20VC Roundtable: NEW FORMAT: Why the Seed Investing Model is Broken, How to Make Money at Seed Moving Forward; Who Wins and Who Loses, Why Venture Value Add Platforms are BS and Failed and Why There Will be an IPO per Week in H2 2024

23:09Yes, it's good, it's not nearly enough. I would argue that a hundred is not even enough. I don't know, but on the flip side I think like you just got to be good at picking like no one said it's easy. You only get so many boards in the gun. The reality, Harry, on this is like, I think the most depressing thing in the world is not being wrong It's being right and not making money, you know being right to the tune of like having these epic outcomes And you're like, oh fuck that was a one x returner of the fun fuck, right? Like that's the thing that like is kind of the worst case scenario, right? Because those are rare and and part of it Can I ask do you think we're looking at loss rates in the right way?

23:41Like we mentioned there about kind of the challenges of picking in the right levels of diversification How do you think about loss rates and whether this generation is completely skewed in terms of the mentality around loss rates and graduation rates? Look, I was looking at some data from CrunchBase just to figure out like what percentage of the entire venture world ends up becoming public companies? And it ends up that it's a single digit number and in fact for some Vintages that number is 2 % for some it's 3 some it's 4 but it's not 8 % or 10 % of companies end up becoming public companies. So what you're really looking about is call it a 1 in 50, you know, has the potential to actually execute against a plan Be in a space that's big enough to create the type of outcome that the industry actually cares about But in the venture world in general like you need an IPOable event or a a mega sale of the variety of a honey or a credit Karma to kind of make things work.

24:31It's just small. So you have to I don't know, but it doesn't have to be the casepring. So I started thinking this then directly true I think we got very everyone got addicted to this idea of you can manufacture five billion dollar companies Not maybe 50 but five but I mean, I'm very interested personally I think the future is in these companies a lot of companies You can put $30 million into and get to a place where like you're pretty sure it's profitable It's gonna be worth a hundred two hundred and you have an option on something much bigger, right? Like that's kind of the thing that I think is most interesting these days, right is like options But why is that a better use of time than finding the trade owning 20?

25:05I just I think it's why do you care about that seeming downside mitigation? Totally respect the smaller businesses being Harry and I have both built media businesses. I mean, I've got one that doing almost 30 million on the side. Harry's got a one doing million. I get that life. No, all boots strapped. But why do you want optionality as a VC? No, I guess the question in my mind is like, does building a 100, 200, 300 million dollar company really give up the option value of building the 10 or 20 or 50 billion dollar company? I think there's a lot of examples at this point, right in our in history of people that build the kind of obvious winner, right?

25:37And do a really good job with it and then graduate at like square space. You name it like Anthony's company. Like we can go down the line and like I see people got into this mentality. And it was partially because money was free and partially because of like Uber and Lyft and everything's in Airbnb and blah, blah, blah. I was like the way to play home run Derby is to start with the home run Derby mentality. And I actually think it's not like baseball. It's not like by getting on first. you don't get a chance to hit home run right or a grand slam. I actually get a lot of cases getting on first is the best way to set yourself up for a 10 -year sprint at a home run.

26:08I don't think great companies are just manufactured. Great companies are built on top of good companies. Like you have to get to good first. Yeah. And then you can eventually get to great. And when you get to good, you can stand on whatever that mountaineal is and look around and see what optionality you have. But do you think founders care anymore, Frank? Let me give you an example here in Ieware chatting, we each had the other day about companies that have infinite runway and are overfunded, okay, and are never going to get anywhere. I only have one in my portfolio. The first time in 10 years now looks, I don't invest as often as you guys that I've been 25 investments over 10 years, but I've done, you know, I've invested nine figures at Capitol and I asked one founder and 10 years for my money back, not all of it, just some, and you know what his response was that I feel like this is very au courant.

26:47What do you care? His response back wasn't why or I needed or I wanted to keep going. It's like, what do you, there's no respect for capital. And I'm not saying most founders are that blunt, but I see it again and again. But I don't think founders care about whether the 10X rule, the same thing you I wrote a 10 years ago, the 10X rule, right? You got to sell for at least 10X what you raised. I said it hilariously in shock, and there's a lot of, you know, normally even some known public companies that are tech exits are not even close to that, right? Like it's kind of comical, what a waste of capital, right?

