StarZero All shows Try the podcast clipper →

Founders Fund

also referred to as: ff

27 statements across 11 episodes · 15 bullish · 5 bearish · 9 people on the record · first statement Mar 8, 2024 by David Weisburd · said 128 times in 33 episodes since 2024 · across every show →

Mentions by year

brought up most by Molly O'Shea (60), Delian Asparouhov (9), Brian Singerman (9), Cyan Banister (8), Chris Power (7), Leigh Marie Braswell (5), Kyle Harrison (4), Trae Stephens (3)

tap a year for its mentions
002585015202420252026episodesmentions
0815202420252026episodes it came up in
002.57.5515202420252026episodesmentions per episode
2026 50 mentions in 11 episodes 5 per episode
2025 33 mentions in 12 episodes 3 per episode
2024 45 mentions in 10 episodes 5 per episode

every mention, scene by scene, with the transcript →

Everything said about Founders Fund, oldest first

Mar 8, 2024 positive
Assertion Supported
Weisburd: Founders Fund invests up to 25% of a fund in single positions
“He puts in every fund founders fund, I think puts up to 25%. Somebody could correct me, but up to 25%, a single position, they've done that with SpaceX, Airbnb, all these, you know, iconic companies.”
David Weisburd Mar 8, 2024 ▶ 14:31 David Weisburd, 10X Capital: Finding Alpha and LP Bias · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Mar 15, 2024
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Thiel told Founders Fund to halt investing for six months during COVID
“COVID hits, you know, Peter at Founders Fund basically tells us, you know, go on a six month vacation. We're not going to be deploying any capital.”
Delian Asparouhov Mar 15, 2024 ▶ 6:24 Varda's Landing, Peter Thiel, & the Future of El Segundo, Delian Asparouhov, Founders Fund · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Mar 15, 2024 bearish
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Aerospace venture opportunity window may be closed for five to seven years
“There's a world now where we don't necessarily invest in aerospace for another, you know, sort of 10 years. And so, you know, sometimes, you know, some of these movements, I think, you know, can sometimes be a bit mistimed where, you know, I think the, you kno…”
Delian Asparouhov Mar 15, 2024 ▶ 43:21 Varda's Landing, Peter Thiel, & the Future of El Segundo, Delian Asparouhov, Founders Fund · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Mar 15, 2024 negative
Disclosure
Asparouhov: Founders Fund actively discourages startup incubations
“Where, if that's to say we encourage incubations or anything, if anything, we, like, actively discourage them, because, you know, typically you should just stick to investing.”
Delian Asparouhov Mar 15, 2024 ▶ 30:27 Varda's Landing, Peter Thiel, & the Future of El Segundo, Delian Asparouhov, Founders Fund · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Mar 15, 2024 positive
Insight
Asparouhov: Khosla excels at investor training; Founders Fund enables autonomous execution
“KV is a really great place to, you know, sort of learn you know, venture in that you just get so much, you know, sort of exposure to the team because of those eight hour line partner meetings, there's very rigorous discussions, a memo writing culture, usually …”
Delian Asparouhov Mar 15, 2024 ▶ 36:13 Varda's Landing, Peter Thiel, & the Future of El Segundo, Delian Asparouhov, Founders Fund · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Mar 29, 2024 positive
Opinion
Power: Defense tech ecosystem would not exist without Founders Fund and a16z
“Without founders fund Andreessen, like leading that charge from a narrative and capital perspective, the ecosystem just simply wouldn't be here.”
Chris Power Mar 29, 2024 ▶ 32:22 Get Tesla Big | Chris Power, Hadrian · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Jul 24, 2024 negative
Insight
Coogan: Category-specific VC funds launch too late after power law winners emerge
“Trey Stevens partner at Founders Fund and co-founder Vanderell just posted this good essay in Pirate Wires about how, like by the time that there's a market trend that you can like build a VC fund around, like it might be too late because the power law company…”
John Coogan Jul 24, 2024 ▶ 56:00 John Coogan, EIR at Founders Fund, Founder of Soylent & Lucy · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Jul 24, 2024 neutral
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Founders Fund operates autonomously with few people running their own companies
