Gregory:Pike

Aspiring VC. MBA and PMP

[Jo @JoJoFromJerz]

@gtconway3d Some of the top people who know a lot, ok, maybe more than anybody, and they came up to me, these big strong Constitutional experts, with tears in their eyes and they said “sir sir thank you for saving the 14th amendment sir, thank you sir!”
And I said “you’re very welcome.”

[George Conway ⚖️🇺🇸 @gtconway3d]

Many people are saying this. Many people

[Mo Monuments @MoMonuments]

Long-time friend wants a Co-founder role in a Hardtech startup, preferably at the MVP stage, to lead the software side.

He's interested in Industrial and ML sectors, and is looking for a team that is pro-West, pro-growth, and pro-human (based).

Who should he chat with? 🏭

[BrooklynDad_Defiant!☮️ @mmpadellan]

A complete list of all of the former U.S. Presidents who have stated a desire to be dictator for a day.

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45. Donald J. trump
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[Cliff Pickover @pickover]

This humor, circulating widely on the Web, may appeal to mathematics students.

[david friedberg @friedberg]

last week i took on a new role as ceo @ohalo, a company we founded 4 years ago and have operated in stealth.

@ohalo uses gene editing to completely reimagine agriculture, creating new plant varieties in major crops that were not previously feasible, significantly increasing yields and productivity, ultimately helping farmers make more food using far less land, resources, and capital.

after recently achieving some major breakthroughs, i now believe @ohalo could become one of the world's most important businesses and will be dedicating myself to realizing its potential.

this is a big change for me personally, i haven't been an operating CEO for 7+ years.. but the mind-blowing results the @ohalo team have accomplished make this decision a no-brainer.

i'll be staying on a few of my existing boards while my team @tpboard focuses on our other businesses and i dedicate my time to @ohalo.

will share more details about what we've accomplished and intend to do @ohalo very soon... stay tuned!

[Newshound411 @warrenswil]

Top court in CO weighs if Trump can be barred from ballot
14 Amendment is clear
Insurrection is disqualifying.
Trump plotted a COUP
He just said he’d do it again
#DictatorTrump must be stopped or
Democracy dies in 24
#ProudBlue #DemVoice1 #Fresh
https://t.co/D53hmX2QWA

[💛September💜Rayne🖤 @EndFascism90069]

Who are grooming and harming children?

Here's a clue.

It's #NotADragQueen.

[George Conway ⚖️🇺🇸 @gtconway3d]

I think Ms. Habba should move for sanctions against herself. That’s one motion she could actually win.

[George Conway ⚖️🇺🇸 @gtconway3d]

“‘We believe that American democracy and the rule of law are in grave peril today. And that the legal profession ... is uniquely positioned and uniquely obligated to stand up and support and defend the Constitution and the rule of law today. And the profession has not done that over the past seven years,’ [@judgeluttig] said.”

[Gregory:Pike @Gregory0010Pike]

@gtconway3d Funny, didn't he also criticize our current president?

[Robert E Kelly @Robert_E_Kelly]

be grateful the president is someone experienced and calm, not the erratic sociopath who said he fell in love with Kim Jong Un and won’t read a briefing book.

4

[ian bremmer @ianbremmer]

the difference 100 years can make

[Admiral James Stavridis, USN, Ret. @stavridisj]

Whether this latest pipeline failure was an accident or another act of sabotage it should be a reminder that Putin can go after critical infrastructure both at sea and ashore.  Heads up to Western Europe as winter draws closer. https://t.co/hKU8iwISkZ

[George Conway ⚖️🇺🇸 @gtconway3d]

“The IDF issued rare public statements in recent months, warning that military deterrence was deteriorating. Netanyahu and radical members of his cabinet derided the officials as part of the protest movement, and the protesters as ‘anarchists,’ asserting that the status quo with the Palestinians would hold.”

[Nichole Wischoff @NWischoff]

Probably the coolest office I have ever visited. Humanoids are insane.

[Rick Zullo @Rick_Zullo]

Had an amazing time with @HarryStebbings and @jasonlk on the latest episode of @twentyminutevc

This conversation sparked some thoughts for me about the pivotal moment we are in the venture landscape - what I’m calling the “Jerry Maguire” moment of VC

5 years ago when I was thinking about starting @EqualVentures, I felt the industry was starting to look a lot more like asset management (maximizing for fees) than pure venture capital and we had to go back to the basics.

Since then, this trend has expanded with mega funds getting bigger, rounds being syndicated with no real governance, early-stage investing being delegated as the training ground for partners and a minefield of broken incentive structures misaligning founders, GPs and LPs. VC started to feel more like buying passive lottery tickets in buzzy deals, rather than the hands-on ground game of working with founders that attracted me to it to begin with. Founders and VCs barely engaged with each other in between fundraising cycles (which dominated everything), breaking the once symbiotic relationship shared between these two sides.

I was seeing cases where founders could make close to 9 figures on an exit and produce an amazing return for investors, but it still wouldn’t move the needle for those firms given their small ownership and large fund sizes. @jasonlk highlights this, saying that ‘VC isn’t even about UNICORN hunting anymore, it’s about DECACORN hunting’.

That should be REALLY scary to founders AND VCs when a $1b+ exit doesn’t matter! After all, there are roughly 30 companies funded in the last 20 years that have exited for >$10b, whereas I alone have been involved in 5 unicorns (~20% of the companies I’ve invested in) and believe I’ll see more from the current portfolio alone. IMHO, venture had gotten too big and we needed a reset.

I felt that we needed a “Jerry Maguire” moment in venture capital - less AUM, less companies, more hands on work with founders, better alignment with more trust between founders and board members that the VC actually understood their business and could/would help them. Embracing relationships where founders valued productive pushback. Deep relationships with LPs where we did the same, valuing input on fund strategy to develop the trust necessary to embrace a non-consensus approach. That by making a model where decacorns weren’t necessary to achieve a 3x, you’d 1) attract the best founders who didn’t want to be treated like a lottery ticket at seed stage and 2) increase your probability of generating high returns for LPs. That by right sizing a fund and taking a back to the basics approach to founder/GP/LP dynamics that didnt rely on decacorns, you could arguably increase your probability of hitting them, resulting in funds with the the potential to 10-20x, not just 3x.

Our thesis was that this approach would provide a better product for both our founders AND LPs.

A few years into that journey, I think our thesis is proving itself out with immensely deep relationships with our founders and top decile returns to our LPs.

Plenty of ways to play this game, but the Jerry Maguire way is how we play and that’s what I believe will ‘show the founders/GPs/LPs involved the money’
https://t.co/sNP0iiPM42

[Anton Gerashchenko @Gerashchenko_en]

During his visit to Denmark, President and Mrs Zelensky met with Queen Margrethe II and members of the Danish Royal Family.

The Queen presented the President with a "Tree of Life" painting she painted herself.

Outside, a huge crowd cheered for Ukraine.

We are so grateful for support!

[Visegrád 24 @visegrad24]

BREAKING:

All airports in Moscow are shutting down operations immediately.

Looks like another wave of Ukrainian drone attacks is taking place.