27:18This pharmacation though has changed the mentality of founders forever. Whether we're going back to farms or not, I don't think founders think the same way they used to. I don't think there's respect for capital. I think these things change over time, right? You might be right that there's a moment in Silicon Valley, whatever a founder is like that. But again, I just look at my friends who have started businesses that they wholly own or put a tiny amount of capital into it and have scaled ridiculously. They're happier, they're way richer, right? And they have a ton of option value into the future versus the people who own 10 % of hot things, right?

27:47And they're kind of like holding on to big corporate structures. So I think that there's a big opportunity and I think what we'll see is yes, sure people will still hear the lore of certain types of venture You want to raise it high prices and they won't care and they'll do their art project I actually am very optimistic that there's gonna be a whole generation of people are like, oh shit It is a much better life to own 80 % of a business that has 50 million top line Then on 10 % of a business that does 500 right with a bunch of VCs in it, right? And I think you're gonna start seeing people being much smarter about how they want to manage their time and their entrepreneurial efforts towards outcomes that are fucking much better for them and can't be better for venture capitalists.

28:23So yeah, of course, like, the kids can understand for who like have this like, I want to be Elon Musk thing, like, I'm not gonna find those people. Every little time I all miss one, because like, I love the founders, fun guys, they're really good at finding exactly the right crazy, right? I'm not gonna find those people in general, but like, I think it's like a two general that say it's a founder thing. I actually think there's just tons of entrepreneurial talent that's gonna reevaluate whether they want to be even the success scenario running a $1 billion penny stock public company if they win right with too much capital in it.

28:52I think the answer to them is like that's actually a pretty shitty job. The fallacy in that point, and I agree with this, I've done it. Like I this idea of this, everyone that's chilled themselves for now come and only owned a little bit and seen the economics to say, oh my god, I want to own my own $30 million business, I own 100 % of the fallacy in that argument I've seen in SaaS is most found, maybe I can't say most because there's not enough data. I think they fall behind competitively. I think that venture is not magical. I think venture has been abused the last few years. It has been abused to fund over hiring and massive teams that are not required.

29:24But you go through a phase transition as you scale, maybe it's not even till after 5 or 10 million, where if you don't have capital, you can't all be at Lassian or Qualtrics and they fall behind competitively. And I think that's the fallacy of the lifestyle -esque business, right? Where media businesses are different, the information can be wildly more compelling today than and before, but I don't know about a $20 million chip of payroll company that raised nothing when Ripley and Gusto and everyone is out there maybe in Deal, maybe, but we could trick founders into a path that's right. Here's my client and this goes from a bar, which is like, I mean, this is not meant to be aggressive, but maybe a little bit provocative, which is like, is sassy good place to be investing anymore?

29:59It might not be. I just didn't know anything else. In my initial investment memos, I wrote these were all terrible investments. I first decked corned talk desk, I wrote in the investment, well, this will never be worth more than 150 million, and that was unlikely. because 5 .9, which was the comp, was only worth 150 million at the time. You know, maybe only B2C and FinTech make sense because that's your only way to have a $500 billion company, right? Or there's like a ton of other, there's a big world out there and there's a bajillion other industries that are great if you take the kind of approach of systematic building and profitability and option value, right?

30:30I just think SaaS is a particularly weird race. You know, I'm not spending a lot of time on SaaS these days. I think partially for the dynamics you're talking about, right? which is like, I like Parker, and like I'm super psyched for him, that he's like pulled off, or he's pulled off, but like that's not a game that I feel particularly excited about playing repeatedly. I would think about it a little bit differently. You know, when you get proof, it means that you're on track to build this magical business, that the spreadsheet they gave you describes three or four years out. You feel momentum in these businesses, and when there is momentum, which by the way, is real, like when things are going right, they continue to go right, and usually that compounds over time.

31:03So if you're generating proof, that's a good time to examine and whether capital actually would be an accelerant. Now the problem is when you generate anti -proof, right, the go -to -market motion is harder than you projected. Things are getting worse than you thought. You know, the trends are in the opposite direction. Sometimes the wrong answer is to put more capital into that business. And the problem with the past couple of years, especially at peak madness, people just looked at the top line and everything was a multiple of ARR. And they said, if you're bigger, therefore you're more valuable, therefore I can put more money into the company.

