Joe Montana Interview Live from Modern Treasury Transfer

0:00Hello acquired listeners. We have a great ACQ2 episode for you today and Interview with the one and only Joe Montana recorded live at modern Treasuries transfer conference Before we dive in if you are in San Francisco September 10th or you are thinking about being in San Francisco September 10th we would love to see you at our chase Center show that we are partnering with our good friends at JP Morgan payments to put together It's gonna be a great night. Mark Zuckerberg is joining us on stage We have a few other surprises up our sleeve and it's gonna be an amazing evening of thousands and thousands of acquired fans Getting together for the first time really at this scale for a night of fun and a live recording So it's acquired .fm slash SF to join David and I and we hope to see you there now onto the interview Joe Montana needs literally no introduction, but as a refresher Joe played college football at Notre Dame leading the team to a national championship He played 16 seasons in the NFL which included leading the 49ers to four Super Bowl victories He was the Super Bowl MVP for three of those He's a member of the pro football Hall of Fame and well there is a deep bench of impressive football stats that we can share We only have 45 ticking down minutes today So Joe has quite the post football career that we're gonna spend most of our time talking about in 2015 Joe founded liquid two ventures a pre -seed and seed investing firm Liquid two has been wildly successful in their six funds that have invested in 800 plus companies their aggregate portfolio value is now well over a hundred billion dollars They invested at the earliest stages and companies like GitLab and Daryl Rippling Rappi Mercury retool and of course modern treasury So we've got a great conversation today from football to investing and everything in between please welcome Joe Montana Our first question.

1:58I think it's fair to say you are like a top point 1 % venture capitalists at this point in time You're obviously also a top point 1 % football player David that's a weird even sale I'm not sure which how many zero But this isn't supposed to happen to do this twice in a lifetime at two very competitive Very difficult professions. What's your secret? How do we do this? I learned a lot of things from Bill Walsh but the one thing I Took the hard as I watched him put together the 49ers is how to build a good team and Right from the start whether it's our advisory board Including guys of people like Ron Conway and Paul Graham Jessica lives then From YC to the founders there and Then just assembling the team it just came to I Looked to we have a large team for the small on the size of our funds Most funds our size are run by one or two people and we have five partners But I just think the diversity behind everyone's background really allows us to invest kind of agnostically across all sectors and As early as we possibly can we try to We try to get in and before Sometimes there's even a really a true idea, but You know, I just think that the guys do a great job and hunting down the deals these days and We we made a lot of good connections and The nice thing about where we invest.

3:40It's not always super competitive we're more of a friendly foe than anything Friendly foe yeah, we don't we don't try to run in and take and lead We don't mind being the second biggest check, you know, nobody likes to say that I can you see a lot of times the two of the big guys will come down and They'll fight over a deal and one wins and then the other one will invest at all We don't really care so what jump in there behind you we're not proud so We've had a lot of success doing it that way and like I said the guys are great at The areas that They specialize kind in I Feel like we're gonna go back to your football career here a little bit to start You you said the phrase we're not proud.

4:29I feel like you built a whole career on not being too proud And I want to go all the way back to your your draft moment everyone knows you were you were far from the first overall pick in the draft And yet, you know four -time Super Bowl champion so Can you take us to that moment where the draft is going on you're deeper and deeper in the draft? What is your psychology in that moment as you're thinking about your football career? Well, it's kind of crazy. You don't really think about it or I didn't really think about it, but the What makes you think about it is that you have teams telling you they're gonna take you in the first round They're gonna take you in the second round otherwise, I was just happy to get a chance to play in the NFL and They put a lot of emphasis on a lot of things.

5:13I think don't always make a Lot of difference, right? I mean if you put 225 pounds on my chest I might still be laying there on that on that back then But they're they're so in the size. I mean if you look at the Look at the combine, right? Have you ever seen a Lyman run a square in a game? I haven't unless you didn't hit too hard But other than that, I mean he run who what do you why you run the square? It's got a block that guy in front of you that's the only need you to do and I just think that they there's just no real method to it that they figured out you can go through the first rounds and see as many first round bus as you can go to the Purdies of the world and and see success stories from way down below and I just I just don't think they have that out, but yeah, I was thinking well, okay Everyone goes first round goes a second round going.

