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Arthur Patterson

Co-Founder and Partner Emeritus, Accel · 1 appearance on the record.

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

investorfounderaccel.com/people/arthur-patterson ↗

Arthur Patterson co-founded venture capital firm Accel in 1983 alongside Jim Swartz, pioneering the firm's foundational "prepared mind" investment philosophy. Over an investing career spanning more than four decades, he led investments in market-defining technology companies that went on to achieve major IPOs, including Veritas, MetroPCS, UUNET, Actuate, and AMCC.

18statements → 6claims → 3claims resolved → 67%fully supported → 4/5average certainty → 2.28/5average debate potential → 18said about them ↓

2 supported 1 partly supported 0 contradicted 3 not checkable as stated how the 6 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

1 prediction · 5 assertions · 1 opinion · 9 insights · 1 disclosure · 1 what if · every statement was checked. The prediction and assertions are the 6 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 3 are resolved, and 3 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 Arthur 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
Patterson: Kleiner Perkins invested in Accel's $40M telecom fund in the 1980s
“Jim had made a really strategic move in about 83, 85, where we raised that XL-II was actually a focused telecom fund of a smaller size, but I think it was about forty million, and I think KP even invested in it.”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 13:27 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev

Expressed certainty vs assessment result

none yet certainty 1
none yet certainty 2
100% certainty 3
75% certainty 4
none yet 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? →

220 words/min while actually speaking · 11.2 um and uh per 1k words

No argument clarity score for Arthur Patterson: 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.

Measured by listening to 2,409 words across 1 episode, but every recording we have of Arthur Patterson 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 2 rated episodes:

host pushback ▾ 1.5/10
pushed back at the host ▾ 3.5/10
setup questions received 83%

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

Insight
Patterson: Specialist VC firms always win over generalists
“The specialist always wins over the generalist.”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 11:46 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Insight
Patterson: VC decision-making must be distributed, unlike hierarchical PE
“Venture investing can be quite emotional because the companies are so dynamic and get into such trouble, and it's very important to have a balanced decision-making and not have it dependent on how one guy gets out of bed in the morning, and that's not true in …”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 25:56 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Insight
Patterson: Deal-swapping politics ruin risk-taking culture in VC firms
“The most important thing to us is we don't have politics because what you can get into in these firms is, well, I approve your deal and you'll approve mine. That's not the way to create the right risk environment. We have to encourage risk, but we have to have…”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 28:27 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Insight
Patterson: Early-stage venture and growth investing are fundamentally different businesses
“The biggest problem with the big firms that have had these additions of growth and later stage things, they're the tension between early stage I think Doug said, you know, if you, once you get out of early stage, you have private equity. He's absolutely right.…”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 32:41 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Patterson: Growth fund expansion will drive early-stage VC spin-outs
“Doing that, and then you're going to see a lot of spin-outs from a lot of the big firms with guys focusing on early stage.”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 33:14 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Opinion
Patterson: Stock options should be taxed identically to founder shares
“I think the stock options, for example, should be taxed the same way founder shares are taxed. So if you want to take a step in the direction of equality, that's the best thing you can do in Silicon Valley.”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 35:16 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Insight
Patterson: A venture firm's first fundraise is always its most difficult
“The first fundraise is always your most difficult”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 7:52 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Assertion Supported
Patterson: Kleiner Perkins invested in Accel's $40M telecom fund in the 1980s
“Jim had made a really strategic move in about 83, 85, where we raised that XL-II was actually a focused telecom fund of a smaller size, but I think it was about forty million, and I think KP even invested in it.”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 13:27 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Patterson: Modern SaaS startups are less vulnerable to economic cycles
“This time, almost all of the companies are continuing revenue service companies. The managements are planning, you know, multi-years ahead, and they're much easier businesses to run and build And they're much more sustainable and much less vulnerable to the ec…”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 19:27 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
What-if
Patterson: Accel could not have raised its inaugural fund six months later
“If we'd waited another six months, I don't think we could have.”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 8:19 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Insight
Patterson: Tech cycles no longer rely solely on semiconductor cost declines
“This time, we have, you know, at least a half dozen separate technologies and changes driving all these opportunities, so the dependence on the semiconductors in the cycle is Going away.”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 15:05 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Insight
Patterson: Early-stage investments are more price-protected than growth deals
“Well, I think if you're in the early stage, particularly, you're more price protected. You can still have a good idea for a startup. Your exposure, when you're putting money into things at the four billion dollar valuation, or something like that, and large am…”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 20:52 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Disclosure
Patterson: Accel's international funds don't dilute focus due to decentralization
“The international funds actually don't affect focus because we decentralize all the investment decisions, which is about 99% of it to them.”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 32:33 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Insight
Patterson: Venture capital firm success depends on entrepreneurial supply
“Venture businesses are a function of the supply, and I just hope the supply of great entrepreneurship keeps flowing through”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 36:36 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Insight
Patterson: Venture capitalists never know if another good deal exists
“A venture capitalist never knows whether there's one new deal, good new deal ahead of him.”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 36:50 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Patterson: Accel partners prepared personal checks to reach $100M Fund III
“In the end, actually, we were a little bit short, and we were going to write checks ourselves to bring it over a hundred.”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 10:27 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Assertion Supported
Patterson: VC market is 100 times larger today than in 1980
“Today, the business is two orders of magnitude, what it was in those days. It's just, everybody knew everybody in those days, and today it's two orders of magnitude.”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 4:27 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Assertion Partly supported
Patterson: Citicorp shut down its UK venture arm due to no deals
“When Jim was at Citicorp Venture Capital, one of his first jobs was to go to close down their English operation because there weren't any good deals in Europe.”
Arthur Patterson Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 29:22 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev

