The Exchanges

Q Now, I want to start with the core question that I think every investor is thinking about, which is how do we ascertain true value in an AI world where technology seems so transient and revenue seems so endurable?

A I think in terms of evaluating these AI categories in companies, There's a pretty useful framework, which is basically trying to understand a company's time to value and then the durability of that value. And so I think that a number of these companies sort of shine on, on different dimensions. If I were to look at, um, you know, legal AI, uh, accounting AI, a company like basis that we just invested in, I actually think these companies don't have immediately quick time to value. And so when you look at like, you know, the deployment cycle and getting lawyers and getting accountants sort of Sold on the technology. That can take a little while, but once it is hooked, the durability of that value is like transformational to these firms. On the other end in the spectrum, I would take some of like the very early vibe coding companies, right? Very quick time to value. Like you start vibe coding, all of a sudden you have a weekend warrior pickleball app ready to go overnight. Like you can start using something very quickly, but the bottom just fell out for a lot of these apps because there was no durability of value. The reason that I think coding has become like the vertical in AI is because it shines on both dimensions. Like you can start using cursor in an afternoon and by that evening, like you're 10 times more productive. The, the time to value is very short. And then the durabi…

AI assessment note: “useful framework, which is basically trying to understand a company's time to value”

Q Do you not think we do legitimately operate in monopoly markets? I mean, let's look at like Nvidia. Let's look at Apple for consumer hardware. I mean, some, you know, Salesforce for CRM, you know, Salesforce is a two hundred and fifty billion dollar business.

A Yeah, but I, I think it's different when you get into, like, the mega cap companies. Like, there are monopoly conversations, and that is, you know, what the federal government is there for, some would argue. I would not argue, but that's what the federal government tends to do these days. Um, you know, I think in the private markets at the scale of companies that we're talking about, I, I just don't think so. And, like, I'll give you one framing for, like, the winning conversation. Um, we've talked about, and you talk on the show a lot about deal. People say, like, deal has won the market. Alex is phenomenal. Deal has won. You know, we're not investors in the company. I think it was published that they passed like a billion dollars of ARR. It's incredible. It's like, welcome to the big leagues. ADP has twenty billion dollars of ARR. Like you are one 20th the size of ADP. And by the way, in this market, you've got like Paychex is a sixty billion dollar company and Paycom and Paylocity. And, you know, so like, I think the venture framing of this company one is, is not always, you know, I think it can be a little bit oversimplified.

AI assessment note: “in the private markets at the scale of companies that we're talking about, I just don't think so”

Q Do you not think we do legitimately operate in monopoly markets? I mean, let's look at like Nvidia. Let's look at Apple for consumer hardware. I mean, some, you know, Salesforce for CRM, you know, Salesforce is a two hundred and fifty billion dollar business.

A Yeah, but I, I think it's different when you get into, like, the mega cap companies. Like, there are monopoly conversations, and that is, you know, what the federal government is there for, some would argue. I would not argue, but that's what the federal government tends to do these days. Um, you know, I think in the private markets at the scale of companies that we're talking about, I, I just don't think so. And, like, I'll give you one framing for, like, the winning conversation. Um, we've talked about, and you talk on the show a lot about deal. People say, like, deal has won the market. Alex is phenomenal. Deal has won. You know, we're not investors in the company. I think it was published that they passed like a billion dollars of ARR. It's incredible. It's like, welcome to the big leagues. ADP has twenty billion dollars of ARR. Like you are one 20th the size of ADP. And by the way, in this market, you've got like Paychex is a sixty billion dollar company and Paycom and Paylocity. And, you know, so like, I think the venture framing of this company one is, is not always, you know, I think it can be a little bit oversimplified.

AI assessment note: “I think in the private markets at the scale of companies... I just don't think so.”

Q Can I ask, when you did, is it like a, like, partnership meeting? Hmm, have we fucked up? Or is it like an unspoken rule like the British people when it rains and we just pretend it doesn't rain and we walk anyway?

A No, like, it's the most important conversation there is. So it's a global offsite where every partner at Excel sits in a room together, And we say, how did we not get this right? And how do we fix it going forward? And you know, what are the 50 best company, private companies in the world right now? And for how many of those companies are we not just a passive shareholder, but like the investor of record? And what is our score? And then what do we think is the next set of 50 companies and how many of those are we going to win? And like, if we're not getting better, no one will beat us up more, you know, than we will ourselves. Um, so that's what the conversation is. I mean, it's, The most important thing for the entire partnership globally.