6:13Oh, no, it's gonna get through the third And I'm gonna be a glad I got lucky and got snatched it. I got a great opportunity got with a great team great organization and Lucky to get with Bill Walshson as my first coach and Didn't really want him to be anything other than only have one coach, but that didn't work out Well, we're gonna come back to to Bill Walsh, but to stick with the draft for a minute I've been thinking about this. I mean we're living it again now with with Brock and here in San Francisco, but Why is this so hard? I mean, it's it's one thing it shouldn't have been hard this hard back when you were drafted But now the NFL is the biggest media business in the world.

6:53There's so many billions at stake and How does Brock Purdy get picked last? How did teams get this so wrong? Despite investing so much money so much time so many resources Why is it so hard? Well, if I knew that I could be a team I'd have a startup in reference for the NFL, but They just sometimes they just lose sight of turning on the video and watch the video you know they want to Interview you and talk to you and I play with guys who Lucky could speak, but they could play football but It's just hard it's hard to tell whether who's gonna make that transition if you look you can do the same thing in high school go watch The guys they picked for what they had that you lead 11 for the quarterbacks Just watch how many of those guys make it in college and then you'll see that again happening for that transition and there's just something about I mean, I mean I didn't get forced into playing early a lot of these guys get forced into playing and they're not really ready for it And especially in today's game Because if you watch the thing drives me Crazy is they don't teach the kids today how to read defenses and If when you watch a college game and you see this happen and Then back to the field they're telling them everything from the sideline and When you get to the NFL you can't be trying to learn how to do that you have to know how to do that and if you look at a lot of the read option guys they make it for a few years because they they run around and People finally figured out that just make him run all the time make the quarterback run all the time All right, because he's not made for running all the time, you know, and that's what I would do and I would even say okay make him run and then I'll pay the first fine for the late hit That's why you're not a GM That's why I'm out of football.

9:05Yeah, but no, I just you know It's just hard the transition that that's there. I think some people get caught up in it mentally and They just think sometimes they think Too much of themselves especially up in the first round and instead of just Going out and playing football. They mean like I was hoping and hoping I Can't I can't the kid who's taken first from USC. I was hoping They passed on him just because he was so arrogant about I'm only thinking about being the first quarterback taken I just wanted him to go second. Yeah, it's gonna be the best thing we could have there. Yeah And but there's a lot of pressure on that you know when you get up there because they're gonna he's gonna play right away They're gonna make off those guys.

9:51Yeah, I just watched the Netflix series quarterback the pressure Tell us about the pressure and and you handled it better than anybody in history. What? I was fortunate because I didn't get forced into playing real early and I had a chance to understand Get an understanding what Bill's offense was all about and he was kind of on the forefront of what they call the West Coast offense So so to speak but basically what it was why did you just roll your eyes at that? That cuz it I don't know it's more Bill Walsh's idea than he been in the West Coast should be the Bill Walsh offense. Yeah But he he would if you watch a lot of these games these guys I got I watched in 49er game that one point on where I could see I Couldn't see one person in the screen on TV and You're this is in the end of the game now this poor guy stand back there and he's got everybody 20 30 yards now field and nothing to do with the ball He's got those guys that he has on the team or sort of like what I had at the end of my career in San Francisco with John Taylor and Jerry Rice and Brent Jones and those guys John Jay well Jerry could do it, but John Taylor was the only one of only two two receivers ever In one game to go 90 plus yards for touchdowns in the same game and they were very elusive And so what Bill's offense was about is I'm gonna give you somebody down there But you know what if it's first down or second down?

11:26I don't need to force it down there so I'm gonna give you this guy and this guy down here too and You have a progression there go through and the offense was actually very fun and very easy to run Not always did it always look that way, but it actually was everything was built in there was a built -in Hot receiver for every blitz that was coming And so your first thing you do your eyes come up from the ball you look for that hot guy and then back to your reads and Yeah, it was just fun and especially It towards the end there like I said when you got guys like John and Jerry made my job easy Just get the ball.