“It's a really, really tight knit firm. It was like 30, 40 people and everyone's kind of off doing whatever they want. A lot of people run companies.”
John Coogan Jul 24, 2024 ▶ 2:59 John Coogan, EIR at Founders Fund, Founder of Soylent & Lucy · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Mar 28, 2025 positive
Disclosure
Ramp and Sword Health drive virtually all of Asparouhov's venture capital returns
“Basically, you know, ramp plus sword drive everything and, you know, the rest of everything that I've worked on is effectively a rounding error in comparison.”
Delian Asparouhov Mar 28, 2025 ▶ 40:38 Inside Varda’s Space Factory | Delian Asparouhov, Founders Fund & Varda · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Mar 28, 2025 neutral
Disclosure
Asparouhov: Led Sword Health Series A at $5M on $25M post-money
“Originally led the Series A from Coastal Ventures, five on 25 post and then doubled down and joined the board, and then doubled down from Founders Fund when I shifted over to there.”
Delian Asparouhov Mar 28, 2025 ▶ 48:42 Inside Varda’s Space Factory | Delian Asparouhov, Founders Fund & Varda · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Mar 28, 2025 bearish
Prediction Not checkable as stated
The defense tech market will support only one or two next-generation primes
“There's not going to be, like, five Andrels. Like, there's probably going to be an Andrel. There may be, like, a number two. That's probably about it, you know, in that sphere of, like, next generation Defense Prime.”
Delian Asparouhov Mar 28, 2025 ▶ 29:38 Inside Varda’s Space Factory | Delian Asparouhov, Founders Fund & Varda · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Mar 28, 2025
Disclosure
Asparouhov: Goal is to meet only 30 founders annually
“My goal is ideally only meet with, you know, 30 founders per year, but make sure that one of those 30 is that, you know, sort of .1%, you know, sort of founder.”
Delian Asparouhov Mar 28, 2025 ▶ 51:45 Inside Varda’s Space Factory | Delian Asparouhov, Founders Fund & Varda · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Mar 28, 2025 bullish
Disclosure
Asparouhov: Founders Fund Wrote $100M+ Follow-On Checks into Ramp
“With ramp, we've doubled down with a hundred and plus million dollar checks.”
Delian Asparouhov Mar 28, 2025 ▶ 42:45 Inside Varda’s Space Factory | Delian Asparouhov, Founders Fund & Varda · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Jul 18, 2025 bullish
Disclosure
Power: Hadrian raises $260M in equity and factory financing
“We just raised another two hundred sixty million dollars equity and factory financing. So Founders Fund and Lux led the round. So a hundred and ten million in new equity dollars as well as new investors like Altimeter.”
Chris Power Jul 18, 2025 ▶ 1:02 Inside Hadrian's $260M Series C to Advance Manufacturing in America · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Dec 18, 2025 positive
Insight
Stephens: Heavy portfolio concentration drives superior venture fund returns
“Concentration and venture is a really important one. This is like the idea that you don't want to have a thousand investments in a billion dollar fund. You want to have like a massive amount of concentration in the top few positions in that fund. That's someth…”
Trae Stephens Dec 18, 2025 ▶ 30:32 Trae Stephens on Anduril’s Origin, Peter Thiel, & Palantir DNA · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Dec 18, 2025 bullish
Disclosure
Stephens: Founders Fund holds a large position in Cognition
“Cognition, the AI coding company is a large position for us.”
Trae Stephens Dec 18, 2025 ▶ 28:56 Trae Stephens on Anduril’s Origin, Peter Thiel, & Palantir DNA · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Dec 18, 2025 positive
Disclosure
Stephens: Founders Fund Culture Supports Partners Co-Founding Companies
“We have no build program, there's no incubation policy or anything like that at Founders Fund, but, you know, Peter started Palantir. I started Anderil. Scott Nolan started General Matter. Delia and Esperohov started Varda, and it's just kind of part of the cu…”
Trae Stephens Dec 18, 2025 ▶ 27:45 Trae Stephens on Anduril’s Origin, Peter Thiel, & Palantir DNA · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Jun 11, 2026 positive
Opinion
Singerman calls Peter Thiel the best global macro thinker he knows
“Peter's usually pretty right on the macro things at the end of the day. Timing, timing does come into this stuff, and he's not always exactly right on timing, but at the end of the day, he's pretty good at being correct on, especially on, on macro Global macro…”