AI assessment note: “it's a global offsite where every partner at Excel sits in a room together”

Q Okay, 9.5. When we're doing like a 9.5 and a 27, what are we underwriting it to? If I was your partner, I'd be like, totally get it, and this is super exciting, but like, what's the upside here? How did you think about that?

A Yeah. I think that there's a couple of ways to frame the upside. One is that you think about like platform companies that are publicly traded that own their domains. There's very few of them out there. So Salesforce historically has been like the go to market platform company, you know, CrowdStrike and maybe Palo Alto are like the platform cybersecurity companies. There has never been a platform company for engineering as a vertical and engineers are like, I mean, this is the fastest growing, most dynamic vertical there is, and no one has ever owned that. Now you've had companies that have built tremendous value biting off pieces of the stack, you know, Atlassian, hugely value company, that hugely valuable company that, that we love, um, began around issue tracking data dog around monitoring. These have been like 50 to a hundred billion dollar companies built over time addressing like one portion of the engineering product stack. No one has built the platform company to own it all. And we think they have that aspiration. So that's one thing. The other is like, We were also joking before the show that I think sometimes getting overly fixated on the financial metrics in this environment can leave you just like with an unsatisfying taste in your mouth. Actually, this company is growing so quickly that on a multiples basis, you know, our first investment was at like, um, four times…

AI assessment note: “I think that there's a couple of ways to frame the upside.”

Q What have you changed your mind on most in the last 12 months as an investor?

A I believed this thing a year ago that in hindsight I feel very stupid for having said. I believe that, like, all of the generational investments in AI had been made. You know, I looked at My partner, Dan Levine incubating scale AI, building a relationship with Alex Wang in 2016 and making that investment. You know, the early investments in the labs, I sort of thought, listen, the bets were made eight years ago and it's too late. And now we're all sort of fighting for what's left over. So that was a really stupid thing to say, and I no longer believe it. Um, that's probably the thing that I've, you know, fundamentally changed my mind on both because Those companies will be bigger than the outcomes that I probably envisioned a year ago, and there is still time to be a part of some of them, and because, like, the innovation flywheel is just getting started. We are barely scratching the surface.

AI assessment note: “I believe that, like, all of the generational investments in AI had been made.”

Q When you are so off in your ability to predict revenue at year-end, how does that change your go-forward investor mindset? Do you just place no value on, like, revenue predictions? How do you think about that?

A I think revenue predictions are important in that they sort of encode a lot of business assumptions. You know, like, if, if we get this product right, if our pricing here is correct, If our penetration of this customer segment works out, we should be at this rough revenue scale. But you know, the idea of having a budget so that you can go hold the founders feet to the fire quarter after quarter and is just not really relevant. Um, so to me, the less important thing is if a company finishes, you know, 10% below plan, 10% above plan, like we're not public market investors. We're not managing to earnings calls. We care a lot about the inputs that go into the assumptions, but, like, the output is a little bit less important.

AI assessment note: “revenue predictions are important in that they sort of encode a lot of business assumptions”

Q Can I ask, when you did, is it like a, like, partnership meeting? Hmm, have we fucked up? Or is it like an unspoken rule like the British people when it rains and we just pretend it doesn't rain and we walk anyway?

A No, like, it's the most important conversation there is. So it's a global offsite where every partner at Excel sits in a room together, And we say, how did we not get this right? And how do we fix it going forward? And you know, what are the 50 best company, private companies in the world right now? And for how many of those companies are we not just a passive shareholder, but like the investor of record? And what is our score? And then what do we think is the next set of 50 companies and how many of those are we going to win? And like, if we're not getting better, no one will beat us up more, you know, than we will ourselves. Um, so that's what the conversation is. I mean, it's, The most important thing for the entire partnership globally.

AI assessment note: “So it's a global offsite where every partner at Excel sits in a room together”

Q Do you think the best founders need your help? I was going through the pillars of venture there in terms of sourcing, selecting, securing, and servicing, and I was like, do you think the best founders actually need your help?

A I think need our help is an overstatement. I think of the role of a good investor as being like, There's basically these like bumper decisions that come up a couple of times a year. Like if you're a founder, your life is a bunch of little decisions and then a couple of really big decisions. The little decisions are like, you know, design decisions about the product and, um, pricing and should we dial up CAC and should we make this higher? Like you don't need an investor micromanaging you through all the little decisions. I do think every year there's probably a couple of like Big decisions. Where having a good sounding board can be really useful. Should we do this partnership? Should we make this acquisition? Um, do we need to pivot? And there, yeah, I think having a good investor or just a good partner to the business can be really useful, but, um, it's all about striking the right balance.