12:09I was like a mailman. Give this doesn't belong to me. He put it in the slot. Here you go So I Had heard you in previous interviews talk about how the play calling for the West Coast offense was different than sort of especially how college ball Typically plays were called can you walk us through sort of simple straightforward play calls versus then what you had to learn in this new Innovative system in the West Coast offense Well, when I came out of Lord a we were running a numbered system. So if we were running a pass The number that you would start on the left you would say 789 so there's you had a route tree and they were all numbered So this guy would run seven he'd run eight and I'd run a nine and So for when we got to San Francisco Bill's offense was numbers and words so the numbers really Met nothing but the protection What how the how are you protected and where the tight end would basically what side of the ball he would be on and It also would tell you which guy was hot the second number told you which guy was the hot guy and Where you had to look first and then the words came after it told you the place so we would say 20 red right 20 half -back read so Red was the formation 20 was the type of protection Half -back read we only told the half -back what to do so everybody else had to learn what when they hear half -back read you had They all had to know what their route is because we didn't tell them well sometimes I had to tell a lot of guys Almost every play and Was this the beginning of really again if you watch the Netflix series Really making the quarterback like on the field having to make executive decisions was this the beginning of that with Bill?

14:11The only time we really were put in the position is when you would line up and there was just a blitz that you could not handle And you had you had to change your play otherwise he wanted you to Go with the play he called then the main reason is is we had so many plays in our offense We typically have 125 passes in a game plan maybe 130 35 more runs and all those had two and three formations and You had to know yet to memorize the Order to those and that he wanted them in and And all them all those because only thing you got signaled was the was the number the play So you got 20 half -back read didn't get all the rest of that stuff and Didn't have time to tell you you know what the formation is because we didn't have the earpieces That they talked to him in now these days.

15:11So it was for me it was from Monday Till Saturday night. I was studying to learn And memorize those formations, but on top of that I had to remember I had to understand the play at the same time And so it was very very difficult From Monday to Saturday. I did not have time or would I've had enough time to Go on and study down in distance for For what the other teams do during those periods. I mean way the perfect example Where we lost to the the redskins in the championship game So bill the back then the loser's coach coaches in the In the pro bowl so we're in the pro bowl And Joe thysman was there who also you know, I've known for a long time since he was went to Notre Dame also and First day of practice Bill puts in 35 past plays And Joe looks at me and goes well this awesome bill gave us all our past plays in one day I go you're crazy This he's gonna install till Saturday And he goes what do you mean?

16:22I go I'm not even studying I mean typically we get like 60 or 80 in the first day of practice And he continues to put in until install until Saturday he goes there's no way Thanks for no he's tall all the way till Saturday And Joe goes I don't know how you do it. I go oh this was easy. I told you I'm not even studying It's so that for from for me it was easy back because he didn't nowhere near the pressure So your your job was just as cerebral as a want of one as it was a physical one Yeah, I mean and then on top of that I had to watch video of the defense right Because you had to understand you had to find out there was always a little key One usually there was one player that would tell you and give away It's a blitz or it's a different defense than what they're lining up And so it took hours and hours of film watch that feels like an AI opportunity just find the correlation between The cells That probably will be if it isn't already But surface tablets on the sideline are all yeah, that's a great story tablets You know what we had we were in New Orleans And there was a wire They came from way up in the boxes and you know those metal paper clips They would take a polaroid of the play and a polaroid right after the ball was snapped Pin it to that thing and slide it down the line for us on the deal above the fans And then it got down to us and then we got a chance to look at it I would have given anything for it and I'd have That's amazing All right listeners.

18:07We want to thank a new friend of the show plaid the name is likely very familiar to you after our recent acq2 episode odds are you've used plaid before without even maybe realizing it If you've ever linked your bank account to apps like Robinhood Venmo or chime You're one of the millions of people like one in every two Americans who've already used plaid I feel like I've grown up in the tech industry alongside plaid There are so many modern experiences that are powered by them and at its core plaid isn't just about making it easier to connect to your bank It ends up being the backbone for thousands of companies building faster, safer And more seamless financial experiences So whether it's reducing fraud, speeding up onboarding Or turning old school banking processes into something that feels instant and effortless plaid is making it happen So last year plaid rolled out some powerful tools Think cash flow data for better credit decisions Anti fraud tech with AI and analytics for bank payments And this year they've leveled up again with major updates across all three of those product lines Yep, they're even helping businesses manage things like direct billing for your subscriptions So the bottom line is plaid is making it easier for companies to build smarter, safer, and more personalized financial experiences that just work If you're building financial tools or infrastructure plaid's data analytics can give you a serious edge Whether it's fighting fraud, underwriting smarter, or managing payments more efficiently So if you want to learn more about how plaid created one of the biggest networks in financial services today Listen to our recent ACQ2 episode with plaid's founder and CEO, Zach Pare And our thanks to plaid Well, we want to turn this and talk about leadership and teams and investing But maybe a good way to do that is just tell us a little bit about Bill Like what was it about the team that he built?

