Mar 19, 2025 · 27m · tbpn
"I Partner with People" - Chad Byers talks about Venture, Fitness, and Being a Chad.
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
Susa Ventures partner Chad Byers announces the launch of Fund V and discusses his boutique, people-first venture capital philosophy amidst the current AI frenzy. Across the interview, Chad shares foundational sourcing stories from Robinhood and Flexport, warns against market FOMO, and reflects on his intense athletic lifestyle.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. The hosts hold 24.6% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
The hosts as informed peer 4.4 Guest teaching 4.3 Guest disagreement 1.4 The hosts pushing back 1.1
speaking balance: gold is the hosts, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 23:00 Dismissal of market size diligence
Chad decisively rejects John's premise of researching market size, arguing that doing top-down TAM diligence at the seed stage is fundamentally misguided.
Hardest push from the hosts ▶ 16:45 Questioning American Dynamism multiplesJordi challenges the prevailing hype around hardware and manufacturing re-industrialization by pointing out that traditional EBITDA multiples often fail to fit venture return profiles.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 5:40 Buffet vs Michelin star venture modelChad delivers an insightful analogy contrasting multi-stage 'buffet' venture capital firms with disciplined, specialized seed funds.
The host holds their own ▶ 0:10 Nominative determinism data dropJordi demonstrates domain knowledge and statistical research by reciting the chronological birth rank history of the name Chad from 1945 to today.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | The hosts as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | The hosts pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Origins of the Chad Moniker and Nominative Determinism | 5 | 2 | 1 | 1 | Jordi opens the episode demonstrating research and niche trivia regarding the historical popularity and determinism of the name Chad. The atmosphere is lighthearted and banter-driven as Chad leans into the meme. | |
| Announcing Susa Ventures V and Returning to Seed Roots | 4 | 5 | 1 | 1 | Chad announces Susa Ventures V and explains the firm's history from pass-the-hat beginnings to avoiding 'buffet venture capital'. The hosts act as receptive interviewers facilitating the announcement. | |
| People-First Investing and Evolving Capital Efficiency | 5 | 5 | 1 | 1 | The hosts ask sharp industry questions about pro rata rights, capital efficiency, and structural dilution. Chad explains how pricing and round structures in venture capital remain inefficient compared to public markets. | |
| Navigating AI Market Frenzy and Managing Venture FOMO | 4 | 4 | 2 | 1 | Jordi prompts Chad on dealing with AI hype and FOMO. Chad strongly criticizes the current bubble valuations and compares the atmosphere to the 2021 market downturn. | |
| Flexport Sourcing Lore and Portfolio Spotlight on Chapter | 4 | 5 | 1 | 1 | John inquires into the Flexport origin story, prompting Chad to share his experience committing to the deal in a 24-minute call before spotlighting Chapter's board pedigree. | |
| American Dynamism, Manufacturing, and Susa V Investments | 6 | 5 | 1 | 2 | Jordi offers a thoughtful critique on whether manufacturing and robotics companies yield venture-scale returns versus traditional EBITDA multiples. Chad agrees with the premise and clarifies Susa's software and supply chain focus. | |
| Rise of Solo Founders, Venture Diligence, and Susa's Name | 4 | 6 | 3 | 1 | When John asks about using AI to research market size, Chad bluntly dismisses doing market sizing diligence at the seed stage as fundamentally flawed work, before recounting the gorilla naming lore of Susa. | |
| Fitness Regimen, SF Dating Shoutout, and Show Conclusion | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 | The conversation closes with casual banter about Chad's upcoming athletic goals and a matchmaking shoutout for an SF bachelorette. |
Statements from this episode (15)
Byers: Susa Ventures launches $175M Fund V for pre-seed and seed
“Fifth fund, hundred and seventy-five million, and it's a return to what we did at the very start. So only pre-seed and seed.”
Byers: Susa Ventures launched in 2013 with $25M from 75 individual LPs
“20 13 started with twenty five million it was kind of a pass the hat type fund no institutions all individuals family offices 75 lps like horrific to manage wouldn't recommend that to literally anyone”
Byers: Early success leads venture capital firms into destructive feature creep
“I think there's this
General thing in venture, but it's true of the whole world, right?
You get a little bit of success, start to think you're, you know, you're onto something, and then you get feature creep.
And so feature creep in venture is like, oh, maybe …”
Byers: Susa Ventures resisted pivoting entirely to crypto or AI
“We have. Yet to go all in on something, but that is not to say we haven't had a risk of potentially falling into that a hundred times in the last decade. We talked about going all in on crypto. We talked about going all in on AI.”
Byers: Early stage will be the last entrenched Alamo of venture
“In a world where companies are more efficient, early stage is really like the place to, Do this business. It'll be the last entrenched Alamo of venture.”
Byers: 2021 venture capital vintage will be historically poor
“Like that vintage is going to be historically shitty.”
Byers: $70M pre-product seed rounds will be a huge waste of capital
“There's seed rounds at 70 with nothing and like four 19 year olds. Like this is insane. And because Ventures Power Law, that individual deal can make sense if it's the right one. But as an industry, it's going to be a huge waste of capital.”
Byers: Flexport is the only deal Susa ever committed to on a phone call
“We committed to Ryan on the phone. It's the only time we've ever done that in SUSE history. We committed to the deal on the phone call.”
Byers: Vivek Ramaswamy co-founded Chapter; Vance and Thiel on board
“Up until two years ago, Kobe had a very interesting board and a very interesting co-founder. So his co-founder was Vivek. And his board was JD and Peter Thiel.”
Byers: AI will spark a Cambrian explosion of non-venture-scale SMBs
“There's going to be this Cameron explosion of. Like micro S and B and midsize company creation that AI enables that maybe shouldn't be venture backed”
Byers: Susa quietly began deploying Fund V in December, completing four deals
“We soft secretly started writing checks out of it in December. So we're actually four in, which is a little hot for us.”
Byers: Each Susa Ventures partner only completes two to three deals annually
“We do relatively low volume. Each partner will only do two or three deal of the year.”
Byers: Apple will face innovator's dilemma against personal AI copilot startups
“We think the apples and others are going to have a little bit of innovators dilemma on this stuff.”