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 17 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
Agarwal: EQ will separate top VC firms over the next decade
“I do think it's what's going to separate the best firms in the next decades to come. I think IQ, if you want to call it, just Being smart, understanding industries. I do believe that's table stakes in a lot of ways. There's a lot of smart people around. A lot …”
Agarwal: True's Best Investments Spark Dissension and Maximize Initial Risk
“There's some dissension in the room, and those are the best investments that tend to go forward, and that, that we make, at least on that first check. We're trying to, as I said before, really maximize risk on that first check.”
Agarwal: 40% to 50% of True Ventures investments will fail
“We are very open about the fact that 40 to 50% of the companies we invest in will probably lose or go to zero.”
True Ventures Operates Without Consensus or Individual Deal Attribution
“So we don't have a consensus driven approach. We actually encourage dissension and we want dissension. We don't have attribution.”
Agarwal: Venture capital is becoming risk averse by shifting later stage
“I think one of the challenges that we have in the venture industry is we don't take enough risk. It's becoming a little more risk averse because just people are inherently moving more later stage, which means you in fact, just look at more spreadsheets and num…”
True Ventures let founder keep $5M investment following cancer diagnosis
“There was a company and I've been a little bit open about this, but there was a company that we put five million dollars into the company on the day of wiring. The CEO called me and said that he was diagnosed with colon cancer. And that he didn't have a long t…”
Agarwal: VC board members can and should be true friends with founders
“No, I do think they can. I know there's colleagues of mine who vehemently disagree with me on that, but I do think you can be friends. I mean, if you unpack what friendship means, it means respect. It means love for another individual. It also means honesty an…”
Agarwal: Spending time mainly with winning portfolio companies is flawed advice
“Some of the time allocation statements that people make about, Hey, you need to spend more time with the winners are maybe a little bit off base because maybe you actually don't need to spend as much time because they're doing just fine.”
Agarwal: Warranties generate 2% of Best Buy's revenue but 60% of profits
“Best Buy charges, gets two percent of its revenue from the warranties it sells against its electronics, but it's 60% of its profit.”
Agarwal: Venture investors without portfolio failures are taking insufficient risk
“If you're not pushing the envelope, and you're not failing, you're probably not doing it right.”
Agarwal: True Ventures targets 20% ownership with $1M–$3M initial checks
“So when we make that one to three million initial check, we target around 20% ownership, and we have a big enough fund, so our latest fund's around three hundred fifty million, and we have an opportunity fund, which is about two hundred eighty million. That's …”
Agarwal: Maximizing risk is the third bullet in True Ventures' LP deck
“Maximizing risk is such a core tenant tenet to what we do. It was the third bullet point on the first page of our investment deck that we've been pitching to LPs”
Mayfield Completed Around 50 Deals in 1999
“So when I got there in 99, you know, Mayfield had done, I believe they had done 50 deals in 99, you know, one deal a week.”
Dot-Com Era Companies Went Public With Sub-$10M Revenue at $1B+ Valuations
“I mean, companies were going public at that time with sub-ten million in revenue at billion-dollar market caps.”
Agarwal: True Ventures' initial checks are around $2M
“For example, we invest a very small portion of our fund to begin with. It's, you know, two million bucks, for example, maybe that's one half or one percent of the fund.”
Agarwal: True Ventures makes 45 to 50 investments per fund
“We do about 45 to 50 investments per fund. That tends to be around the right number. It's higher than what you typically see in some of the later stage funds, obviously. But we think, you know, having, it's sort of the right number for us in terms of failure r…”