AI assessment note: “I think need our help is an overstatement.”

Q he's public that private company founders like the Collison's are able to do. How do you think about the benefits of public versus private today? And given the liquidity so inherent within secondary markets, like we're seeing with even as early as your linears where you're doing tenders for them, clay has tenders and then stripes on bigger scales has Obviously much more liquid markets. Why would anyone go public?

A Well, the reverse is true too. There are things that Mike can do as a public CEO and the public companies can do that private companies cannot. But I think you're asking the right question. I mean, I think there's a reason a lot of these founders are staying private longer. Um, what are the things that you typically needed to access the public markets in order to do? Um, liquidity for employees. You can certainly do that now as a private company. M&A currency and just increasing your valuation benchmarks or your valuation mark. You can totally do that as a private company. So, um, I think that is all true. With that said, I think that applies to like the 10 best private companies in the world. Like Databricks can do those things. Stripe can do those things. There's a lot of companies that just do need to get public.

AI assessment note: “There's a lot of companies that just do need to get public.”

Q Okay, 9.5. When we're doing like a 9.5 and a 27, what are we underwriting it to? If I was your partner, I'd be like, totally get it, and this is super exciting, but like, what's the upside here? How did you think about that?

A Yeah. I think that there's a couple of ways to frame the upside. One is that you think about like platform companies that are publicly traded that own their domains. There's very few of them out there. So Salesforce historically has been like the go to market platform company, you know, CrowdStrike and maybe Palo Alto are like the platform cybersecurity companies. There has never been a platform company for engineering as a vertical and engineers are like, I mean, this is the fastest growing, most dynamic vertical there is, and no one has ever owned that. Now you've had companies that have built tremendous value biting off pieces of the stack, you know, Atlassian, hugely value company, that hugely valuable company that, that we love, um, began around issue tracking data dog around monitoring. These have been like 50 to a hundred billion dollar companies built over time addressing like one portion of the engineering product stack. No one has built the platform company to own it all. And we think they have that aspiration. So that's one thing. The other is like, We were also joking before the show that I think sometimes getting overly fixated on the financial metrics in this environment can leave you just like with an unsatisfying taste in your mouth. Actually, this company is growing so quickly that on a multiples basis, you know, our first investment was at like, um, four times…

AI assessment note: “there's a couple of ways to frame the upside.”

Q Was cursor wrong to focus on building their own models?

A I don't think so. I think what they're going to be able to achieve is incredible. I also think we need to frame in the right context what their aspirations are with these models. So I think generally speaking, like there are generalists and there are specialists. Cursor is going to build specialized coding models that are going to serve specialized coding tasks, especially for a lot of enterprise users. Like they don't need for their models to be good at poetry or teach you how to make an apple pie. Like, their models are there for professional coders to do professional work, and I think that, like, that's very powerful and can, will continue to make the product experience really differentiated.

AI assessment note: “I don't think so. I think what they're going to be able to achieve”

Q I see that grand play, but then it kind of goes against something that we kind of noted down before you said, who will win as a narrow-minded framing of the market? Are they not paradoxical? Like, if you think about Cursor being that engineering platform company, totally get that, and I believe in that view of the world, but I don't believe the who will win is narrow-minded view.

A I think that, um, I think cursor will win. I think there's huge value to being the winner in these markets. But the reason I think the conversation is like the, the framing is overly simplified is, you know, people forget we don't operate monopoly markets in this country. Like the forces of capitalism don't permit it. And if they did, then the federal government wouldn't permit it. So like, I think the best software company in the world is AWS. AWS has like 35% market share. So, you know, everyone aspires to win and you, you, you get into business with these founders because you believe that they can win. But I also think the way that a number of these verticals are going to play out in a number of the AI categories, there's going to be a couple of really big companies and several of them.

AI assessment note: “the reason I think the conversation is like the, the framing is overly simplified”

Q I'm, I'm sorry, I still don't quite understand. If you have a pot of money, and you can put it in companies that are growing 15 X, to then put it in companies that are growing three X, three X, two X, two X, the opportunity cost of your cash is real. As your partner, I'd be saying, why are we doing that?

