Lemkin: 'Good, not great' growth causes startups to fail raising Series A

“I think here's what I think the most common reason is they have good, but not great growth. This is the risk for seed investors, especially late seed investors. And I didn't used to want to think this was true. When I started investing, I did a whiteboard and I looked at, I said, okay, when I was at 10 millionaire, I was growing a hundred percent. So I only want to invest in companies growing at least a 120. And I boiled that down to at least eight percent a month growth at sort of the mid seed stage. And I kept it as a rule, right? And I've bent that rule a little bit and people will tell you otherwise, and they'll tell you about folks that got lost in the jungle, but that's where I don't see it happen. Is you do good. Like you're building a real company that's growing, but it goes from one to two in a year, or it goes from two to 3.1 in a year and the founders don't get it, but that's where you fall. It's tough, but that's where you fall off the track and you can still have making good money as a founder, but you're off the venture track without realizing it. Good. The line between good and great is subtle, but it's painful, but it's so real.”

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