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Arlan Hamilton

Founder & Managing Partner, Backstage Capital · 1 appearance on the record.

computed by AI from the episodes · how this works → · full disclaimer →

investorfounderauthorhost@arlanwashere ↗LinkedIn ↗arlanwashere.com ↗Wikipedia ↗Instagram ↗

Hamilton founded Backstage Capital in 2015 while experiencing homelessness, building a venture fund dedicated to backing historically underestimated founders—specifically women, people of color, and LGBTQ+ entrepreneurs. She is the author of It's About Damn Time and Your First Million, and hosts the business podcast Your First Million.

16statements → 9claims → 3claims resolved → 67%fully supported → 4.06/5average certainty → 2.12/5average debate potential → ≈4.5/5argument clarity, estimated → 8said about them ↓

2 supported 1 partly supported 0 contradicted 1 not yet assessed 5 not checkable as stated how the 9 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

3 predictions · 6 assertions · 2 opinions · 2 insights · 3 disclosures · every statement was checked. The predictions and assertions are the 9 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 3 are resolved, 1 is not yet assessed, and 5 name no date, number or outcome precise enough to check. Everything else (opinions, insights, what ifs, disclosures) can never be settled by the record, so it carries no assessment.

The record, in short

What the tape says about how Arlan argues and how the claims held up. Everything they said, and everything said about them, is in the tabs below.

Their most notable supported claim

Assertion Supported
Arlan Hamilton: 90% of venture capital funding goes to white men
“I came across the statistic that 90% of venture capital and investment money into startups was going to white men.”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 5:37 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded

Expressed certainty vs assessment result

none yet certainty 1
none yet certainty 2
50% certainty 3
100% certainty 4
100% certainty 5

weighted support: a fully supported claim counts one, a partly supported claim counts half. Each filled bar is clickable and opens exactly those claims; "none yet" means nothing said at that certainty level has resolved yet

How they sound: speaking style how? →

248 words/min while actually speaking · 0 um and uh per 1k words

No argument clarity score for Arlan Hamilton: no usable question→answer exchanges on raw tape (a fair score needs 8+). We do not score a sample that small. Roundtable and news formats yield far fewer direct exchanges than interviews. Their coarse estimate from 22 exchanges on the produced feed is ≈4.5/5, shown at half point precision because the sample is small and produced tape scores higher.

Measured by listening to 5,810 words across 1 episode, but every recording we have of Arlan Hamilton is the aired feed, and an editor cleaned that audio before release. Some of the hesitation was cut before we ever heard it, so read these as floors: the true rates are at least this high. These are measurements of speaking style, not scores. How it's measured →

How the interview went all their pushback → series average →

Across 1 rated episode:

host pushback ▾ 0/10
pushed back at the host 1/10
setup questions received 85%

Everything Arlan Hamilton said on 20VC that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →

Opinion
Arlan Hamilton: Institutional LPs should mandate capital for underrepresented fund managers
“I think that LPs should have mandates where especially those who are endowments and pensions should have mandates that say that since so many underrepresented people are paying into those funds, the funds that are paid out to managers, our percentage has to go…”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 32:48 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Arlan Hamilton aims to return $1B to LPs within ten years
“I have a goal for myself to return at least a billion dollars in capital in the different ways that I do. It's not just out of one fund here or one thing there, but a total of a billion dollars returned to LPs and to myself and to our employees over the next 1…”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 23:58 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Assertion Partly supported
Black female founders received just $250M of $130B US VC in 2018
“It is catching up to the hundred and thirty billion dollars that was It was put into venture capital in 2018 in the United States alone, where black women received, I think, two hundred and fifty million of that.”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 26:07 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Arlan Hamilton pledges to donate or invest 90% of her wealth
“My goal is to give away or to invest 90% of my wealth over my lifetime.”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 13:41 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Opinion
Arlan Hamilton: Underrepresented founders are conditioned against celebrating their accomplishments
“I think that, especially women, and especially people of color, we are kind of trained. This is not to say that white men are not, because obviously we're having this conversation, but I think a lot of us are trained, depending on how we grew up, we're trained…”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 19:20 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Prediction Open · timeframe Dec 2030
Arlan Hamilton pledges to invest in 100 emerging managers by 2030
“I've recently said, yes, I am going to invest in a hundred emerging managers by 20 30 in the next decade.”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 26:44 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Assertion Supported
Arlan Hamilton: 90% of venture capital funding goes to white men
“I came across the statistic that 90% of venture capital and investment money into startups was going to white men.”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 5:37 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Disclosure
Arlan Hamilton pattern matches for founder grit based on lived experience
“I do what I call pattern matching for grit. I do the same thing that other investors do with the data that they are used to, and the profiles that they're used to, and I just supply that to my lived experience.”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 7:36 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Disclosure
Arlan Hamilton deleted Twitter from her phone due to targeted harassment
“I mean, I had to delete my Twitter app from my phone recently, because I was getting not just trolls who didn't know me, but people who did, who make it their life's goal every day to put me down and to take away from what I'm doing, even though it's so obviou…”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 19:46 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Assertion Supported
Backstage Capital scaled to 40 employees before downsizing to just five
“We went from one person, me, with a backpack and a dream, to three or four people who believed in me and really took pay cuts that you couldn't imagine, to having more than 40 people across two countries just a few months later to build the accelerator that we…”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 28:07 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Insight
Arlan Hamilton: Venture firms should act as stepping-stone universities for talent
“I started thinking of Backstage as less of a company or a set of companies that employs people, lays off people, et cetera, and more like a university where hopefully we are the stepping stone for you. You graduate from Backstage. Stage into something even big…”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 30:37 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Insight
Arlan Hamilton: Founders skip critical R&D when copying visible benchmark companies
“I think founders skip steps. They skip steps because they are looking at perhaps headlines or someone else as an example, but they don't dig in to see how that company that they like so much got to where they are. So I think there's an element of research and …”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 32:24 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Arlan Hamilton rejects 80% of inbound media and press opportunities
“The majority of that, I mean, 99% of any press is inbound. It's coming from me. I also say no to, I would say, 80% of what comes to me.”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 10:13 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Backstage Capital invested in just 100 of 5,000 evaluated startups
“First getting to a hundred companies in less than four years, which is insane, right? Getting to a hundred companies because we saw 5000 companies. Because we only invested in two percent of what we saw, because there was so much talent out there that had been…”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 12:11 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Arlan Hamilton spent 85% of her adult life living in poverty
“Most of my adult life, 85% of my life has been in poverty. I've lived below the poverty line for that amount of time”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 16:29 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded
Disclosure
Arlan Hamilton has quietly invested as an LP for two years
“That is why I have started making LP investments quietly for the past two years,”
Arlan Hamilton Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 26:39 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded

The other half of the tape: Arlan Hamilton's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 7 times in 4 episodes on 20VC. 1 statement on the record names them. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Katie Stanton 4Harry Stebbings 2Elizabeth Yin 1

Statements about Arlan Hamilton, by other people (1)

Assertion Partly supported
Mark Cuban invested $6M in Arlan Hamilton's fund for underestimated founders
“Last month, Mark Cuban gave Arlen six million dollars to invest in underestimated founders.”
Harry Stebbings Oct 5, 2020 ▶ 0:26 20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn in 10 Years, Why Arlan Plans To Giveaway or Invest 90% of Her Wealth & What The LP Class Can Do To Ensure More Under-Represented Managers Get Funded

Every mention by year

Appearances (1)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
20VC: Arlan Hamilton: "We Have Come For Cake, Not The Crumbs", Arlan's Plan To Return $1Bn Oct 5, 2020 25m
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