A Yeah, but this is where, you know, we're ignoring, like, all of the other important inputs, right? Like, quality of the founder. What market are they in? What ownership are you getting in the investment? You know, all of these other things factor in, too. So I, I think one thing that's happened in our market is, like, investors have tended to just flock to the extremes. Either, like, we're AI maximalists. We're gonna buy the basket. Ownership valuation. Be damned. We want everything. Or, like, we hate the valuations. They make no sense. We're gonna sit on our hands and wait until things cool off a little bit. The reality is, like, the best funds in the world, the best investors in the world embrace the nuance. The, the right answer is always somewhere in the middle. And like construing a, you know, constructing a basket of companies where maybe some, they were undisputed breakout leaders and you didn't get the ownership that you wanted, but you, you wanted to be a part of that company and you wanted to be partnered with that founder. There's room for that in the portfolio, but there's also bootstrap companies in Little Rock, Arkansas, where you can have a different ownership threshold and work with a really special founder and build the company in a different way. And, um, you can do very well that way too. We don't really run from the nuance, like, we embrace the nuance, and t…

AI assessment note: “we're ignoring, like, all of the other important inputs, right? Like, quality”

Q You said that kind of brilliantly wanky phrase, The marginal ease of ARR accumulation. I'm going to give you five tequilas and then ask you to say that again. Um, sounds wonderful. Where did you think there was marginal ease of ARR accumulation where there maybe wasn't, and what did you not see?

A I think as the market has gotten more competitive, The pressure to be right, to pick correctly has never been greater, and it causes you to extrapolate. You have to extrapolate from early data points. There have been investments where, you know, a company went from, they had a million dollars of ARR, and then in the period that, um, you know, before they fundraise, they had like a four million dollar quarter, and it's like, they've got it. Like the product market fit snapped. Like they, this is it. This is the time to, Forward invest and you can extrapolate these trends. And then it turns out sometimes they just had an anomaly quarter and, um, I have fallen into that trap before.

AI assessment note: “they just had an anomaly quarter and, um, I have fallen into that trap before.”

Q What have you changed your mind on most in the last 12 months as an investor?

A I believed this thing a year ago that in hindsight I feel very stupid for having said. I believe that, like, all of the generational investments in AI had been made. You know, I looked at My partner, Dan Levine incubating scale AI, building a relationship with Alex Wang in 2016 and making that investment. You know, the early investments in the labs, I sort of thought, listen, the bets were made eight years ago and it's too late. And now we're all sort of fighting for what's left over. So that was a really stupid thing to say, and I no longer believe it. Um, that's probably the thing that I've, you know, fundamentally changed my mind on both because Those companies will be bigger than the outcomes that I probably envisioned a year ago, and there is still time to be a part of some of them, and because, like, the innovation flywheel is just getting started. We are barely scratching the surface.

AI assessment note: “that's probably the thing that I've, you know, fundamentally changed my mind on”

Q Was cursor wrong to focus on building their own models?

A I don't think so. I think what they're going to be able to achieve is incredible. I also think we need to frame in the right context what their aspirations are with these models. So I think generally speaking, like there are generalists and there are specialists. Cursor is going to build specialized coding models that are going to serve specialized coding tasks, especially for a lot of enterprise users. Like they don't need for their models to be good at poetry or teach you how to make an apple pie. Like, their models are there for professional coders to do professional work, and I think that, like, that's very powerful and can, will continue to make the product experience really differentiated.

AI assessment note: “I don't think so. I think what they're going to be able to achieve”

Q When you are so off in your ability to predict revenue at year-end, how does that change your go-forward investor mindset? Do you just place no value on, like, revenue predictions? How do you think about that?

A I think revenue predictions are important in that they sort of encode a lot of business assumptions. You know, like, if, if we get this product right, if our pricing here is correct, If our penetration of this customer segment works out, we should be at this rough revenue scale. But you know, the idea of having a budget so that you can go hold the founders feet to the fire quarter after quarter and is just not really relevant. Um, so to me, the less important thing is if a company finishes, you know, 10% below plan, 10% above plan, like we're not public market investors. We're not managing to earnings calls. We care a lot about the inputs that go into the assumptions, but, like, the output is a little bit less important.

AI assessment note: “We care a lot about the inputs that go into the assumptions, but, like, the output is a little bit less important.”

