Tom Hulme
Managing Partner, GV. On 1 show, 2 appearances, plus 1 compilation re-air not counted. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
investorfounderexecutiveoperator@thulme ↗LinkedIn ↗thulme.com ↗
Tom Hulme leads GV's European investing efforts and has led backing in companies including Lemonade, Snyk, Monzo, GoCardless, and Secret Escapes. Before joining GV, he served as a design director at IDEO, where he created OpenIDEO, and built a notable angel portfolio.
1shows
2appearances
83statements
11resolved
9supported
2contradicted
82%fully supported
10said about them ↓ Everything Tom Hulme said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Hulme: Microsoft acquired Inflection primarily for its 12,000 H100 GPU cluster
“I do not believe that Microsoft were buying the Pi model. I think Microsoft are GPU constrained, and we're buying a cluster of 12,000 H-one hundreds.”
Hulme: GV would not invest in OpenAI at a $90B valuation
“I would struggle To make that investment today. No.”
Hulme: 90% of AI foundation model capital will go to zero
“Foundation models, 90%. Application layer, 70%. And in the incumbents, the value going into the incumbents, only 20%.”
Hulme: AGI hype correlates directly with founders' capital fundraising needs
“I think there is a Correlation between how aggressively people predict AGI is coming and how much capital they need to raise. So you've got Emodi from Anthropic, you've got Altman, OpenAI, Musk, XAI, all of these guys are saying that it's just around the corne…”
Hulme: Ending non-dom status drives top UK angel investors abroad
“If I do say, see the brain drain. I recognize it. And I do see that many of the people I know well that have chosen to leave have left. They were also incredible angel investors. They employed a bunch of people. And so do I think everyone should pay Equal tax.…”
Hulme: Requiring every VC investment to be a fund-returner is flawed
“I think, ah, a lot of VC strategy is a lagging indicator of what did work in the past, and the test, Or the experiment that worked very well in the past is funds with 25 portfolio companies, power law of returns, and one or two return the whole fund, and then …”
Hulme: Generative AI is a sustaining innovation, not internet-scale creative destruction
“I think one of the frustrations with Gen AI, as the technology is commoditizing so quickly, is it's a sustaining innovation. It's actually going to get sprinkled across all businesses to lower costs in call centers or to improve the product in personalization.…”
Hulme: Expecting AI researchers to build profitable businesses is ridiculous
“The idea that they can all go out and create highly profitable, fast moving businesses seems ridiculous.”
Tom Hulme: Distributing VC capital evenly damages talent concentration
“I don't think What we should be doing is necessarily just sort of evenly distributing capital across the whole market. I actually think that's damaging for talent concentration as well. Instead, we should have sophisticated people that say, these are the compa…”
Hulme: Less venture capital will be available in two years
“I actually think there's probably going to be less money in the market for venture in two years than there is today.”
Hulme: High UK energy costs prevent competitive AI model training
“We have the, probably the highest electricity or energy costs in the whole of the Western world. In the UK. That just does not enable you to do a great job of this. It doesn't even enable you to do a great job of training foundation models. Like, if the blende…”
Hulme: AI foundation models are the fastest depreciating assets in human history
“Foundation models can be distilled relatively quickly. When I was on your show last time, I talked about how foundation models were sort of going to be the fastest depreciating assets in human history, like weeks. It's almost days now.”
Hulme: The idea of a one-person billion-dollar company is a myth
“I think I keep hearing people talking about the first one person billion dollar business is already created. I think that's absolutely ridiculous. On the one hand, companies are growing faster and more efficiently than ever. Like bolt.new, forty million dollar…”
Hulme: OpenAI is a consumer company, not a foundation model provider
“So my big one here is that I've changed my mind. I thought OpenAI was a foundation model company. I now think it's a consumer company. So a twelve billion dollar run rate or something.”
Hulme: OpenAI is a good investment at a $12 billion run rate
“I it doesn't mean I think it's the best gen AI investment, but if I was sitting independently, do I think it's a good investment now when your downside is somewhat protected and they're at a twelve billion dollar run rate? Let's say it's a 20 times forward mul…”
Tom Hulme: Generative AI will not cause internet-level creative destruction
“It's actually going to get sprinkled across all businesses to lower costs in call centers or to improve the product in personalization. It's not going to Have a creative destruction effect like the internet did on many industries.”
Hulme: Founders must avoid passive investors who think they are smart
“There are basically three types of investors. You've got smart investors that know they're smart and they're going to add value. Then you've got passive investors that are going to stay passive and they're not going to get in the way. Both of those are absolut…”
Hulme: Second-time founders strongly prefer passive investors over value-add ones
“First time founders are looking for investors that add a lot of value. Those that are second time around understand it, bias, and skew wildly towards the passive.”
Hulme: Founders should accept realistic valuations instead of complex deal structures
“I think actually, if you want to maximize value for the business, you're much better off accepting the valuation That's closer to reality in the moment and building from there.”
Hulme: Premature scaling inflates costs and destroys startup adaptability
“And I think what you're talking about is when the money's used for premature scaling, it's really damaging because costs go up. When your costs go up, ironically, you actually become less adaptable. So your clock speed goes down. So if your primary job in a bu…”
Hulme: Angel investors should refrain from making follow-on investments
“It led me to draw the conclusion as an angel, I shouldn't follow on. So I had examples of companies that would go up sort of 50 X, my pro rata allocation in the next round would be a million dollars plus, and they went to zero.”
Hulme: Asking founders about product is a lens to evaluate thinking
“I spend a lot of time with founders, and I'll ask them a lot about the product they're going to build. I know that that's probably not what they'll end up being successful with. In fact, empirically, the product often changes a lot. But I'm asking about that p…”
Hulme: Being too early in a market equals being wrong
“Being too early is tantamount to being wrong.”
Hulme: Absolute conviction in VC investments is irrational and unrealistic
“I don't understand in our industry how anyone can have complete conviction on anything. That makes no sense to me. Like I studied physics at university. We would go through a proof and I still didn't have complete conviction that I got it right. And then now w…”
The other half of the tape: Tom Hulme's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 10 times in 5 episodes across the shows. every mention, with the transcript →
Who brings them up most Harry Stebbings 10
Every mention by year
tap a year for its mentions
20VC 10
2026 3 mentions in 1 episode
2024 6 mentions in 3 episodes 2 per episode
- Laela Sturdy: Life Inside Alphabet's $7BN Growth Fund | E1190 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Tom Blomfield: Do the Best All Raise Pre-Demo Day & YC's Fundraising Advice to Startups | E 1152 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Guy Podjarny: The Future of AI Software Development - What is Real & What is BS | E1232 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- every mention in 2024, scene by scene →
One line per show, most statements first. The link opens Tom's full record on that show: the calibration, argument clarity, speaking style and every statement made there.
| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20VCLEDGER | Managing Partner, GV | 2 +1 | 83 | 82% 9/11 | full record on 20VC → |