Phil Black

Founder, True Ventures · 1 appearance on the record.

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

Phil Black is a founder of True Ventures. Prior to True, he worked at Summit Partners and the predecessor firm to Lightspeed Venture Partners.

8statements → 2claims → 1claims resolved → 4.25/5average certainty → 2.38/5average debate potential → 4.2/5argument clarity · the sources → 30said about them ↓

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

1 prediction · 1 assertion · 1 opinion · 2 insights · 2 disclosures · 1 what if · every statement was checked. The prediction and assertion are the 2 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 1 is resolved, and 1 names 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 Phil 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

True Ventures will never invest in another fitness step-counter startup

“We're never going to go after another fitness counter, a step counter kind of idea. That's old and in the market now.”

Phil Black Sep 4, 2017 ▶ 17:33 20VC: True Ventures Founder, Phil Black on 4 Major Risk Categories for Startups, Why The Funding Gap Is At The "Rational B" Round & Why VCs Must Start Small But Think Big

Argument clarity: do they answer the question? how? →

4.2 / 5 directness 4.4 · coherence 4.4 · precision 3.9 · compression 3.6

answered every one of 12 assessed questions directly

This is a score against a rubric. It is not a rank. Every host question → answer exchange is scored with names hidden on directness, coherence, precision and compression, 1–5 each, on meaning alone: disfluencies are ignored, and only raw unedited episodes count. This is the score that measures thought. Every scored exchange, scores shown → · The rubric and its checks →

How they sound: speaking style how? →

242 words/min while actually speaking · 12.5 um and uh per 1k words

Measured by listening to the audio itself: 3,530 words across 1 episode of raw-level tape, transcribed verbatim with every um and uh kept, each one attributed only where the alignment onto our timed stream is unambiguous. These are measurements of speaking style. We do not rank them: across this corpus, fluency and argument quality are nearly uncorrelated (ρ≈0.2), and smooth talking does not signal clear thinking. How it's measured →

How the interview went all their pushback → series average →

Across 1 rated episode:

host pushback ▾ 4/10

pushed back at the host 2/10

setup questions received 55%

host pushback: the hardest questions Harry asked, tap to play ▶ 12:34“Do you share that thesis?” ▶ 18:06“I guess I'm asking more from a portfolio construction thesis in terms of does small, small checks actually bring enough to the table for you now at True with the significant AUM in…” ▶ 11:07“What's your thoughts around the bridge round? Do you agree with Mike Maples in saying that it's often a peer that leads to nowhere?”

What they said8 What others said30 Episodes1

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

Assertion Not checkable as stated

The primary VC funding gap is the $3M to $7M Series B

“Right now in today's funding market, I, you know, to me, the gap that has been present for a while has been what we've referred to as the rational B round, you know, and that historically has been kind of a three to five, five to seven million dollar round of …”

Phil Black Sep 4, 2017 ▶ 16:01 20VC: True Ventures Founder, Phil Black on 4 Major Risk Categories for Startups, Why The Funding Gap Is At The "Rational B" Round & Why VCs Must Start Small But Think Big

Disclosure

Phil Black named Jet.com, Zenefits, and Magic Leap as struggling unicorns

“So I had a Twitter post about this about, I don't know, nine months ago. And I said my three favorite unicorns that I think are in trouble were at that time, jet.com, Zenefits, and Magic Leap.”

Phil Black Sep 4, 2017 ▶ 20:50 20VC: True Ventures Founder, Phil Black on 4 Major Risk Categories for Startups, Why The Funding Gap Is At The "Rational B" Round & Why VCs Must Start Small But Think Big

Insight

Bridge rounds work for product delays, not market or team failures

“If it really is, you know, it took a little longer for the product, but it's awesome. We just need three more months before we can have that customer traction. I think that the bridge round is probably going to be fine. If it's, well, we need six more months b…”

Phil Black Sep 4, 2017 ▶ 13:07 20VC: True Ventures Founder, Phil Black on 4 Major Risk Categories for Startups, Why The Funding Gap Is At The "Rational B" Round & Why VCs Must Start Small But Think Big

Opinion

Convertible notes and SAFEs are like alcohol: use only in moderation

“Oh, they're okay, but it's kind of like alcohol, and it should only be used in moderation.”

Phil Black Sep 4, 2017 ▶ 19:19 20VC: True Ventures Founder, Phil Black on 4 Major Risk Categories for Startups, Why The Funding Gap Is At The "Rational B" Round & Why VCs Must Start Small But Think Big

What-if

Walmart could have bought Jet.com for one dollar by waiting

“That would have, they could have had that for a dollar if they just would have waited.”

Phil Black Sep 4, 2017 ▶ 21:17 20VC: True Ventures Founder, Phil Black on 4 Major Risk Categories for Startups, Why The Funding Gap Is At The "Rational B" Round & Why VCs Must Start Small But Think Big

Insight

Founders spend large early rounds over 12 to 18 months regardless

“The problem with saying, well, we'll just raise a whole bunch more on the first round is that it's human nature. You don't divide that number by 36 and spend accordingly. You tend to just Divide that number again by that 12 or that 18. And so then you're spend…”

Phil Black Sep 4, 2017 ▶ 10:29 20VC: True Ventures Founder, Phil Black on 4 Major Risk Categories for Startups, Why The Funding Gap Is At The "Rational B" Round & Why VCs Must Start Small But Think Big

Prediction Held up

True Ventures will never invest in another fitness step-counter startup

“We're never going to go after another fitness counter, a step counter kind of idea. That's old and in the market now.”

Disclosure

Phil Black rounded his $4.64M angel fund to $5M to sound bigger

“Oh, it was 4.64 million dollars, and I rounded up to five million to make myself a You know, sound bigger.”

Phil Black Sep 4, 2017 ▶ 5:58 20VC: True Ventures Founder, Phil Black on 4 Major Risk Categories for Startups, Why The Funding Gap Is At The "Rational B" Round & Why VCs Must Start Small But Think Big

The other half of the tape: Phil Black's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 30 times in 8 episodes on 20VC. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Harry Stebbings 23 Puneet Agarwal 2 Matt Mullenweg 2 Adam D'Augelli 2 Brian Wong 1