Q he's public that private company founders like the Collison's are able to do. How do you think about the benefits of public versus private today? And given the liquidity so inherent within secondary markets, like we're seeing with even as early as your linears where you're doing tenders for them, clay has tenders and then stripes on bigger scales has Obviously much more liquid markets. Why would anyone go public?

A Well, the reverse is true too. There are things that Mike can do as a public CEO and the public companies can do that private companies cannot. But I think you're asking the right question. I mean, I think there's a reason a lot of these founders are staying private longer. Um, what are the things that you typically needed to access the public markets in order to do? Um, liquidity for employees. You can certainly do that now as a private company. M&A currency and just increasing your valuation benchmarks or your valuation mark. You can totally do that as a private company. So, um, I think that is all true. With that said, I think that applies to like the 10 best private companies in the world. Like Databricks can do those things. Stripe can do those things. There's a lot of companies that just do need to get public.

AI assessment note: “With that said, I think that applies to like the 10 best private companies”

Q Do you think the best founders need your help? I was going through the pillars of venture there in terms of sourcing, selecting, securing, and servicing, and I was like, do you think the best founders actually need your help?

A I think need our help is an overstatement. I think of the role of a good investor as being like, There's basically these like bumper decisions that come up a couple of times a year. Like if you're a founder, your life is a bunch of little decisions and then a couple of really big decisions. The little decisions are like, you know, design decisions about the product and, um, pricing and should we dial up CAC and should we make this higher? Like you don't need an investor micromanaging you through all the little decisions. I do think every year there's probably a couple of like Big decisions. Where having a good sounding board can be really useful. Should we do this partnership? Should we make this acquisition? Um, do we need to pivot? And there, yeah, I think having a good investor or just a good partner to the business can be really useful, but, um, it's all about striking the right balance.

AI assessment note: “I think need our help is an overstatement.”

Q I'm, I'm sorry, I still don't quite understand. If you have a pot of money, and you can put it in companies that are growing 15 X, to then put it in companies that are growing three X, three X, two X, two X, the opportunity cost of your cash is real. As your partner, I'd be saying, why are we doing that?

A Yeah, but this is where, you know, we're ignoring, like, all of the other important inputs, right? Like, quality of the founder. What market are they in? What ownership are you getting in the investment? You know, all of these other things factor in, too. So I, I think one thing that's happened in our market is, like, investors have tended to just flock to the extremes. Either, like, we're AI maximalists. We're gonna buy the basket. Ownership valuation. Be damned. We want everything. Or, like, we hate the valuations. They make no sense. We're gonna sit on our hands and wait until things cool off a little bit. The reality is, like, the best funds in the world, the best investors in the world embrace the nuance. The, the right answer is always somewhere in the middle. And like construing a, you know, constructing a basket of companies where maybe some, they were undisputed breakout leaders and you didn't get the ownership that you wanted, but you, you wanted to be a part of that company and you wanted to be partnered with that founder. There's room for that in the portfolio, but there's also bootstrap companies in Little Rock, Arkansas, where you can have a different ownership threshold and work with a really special founder and build the company in a different way. And, um, you can do very well that way too. We don't really run from the nuance, like, we embrace the nuance, and t…

AI assessment note: “we're ignoring, like, all of the other important inputs, right? Like, quality of the founder.”

Q I see that grand play, but then it kind of goes against something that we kind of noted down before you said, who will win as a narrow-minded framing of the market? Are they not paradoxical? Like, if you think about Cursor being that engineering platform company, totally get that, and I believe in that view of the world, but I don't believe the who will win is narrow-minded view.

A I think that, um, I think cursor will win. I think there's huge value to being the winner in these markets. But the reason I think the conversation is like the, the framing is overly simplified is, you know, people forget we don't operate monopoly markets in this country. Like the forces of capitalism don't permit it. And if they did, then the federal government wouldn't permit it. So like, I think the best software company in the world is AWS. AWS has like 35% market share. So, you know, everyone aspires to win and you, you, you get into business with these founders because you believe that they can win. But I also think the way that a number of these verticals are going to play out in a number of the AI categories, there's going to be a couple of really big companies and several of them.

AI assessment note: “the reason I think the framing is overly simplified is we don't operate monopoly markets”

Q You said that kind of brilliantly wanky phrase, The marginal ease of ARR accumulation. I'm going to give you five tequilas and then ask you to say that again. Um, sounds wonderful. Where did you think there was marginal ease of ARR accumulation where there maybe wasn't, and what did you not see?

