment note: “So, absolutely, they have the ability to generate money.”

Q And we mentioned the rise of on demand there with the likes of Uber and the accessibility that Uber allows people with regards to revenue generation. And I know that on demand is another area you're super excited about, but you've said before, not locally. So what does that mean? And which verticals provide the best opportunities for on demand without the need for local infrastructure?

A Yeah. Yeah. You know, on demand is a bit of a taboo word in, uh, in venture these days. And, and I, we think about it very, very differently. So You know, I think historically on demand, uh, and it's one of the reasons we've largely stayed out of that, that sector has required local logistics, right? So I think everyone took the Uber concept and tried to apply it to other verticals like dry cleaning or, or, or food delivery or grocery pickups. And the challenge is when you add an infrastructure of local delivery people, the unit economics can get very, very challenging. Uh, and so you end up either in a situation where you have to charge a A significant premium to what the goods normally cost, in which case you end up with, with a smaller addressable market, because just not the average American can't afford it, or you have to lower prices, in which case economics become very unattractive. And so the on-demand I'm talking about is not that I'm talking about on-demand where I can get an experience now or in the very near term, but it doesn't require anyone locally. And it's an experience that comes near to To replicating something that has historically been local. So I'll give you an example. Uh, we have a company in our portfolio called Havenly in the interior designer space. And the idea is that historically interior design is something that is reserved for the wealthy. It req…

AI assessment note: “we have a company in our portfolio called Havenly in the interior designer space”

Q Now, Justin, this is a very special episode, as you know, so I'm adding a new round today called the friends and family round. So I'm going to start with one from your brother and previous guest, Ryan at CircuitUp, and excluding the basketball question, what VCs do you most respect and admire?

A I'd say there's two, the two best that I've, I've worked with who I really respect for different reasons are, uh, I would say Chris Saka and Bill Gurley. Very different styles, uh, very different stages, but both I think have been incredible, uh, partners when I've been on boards with them. Chris has extraordinary pattern matching at the early stage, uh, incredible product instincts, go to market instincts, very, very helpful to, to seed stage companies. And I just think can articulate the A vision in a way that very few, very few others can. I mean, I think he, having worked with a lot of seed investors, I think he is far and away the best that I've worked alongside. And Bill, I really admire and respect a lot as well. I think Bill is extraordinarily analytic. He is very, very direct. I think he does a good job of avoiding hype cycles. I think he focuses on a lot of the stuff that, that candidly I find important around unit economics and That I think, candidly, a lot of investors can, can ignore when getting caught up in the hype cycle of growth. I, those two, for a bunch of reasons, I think are, are the two that I, I most, uh, admire and enjoy working with.

AI assessment note: “I would say Chris Saka and Bill Gurley. Very different styles”

Q And you've done it twice then now in terms of with Bain taking them to the West Coast and now with Binary when you left Lightspeed. So what does it take then to establish a fund in the already very crowded market of West Coast financing?

A Yeah, you know, I think it requires, I mean, it requires differentiation, I think, and I think focus, and I think this is something that, that my partner JT and I have talked about for a long time. It's, it's really interesting because a lot of VCs talk to entrepreneurs about focus, and yet do everything from seed, series A, growth, consumer, infrastructure, clean tech, maybe some international, and our belief is that we think there's a huge amount of value to being very, very strong. Squarely focused in particular in consumer because consumer is an area where, you know, even if people aren't investing in consumer, they have an opinion and in big partnerships that, that sometimes can distract from the conversation. And so, you know, we, we, uh, we set out with a premise around being very squarely focused where everyone in the firm was thinking about trends and themes and all the discussions were really informed, educated discussions around consumer tech. And I think that's, that's different than a lot of, a lot of firms that, that are doing You know, really the full suite of stages and sectors and geographies. It just, it lends itself, at least in our view, to a much better set of discussions and more focused approach.

AI assessment note: “it requires differentiation, I think, and I think focus”

Q I'm intrigued then, with such nascent potential in a market, what's been done previously to try and harness this market before?

