Justin Fishner-Wolfson, Managing Partner at 137 Ventures, explains why 137 concentrated on SpaceX rather than diversifying across the space sector.
Assertion Supported
Fishner-Wolfson claims OpenAI and Anthropic have confidentially filed S-1s
“SpaceX is the big one to kind of start this, but, I mean, as you mentioned, like, OpenAI and Anthropic are both valid. They're S-one's confidentially, so it's gonna be a pretty interesting, you know, few quarters in the public markets.”
Assertion Supported
Facebook's early secondary policy inadvertently caused employees to quit to sell stock
“Facebook got big, and it turned out that the company kind of couldn't buy all their shares that were, that people were selling, because the dollar amount just got so big, and the volume got so high, and they basically started telling people, like, if you sell …”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Fishner-Wolfson notes SpaceX's launch business has been profitable for years
“Well, I mean, they were, I mean, they were profitable for a very long time, and the launch business was, I mean, they were doing things that no one in the industry had accomplished, right?”
Assertion Supported
Fishner-Wolfson says SpaceX equity creates life-changing wealth for shop-floor workers
“They've really shared equity across the entire company, which is incredible. And to your point, they have lots of people on the shop floor who literally make all of the stuff that matters. So the fact that this is life changing for so many people, I really thi…”
Insight
Fishner-Wolfson argues VC debates over ownership percentage targets are distracting
“Getting to an argument about ownership percentage is like sort of distracting.”
Disclosure
137 Ventures has invested in SpaceX roughly two dozen times
“When we started OneThirtySet Ventures, we continued to invest really many times over the last 16 years. So, I don't actually know what the total count is, but we're, we've probably made two dozen investments in the company since we started the firm.”