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Mullen: Multi-Stage Venture Firms Cannot Scale Hands-On Seed Portfolio Support

Mark Mullen · 20VC: Optimising Investment Decision-Making in Compressed Fundraising Timelines & A Deep Dive on Portfolio Construction, Price Sensitivity and The Importance of Ownership with Mark Mullen, Co-Founder @ Bonfire Ventures · Jun 24, 2021 · at 18:25

Mark Mullen, Co-Founder of seed firm Bonfire Ventures, discusses whether large multi-stage VC firms can deliver dedicated hands-on team support to massive seed portfolios.

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“How does a company like Sequoia invest a six hundred million dollar seed fund? How do they write a two million dollar check, let's say in a seed round, and then actually give you the full Sequoia team behind? Maybe they do that. I'm not saying they don't. I'm just saying it's hard to scale that if that's what you're selling.”

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