31:32But if it was harder to get that doubling than you thought, or it costs you more to get that doubling than you thought? You're actually generating anti -proof of the business. But when money was free, if revenue was 2x, enterprise value was 2x, therefore I can put more money in the company and feel good about it. So I think we have to get back to actually examining these businesses for what they are, getting rid of the proximity bias of the founders, you know, figuring out how you can be a bit more agnostic as an investor and really look at the business and see if a deserves capital or not. And I think those are going to be like the best investments when you're getting proof without anti -proof, you're putting money into the companies that are growing and things are actually working and the model is coming true.

32:12Darwin will do its job by limiting capital availability that I think people are going to start staring at these marginal businesses and we'll see what happens to them. We've looked at different models here. We've seen multi -stage funds as we've discussed. We've discussed pure play seed funds. Sam, you've said something that was different towards Jason said the other day. So I'm intrigued to hear these opposing thoughts. You've written the clubby seed investing and the YC play but will certainly not work anymore. And then Jason we chanted the other day about actually wide party rounds and proliferation of very rich tech execs from the liquid years we've had over the last years is more than ever.

32:48Are these two ideas arguing with each other? Are they the same? I'm trying to understand do we have more party rounds less party rounds more itch execs last rich ex, which one is it? The Y -ce thing in particular was if we're telling about venture capital to factory, that was like ground zero for the construction of the factory. It literally was like, oh, venture capital and like how you raise money and form these companies is like the so -pick playbook, it's hard to figure out. It's literally here as playbook, and then here is demo day we bring in a bunch of every investor they did, they did it up, they justify our seven percent were done, it's packaged, it moves on the factory line.

33:24It is the purest part of the factory you can imagine and as an investor, we've stayed away from it for a long time Parts because there's no signal in it because everything comes off the factory line and look them exactly the same package properly All looks fine, but it's packages, etc etc So the factory part is the bed part party rounds rich tech execs sure there are lots of rich tech execs And like again seed investing is fun and you get 50 % in a money back when it fails right so the nice part about mortality rate being buyers get your money back faster at $0 .50 on the dollar, right? You know, as a tax write -off.

33:52So like, sure, that'll happen. People can team up on that. But I think that's more about the capital side than in my mind than it is the factory part. Jason French, you agree in terms of YC's days being challenged as ground zero for factory line formation? You know, I have my own issues with accelerators about the type of advice that they're able to actually give companies and not just YC, but there are a bunch of different factories out there that might not understand the nuances of businesses like we are FinTech investors and it's a highly regulated industry and you have to do things a certain way.

34:24And we find that some of the things coming off the factory, the hygiene about how they were built and what they learned during their period in the factory, wasn't necessarily the things or the order that they should be learning. Now they weren't set up in necessarily the right way. A lot of the growth trajectory was an unscalable things in order to get the up into the right 45 degree chart so that you can package it for a demo day. You know, so there are a lot of artificial things done in order to package it. To say I was point, it will come off the factory all looking the same. And a lot of that advice, you actually have to undo, you know, if you end up funding the company.

34:54So you end up overpaying and then having to undo a bunch of the damage. So I just worry about are the companies actually getting the proper advice for the industry they're in, you know, from a generic factory doing hundreds of businesses a year? Jason, how do you feel? So one thing is I like to only invest in outsiders and first time CEOs on a two by two outsider first time CEO and over time the obvious lesson I've learned is you want to find really great CEOs right and you know sometimes you'll get an email from Frank or Sam and say hey this is the best kid I've worked with in 72 years like you know okay if you trust them or Harry says the smartest kid if it's outsiders and first time CEOs you can only guess I enjoy the fact that YC is an IQ and drive filter it is not perfect there are folks in each batch of 200 that are not as smart as the rest or that are gaining the system.

35:40But above average, I know high drive and high IQ. I love it. And so I will enjoy that meeting. I will take that meeting. I will take a cold inbound that is worse than a traditional from a YC company and I don't actually mind the 20 million post. It's okay for my fun size, which isn't even huge. What is hard today is that the rounds are too split up. And I've done two YC companies. One, I led the seed. I'll hopefully it will IPO next year and another one I love that we do together, Harry Revenue Cat. But I don't think I can get those ownership today with the fun style. That's for me. I can't have to give up on YC, not because I won't pay or don't love the signal.