19:58He was such a maverick. What was playing for him like? It was great honestly. I mean, yeah, you always have disagreements and the way things are done Or the way you're being treated sometimes But in most cases, we had a blast. He was fun to work with. He had a crazy sense of humor, real dry and But he was very ahead of his time. So guys would come up to us during this season and go, okay, seriously You guys don't wear pads into a day's in training camp. Yeah You don't wear pads during the week in practice. Yeah Why no way we were and they would say we were we hit from Wednesday They still tackle have tack full pad practice all the way till friday And what Bill saw was that our lineman you could watch it.

20:55They never wore sleeves Their arms were always just like the mess of bruises So his philosophy was if I see the effort from you guys that I want We don't have to put pads on And I want you fresh on sunday. I don't need you fresh on Wednesday and As long as you do that I won't make you go back in and put the pads on of course He made us go back and do that a couple times just to prove we could do it and But he was always ahead of his time and the things that he did and um And it helped with mr. de marlotte too because he was very generous for us and as long as things were going the right way and And working in that organization and The things that they do that make don't seem like to make a big difference made a huge difference we Most of you probably don't remember the old dc8 pen They're like a big flying pencil long skinny thing But we were the most traveled team and going there's never an issue It's when you come back after the game because there's ice bags and ivs and everything and We were There first away game and his thing was 81 The DC8 broke down and They we had a DC 10 and Everybody was very excited We we go to the game we win and mr.

22:22de marlotte comes in the locker room and He's everybody's happy and then they see Eddie and they start going DC 10 He goes make you deal you keep winning you can have the DC 10 We went undefeated and You show what is the Charlie mongerism you you show me the outcome you're Yeah, I'll tell you the outcome Oh, that's amazing Well to transition over to your post football greatness Maybe I mean this is obvious maybe too obvious to even ask but like what role did playing in San Francisco have with You now doing what you do now? well, I've done it What I would call the bill was kind of way and The guys won't agree with me, but This is kind of what bill would do in the beginning of when Back in 79 when I got there we were two and 14 And I swear every Saturday it was like a revolving door As soon as we left practice like 50 more guys came in To work and he was trying to build a culture that he knew he wanted and he knew he didn't have it and Even if how it didn't matter how good you were if you Messed with that culture you would be gone.

23:47He didn't put up with the Interferring in the locker room and making that a mess and and I kind of did the same type of thing when I first found the My first two partners I made him work for almost three months without pay And they show me the incentives and I'll show you the outcome And they they laughed about it and now they laugh about it But as things grew and I realized that I mean I wear house 26 Deals if and then once we figured out we could work together And just for not investors in that in the room that means you personally Invested in 26 companies that you then put into the fund I dropped back into the fund at cost As my wife reminds me one of them was GitLab So she's not real happy about that one but um do you recall the order of magnitude valuation that you invested in GitLab?

24:49Oh, we were pretty close first money in Yeah, so it's not a battery Still not a bad return, but it would have been better if it was all mine So you're saying they got a good deal by working pretty much perfectly. Yeah Yeah, and so but eventually you know These guys they'd never invested before Right they both had started companies ones company was in mobile feedback space got bought by Google This is Michael your partner. Yeah, Michael Ma He's a yellow and grad Harvard MBA guy Mike Miller I give him a hard time because he's a Notre Dame Michigan state always had this thing going He's a Michigan state undergrad, but he's a PhD in experimental particle physics out of Yale MIT fellow His companies he started when and went both these guys went through I see his company went through I see when it was still back in Boston And there were only 12 companies in the batch unlike yeah and uh reddit was probably his batch made or maybe dropbox back then Yeah, and so he His company that he started ended up being bought by IBM and started basically started IBM's cloud service as of yesterday and And then my my son who Ron Conway started taking myself and him to my commonator when Ron spoke to the batches We were doing an individual investing together And then Nathaniel caught on to a startup like real or real real early They went on a crazy run rate got bought by twitter and He went to twitter for a year and a half and then came back to the fund So did your interest and startup investing come from Nathaniel's sort of plugged in this in that world?