A I think as the market has gotten more competitive, The pressure to be right, to pick correctly has never been greater, and it causes you to extrapolate. You have to extrapolate from early data points. There have been investments where, you know, a company went from, they had a million dollars of ARR, and then in the period that, um, you know, before they fundraise, they had like a four million dollar quarter, and it's like, they've got it. Like the product market fit snapped. Like they, this is it. This is the time to, Forward invest and you can extrapolate these trends. And then it turns out sometimes they just had an anomaly quarter and, um, I have fallen into that trap before.

AI assessment note: “turns out sometimes they just had an anomaly quarter and, um, I have fallen into that trap”

Q the rules on series A's. The prices have gone from 20 on a hundred to 20 to 40 on 200 to 400. And I'm forced every day to question, should we break the rules on ownership for these incredibly fast growing hot AI companies? And we go back and forth on it. We're friends sitting in a coffee shop. What would you say to me if I was debating that?

A Yeah, I'm chuckling because there's this funny quote that comes to mind. Um, I've been very lucky at Excel to learn from a lot of really great people. One of them is Jim Breyer. Jim used to say this thing, which I think he was paraphrasing from somebody else, but it was basically that like investing is an art and a science. The science is understanding how to properly value a company and the art is understanding when to break the rules. I just think in this market, like you got to do that constantly. And, um, generally speaking, sticking to your rules is a good place to be. Now I do think You know, the vocabulary around what a Series A is in this market is just very different, and so I would actually, you know, I think there's, like, multiple subcategories of investing that goes on in Series A land, and you just have to decide what you want to participate in and what you don't. It's okay to say no. Like, you don't have to be in every single round, and, um, so I think that, like, breaking the rules is something you should do very, very rarely.

AI assessment note: “breaking the rules is something you should do very, very rarely.”

Q the rules on series A's. The prices have gone from 20 on a hundred to 20 to 40 on 200 to 400. And I'm forced every day to question, should we break the rules on ownership for these incredibly fast growing hot AI companies? And we go back and forth on it. We're friends sitting in a coffee shop. What would you say to me if I was debating that?

A Yeah, I'm chuckling because there's this funny quote that comes to mind. Um, I've been very lucky at Excel to learn from a lot of really great people. One of them is Jim Breyer. Jim used to say this thing, which I think he was paraphrasing from somebody else, but it was basically that like investing is an art and a science. The science is understanding how to properly value a company and the art is understanding when to break the rules. I just think in this market, like you got to do that constantly. And, um, generally speaking, sticking to your rules is a good place to be. Now I do think You know, the vocabulary around what a Series A is in this market is just very different, and so I would actually, you know, I think there's, like, multiple subcategories of investing that goes on in Series A land, and you just have to decide what you want to participate in and what you don't. It's okay to say no. Like, you don't have to be in every single round, and, um, so I think that, like, breaking the rules is something you should do very, very rarely.

AI assessment note: “breaking the rules is something you should do very, very rarely.”

Q Like if you look at his sneak, I'm in Guy's new company, but he ain't there. What do you do? It's a three hundred million ARR growing 15%, and its last price was seven.

A I think this is in some regards, like as the founder of the company, we lose sight of this. That's not a great setup for people who might have invested at seventeen billion dollars, but it's a great business with a great product, with a great customer base. You know, there will be an outcome for that company. It is humbling relative to, you know, the valuations of the 2021 era. But again, you know, who are, who is the team that you're in business with and how are they behaving and how are you behaving more importantly? As an investor, you know, when the team's back is collectively against the wall, you know, I, I think that is the best reflection of, you know, I, I think, um.

AI assessment note: “That's not a great setup for people who might have invested at seventeen billion dollars”

Q Like if you look at his sneak, I'm in Guy's new company, but he ain't there. What do you do? It's a three hundred million ARR growing 15%, and its last price was seven.

A I think this is in some regards, like as the founder of the company, we lose sight of this. That's not a great setup for people who might have invested at seventeen billion dollars, but it's a great business with a great product, with a great customer base. You know, there will be an outcome for that company. It is humbling relative to, you know, the valuations of the 2021 era. But again, you know, who are, who is the team that you're in business with and how are they behaving and how are you behaving more importantly? As an investor, you know, when the team's back is collectively against the wall, you know, I, I think that is the best reflection of, you know, I, I think, um.

AI assessment note: “who is the team that you're in business with and how are they behaving”