36:15If there's 84 people in the round, I didn't know putting me putting 100 grand in a 20 post. It just doesn't get me the 100x fun. Sam was talking to you. It doesn't even get me close to 1x. So I just don't have the time to invest. And I just don't have the time at this point in life, right? But I love the signal, actually. Inventure, there are a lot of ways to make money, but you have to choose one of them and do it well. Accelerators is very hard. Right, they're crowded. And we don't like crowded cap tables in general. We like when we have, you know, friendlies who have diversity of rolodex or diversity of ability to hire or diversity of introduction they can make to different companies.

36:48You've got to be very careful about who you're assembling around the cap table and a lot of these party rounds. Like, 40 and 50 people taking up a lot of room. To series A investors give a shit if the seed company that's graduating has a party round before or an institutional seat. Do they care? No, why would they care? Yeah, this is the trade -off the paradox, right? Seed investors might not like 48 people out in the round, but if the seed guys will still do the deal, maybe the founders are happy with John Collision and Olivier from DataDog and, uh, you know, all the other folks on their cap table that they will respond to an email.

37:22In my ecosystem, it's pretty amazing what one that you know, a ten or a hundred billion dollar company CEO will actually respond thoughtfully More than many VCs frankly who's just say good job good job kid good job pal That's my favorite email good job. What's wrong good job? Good job. Let's not say let me know I can help Let's just simplify it to good job. I know she's gonna thumbs up the best use of an emoticon ever is the investor update thumbs up If you have 30 hundred K checks from amazing amazing individuals and it actually means something to them It can be just a strategic. Like in the end of the day, there are plenty of people who do this seat.

37:55They don't need help. They're gonna do this seat on their own. Sure, I'm gonna call here. There is helpful. And those people don't. It doesn't matter. Just money. Like we're just selling the money. We have this thing, which is very different. I think we didn't sound like Jason Frank, I go approach. Which is like, when people sometimes ask slow ventures, they're like, what do you guys do to support founders? And my answer is always nothing. Now, that's not actually true. But like, when people ask, my answer is nothing. Because if you're coming to me for help, My view is you're almost by definition.

38:22You're saying I need help us ever I want help I think you're a weak founder and like I want founders who are like I got this I got the plan you're money to me Right, and then sure actually we will be helpful. No, our things we do But like I think there's signal on how people think about that and it's very different like if you are really like I got this say the fuck out of my business you want 30 famous people at a high price go nuts Like it doesn't matter to the series a firms find the weird shit No one else can fun with the money's expensive because the founders the tonic conviction and wants to go for it and you can see it and you're gonna be wrong a bunch, but everyone's gonna allow you really right.

38:52So I'm with you, totally. A chase and disagreements with me. In terms of we can't really help the best founders, I know almost no founders that are born amazing recruiters. I don't know too many first time founders that know I'd recruit a perfect VP of sales or a perfect VP of marketing, let alone a true VP of engineering even for a CTO. And I think that is an area you can add massive value. It's seen in fact, I think that all venture firms of failed with their talent arms. I think all venture firms that are seed into A, actually, they're just investing firms, but if they really want to do what they pretend they should do, at least half the headcount should be recruiting.

39:28Not fake recruiting, not some of that doesn't want to work hard at a tech company and is phoning it in at a big venture firm. That's the value or not that VCs aren't delivering like none. None of these talent arms really work, right? They don't. That's amazing. That's what I've seen make the end of the story. I think that's right. I think it's right. It's right. classic thing is like when people come to me they're like I need help recruiting. I'm like go over to someone else. I don't think they say that. I think they say what they a founder will typically say is I need a great VP of sales like they all come to the same conclusion somewhere approaching a million in revenue right no go out and find their own person but if you can actually help them find that person there was actually the number one person that rippling today that was there early that match or whatever it is it's a game changer seed firms all think they want to be on speed dial That's nice, but I am the guy who agreed to it and it sales is particularly interesting when I would actually argue in my life as an entrepreneur I've like never successfully hired sales.