A This is the classic issue of, in a number of instances, uh, those businesses got started too early. You know, really only in the last few years, uh, have people gotten used to transacting online with strangers. Trust and safety has gotten to a place where people will not just transact with strangers, but they'll ride with strangers, they'll spend the night in a stranger's home. I think the trust and safety piece Is really important for a platform like this to be successful. And that's only happened in the last few years. You have seen, you know, verticalized attempts at this. I think couch surfing started off and did see, uh, some really interesting early traction. But I think in a lot of these instances, it's not necessarily the idea. It's the way that that idea was manifested in a product or go to market. You know, do you focus on a vertical first? Do you focus kind of on, on, on more of a horizontal play? And so you are starting to see, I think, you know, there was a company in the last, Last YC batch that is trying to tackle this issue, but I think you're going to see more and more folks really go after this, this vision, because it really is a massive, truly ubiquitous vision. It just hasn't been implemented in the right way so far.

AI assessment note: “You have seen, you know, verticalized attempts at this. I think couch surfing started”

Q Do you think the sector focus also plays a large role in increasing the efficiency of your pattern recognition in terms of seeing so much in the same space you can determine much easier what is good and what isn't? Is that the case for you?

A Well, there's, there's no question about it, right? I think if you're spending a hundred percent of your time looking at, at certain types of consumer companies, you can't help but Uh, but pattern match, uh, in a better way than if you're spending 20% of your time on SAS and 15% of your time being a second partner on someone's, you know, med device company. And so we, we absolutely think, I think in a couple of ways, it helps, helps get better pattern matching around, uh, around picking. But the other thing that happens is you end up with a portfolio of companies that are all at similar stages dealing with similar types of issues around growth or hiring or, Finding liquidity in a local marketplace, whatever the issue is. And I think there's a lot better knowledge swapping that can happen than if only a small subsection of your, of your portfolio is consumer. And by the way, even within consumer, some is seed and some is much further along. So we've seen that benefit as well as, as the portfolio is developed.

AI assessment note: “Well, there's, there's no question about it, right?”

Q Another question from your brother, Ryan, and he asks, what makes one board member a better board member than another, and what makes a truly great board member?

A You know, I think to be a great board member, I think there's a few things. I think, first of all, is empathy, right? Like, have empathy for the founders, right? It is a extraordinarily scary, Hard business to be a founder. You've got incredible ups and downs, and I think it's, it's disappointing when I see VCs, you know, parachute in and not just give advice, but really kind of try to direct and mandate certain things without empathy for all of the work that the founders have been doing over the previous weeks and months and years, right? I think secondly, you gotta be, you gotta be low maintenance, right? I think there's some kind of degree of, you know, Hippocratic oath, right? Do no harm. Don't try to change the date of the meeting. Come prepared. Put away your phone. I think right away that, you know, that eliminates a bunch of VCs candidly. Be engaged in and out of the meeting. Don't just come in to the meeting with your perspectives. Read the materials ahead of time. Be engaged with the founder on a more frequent basis around ways that you can help him or her, right? And I also think that leads into the last point, which is know where you actually can add value and can't. Every VC can add a lot of value in terms of team building and recruiting, and most don't because it requires work. Like, don't take the, don't take the shortcut and start, try to, you know, give your pr…

AI assessment note: “I think to be a great board member, I think there's a few things.”

Q Can I ask, is that an investable proposition without having the opportunity for a take rate? How do you really assess that kind of lack of monetization avenue?

A Yeah, well, you know, it reminds me of a lot of the platforms that I think started off, again, not, not monetizing, right? I think if you look at a lot of the social ubiquity platforms like Facebook or Twitter or Snapchat, uh, there was no monetization plan early on. I think you can imagine a world, it doesn't mean money goes away. What it means is that there's a vibrant economy of barter and trade, uh, that happens on a platform. And what I think it allows, if you believe that tens or hundreds of millions of people Or on this platform talking about what items do they have to lend? What skills do they have to offer? What assets do they have to share? You can imagine that that data is very, very valuable. And certainly when you get to that scale, just owning that real estate is very, very valuable. And I think there's a lot of ways to monetize that because you really ultimately start to have a lot of data again around what people own, what they're sharing, what they want, how they're transacting. Um, and I'm not sure that you do necessarily need to take, need to take rate for quite a period of time.

AI assessment note: “when you get to that scale, just owning that real estate is very, very valuable.”

Q And you've done it twice then now in terms of with Bain taking them to the West Coast and now with Binary when you left Lightspeed. So what does it take then to establish a fund in the already very crowded market of West Coast financing?