The other half of the tape: Arthur Patterson's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 15 times in 6 episodes on 20VC. 3 statements on the record name them. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Sonali De Rycker 5Miles Clements 4Peter Wagner 2Harry Stebbings 2Jason Calacanis 1Alexa von Tobel 1

Statements about Arthur Patterson, by other people (3)

Opinion
Swartz: Believing current asset bubbles are 'different this time' is bullshit
“That's the key word. It's different this time. Yeah. Bullshit. I can't believe Arthur actually said that. It's different this time. He's bought into it.”
Jim Swartz Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 17:11 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Disclosure
Swartz: Accel co-founders began relinquishing firm equity around 2000
“So we started giving up our ownership in the firm, you know, beginning around 2000 or so late nineties, early 2000 started scaling back, which allowed others to grow.”
Jim Swartz Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 24:29 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Swartz: Accel was named to be near the alphabet's beginning
“The Accel name, both Arthur and I spent our lives at the tail end of the alphabet. We wanted something at the front end of the alphabet. Going through a dictionary, he came across, it's actually a music term. It's short for accelerando, if you're into music.”
Jim Swartz Nov 8, 2021 ▶ 7:22 20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of the Most Prominent Venture Firms Over Four Decades, How Today's Market Compares To The Dot Com Bubble, How To Do Generational Transition Well and Why Accel Will Nev

Every mention by year

tap a year for its mentions
0031612020202120222023202420252026episodesmentions
0112020202120222023202420252026episodes it came up in
0030.5612020202120222023202420252026episodesmentions per episode
2026 4 mentions in 1 episode
2025 1 mention in 1 episode
2024 2 mentions in 1 episode
2022 6 mentions in 1 episode
2021 1 mention in 1 episode
2020 1 mention in 1 episode

Appearances (1)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
20VC Special: Accel Founders Arthur Patterson and Jim Swartz on Building Accel Into One of Nov 8, 2021 12m

Played on the show (1)

Episodes where a recording of Arthur Patterson was played rather than Arthur taking part, or where the tape carries an address with nobody putting questions to them. Listed because the words are on the record, kept out of every score on this page because they were not said on this show. We read this off the tape: who was spoken to, who was asked something, who answered whom.

EpisodeDateOn tapeWhat it is
20VC: The Memo: Bill Gurley, Doug Leone, Keith Rabois; Investing Lessons from Prior Busts, Jun 29, 2022 16s clip played
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