26:39I think Nathaniel's the one that got kind of Got the idea going and then Because of my late or family relationship with Ron He said oh yeah, you guys can come with us and so we followed the sv angel guys around Trying to figure out what their secret sauce was and you know listen to the questions They're asking and look at the companies. They're looking at and um and then He was he was happy once he left twitter and he came back and now Um, we brought on one other partner that who was one of the original Investing partners at co2 for in the pre -seed in the C pre -seed Area and then became a partner at eclipse and then He's been a real close friend of the family.

27:23So He and Nathaniel were both walk on quarterbacks at Notre Dame and Matt had a little different Tracked and then Nathaniel did to the fund but wait, so how many What percent of your employees were quarterbacks at Notre Dame?

27:4260 sounds like three of the five partners How there's the answer we figured out how to be a top point one percent investor. How um, how did you first meet Ron Conway? Oh, that's a i don't you know i can't even remember It's been so long just by being in the valley you know, I originally got into Into the venture space by Ronnie lot and Harris -parton When we started a fund of funds in the venture we basically all our friends and neighbors were all guys who were ansecoia Cliner excel and we just leveraged our friendship into access into the funds And you were you raised a fund of funds that became an LP in those venture funds.

28:19That's what hrj was yeah and so We after a while it became we had Ventured or leveraged by out hedge and real estate funds and all we did was raise money So the fund of funds was no fund And Ron's that's when and I don't know the reconnect with Ronnie. So I know this is a lot more fund And you get to meet with the the founders you get to see all the new thing technology and things that are coming up and um It was a it was a lot more fun He just forgot to tell me how much more work it was gonna be on top of it But um yeah, I know and Ron we've actually traveled with Ron almost every summer and his family together So we have what was it a um So staying in San Francisco after your playing career Uh, what was that decision like?

29:12I We keep trying to think you what we want to go somewhere else and we just can't figure out where we go that would match kind of where we are and um but It it helped by staying here because what a lot of guys tried to take advantage of it while that while we were playing I just didn't have that wear for all in time in my I had too many things that I had to work on just spend seven days a week Yeah, the west coast offense. Yeah, I wanted to play football and I knew that eventually I was gonna retire and I could Find another way to do something that would be fun and Ex - as it maybe as exciting, but I mean not quite The next step one thing was except on IP you got a human the audience little bit IPO days are good but Yeah, I just and then I realized that I'd missed a lot of stuff grow while I was playing and When Ronnie and Harris I really wasn't looking for another job Wasn't full -time job at that point because I really had just retired And I said okay, why not and off we went and Just kind of grew into where we are today and I've done like I think I've done one of the things that I've drive a lot of people crazy and I love the team I have so I made everybody equal so we all get paid the same we all get the same carry um, I make them buy lunch and breakfast But I just I just don't I don't can they make more salary somewhere probably Can they get the carry I'm giving them?

30:54No, they can't get that as at another one. Wait, let's they start Yeah, yeah, let's have a listen start their own We've spent a lot of time doing acquired episodes on the big venture firms and like this is always The big topic is how do you split up the carry yeah, how Wait, wait, so fun fun one and fun two I made them earn I gave him a certain amount of carry and then I made him earn more fun from fun three on I said You know what I think we're doing a great job. What we're we're working well together I want to make everybody equal you guys have a problem with that And he said no I didn't think so and so off we go actually I make less than they do because I paying Two other people Head of finance and ahead of operations.