40:22I think sales is incredibly hard to hire at startups I specifically because the whole nature of sales is like the people who want to go early are like Anti -correlated with the good people right because that is not how sales works Right like in general like the whole point sales is coin operated You want to go to a place with a playbook super clear? You just go fucking make bang the people are like oh, I want an entrepreneurial adventure and go early Those people are almost always the worst sales people, right? So I think if you are a specialist at that and you can crush early status sales, that's a superpower You don't even need to have a venture fund.

40:50You can just take equity. Don't put money in just take equity for finding Vanishingly small number of people that sit the I'm actually good at sales not doing it not just strategizing about it And I want to go early. I mean that alone is like a winning strategy is certainly not one we have I do want to just be cognizant of time and I want to finish on a bet me and Jason had a bet and we had a bet on IPO timing and I think he's batshit crazy, but also I hope he's right. So Jason bet me that he thought there would be an IPO week I think it was from the back half of next year. So 2020 for age two, we're going to have an IPO week.

41:31The flood gates are going to open on IPO's second half of next year. Do you agree? Can I understand the con? It's just these is on that because everyone will be completely out of money as they're going to dump it because they just have to get out? No, no, no. I think times are materially better than 12 months ago. Ignore the measurement point of 2021. Public markets are up 30 % every public company is more efficient. Even me, I have five investments I've made north of 200 million in revenue growing 30 % are faster than are now efficient. They're ready to IPO when the markets say it's okay and they're not an IPA, they certainly were laughing six months ago, but if multiples stay here or go up, they're all going to go out in late 2024, right?

42:09It's 2023 is too soon. So they're not actually up. It's the biggest play in the market that are up, right? I think that's like the big question is there's a stand. I might be wrong. Listen, I'm not, I bet Terry five to one, I may lose this bet. I just feel like what we're missing in all the ups, the drama, the craziness of the last four years, I mean, insane what we went through, right? is how many good companies got to 200 million or more that are now, bless their soul, that are now efficient. And I may have the timing all wrong, I'm too optimistic, but I think there's 26 of them, which is one a week.

42:39I think there's 26 good companies at 200 that can IPO in 26 weeks in the back of a 20. But I may be - I'll take the under with Harry on this and here's what he's gonna say. I don't mean I'm only going one to one on you, Sam. I want five to one on Harry. If Frank and Sam take it, I'm just one to one, because I'm already 50 grand into this. So I'm not going 100. I'll go one to one of you. but here's the basic theory. I think that's the thing that everyone's missing. And this is again, again, I could be very wrong. This is, no one gives a shit about a company that does 200 million top line and grows with 30 % margins.

43:06No one cares. It's like easier to just invest in Facebook, right? I'm being provocative here, me out, which is like, I think this is like actually the big shift in the world, which is like take the AI theme. It's like, you want a bet on AI, bet on Facebook, bet on Amazon, bet on Microsoft. It's so obvious like where to put public market dollars, betting on like a $200 million top line company that's fine, but has a bunch of risks, similar to market, and they're kind of small. Like, I don't actually think that's the future, and it is part of the reason why I think I see home run Derby or be small and nimble and be a good business and patient and have options.

43:40Is I think that's the whole factory line thing, is like the good businesses aren't worth as much as people thought they were. The great businesses are worth more. And so I just think that you're not gonna see it because like, no one cares if you make $200 million a year. I would say that Jason's narrative is right. I think the timing is probably wrong. So I think there are a lot of companies that are kind of baking and it's just a matter of time. But I don't think it's gonna be one a week in the back half of next year. I think it will open up in the half of next year and maybe the year after. Oh, you're gonna take the bet too, right?

44:10You're gonna go in with Harry. That's three to one. You're taking this bet too, Frank. It's 10 grand. Sure. It's a fun to expect. I've got a lot of exposure here, Erie. I got 80 grand of exposure here. I'm a little optimistic. Frank said I'm directly correct. I'm just my time means to optimistic and that's quite plausible to me. That sounds quite plausible, but I'm a little optimistic. I think only the plausibility that the entire idea of a $200 million revenue growing public company is bunk in the future is you know like that thesis. You might be right. Here's the thing. If you look at the HubSpots, you can do a 10X or in the public market.

