Sean O'Sullivan, founder and managing partner of SOSV, explains the origin of his firm's regional accelerator programs.
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“And so I started China Accelerator, which was the first accelerator program in Asia.”
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More from Sean O'Sullivan
PredictionNot checkable as stated
O'Sullivan: Connected, AI-enabled hardware will replace all physical devices within 20-30 years
“So hardware would need to be cloud connected, would need to have AI built into it, and would need to basically replace all existing physical devices over time. And so that was a megatrend. It would take 2030 years for that to fully play out.”
Sean O'SullivanJan 17, 2022▶ 22:00Sean O'Sullivan – Start-up Development at SOSV, Venture is Eating the Investment World 3 (Capital Allocators, EP.231)
AssertionPartly supported
O'Sullivan: SOSV is world's most active investor in life sciences and hardware
“We're the world's most active investor in life sciences and hardware and also just generally we would rank as
Perhaps the world's third most active seed investor.
And I think we make a top 10 in the world's most active Series A investors as well.”
Sean O'SullivanJan 17, 2022▶ 30:38Sean O'Sullivan – Start-up Development at SOSV, Venture is Eating the Investment World 3 (Capital Allocators, EP.231)
AssertionNot checkable as stated
O'Sullivan: 70% of IndieBio startups raise follow-on rounds vs 30% in software
“I'd say only 70%
Of our companies actually make it past that first stage.
That is the number that we've been getting out of the indie bio program, for example, which is still higher than a lot of the software programs, which are more in the 30% range.”
Sean O'SullivanJan 17, 2022▶ 34:40Sean O'Sullivan – Start-up Development at SOSV, Venture is Eating the Investment World 3 (Capital Allocators, EP.231)
Insight
O'Sullivan: Easier to turn scientists into entrepreneurs than business people into scientists
“I think it's much easier to train a scientist to be an entrepreneur than it is to train a business guy to be a scientist.”
Sean O'SullivanJan 17, 2022▶ 36:33Sean O'Sullivan – Start-up Development at SOSV, Venture is Eating the Investment World 3 (Capital Allocators, EP.231)
AssertionPartly supported
SOSV was the sole VC backer of BitMEX, rivaling NASDAQ's profitability
“We were the only venture company to have backed them, and then they became profitable very quickly after exiting our program. They were as profitable as NASDAQ was for a couple of years in there.”
Sean O'SullivanJan 17, 2022▶ 40:30Sean O'Sullivan – Start-up Development at SOSV, Venture is Eating the Investment World 3 (Capital Allocators, EP.231)
AssertionPartly supported
O'Sullivan: MapInfo invented digital street mapping on computers
“So MapInfo created the industry of street mapping on computers. So if you type an address into a computer, whether it's your smartphone or on your PC, and you see a street map, that's what we invented.”
Sean O'SullivanJan 17, 2022▶ 13:55Sean O'Sullivan – Start-up Development at SOSV, Venture is Eating the Investment World 3 (Capital Allocators, EP.231)
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