31:43So I took the cut money from me and not from them What are the trade -offs give us the pros and cons because it sounds great, but in practice what do you actually see that due to the organization? Well, that's the one thing to build said we're from the right in the beginning I said I just want to tell you guys because There's no rookie hazing here. I said when somebody walks in that door and in that locker room They're part of the 49er team in organization You treat them and you treat the people upstairs no matter people who work on the field You treat them with the same respect to cheat everybody in the locker room with and You know, I just I just think that It He had the hammer though right So I had to find a way to get the hammer Because I gave up a lot of the things so I just owned the management company So I control right where the all the money goes but separating economics control is a great structure for that Yeah, I mean and we do Majority kind of rules on things and um Um We try to get at least two partners on every deal and usually try to as many as we can get eyes on deals and um There's no bickering over Oh, I brought in more capital when I brought in more companies What's more?

33:08I mean, how do you weigh those? I couldn't figure that out Um, and how you put No price on either one so I just said it just makes more sense to me just to say look Doesn't matter if I bring a deal in and it's not really what What might that mic Miller should see I just give it to mic Miller and it's not it not a there's not an issue of okay It's my deal or is it your deal? It's it's our deal yeah, and so that's that's the way we operate and so far we haven't had any issues with it and Um Everybody's Was still off and running It's really um I mean it's so rare In venture firms period that there's this model we've done several episodes on you know benchmark They famously have this model and very few others do I imagine you must be the only venture firm, you know A a provenance like yours of there many other Athletes celebrities etc former athletes who have venture firms now That have an equal partnership model like I think a lot but I think one of the things that no other athletes Didn't realize I is that It's a day -to -day world.

34:22It's not put your name on something and Let somebody else run it I I just can't that'll operate that way of do I stick my You know based in there and say hey, this isn't right when it's time. Yes. Oh, then that Um, I just let it up them operate and I just kind of oversee that right now. I mean I mean if you look at success Fun one was 28 million and we have we returned the fun 1 .8 time X And we still have 21 unicorns in the fun To do you want to do you want to share with the current multiple is sitting around? It's um, it's sitting somewhere between 8 and 10 All right, that's that's pretty good and um fun twos was we raised 53 and we have We returned About I think it's point eight of that and we have 13 unicorn sitting in that and fun three we just kind of closed and We we already just closed less than a year ago and We have one sitting in there So I think we've been fairly successful with the model and in our ability to pick companies and and Part of that reason is that our guys are so good and understand the growth pattern from what we've called zero to one right Because they've all been there And understand that they've had exits to large corporations And they understand what what's being what's necessary and what what needs to look like And from there we've gotten so many um Accolades from our portfolio companies Saying hey you guys punch way above your Check size and our our check sizes now are between 250 and 500 um but I just think that you know we're we're on to something good and I didn't I want to I want to try to keep it that way as long as Yes, so you have this new problem like the the initial problem for any startup or fund one is Does our idea work and you've now proven with the numbers that you just shared with us?

36:45Okay, it works. So your new problem is we have this magic thing in our hands. What do we do with it? How do we harness it? So what what things are different as you look forward to make sure that you don't a kill the golden goose But you can be lean into it as much as you can Um We've solved that problem but Because of the SEC I can't talk Understood Yeah, there's we'll push you We're able to follow on that's but great Completely different question and a completely different vein Your fund is not called jump on Tana ventures. It's called liquid two What was the logic there and where did that come from?

37:30Oh, it's it to me when I first it was trying to figure out a name I was going Came up with all these ideas and then I was going liquid. It's like a oxymoron, right? It's not liquid. It's one of those the other The world precedes about as far away as you can get and it's funny. How things fall together because I said it was liquid And it was taken liquid one was taken It was in the I got to do And then I was sitting around and I and I drew up the I was like was this a play call or something like where did this come? And so I drew up the logo and it was just an L and a tube like that and so Mike Miller or resident PhD says How did you come up with that I go?

38:16Well, I just Playing around with the L and the two and it looked good I go why he goes well that because I did a thesis on On that and it's it's some place in outer space That is Trackable, but it's hard to find I go Sounds like ventured me So things kind of fall in place so far It's also you know, it couldn't be for the L2 cash on a on a processor You're just you're really into the you know deep tech investing. Yeah, no it They keep everybody keeps trying to get the guys want to kept for a longest time one to change the name I go okay, so here's the problem right now everybody knows us as liquid or L2 Why do you want to mess with that right then they're gonna change the name and then no one's gonna remember I said they already know It sounds like a crazy name But we've built something behind it so we've been Trying to we've been want Go through some exercise to try to update it a little bit But we'll probably stick with the name.

