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 10 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 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
VCs relying on gut instinct miss breakout companies like FanDuel
“If you're not looking at the spreadsheet and only looking at kind of these softer, subjective, gut-oriented factors, you're going to miss FanDuel. You're going to miss Namely. You're going to miss Ipsy. You're going to miss some of the absolute best performing…”
Targeting older incubator cohorts yields superior venture deal flow
“What if we said, let's go look at not what the cool kids are in YC's graduating class, but let's go look at those companies that have great metrics from three classes ago that nobody's paying attention to. You know, we sat down with some of the incubators, for…”
18 to 24 months is optimal startup runway; 36 breeds complacency
“And so I think 24 months is about the most I'd ever advise a startup company taking in an early stage. I think 36 is too much. But you know what? 12 is probably too little now, given that the depths of the crunch is as bad as it is.”
Fewer than 10% of new VC funds have unique strategies
“I would say no more than 25 of them have a truly different strategy other than I'm better in this category. I'm better in this geography than these other people. And so it's crazy to me that less than 10% of all of the newly created funds have a different stra…”
Bullpen Capital ignores founder pedigree and screens purely on metrics
“We ignore a lot of that stuff at the front of the screen and just look at the numbers. And what it allows us to do is it allows us to spot a lot of things other people are just missing. Categories, founding teams, and geographies that nobody's paying attention…”
Bullpen Capital averages a 20% valuation step-up over prior seed rounds
“We're now 54 deals in across three funds, and on average, the valuation we pay is about 20% higher than the post money of the round in front of us. This is a very interesting statistic, and by the way, let me give you the variance. Our rounds are between flat …”
Starcity took a lower valuation offer from Bullpen Capital over bigger VCs
“We took on the folks from Eric Weizen from Bullpen Capital, and I'm just a huge fan of Bullpen Capital and what Paul has built over there. Their offer was a little bit lower, and they were sort of very transparent”
Target sectors that were popular two years ago but are now ignored
“But the way I find my new favorite one is what was cool two years ago that's out of favor now, that's what I'm going to be looking at.”