A Yeah, you know, I think it requires, I mean, it requires differentiation, I think, and I think focus, and I think this is something that, that my partner JT and I have talked about for a long time. It's, it's really interesting because a lot of VCs talk to entrepreneurs about focus, and yet do everything from seed, series A, growth, consumer, infrastructure, clean tech, maybe some international, and our belief is that we think there's a huge amount of value to being very, very strong. Squarely focused in particular in consumer because consumer is an area where, you know, even if people aren't investing in consumer, they have an opinion and in big partnerships that, that sometimes can distract from the conversation. And so, you know, we, we, uh, we set out with a premise around being very squarely focused where everyone in the firm was thinking about trends and themes and all the discussions were really informed, educated discussions around consumer tech. And I think that's, that's different than a lot of, a lot of firms that, that are doing You know, really the full suite of stages and sectors and geographies. It just, it lends itself, at least in our view, to a much better set of discussions and more focused approach.

AI assessment note: “I mean, it requires differentiation, I think, and I think focus”

Q Now, pre binary, you mentioned your experience with the likes of Bain and Lightspeed, some incredible funds. And we've got a question from one of your LPs, Judith at Weathergage. And she says, how's the conversation changed with founders? Now you're no longer at the big established fund, and how's that aided or deteriorated in terms of getting into the very best deals?

A Judith with a hard-hitting question right out of the gate. We love Judith. You know, it's funny. We think it's been the exact opposite. Certainly tons of respect for Baincap and Lightspeed, but the reality is those firms weren't really consumer firms. You know, Bain is really an enterprise-oriented firm, and Lightspeed, four or five years ago, really had been I had seen the majority of its success around enterprise and infrastructure, and so big, well-known brands. But I think, you know, I think smart entrepreneurs want to not just go with brands, but they want to go with the individual investors and partners that have led those deals and have seen success. And so, you know, I think if you look at Lightspeed, for example, a lot of their success has been in companies on the consumer side invested in since And so we didn't really have much of that luxury when I first started out at Lightspeed, and I'm pretty proud to say that, you know, helped build it. I think here at Binary, we've actually found it much easier to win for a couple reasons. First of all, everyone in the firm, again, is very, very educated on consumers, so there's no notion of kind of internal education, right? Having to educate the older, you know, clean tech-focused investor on why this is an interesting early-stage consumer investment, right? Everyone here is thinking about the same themes and trends, and so Th…

AI assessment note: “I think here at Binary, we've actually found it much easier to win”

Q Can I ask, is that an investable proposition without having the opportunity for a take rate? How do you really assess that kind of lack of monetization avenue?

A Yeah, well, you know, it reminds me of a lot of the platforms that I think started off, again, not, not monetizing, right? I think if you look at a lot of the social ubiquity platforms like Facebook or Twitter or Snapchat, uh, there was no monetization plan early on. I think you can imagine a world, it doesn't mean money goes away. What it means is that there's a vibrant economy of barter and trade, uh, that happens on a platform. And what I think it allows, if you believe that tens or hundreds of millions of people Or on this platform talking about what items do they have to lend? What skills do they have to offer? What assets do they have to share? You can imagine that that data is very, very valuable. And certainly when you get to that scale, just owning that real estate is very, very valuable. And I think there's a lot of ways to monetize that because you really ultimately start to have a lot of data again around what people own, what they're sharing, what they want, how they're transacting. Um, and I'm not sure that you do necessarily need to take, need to take rate for quite a period of time.

AI assessment note: “I'm not sure that you do necessarily need to take rate for quite a period of time.”

Q Tiffany tells me you're in calls back to back all day long. So talk to me, what are the productivity tips and how do you stay on top of your day?

A Well, it's ironic given that context, but, but two things, put my phone away. During, during periods where I'm not on calls, right? Being able to put the phone away and have extended periods where I'm actually able to just do work or think more thematically. And then, you know, the other thing is Tony Robbins talks a lot about becoming obsessed with outcomes instead of activities. I am a firm believer in that. I really try to use his three questions often, right? Which is what do I want? Why do I want it? And what is kind of, I think he terms it my massive action plan. That is what I, like, I obsess around that, uh, kind of at the start of every day and every week. Uh, you know, what are the goals? You know, why do I want those things, and what's my action plan to get them?