44:39It's like there's two ways to look at the IPO. Either I can either price it cheap and let me flip it, right, which I think is going to be important the next year, right? Is it we don't do these bill girly, perfect pricings for a while? And then hey, is this as good as HubSpot when an IPO do I have a shot at 10x, going to your point, actually, Sam, I think that's a great bet if it has a chance to be worse case. I lose a little bit of money. It can ride off some long -term capital gains. Best case, there isn't a ceiling to some of these folks. Like the hub spots, the data dogs I'll take, so I'm optimistic.

45:06I also think 08109 were like, I know VCs think differently. I think 08109 as a founder was like 50 trillion times worse than today. The world was ending into 08109. And when we came out of this in 2011 and 2012, I know it's not the same, but we bounced back so much faster than we thought. And when I look at what Elastia is saying, like they're bouncing off the bottom and Mongo's bouncing off the bottom and other folks are seeing things improve. I know this is VC is something I'm good at, but we don't always know the slope of the curve in the early days. So I do think there's a chance, we're never going back to 2021, but I think there's a chance 2024 is better than it feels in our gut today.

45:38Like I think we maybe, the slope may be better. It just think like the future seems to me to be like constellation software style, like roll ups, PE, you own a bunch of things and get bulk up, slash, it's the Megadon, so whatever you wanna call them, cause like been saying that for decades. But it kinda is playing out. And like I think that's the thing, is like you look at my busy, you would be like, there used to be this idea that like companies could only get so big. And so like the reason you didn't buy more Apple stock I'd trillian, cause like, or 800 billion. Cause no one'd see a trillion dollar company.

46:05Now like, there seems to be no upper bound and the biggest guys are crushing it. And so to me, as long as the biggest guys keep crushing it and we tail on everyone's like, I can just buy more Apple stock. Maybe that's how the best example this week. but like it's a survey of safe bet. You know, the beauty is adventure. We can always just raise another fund. You know, the great thing is everyone gets to write off their 2021 fund, right? The LPs aren't even holding it against VCs anymore. So VCs have this special gift. You know, everyone's allowed one bad fund, aren't they? It's wrong. They're, they're, they're cutting fun sizes left and right.

46:34And they're combining funds to bulk them up. I actually think you're seeing very real repercussions, right? As people realign here. There have been many articles published recently about people dramatically cutting slash underfunding funds, combining funds to bulk them up because they can't raise the vertical vehicles, etc. There is absolutely an L people back and it's very real in material. Now, will Anderson raise any fund, of course? The scale is definitely dropping. Just one metric. I looked at this before in 2019, the average SaaS company they want public absorbed just shy of 400 million in capital, 390 million in capital before they want public.

47:06Now, there haven't been any IPOs for a while and there's a few downhunts going on, but I have to assume when the engine revives, we will absorb 400 million again per IPO, and that should reflate all these megafunds, like no matter what else is happening today, with venture being negative for LP's last year, and valuations being down, there's some raw math of how I think these bigger funds are designed to absorb that 400 million, right? How can I put 200 million of the 400 million going into data dog? That's their goal, right? Yeah, LP's are waking up. I mean, we just completed a fundraise and talked to probably 150 LP's a lot of them are the same LPs that end up funding a lot of the funds.

47:45They definitely are waking up. Like if you are a mid -tier firm with good but not great results, like they are consolidating, they are making very strategic choices about which funds they're putting money into and which ones they're not going to renew. They have, you know, very tough conversations about which emerging managers that they did fund that they're no longer going to fund when they come back to market. So I think this plays out over a number of years, it doesn't happen instantaneously which is why you might not be seeing it or feeling it. Also a lot of the funds are coming back to market because they know that they would be raising off of the track record which is depressed because everyone is taking markdowns right now.

48:21So they're avoiding going back to market. If they did go back to market, a lot of them wouldn't be received very well. So there is a period of time right now where the LPs are awake and they are rationalizing where they're putting their money. And the question is like if Jason is right with the IPOs, then money will flow back into the LP ecosystem once the IPO window opens up and that might reverse course. But I think for a number of years, like if you are a middling fund, you're going to have problems raising capital. Right, we're going to do a quick fire round, chaps, otherwise I'm going to keep you all day.

