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 13 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
Tunguz: SaaS survey shows AI has no impact on ARR growth
“AI today has no impact on conversion rate, has no impact on ARR growth, even though people who buy AI perceive it as a meaningful contributor to their overall efficiency gains.”
Tunguz: AI buying barrier shifted from security to ROI
“Six months ago, we were asking them, what is the number one prohibition, the thing that inhibits you from buying AI? Six months ago, the answer was security. Today it's ROI. People are struggling to find exactly the value that AI systems are building.”
Tunguz: Pricing model drives statistically significant performance differences in software
“There's actually a statistically significant difference in the underlying performance of these businesses as a function of their pricing model, irrespective of the layer in the stack.”
Tunguz: Hybrid seat-and-usage pricing yields 3x net dollar retention growth
“If you're using a combination pricing model, in other words, seats plus usage, three X the growth in that dollar retention as somebody who's using any other form of pricing.”
Tunguz: Portfolio startup keeping engineering headcount flat using AI IDEs
“We have one company growing really fast. Engineering headcount year over year will be flat. Because they deploy some AI enabled ID and they can write a lot more software.”
Tunguz: Software burn rate dropped from $5 to $3 per ARR dollar
“During the twenty-twenty era, most companies were burning five dollars for every new dollar of bookings. When the capital markets retrenched and the Fed raised rates, 550 basis points. Companies went from burning five dollars for every dollar, marginal dollar …”
Tunguz: Average SaaS company raised sales quotas 14% year-over-year
“So the average respondents company increased quota, 14% year over year, which is higher than inflation.”
Tunguz: Founders are more positive than in 2022 despite longer sales cycles
“In terms of what we've noticed, founders are more positive today than in 2022, despite the fact that sales cycles are about 12% longer.”
Tunguz: LLMs replace 3 to 12 months of SQL training for data analysis
“It's really much easier for someone who's maybe not be as sophisticated with SQL to suddenly start asking and answering questions of their data in ways that would have taken them three, six, 12 months to learn beforehand.”
Tunguz: Theory Ventures produced its first investment memo summary using an LLM
“We record the conversation so we don't have to ask them to repeat, and we're starting to save all that information, produce LLMs on top that summarize diligence, and we produced our first investment memo summary from an LLM.”
Tunguz: Theory Ventures raised closer to $700M across two funds in 14 months
“A little less than that. Closer to 700, but.”
Tunguz: Customer acquisition payback periods increased 12% on average
“We've seen payback here has increased about 12% on average. This is basically linear. It's in line with the increase in sales cycles.”
Tunguz: Top third of SaaS companies saw 40% lead conversion increase
“And then the 70, the second standard, the first standard deviation now, which is that line on the right is actually a 40% increase. In sales qualified conversion. So that means the top third of all businesses actually saw a 40% increase in lead conversion.”