Brian Singerman Jun 11, 2026 ▶ 14:17 Brian Singerman: "If SpaceX Didn't Work, Founders Fund Wouldn't Exist" · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Jun 11, 2026
Disclosure
Singerman never read a financial report during his venture capital career
“I didn't read a financial report ever. I still don't know how to read financial reports, right? The one time I ever had to do a spreadsheet, my wife had to do it for me, right?”
Brian Singerman Jun 11, 2026 ▶ 12:14 Brian Singerman: "If SpaceX Didn't Work, Founders Fund Wouldn't Exist" · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Jun 11, 2026 positive
What-if
Singerman admits Founders Fund would not exist if SpaceX had failed
“If SpaceX didn't work, Founders Fund would not exist. Like, we bet our careers, essentially, on SpaceX”
Brian Singerman Jun 11, 2026 ▶ 23:38 Brian Singerman: "If SpaceX Didn't Work, Founders Fund Wouldn't Exist" · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Jun 11, 2026 positive
Opinion
Singerman calls Peter Thiel the greatest venture capitalist in history
“There's a reason why Peter Thiel is the greatest venture capitalist in history, right?”
Brian Singerman Jun 11, 2026 ▶ 8:37 Brian Singerman: "If SpaceX Didn't Work, Founders Fund Wouldn't Exist" · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Jun 11, 2026 negative
Insight
Singerman argues venture capital should ignore portfolio management and reserve calculations
“Venture capital to me has put the most money into the best companies possible at the best price possible. Nowhere in that is like portfolio management and reserve calculations and ownership percentages and all that nonsense.”
Brian Singerman Jun 11, 2026 ▶ 21:34 Brian Singerman: "If SpaceX Didn't Work, Founders Fund Wouldn't Exist" · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Jun 11, 2026 bullish
Assertion Not publicly verifiable
Singerman reveals Founders Fund invested over 30% of a fund into Palantir
“You know, we put a lot of money into it. I think we put like 30 something percent of.”
Brian Singerman Jun 11, 2026 ▶ 29:46 Brian Singerman: "If SpaceX Didn't Work, Founders Fund Wouldn't Exist" · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Jun 11, 2026
Disclosure
Singerman backs emerging managers only if they could beat him
“What I'm actually looking for is, hey, is there some chance this person could have beaten me in my prime? Right, as a game, like playing their game. Their game is not going to be the same as mine. You're not going to beat me at my game, but playing their game,…”
Brian Singerman Jun 11, 2026 ▶ 33:56 Brian Singerman: "If SpaceX Didn't Work, Founders Fund Wouldn't Exist" · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Jun 14, 2026 neutral
Assertion Supported
Fishner-Wolfson: Founders Fund was SpaceX's first outside institutional investor
“Back at Founders Fund, we did the deal in, in, in, in that was sort of the beginning because at that point, Elon had mostly funded it himself. And we were really the first outside institutional capital.”
Justin Fishner Wolfson Jun 14, 2026 ▶ 2:18 SpaceX IPO: Inside the Firm That Owns 1% · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Jul 10, 2026 positive
Opinion
Banister: Peter Thiel is exceptionally tolerant, open-minded, and widely misunderstood
“I've never met anyone more tolerant, more open-minded. He gets such a bad rep for a lot of things, but he's just probably one of the most poorly understood people.”
Cyan Banister Jul 10, 2026 ▶ 1:20:15 "Dig Through Your Couches. SpaceX Needs It." Cyan Banister on Luke Nosek's Pitch · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Jul 15, 2026 positive
Disclosure
Senra Systems Closes $65M Series B Led by Lowercarbon and Interlagos
“Senra Systems officially closed our Series B fundraising for sixty-five million dollars. We had Lower Carbon, Interlagos leading the round with a lot of our existing investors coming into the mix, such as Sequoia, Founders Fund, General Catalyst Andreessen Hor…”
Jordan Black Jul 15, 2026 ▶ 1:10 Senra Systems' $65M Series B: Fixing Aerospace & Defense's Biggest Bottleneck · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea
Made with StarZero

Turn any episode into a week of clips.

This entire site, over 160 episodes transcribed, diarized, checked and made playable, runs on the StarZero media pipeline. Drop in your own episode and the podcast clipper finds the moments worth sharing, cuts them, captions them, and reframes them for every feed.

Try the podcast clipper Learn more