AI assessment note: “two things, put my phone away... the other thing is Tony Robbins talks a lot about”

Q Do you think the sector focus also plays a large role in increasing the efficiency of your pattern recognition in terms of seeing so much in the same space you can determine much easier what is good and what isn't? Is that the case for you?

A Well, there's, there's no question about it, right? I think if you're spending a hundred percent of your time looking at, at certain types of consumer companies, you can't help but Uh, but pattern match, uh, in a better way than if you're spending 20% of your time on SAS and 15% of your time being a second partner on someone's, you know, med device company. And so we, we absolutely think, I think in a couple of ways, it helps, helps get better pattern matching around, uh, around picking. But the other thing that happens is you end up with a portfolio of companies that are all at similar stages dealing with similar types of issues around growth or hiring or, Finding liquidity in a local marketplace, whatever the issue is. And I think there's a lot better knowledge swapping that can happen than if only a small subsection of your, of your portfolio is consumer. And by the way, even within consumer, some is seed and some is much further along. So we've seen that benefit as well as, as the portfolio is developed.

AI assessment note: “there's no question about it, right? I think if you're spending a hundred percent”

Q I'm intrigued then, with such nascent potential in a market, what's been done previously to try and harness this market before?

A This is the classic issue of, in a number of instances, uh, those businesses got started too early. You know, really only in the last few years, uh, have people gotten used to transacting online with strangers. Trust and safety has gotten to a place where people will not just transact with strangers, but they'll ride with strangers, they'll spend the night in a stranger's home. I think the trust and safety piece Is really important for a platform like this to be successful. And that's only happened in the last few years. You have seen, you know, verticalized attempts at this. I think couch surfing started off and did see, uh, some really interesting early traction. But I think in a lot of these instances, it's not necessarily the idea. It's the way that that idea was manifested in a product or go to market. You know, do you focus on a vertical first? Do you focus kind of on, on, on more of a horizontal play? And so you are starting to see, I think, you know, there was a company in the last, Last YC batch that is trying to tackle this issue, but I think you're going to see more and more folks really go after this, this vision, because it really is a massive, truly ubiquitous vision. It just hasn't been implemented in the right way so far.

AI assessment note: “You have seen, you know, verticalized attempts at this. I think couch surfing started off”

Q Now, pre binary, you mentioned your experience with the likes of Bain and Lightspeed, some incredible funds. And we've got a question from one of your LPs, Judith at Weathergage. And she says, how's the conversation changed with founders? Now you're no longer at the big established fund, and how's that aided or deteriorated in terms of getting into the very best deals?

A Judith with a hard-hitting question right out of the gate. We love Judith. You know, it's funny. We think it's been the exact opposite. Certainly tons of respect for Baincap and Lightspeed, but the reality is those firms weren't really consumer firms. You know, Bain is really an enterprise-oriented firm, and Lightspeed, four or five years ago, really had been I had seen the majority of its success around enterprise and infrastructure, and so big, well-known brands. But I think, you know, I think smart entrepreneurs want to not just go with brands, but they want to go with the individual investors and partners that have led those deals and have seen success. And so, you know, I think if you look at Lightspeed, for example, a lot of their success has been in companies on the consumer side invested in since And so we didn't really have much of that luxury when I first started out at Lightspeed, and I'm pretty proud to say that, you know, helped build it. I think here at Binary, we've actually found it much easier to win for a couple reasons. First of all, everyone in the firm, again, is very, very educated on consumers, so there's no notion of kind of internal education, right? Having to educate the older, you know, clean tech-focused investor on why this is an interesting early-stage consumer investment, right? Everyone here is thinking about the same themes and trends, and so Th…

AI assessment note: “here at Binary, we've actually found it much easier to win for a couple reasons.”

Q Can I ask, would you not consider Uber to be, to be one, As such, where kind of people without much money have the ability to generate revenues using their skills and their assets?

