Assertion Supported AI assessment confidence: 95% certainty 5/5 debate potential 1/5

Sequoia Capital Stopped Accepting Public Funds To Avoid FOIA Disclosures

Chris Olsen · 20VC: The Biggest Trend Of Our Lifetime Is The Decentralisation of Entrepreneurship Away From The Valley, The Biggest Lessons From Learnings The Craft of VC at Sequoia & The Benchmarks Required to Attract Growth Investors with Chris Olsen, Founding Partne · Apr 23, 2018 · at 5:33

Chris Olsen, founding partner of Drive Capital and former Sequoia investor, recalls the Wall Street Journal article about Sequoia Capital that first sparked his interest in venture capital.

0:00 / 0:08exact quote · 8.6s

720p mp4 · rendered on demand · StarZero watermark

“Sequoia at the time made the decision to no longer accept public funds. And because of this disclosure, they wanted to protect the stealthiness of their businesses.”

quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →

The claim, plainly

Sequoia Capital decided to stop accepting capital from public entities to avoid FOIA disclosure requirements regarding their portfolio companies.

a quote alone can be ambiguous, so this restates it with the references and context of the conversation around it resolved. AI-written; the tape below the player is the source.

Assessment

Historical records confirm that in 2003, Sequoia Capital explicitly stopped accepting capital from public entities and asked the University of Michigan to sell its stakes and exit new fund commitments due to state FOIA and public records disclosure requirements. Sequoia subsequently maintained a long-standing policy of avoiding U.S. public pension funds and public endowments to protect confidential fund and portfolio company information until reversing the stance in April 2018.

In August/September 2003, Sequoia Capital partner Mike Moritz sent a letter removing the University of Michigan from Sequoia Capital XI and requesting they sell off prior positions specifically citing Michigan Freedom of Information Act disclosure concerns.
Sequoia similarly barred the University of California system and established a policy shunning public entities to avoid FOIA mandates.
Sequoia maintained this restriction against U.S. public pension funds until April 2018, when it raised its Global Growth Fund III.

Checked against

[1] buyoutsinsider.com [2] buyoutsinsider.com [3] buyoutsinsider.com [4] venturecapitaljournal.com [5] buyoutsinsider.com [6] umich.edu [7] axios.com [8] umich.edu

assessed as of 2026-07-23

This assessment is an AI reading of a public statement, made against the cited references with the confidence shown. It can be wrong. The quote, the tape and the references are all on this page; if something is off, use report an error below. full disclaimer →

Mentioned

public funds Sequoia Capital

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