Celebrating a Near‑Miss Investment in Interface’s Vision
Congrats to Thomas Lee Young , Aaryan Mehta , and the whole Interface team on today's announcement! This is an investment that almost didn't happen - thankfully, a friend nudged me to meet with them before the round closed. I've really enjoyed working with this team and I am very excited about what they are building.
AI Investment Drives Half of GDP Growth, Reversal Risks Recession
According to today’s WSJ, AI-related investment accounts for half of GDP growth. A reversal would risk recession. We can’t afford to go backwards.
Forge Slowly, Thrive as AI Automates Speed
“Move Fast and Break Things” vs “Move Slow and Forge Things” “Move fast and break things” was a something we invented at Facebook to get a bunch of entitled Ivy League kids to grind for us. It worked. Then, all of...
Allocate 10% to a 30x Winner for 3x Fund
How do you create a 3x venture fund? For a smaller fund, in theory there are many ways, but most likely is: 1️⃣ Put 10% of your fund into your very best investment 2️⃣ It does 30x = 3x the whole...
Model Prices Expected Near Zero, Margins Become Irrelevant
" The margins are the least thing that I'm worried about. We're taking into consideration that the prices of models will go down to zero." @MS_BASE44 How do you think about model costs over time? Right to assume close to zero? @destraynor...
Spotlight on USV’s Star Entrepreneur and Portfolio Success
Great read about a fantastic entrepreneur and @usv portfolio company (also featuring @BradUSV)
Success No Longer Dependent on Silicon Valley Location
6. Why Base44 Is Helped & Not Hurt by Not Being in Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is no longer mandatory for building important companies or accessing opportunity. The war on talent is tough in Silicon Valley: If you don’t have deep pockets,...
Base44 Lets Anyone Build Products, Outpacing Cursor
5. How Does Base44 Beat Cursor in the End? I started Base44 for non-technical people: no API keys, no Supabase links… As models improve, even developers care less about editing files or seeing code. When you can build whole products inside Base44, most...
Tiny Carry, Massive Payout: VC Economics Explained
That new VC partner on your board? They might have say 5% carry in the fund Let's say you sell for an incredible $500,000,000 after 10 years. WOW! And the fund owns 15% The new partner then makes ... $750,000 $500m x 15% x...
Outdated Travel Policies Force Meetings Away From Tel Aviv
As I mentioned, we had to do our LP meeting in London because many firms' travel policies have not been updated to show how safe Tel Aviv is and we always want to see our partners in person. We appreciate...
Key Investable Themes Highlighted in Slide
This is a slide I showed last year as well. These are investable themes. /2 https://t.co/Ahu2RPdjuo
Sharing Select Slides: Israel vs UK Insights Unveiled
Every year, at our annual meeting with our LPs, I do a State of the Union. It is pretty wide ranging. It covers Geopolitics, VC, Investment Themes, Opportunities, State of Aleph and more. For years I have debated whether to share...
What It Takes for OpenAI to Reach $500B
A spicy thought experiment: What would OpenAI have to do to hit $500 billion in annual revenue within the next five years? https://t.co/jxxTIIIqgC https://t.co/blAVz6cHUP
AI Lowers Founder Bar, Sparks Career Reinvention
Aileen Lee 's in conversation with Reid Hoffman , Stacy Brown-Philpot , & Van Jones sharing prescient thoughts on how this AI revolution has lowered the bar for founder entry and career re-imagination. #MastersofScale
AI Music SaaS Hits $621K ARR, Profitable
This is the future of music right here. Live on @acquiredotcom: AI music creation SaaS that turns vocals and text into full songs with voice. > 3M+ users > $621K ARR > $559K TTM profit > 80% margins Bootstrapped and profitable. Full listing: https://t.co/Obvm9zKtc6 https://t.co/W1RRxUq9Oj
AI Boom Thrives, Business Models Still Uncertain
Everyone in AI feels the same tension right now, but this piece finally names it clearly. The tech is real. The progress is real. The spending is real. The business models aren’t. Not yet. This is the best breakdown I’ve...
