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Eric Liaw

General Partner, IVP · 1 appearance on the record, plus 1 compilation re-air.

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

investor@eliaw ↗ivp.com/team/eric-liaw ↗

Eric Liaw joined IVP in 2011 and later moved to London to help establish the firm's European operations. He is known for leading growth-stage venture investments in high-profile technology companies including Datadog, GitHub, UiPath, Robinhood, Klarna, and DeepL.

14statements → 4claims → 4claims resolved → 75%fully supported → 3.71/5average certainty → 2.07/5average debate potential → ≈4.5/5argument clarity, estimated → 3said about them ↓

3 supported 0 partly supported 1 contradicted how the 4 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

4 predictions · 2 opinions · 6 insights · 2 disclosures · every statement was checked. The predictions and assertions are the 4 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 4 are resolved. 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 Eric 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

Prediction Held up
Liaw: Growth stage startups will be hit hardest by market correction
“I think growth will be hit the hardest, because there, the universe of alternatives, particularly for some of the largest investors, is Private company A at multiple X or public company B at multiple Y.”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 13:19 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP

Their most notable contradicted claim

Prediction Didn’t hold up
Liaw: 2022 tech M&A volume will slightly exceed 2021
“I expect maybe a little bit more M&A this year than last year, just because last year there wasn't that much of it.”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 11:49 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP

Expressed certainty vs assessment result

none yet certainty 1
0% certainty 2
100% certainty 3
100% 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? →

291 words/min while actually speaking · 1.3 um and uh per 1k words

No argument clarity score for Eric Liaw: 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 28 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 6,350 words across 1 episode, but every recording we have of Eric Liaw 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 ▾ 2.5/10
pushed back at the host ▾ 2.5/10
setup questions received 65%

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

Opinion
Liaw: Regulatory fear has chilled M&A for Meta, Google, Amazon, and Apple
“I think that probably the bigger challenge is for a lot of the biggest mega cap tech companies, fear of regulation and regulatory authority intervention is probably causing a lot of them to say, this is probably not worth our time, right? So it's kind of a fun…”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 11:53 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP
Insight
Liaw: Early-stage venture is about picking; late-stage is about access
“I think at earlier in seed stages, I think there's Probably more picking going on. I think that those stages companies need capital or else they're likely to die. Capital is more like a necessity. I think as you get much, much later sort of companies that are …”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 6:49 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP
Prediction Held up
Liaw: Growth stage startups will be hit hardest by market correction
“I think growth will be hit the hardest, because there, the universe of alternatives, particularly for some of the largest investors, is Private company A at multiple X or public company B at multiple Y.”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 13:19 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP
Insight
Liaw: High entry valuation multiples require path to $300M+ revenue
“If something's five or ten million, but you really have conviction, it can become three, four, five hundred million in revenue, then the 600 to a billion entry price is still fine. If it's like five, 10, and you think it's gonna maybe get to a hundred, a 150, …”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 15:21 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP
Opinion
Liaw: Venture capital has lost sincerity due to a self-congratulatory echo chamber
“I think that, hey, did you hear so-and-so did this seed? And then that becomes the A, and then everyone's like, oh, you're so smart. Like, it's lost some of the sincerity, and that's too bad.”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 35:26 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP
Prediction Held up
Liaw: 2022 public listings and SPAC activity will decline from 2021
“I think there will still obviously be new listings and direct listings and probably not as many SPACs. That's a different topic. I do think you'll still have some activity, but not like last year.”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 11:30 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP
Prediction Didn’t hold up
Liaw: 2022 tech M&A volume will slightly exceed 2021
“I expect maybe a little bit more M&A this year than last year, just because last year there wasn't that much of it.”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 11:49 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP
Prediction Held up
Liaw: Salesforce will pause major M&A while digesting Slack
“Now, I think Salesforce is probably going to be quiet for a little bit as they digest Slack.”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 12:27 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP
Disclosure
Liaw: IVP Invested Over $100M into Aiven After $16M Initial Check
“Our first investment was sixteen million dollars in size in their series B. They've now gone on to raise a C and a C one. Now we have over a hundred million dollars invested.”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 18:15 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP
Disclosure
Liaw: Passing on Datadog's Series B was his biggest career regret
“Biggest regret in my career was not investing in Datadog a lot earlier than when we ultimately did. We loved The company, it was probably nine or eleven million dollars in revenue at the time. This is probably the 2014 time frame, and they raised a series B. S…”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 21:11 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP
Insight
Liaw: Unprepared introductory pitch meetings with founders are now obsolete
“The idea of, you know, have a first meeting. So tell me about your company and you know nothing like that's a dead meeting. And that's actually great. It saves time, saves the entrepreneurs time so they can get back to running their companies and doing the bus…”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 23:16 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP
Insight
Liaw: Distrusting a CEO's decision means investing in the wrong person
“And then you have to go back to, well, you don't trust your CEO to make the decision. You probably invested in the wrong company or person.”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 25:35 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP
Insight
Liaw: Boards Must Replace CEOs Who Have Lost Board Confidence
“If the consensus view ends up being that the CEO has lost the confidence of the board, then I think the board has a responsibility to make a tough decision. The CEO serves at the pleasure of, for the shareholders, and the board is actually supposed to be the o…”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 26:01 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP
Insight
Liaw: Board members will always know less about companies than CEOs
“There's no way as a board member investor, I will know more about what's going on inside of a company Then the CEO, if I do, there's a major problem, but I shouldn't, and I will know a lot less.”
Eric Liaw Apr 8, 2022 ▶ 27:47 20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? How Does This Impact M&A and Going Public? How do Crossover Funds Respond? What Does it Mean For Early Stage and more with Eric Liaw, General Partner @ IVP

The other half of the tape: Eric Liaw's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 3 times in 2 episodes on 20VC. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Harry Stebbings 2Tom Loverro 1

Every mention by year

tap a year for its mentions
00112120232024episodesmentions
01120232024episodes it came up in
0010.52120232024episodesmentions per episode
2024 2 mentions in 1 episode
2023 1 mention in 1 episode

Appearances (2)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
20VC: The Memo: Chris Sacca on Why We Are Breeding a Generation of Entitled Assholes, Harl compilation May 4, 2022 1m
20VC: What Happens To Growth Rounds in this New Environment? Where is the Funding Crunch? Apr 8, 2022 24m
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