Patel: Landed first VC job by sending 50-plus physical letters
Satya Patel · 20VC: Homebrew's Satya Patel on The Key Components of Being A Great VC & The 3 Main Reasons Startups Fail At Seed · Mar 28, 2016 · at 2:08
Satya Patel, co-founder of Homebrew, describes how he transitioned from management consulting into venture capital investing early in his career.
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“My first investing job happened because I literally sent fifty-plus snail mail letters to venture firms looking for a job. Even back then, lots of venture firms didn't have email that they published, certainly, and many didn't use email.”
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More from Satya Patel
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Patel: Self-funded investing frees investors from needing fund-returner outcomes
“The flexibility that we have in not having a fund now is that we don't have to think of every investment as having the potential to return the fund, right? Every investment just has to be a good return.”
Patel: Homebrew testing whether non-lead seed investors can maintain lead influence
“One of the experiments we're running here is kind of the testing the thinking around can capital and counsel be separated over the course of time, right? And so one of the things we're trying to evaluate is in some cases when we do a smaller check, can we stil…”
Patel: VCs rarely regret early distributions, but heavily regret holding to zero
“Most investors, investors don't realize, like, they're not gonna regret the upside if they put money in their pocket, but if they don't take the upside and things go away, they're gonna have a lot of regret.”
Patel: Distribution wins over product in early-stage startups
“It's not the best product that wins, it's the best distribution that wins, and that the best distribution creates a feedback cycle that allows you to have the best product over time, but distribution wins over product in the early days.”