Fresh, Focused AI Memory Beats Massive, Outdated Datasets
I know ‘memory’ is a big deal in AI — what I don’t know is how >much< of it you really need to have a great AI experience. The more I learn about how our own AI Agents work, the...
AI Startups Must Master Unit Economics to Survive
🔥 AI startups are burning cash faster than you think. You see Series A AI companies burning $500K/month on GPUs while showing zero profit margins. More users = more GPU usage = bigger losses. But the survivors won't have the...
Brace for a Major M&A Wave Within Six Months
Here’s why I say we’re going to see a “major M&A moment” in the next six months. There’s a business-friendly administration in the White House. (Everyone knows the President LOVES DEALS… he wrote a book about it.) $GOOG got off...
NVDA‑OpenAI Agreements Are Merely Non‑binding Letters of Intent
We’re reading the fine print on those $NVDA/@OpenAI “deals”… and they’re not EXACTLY deals. It turns out, at least according to Nvidia chief Jensen Huang, either company can essentially walk away at any time, and it’s more of an aspirational...
Purpose‑Driven Founders Outperform Fame‑Seeking Entrepreneurs
This is my single biggest disagreement with YC. Starting a startup to get famous, or to do better than those around you, or for vanity, or yes even just to get rich, is worse for society and worse for founders. It's...
Founder Update Discipline ≠ Success; Execution Drives Results
We had our Precursor Ventures AGM this week in SF, so Mia and I were able to record in person! The first topic we covered was founder update emails, specifically how valuable they are for both founders and investors, especially...
A16z Leads, Top Four Funds Dominate Seed and Series A
Top 10 Most Active Investors at Series A: Out of the 90 mega-funds we looked at, @a16z, @generalcatalyst, @lightspeedvp & @sequoia all remain in the top 5 across both Seed and A - with a16z far outrunning the pack at...
Who’s Driving Seed Deals: Top 10 Active Investors
Top 10 Most Active Investors at Seed: https://t.co/2pB2bbv0yP
Boutique Seed Funds Dominate Sub‑$10M Rounds, Mega‑Funds Rarely Lead
🔹Boutique, dedicated Seed funds continue to lead <60% of priced seed rounds in the sub-$10M range, which account for the gross majority of deals done. 🔹~90% of priced Seed rounds happen below $20M - where dedicated funds maintain a clear advantage. 🔹Nearly...
Megafunds Dominate Series A Rounds Above $20M
🔹The majority of Series A activity now clusters around $20M, but this isn’t where the power dynamics are shaping the market. 🔹At sub-$20M, dedicated A funds lead most rounds, and mega-fund involvement stays below half. 🔹Once rounds cross $20M, the megas come...
Boutique Seed Leaders Thrive Amid Mega‑Fund AI Hype
In Aug, I wrote “Is Venture Broken?” – a data-driven look at whether the growing spread in fund sizes at the early stage was pushing venture to a breaking point. We found that while mega-funds are moving earlier, dedicated-stage, boutique...
Venture Market Thriving: Opportunities for High‑Growth Startups
🧵Is the venture market “healthy”? “The highest order way I think about it is: ‘Is there opportunity?’ Is there opportunity for high impact, high growth, high scale businesses being born right now? And the answer to that is unequivocally yes.” @kirstenagreen,...
Graphite: The Ultimate Test for Any Code
Whether the code is being written by a human, a computer, or a hybrid, the moment of truth is Graphite
Experience Meets Open‑Minded Imagination in Uncharted Era
Great to be on the Library of Minds with @daraladje. 13 yrs into Forerunner, experience is an edge. But open-mindedness is equally critical. This era is about the courage of imagination. Eyes wide open and genuine bravery are needed when...