A So, absolutely, they have the ability to generate money. Now, now the challenge is that money is taxed. What they don't have the ability to do today is say, you know what, I'm going to drive you from San Francisco to the airport in exchange for, uh, for a Spanish They, they earn 25 dollars for the ride. They pay some of that in taxes, and then they've got the remainder to try to spend on maybe what is a partial Spanish lesson, right? And so the notion of much more fluidless, moneyless commerce and transactions, and really the building of a barter economy is, is what we, and again, I know it sounds crazy, but we absolutely believe that that should exist. So, so what you are seeing, Harry, though, you know, in Uber and Airbnb and, and other Platforms is people offering up that excess capacity and their skills for money, and we want to take it to the next level where people have the ability to transact those, those types of skills or experiences for other skills or experiences without the idea of an exchange of actual money.

AI assessment note: “So, absolutely, they have the ability to generate money.”

Q Can I ask them, with such powerful phones and data availability, why hasn't this been done in a world where it really can be done?

A Well, I think there's a few things. Again, I think, I think, you know, it's easy sometimes to ask why it hasn't been done, but I think, again, if you look back even five years ago, the smartphone penetration, trust and safety, right, the degree to which people felt comfortable interacting and transacting with strangers, uh, the notion of live video, Right. Live video is a relatively, relatively new phenomenon at scale. You know, two of the examples I gave, right, medical, uh, assistance and, and crime prevention really did deliver a, an experience that's meaningfully better in order magnitude better than, than the existing nine one one experience. That's what it requires. Right. And so these things are relatively new, you know, and I think that it just takes time to, With trust and safety and cell phone penetration, and now kind of familiarity with live video, it takes time for people to package these in interesting, more verticalized, uh, applications.

AI assessment note: “it takes time for people to package these in interesting, more verticalized, uh, applications.”

Q Can I ask them, with such powerful phones and data availability, why hasn't this been done in a world where it really can be done?

A Well, I think there's a few things. Again, I think, I think, you know, it's easy sometimes to ask why it hasn't been done, but I think, again, if you look back even five years ago, the smartphone penetration, trust and safety, right, the degree to which people felt comfortable interacting and transacting with strangers, uh, the notion of live video, Right. Live video is a relatively, relatively new phenomenon at scale. You know, two of the examples I gave, right, medical, uh, assistance and, and crime prevention really did deliver a, an experience that's meaningfully better in order magnitude better than, than the existing nine one one experience. That's what it requires. Right. And so these things are relatively new, you know, and I think that it just takes time to, With trust and safety and cell phone penetration, and now kind of familiarity with live video, it takes time for people to package these in interesting, more verticalized, uh, applications.

AI assessment note: “it takes time for people to package these in interesting, more verticalized, uh, applications”

Q Let's do the what, why, and how. So why do you want that then for binary?

A Yeah, you know, the why, the why goes back to, I think, why we got this job in the first place is we love working with entrepreneurs, and what's great about consumer tech companies is they change how all of us interact and how all of us do things in our daily lives, right? We've talked about a Just think about how different our lives are today versus even five or six years ago. And so why is to be partners with the people rethinking the way that we act every day and the way that we communicate every day and helping them build those companies. If we're going to do it, we want to be in the best company, right? And we want to be with the working with the best founders. And I think that's why, and I think that leads into the action plan. And I think the action plan is, is why we started binary is focus. We firmly believe that In order to be in the best companies and work with the best founders, you've got to come in prepared. You've got to come in thinking through themes and trends and having everyone in the firm aligned on what we're looking for to get in the best companies early on at the stage that we play. We're not a firm that waits to the series B and series C and kind of borrows conviction based on, on, on, uh, on traction that is already working. We have to be ahead of that Uh, in, in the seed in series A stage, and so that, you know, I think that's where focus is, is kind …

AI assessment note: “why is to be partners with the people rethinking the way that we act every day”

Q And then Tiffany asked number two, what are the biggest issues in VC today?

A Too much money. Too much money. It really enables, I think there's too many funds out there. I think too little differentiation is And too much funding for companies where the core business doesn't make sense, and so it really breeds unnatural competition, irrational behavior on the part of, of companies in terms of spend, and so you really do have to, I think, be a lot more thoughtful around the, the competitive dynamics in some of these markets, because competitors that shouldn't exist continue to persist and do irrational things, uh, to stay relevant because the underlying capital is so readily available, and so, I very much hope that changes, uh, in the next few years, because that, that is a, it's a big problem, and it, and it really, uh, forces you to think about things in a different way than you would in a more, uh, rational vacuum.

AI assessment note: “Too much money. Too much money. It really enables, I think there's too many funds”