39:28I think I got them convinced that it's not worth the effort to change in it Was there other than the you know, obviously Ron Conway connection and you learning from him And this is what he did this this type of investing Was there any draw to be like well, hey, maybe maybe you should pick a little easier style of investing I mean, you know to you know the jokes about the anti liquidity early I mean preceding seed is hard. You're talking to two former seed and preceding investors here. We like it's hard It is hard, man. I think one of the things we You know, we looked for is we obviously you guys to understand that when you get down to that's down there You're looking at people in a lot of cases.

40:09You're betting on people and because of Our portfolio so large we get repeat founders now And we get a My head of IT's leaving and he's starting something new. You should look at it So our deal flow comes from almost within our universe that we kind of put together in It helps us get in earlier and so getting those types of returns if you're in pre -seed or in some cases Friends and family you're trying to get that you know We're we aim everybody says if you can get to three x you're doing well If you can get to five x you're doing extremely well, we try to aim for five x but real in real honestly I the thing that sticks in my mind was from Doug Nione from Sequoia if it's not 10 x we don't want to look at it So your fun one is like just barely so always was Hey, if you aim to be perfect and you miss you can still be pretty good so And if you aim to just be Mediocre and get by and you miss where you won't be on this team very long And so you know our bar we do we set high for ourselves and If we miss down there, we're still in the top two or any other I think our all of our funds are either 5 % top 25 % of venture It's awesome.

41:46Well, David, you've got the closing question. Yeah, so we have one I don't think you know we're gonna ask this fun question to To wrap up here and transition back to Demetri from Mountain Treasury We had to look we're you know looking up we do a lot of research on acquired and Like okay, we go all through Joe's history and we found this one thing where like Okay, this is you can't make this up Before after football but before liquid two you co -founded a bank called modern bank I had a friend of mine who was um I met when I was at HRJ capital and we stayed friends for a long time and um He just came to me one day and said hey, I'm what I want to start this bank and and actually we were trying to um do what first republished did as you know they've got had offices in to where Sequoia and all they were But we could only get a charter in New York We couldn't get one out here in California and we just we ended up finally giving up and at that point in time It's still there it went from a personal bank to a commercial bank now And mostly on the east coast and I left the board.

43:13I said I can't help you back here Um coming back and forth in New York, you know every month and it just makes sense for me to get off the board But yeah, it was um we were we're having fun. It was I was only on our board. I was only outbanked by I think it was 250 years the 300 years of making experience yeah in our board and uh well it is fun. Yeah, clearly it predestined you too Finding modern treasury and yeah, yeah, and but you know, it's crazy. It's uh it was fun to do while we were working on it and I didn't I totally forgot we had found it Still there I can check Um all right, Joe well any uh there's gonna be I'm sure on the live stream and here in the room um in front of acquired listeners Uh A lot of founders any advice after working with so many founders over your venture career Um I think one of The A lot of things you have to go with like your instinct and your gut And a lot of people are afraid to ask for help And I think that's where the problems always seem to arise Is that when you know there are issues and you let them simmer too long You have people who are invested in you early that are there that you let invest early because most of the cases They decide who gets to invest in the startup Lean on your lean on them as much as you can and They'll help you through it.

45:04You know, we are our approach is We're not Sequoia, we're not excel. We don't come in there and try to run your company, but You have an issue every on your monthly Um Statement to us just put an ask section and As soon as we see that we go to work as fast as we can And if there's ten of them will pick the top three or four that we know we can go after and we can help on and we'll try to do I always say we're in the boat together. You're driving If you need help just let us know we'll help you steer and get the right place that you need and if we can't do it We'll help you find the right people to help you do it and it's just you know You're most and almost all founders are really proud of what they're doing and what that and sometimes just get afraid that really Say hey, I need some help.

46:04Right until it's too late and then help can't come fast enough Yeah, well Joe this has been a great conversation Thank you so much. Thank you mod and treasury. Thank all of you for being here And to close out the day. Please welcome to me tree back to the stage All right listeners that is our show for today We hope to see you at the chase center September 10th if you can make it acquired .fm slash sf is the link or you can click the link in the show notes And I'd say we'll see you next time but for many of you we will see you very soon