Outcast Ventures

Outcast Ventures is a pre-seed/seed VC fund in SF built around people, from founding teams to first hires.

Catalyst 01 applications now open until April 6.

[Andy Chen @andychen]

Today we’re launching Catalyst 02: where founders meet their co-founders

Looking back on cohort 01, one thing stood out…

[Amy Lin @heyamylin]

Your next co-founder might be at this dinner.

@andychen and I are hosting a private founder dinner in SF.

https://t.co/EmbKsYnhKH

[Andy Chen @andychen]

Yesterday's $60B Cursor acquisition means a group of exceptional builders suddenly has the freedom to leave and start companies of their own.

At @OutcastVC , we track this through The Talent Mobility Index: our framework for understanding when exceptional technical talent is locked up, when it becomes liquid, and when it becomes free to build.

[Andy Chen @andychen]

This is the question I get asked more than any other:
I'm grabbing coffee with a potential technical co-founder. What do I ask?"

So I wrote down 100 of them: https://t.co/JRERXhCo4z

[Andy Chen @andychen]

What if the best co-founder for you is someone outside your network? If that question hit home, Catalyst applications close TONIGHT at midnight.

Been a longtime listener of Founder in Arms so was thrilled to sit down with @rajatsuri and talk about why we built @outcastvc and Catalyst around the contrarian idea...

[Amy Lin @heyamylin]

Building a billion-dollar company takes 12+ years. Are you choosing a co-founder who can go the distance?

[Andy Chen @andychen]

The AI generation may build companies 10x larger than those before it.

[Amy Lin @heyamylin]

The most overrated signal in venture? Where the founder went to school.

[Amy Lin @heyamylin]

Most capital goes to all-male teams. The biggest exits don't.

[Andy Chen @andychen]

If you want your kid to be a billionaire, name them… Michael.

[Andy Chen @andychen]

Building a company is a learned skill.

We analyzed 350 U.S. tech IPOs and $1B+ acquisitions over the past 20 years in our Billion-Dollar Founder Study.

[Amy Lin @heyamylin]

Everyone's celebrating the solo founder era. The data says it's a trap.

📊 The Billion-Dollar Founder Insight 02 📊

[Andy Chen @andychen]

The best co-founder probably isn’t someone you’ve worked with before.

[Outcast Ventures @OutcastVC]

@andychen @heyamylin 4/ Applications are now open: https://t.co/1XbXIl5xug

[Outcast Ventures @OutcastVC]

1/ Introducing Catalyst - a program for top 1% builders to meet their co-founder.

Co-founders and GPs @andychen and @heyamylin have spent their careers recruiting, building, and investing at the earliest stages.

[Outcast Ventures @OutcastVC]

3/ So we built Catalyst to change that.

💰️$500K investment
💻️60 founders (half technical, half non-technical)
☀️ 2 months
🤖 $1M+ cloud & compute credits

...all in-person in San Francisco.

The founders work side by side and decide deliberately whether to start a company together.

[Outcast Ventures @OutcastVC]

2/ One pattern kept showing up: who you build with is the most important decision a founder makes, and it's still left to chance.

When we studied 350 billion-dollar U.S. tech exits, the data confirmed it. Founders who previously didn't work together built companies with 21% higher exits than those who had.