Emily Melton
Partner, DFJ. On 1 show, 1 appearance. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
She is a Partner at DFJ, focusing on consumer, mobile, healthcare technologies, and marketplaces. Her investments include BetterUp, Livongo, Redfin, and early-stage sourcing in Box and Meebo.
1shows
1appearances
16statements
1resolved
0supported
0contradicted
0%fully supported
5said about them ↓ Everything Emily Melton said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
VCs rely on simplistic thinking by backing YC and Harvard dropouts
“This is where I do think people and in my industry can be simplistic in their thinking. And they, in some ways it's like being safe. No one's going to look at you funny for investing in a company. That's a young guy out of YC with a hoodie that dropped out of …”
No substantial business was ever built as an analogy to another
“No wonderful business, no substantial business was built because it was an analogy off of something else.”
Judging all startups by outlier growth forces premature capital risk
“I think that some of the trajectory of some of these amazing companies, which are truly outliers, that have had this, you know, up and to the right success, has forced all companies to be, you know, judged by that same curve, and that's not the way that, that …”
DFJ succeeded in Tesla and SpaceX by staging early capital
“And that's why, you know, we were able to be successful with entities like Tesla or SpaceX. Companies that most people would find as not working well for venture, but the way that we thought about it and how we, you know, got involved in the companies at early…”
Early-stage VCs must evaluate upside potential over downside protection
“What you really want to think through, it's not the downside scenarios, because we're investing early, and we're not writing large, large What we really need to understand and what we're evaluating new opportunities is how much could this be worth if everythin…”
The rise of celebrity VCs and personal branding is disturbing
“One of the things I have found a little bit disturbing is this rise of kind of the celebrity investors or all of this need to do personal branding, particularly for venture capitalists early on in their career, because I think what really demonstrates if we're…”
Vulnerability and honesty about challenges are critical for long-term success
“I view showing what you're excited about and what you're scared about and your weaknesses allows you to build authentic relationships. And I think a lot of people, both on the VC side and on the entrepreneurship side, what they're always constantly having to s…”
VC career trajectories mirror the Gartner hype cycle
“You go through a process as a VC, which is, you know, it's almost like the Gartner hype cycle, right? Everything is great, and then you go through the trough of disillusionment where you hate everything, right?”
DFJ made three search engine investments before Google was even funded
“DFJ had already made three investments in search companies prior to Google even being funded. One of those was GoTo, which ended up was Overture, which was acquired by Yahoo, which was, at the time, viewed as an amazing success.”
Conflating investment fads with pattern recognition causes venture capital failures
“And where you get into a lot of trouble is where you conflate a fad with pattern recognition.”
The next breakout tech giant will not resemble past winners
“What I know for sure is that whatever the next big business is that is going to be built, it doesn't necessarily mean that it's going to look like the last, you know, big company that's these five year cycles. Like there's always some new entity that emerges t…”
Building an early-stage startup is statistically irrational
“What you have to recognize is building a company, an early-stage company, is insanely risky. It is It's extremely challenging. You know, statistically, this is not something that a rational person wants to do. You, there are a lot of easier ways to go and make…”
Founder motivation determines whether a startup survives hardship or gives up
“I think you need to really spend that time to delve down and understand what is motivating them, because that's what's going to actually mean the difference between success and failure. Because there's going to be so many times in the course of a company where…”
Learning from failure predicts founder success better than early perfection
“Tell me everything that's gone wrong and what you've learned from that and how you changed, because that's going to be, that's, I think, a more important indicator of long-term success than just getting all the things right.”
Tim Draper hired Emily Melton at DFJ after a 10-minute interview
“I actually emailed a number of VCs. There were investors in a couple of the companies that I was thinking about joining, and one of those was Tim Draper, and he agreed to meet me, and I walked into a meeting. He was late, too, and I was extremely nervous. I ha…”
VC transformed from small partnerships into corporate financial services
“Subsequently, the industry has become a lot more professionalized, so you see a lot of associates and analysts, and, you know, people have hired up, and it becomes much more like a traditional financial services firm, but at the time, it was still, you know, l…”
The other half of the tape: Emily Melton's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 5 times in 3 episodes across the shows. every mention, with the transcript →
Who brings them up most Akshay Kothari 3Harry Stebbings 2
Every mention by year
tap a year for its mentions
20VC 5
2024 3 mentions in 1 episode
2017 2 mentions in 2 episodes 1 per episode
- 20VC: Elad Gil on Becoming One of Silicon Valleys Top Angels, Why Most People Get Market Sizing Wrong & Should VC Services Always Be Bundled Together?
- 20VC: DFJ's Josh Stein on Why VCs Must Adapt To Their Founders, The Major Transition Points For Aaron Levie @ Box & Why SaaS Startups Are Growing At A Rate Never Seen Before
- every mention in 2017, scene by scene →
One line per show, most statements first. The link opens Emily's full record on that show: the calibration, argument clarity, speaking style and every statement made there.
| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20VCLEDGER | Partner, DFJ | 1 | 16 | 0% 0/1 | full record on 20VC → |