Sequoia refused to raise a mulligan fund after the dot-com crash
David Rosenthal · 10 Years of Acquired (with Michael Lewis) · Acquired · Dec 15, 2025 · at 46:01
David Rosenthal discusses venture capital history and recounts Doug Leone's description of Sequoia Capital's reaction after the dot-com crash.
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“We interviewed Doug Leone who was, you know, one of the, I guess, two stewards ago of Sequoia, and he told us that after the dot-com crash for the Sequoia fund that was the dot-com bubble fund, every other venture firm out there, after the bubble popped, were taking mulligan funds. They went to their LPs and they said, you know, there's nothing we can do on this one. We're going to be more disciplined next time. And we said, absolutely not. We will never lose money for our investors ever. We will do everything we can possibly do to make this fund in the black. And he said the best, I think the best line anyone's ever said on acquired, he said, we looked at each other and you could burn cigarettes on our arms and we wouldn't flinch. And they spent the next like five years, they didn't raise another fund. And they just like, went to work with the portfolio.”
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