48:50So I'm going to say a short statement to each of you, I'm going to direct it and then we're going to rock and roll. We'll do one each. Frank was the most important trend in the venture world that not many people are paying attention to. Companies are trying to figure out how to make money at low levels of scale. The capital efficiency is coming back into kind of the decision making, you know, within the venture world. Do you think not many people are paying attention to that? I think that at the earliest stage, they still think narrative is carrying the day, and I think narrative is going to stop at the seed.

49:19I want it used to flow through to the Series A and even into the Series B. So I think the trend is you can raise on narrative at seed and then its results starting at Series A. What do you believe that most around you disbelieve? That's a great question, but I am very excited to fund a bunch of companies at Five and under in weird things that are coming to you because no one else will give them money That are going to be highly profitable on the way up and create option value down a line, right? So it's kind of a riff on what Frank is saying a different way, but like an earlier thing Which is like that's my jam like I don't want to ever be relying on a series a firm again Jason final one Or would you most like to change about the world adventure moving forwards?

49:59You have the magic wand, you can change anything. I wish my magic wand worked. Going back to Frank's point, I would like to have more concentration rounds. I would like to be able to magically buy at least 10 % of any seed company I meet that I want to invest in. That would be a gift. That's my biggest stumbling block to investing. Is like, I have to wait on too many deals where I can't get double digit ownership, and I just don't believe I can make any money without it. Guys, listen, I've loved doing this. Thank you so much for university the besting against Jason with me on this. I'll super appreciate the support.

50:29It was like I'm gonna lose 70 grand, but it's okay. Big guys, honestly, this has been fantastic. So thank you so much. Well, okay, because you have 26 IPOs coming in the bar, right? Chai, which I own 10 % of each. I mean, I just absolutely loved in that show. It's so nice to have that discussion format. Let me know what you think of the new format of the show. We're gonna be doing one every two weeks. So let me know on Twitter at Harry's Debbings and other love to hear your thoughts. But before we leave you today, you know all those mind -numbing tedious tasks that seemingly take up half your day, will code is here with their new AI powered work assistant that helps you and your team not just finish tasks, but make progress.

51:08So your product team can bring a feature to market faster by using code AI to tag customer feedback, draft PRDs, suggest target audiences, summarizing product discussions and more. Your sales team can engage more customers by bringing in data from sources like Salesforce, and then use Coda AI to suggest action items, meeting agendas or lead scores, and your marketing team can drive an impactful launch with Coda AI summarizing user insights, creating briefs generated from notes, and writing mock press releases to visualize taglines. With Coda AI, you can reimagine your do list and how you collaborate, so you're not only finishing tasks, but really making progress.

51:48If you wanna work a system that lets you get back to work, You can get started with Coda AI to stay for free, head over to Coda .io, slash 20VC, that's Coda .io and get started for free. And to be here, amazing tools we cannot live without. Traveling they spend so never associated with cost savings, but now you can reduce costs up to 30 % and actually reward your employees. How do you do this? Well, the Van rewards your employees with personal travel credit every time they save their company money when booking business travel under company policy. Does that sound too good to be true? Navan is so confident you'll move to their game changing all in one travel call precard and he spends super app that they'll give you a $250 in personal travel credit just for taking a quick demo.

52:35Check them out now at navan .com forward slash 20V scene and last but by no means least we need to talk cash. As of 29th June you can get 5 .5 % yield on your cash with 26 -week Treasury bills. But buying Treasury bills is not bad easy and you have to navigate a website that looks like it was made before I was born, enter public .com. Their Treasury accounts make it simple to earn a high yield on your cash and it takes 20 seconds. Here's how it works. Sign up at public .com, easily purchased 26 -week Treasury bills that automatically roll over at maturity for a compounding yield, plus there are no minimum hold periods.

53:14You can access your cash at any time, with the flexibility of a bank account, of course, to receive the full -gown tea deal. Of course, to receive the full -gown tea deal, you do have to hold a maturity. But here's the thing, these are tea bills, which means your investment has the complete backing of the US government, making one of the safest places to park your cash. Go to public .com -20VC to lock in a historic at 5 .4 % yield on your cash. As always, I so appreciate your support and I can't wait to bring you an incredible episode on Monday with the one and only Tim Urban from Weight But Why.