Venture Capital Enters a New Era Beyond Deals
SEE YOU THERE! Beyond the Deal: The New Era of Venture Capital • Hunter Walk, Homebrew • Samara Mejia Hernandez , Chingona Ventures • Mario Ruiz , Infinity Ventures
Seeking Japan‑focused Founders Ready to Go Global
We're looking for ambitious Japan-focused founders ready to go global. Apply and work with our team
Lux LP Unveils Fresh Insights in New Letter
1/ New Lux LP letter...
Why Homebrew Went Evergreen: Founder‑Driven Funding Shift
"Homebrew → Forever -- why Hunter and Satya moved from an LP-backed seed fund to a self-funded evergreen model—and why they accelerated the shift in 2022." So fortunate to back founders who build companies via Homebrew and founders who build...
Profitable AI SaaS with 50% YoY Growth Listed
Supercool SaaS listing JUST dropped on @acquiredotcom. No-code app for launching secure AI-driven web apps fast. > $300K TTM revenue > $100K TTM profit > 50% YoY growth High-margin, vertical SaaS with real enterprise upside. Listing: https://t.co/BATq3sxB2V https://t.co/BMo7n13wQQ
Cursor’s $30B Valuation Fueled by Explosive Revenue Surge
Why $30BN for Cursor Is A Good Deal: "The pro side is revenue and revenue growth rate. If something's gone from $1-$100M in a year, and then $100M to $1BN this year, with Newton's laws of motion, it is going to $3BN-$4BN...
YC Funds the Underdogs Most, and They Thrive
YC is funny because for everything we get hate for, we fund those and fund of that kind by #'s than anyone else Solos Non-traditional background Anything not B2B SaaS Almost any category, we do the most # of anyone, and the ones we...
AI‑Powered Azure Fuels Predictable Microsoft Growth
Azure drives a meaningful share of Microsoft’s revenue growth. The company reports the specific impact of AI on Azure’s expansion each quarter, and the contribution has grown steadily over the past year. This gives a concrete view into how AI...
Microsoft’s Platform Play: Azure Powers the AI Era
Deep Dive: A Primer on Mag7 (Part 7 - Microsoft) Microsoft has spent fifty years building platforms that sit underneath the modern economy. BASIC made early computers usable. MS DOS and Windows standardized personal computing. Office became the core productivity layer for...
Tech Democratizes Finance: AI, Tokenization, and New Investor Mindsets
Uncapped with @vladtenev, CEO of Robinhood. We talked about the evolution of online brokers, how today's younger generations think about finance, the rise of prediction markets, tokenization of private company stock, and how AI will impact personal finance. Timestamps: (0:00) Intro (00:27) History of...
Tiny Early Funding Can Launch Billion‑dollar Companies
A few that >almost< bootstrapped, i.e. did raise a little but < $10m in primary venture: The Trade Desk, worth $26B Klaviyo worth $9B Veeva, worth $44B Sometimes the most valuable capital is just that smidge early on And you can skip the rest
Tech Funding Boom: VC Surge, Private Giants Thrive
The only podcast you have to listen to every week. No politics. Just tech. - Cursor Raises $2.3BN: Who Wins the Coding War - Peter Thiel and Softbank Sell NVIDIA: Analysed - Why Venture Capital Will Hit $1TRN and the Opening of Retail - Why...
London AI Meetup: 150 Experts Gather for State of AI
t-2 weeks til we're back in london for @airstreet state of ai meetup, ft: - @rosstaylor90 of @genreasoning - @youssef_a_mejj of @synthesiaio and yours truly on @stateofaireport! come hang with 150 ai friends across big tech, ai labs, startups and academia https://t.co/ELPmczmd31
AI Generates Ready-to-Use Antibodies in Weeks
Push button, get antibody therapeutics. The future of AI x Bio is here, folks. Nabla Bio unveiled JAM-2, a model capable of generating de novo, developable, antibodies against extremely hard, novel targets. With no lead optimization! These are zero shot therapeutics...