The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 32 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 2 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Sim: Boldstart will never fund AI startups spending mostly on Nvidia
“You will never find both start, for example, finding companies where, you know, they're raising 20 or thirty million dollars, and two thirds of that money goes to NVIDIA.”
Ed Sim: Billion-dollar multi-stage VC funds stopped growth investing in 2022
“The spigot dried out last year, all the big multi-stage firms with a billion dollar plus funds stopped investing in growth.”
Sim: Optimal Modern Seed Venture Funds Must Be $150M to $250M
“I think a fund size between one 52 50 for doing this in a highly concentrated position with ownership and doing it in a way that allows you to write bigger checks after the discovery round to help a classic round, you know, raise a little more of an extension …”
Ed Sim: High-growth tech companies will never see 35x-40x multiples again
“So do I think we're going to move back to one of 35 to 40 for companies greater, going greater than 40%? Never again.”
Sim: Boldstart pushes down seed round sizes to test founders
“I'll lead you around now if you want three, but not at six. So they come back to us, you know, a few days later and like, you know what? How about four? And the reason I do that Harry is because I want to test them. I want to test them to make sure that they a…”
Sim: Boldstart's fastest-growing 2021 vintage startups are Israeli infrastructure companies
“We have over a dozen Israeli founding teams right now, and two of my fastest growing companies in fund five vintage 20, 21, which had, you know, funded inception to now from zero to about two million of ARR were both Israeli infrastructure companies.”
Sim: Snyk Would Have Failed Without Continuous Internal Funding Prior to Series A
“If Guy went out trying to raise capital from someone else and I didn't have enough capital to give to him, he would have gone out of business.”
Sim: Superhuman founder locked $10M Series A in separate bank account untouched
“Then he raised pre raised a ten million dollar A round. He put it in a separate bank account and said, I'm not going to touch this thing. I'm literally just going to put it there. I don't want to see it. It's in a separate bank account. I'm only going to opera…”
Seed startups relying on analyst reports for market sizing are uninvestable
“If you have an analyst report to kind of show us, then it's probably not worth investing in, you know, at the seed stage.”
BoldStart Ventures requires founders to be engineers actively building product
“And secondly, they have to be engineers. Engineers, Building product. That's really important.”
BoldStart Ventures refuses to invest in single-founder startups
“Well, I, we never liked single co-founder, co-founded companies or single founders, number one.”
Sim prefers structuring Boldstart inception rounds at $3M to $4M
“I would prefer Your classic structure of three to four million dollars, to be honest with you.”
Sim: Inception rounds split into discovery, classic, and Megatron jumbo tiers
“The point is the three rounds are, there's a discovery round, which my opinion is less than two million. So it's usually like maybe a first time founder exploring a new market. It would graduate to the next round, which would be a classic. And a classic round,…”
Sim: Startups solving hard technical problems appear slow before hitting rapid growth
“Some of the hardest problems to solve will take longer and it'll look like your slowest plotting company to start with. But in the long run, to your point, these things are the ones that can actually go, you know, hit the J curve pretty quickly.”
Sim: Boldstart funded Snyk through three pre-Series A capital rounds
“You know, guy from sneak, Harry, do you know how many rounds he raised before? He raised his A three rounds of capital before his A. Guess who gave him all three rounds?”
Ed Sim: Boldstart will split $8M–$10M seed rounds for exceptional founders
“The way that we've evolved now is that sometimes I have to play ball, Harry, right? Sometimes there are some exceptional founders where, okay, you know what? I will split. An eight to ten million dollar round for that exceptional founder, depending on what tha…”
Ed Sim: Underwrite tech startups assuming 10x to 14x forward multiples
“So you've got to build your business and your investment strategy and your ownership strategy around looking at a world where we get 10 to 14 for the best companies forward next year's numbers.”
Ed Sim: Top Infrastructure Startups Still Raising Growth Rounds at $250M-$400M Valuations
“There's still pockets Of opportunity where people are going from one to three to four million in the infrastructure space that I see to 10 to 12 kind of on the forecast and they're still raising at two 50 to 400 now.”
Besvinick: Boldstart is the top pre-seed firm to back as an LP
“I'd go with bold start. I think Ed and Elliot are phenomenal investors. They like me are very disciplined on how they get involved and what they invest in.”
BoldStart Ventures strictly keeps seed valuation caps below $10M
“We'll just say sub 10, and it could range from much lower to, you know, upper, up on the upper range. It depends on who the founders are, what their background is, and, you know, and how much they're raising.”
Sim: Boldstart made eight net new investments in 2023 versus three in 2022
“We did eight net new investments last year, and we only did three the prior year with our largest fund yet”
Sim: 55% of Boldstart portfolio companies feature AI offerings today
“Currently in the portfolio of our companies that are running from funds four through six, 55% of our portfolio companies have an AI related offering today.”
Sim: 80% of Boldstart portfolio will offer AI within 12 months
“Within the next 12 months, okay, 80% of the portfolio will have an AI offering.”
Sim: Boldstart Writes $4M-$6M Follow-On Checks for High-Executing Portfolio Companies
“When I start with a three and a half, four million dollar check, I'm writing a four to six million dollar check in the next round if the company's executed.”
Podjarny picks Boldstart Ventures as his top VC fund investment
“I like a bunch of different phases, but bold start would probably be my pick.”
Boldstart Ventures sold four Fund I companies within two years of launch
“We built that portfolio up in 2010, and by 2012, we had sold, ah, I think four of our companies.”
Five of BoldStart's last six investments were repeat entrepreneurs
“We funded, I think the last five or six companies we funded, five of them were repeat entrepreneurs who have built, you know, and scaled companies before”
Ed Sim raised $1M for Boldstart Fund I, making 10 seed investments
“I just took a million dollars in and made 10 investments of about a 100,000 a pop.”
Boldstart Fund I pre-money valuations never exceeded $6M in 2010
“I think in fund one, I don't think we paid higher than a five, Million dollar pre-money for any of our investments. Five or six.”
BoldStart receives 75% of its deal flow from its founder network
“I mean, I think we've tracked that about 75% of our flow comes from founders, whether they be founders that we funded before, you know, their VPs, The engineers that work there, or even, you know, from founders in our existing portfolio who are referring their…”