@byersblake is right.
I joined kpcb a few years after @vkhosla had left to start @khoslaventures. Greentech era.
My interactions, as a super junior guy back then, was that Khosla actually respected entrepreneurs more than some of the dumbass VC’s.
Im sorry you were traumatized by Vinod falling asleep in your meeting. But he founded one of the pioneering companies of the modern computer industry (Eric Schmidt worked for him there), has the highest ever multiple and IRR at exit in Kleiner Perkins history ($7B return on $3M invested in only 3 years) and while everyone was investing in SaaS throughout the 2010s, Vinod was funding the first round of companies building battery tech, rocket launch, fusion, genomics, carbon tech and a little AI research lab called OpenAI. And he did this while hitting grand slams and raising multi billion dollar funds. He is one of the truest VCs to ever do it.
Are you all familiar with bozo multiplication? Hire 1 bozo they hire 2 and those 2 hire 4 and the 4 hire 16… can’t have bozos in a startup. #entrepreneur
TikTok https://t.co/bf04Lnj1es
I was once pitching in a board room at a top 3 VC firm for a $15M Series A.
12 people in the meeting. One of the GPs fully fell asleep. Out cold for 30+ minutes. Nobody acknowledged it. Everyone just kept going.
I kept presenting my Series A slides to an unconscious man in a Herman Miller chair and somehow that was considered normal. That's venture capital.
You might fly across the country to perform for people who may or may not be conscious.
It's a dance.
And sometimes you lead and sometimes you follow and sometimes your partner is unconscious.
If you're raising right now, just know: every founder has a story like this. The process is weird. The power dynamic is weird. You're not crazy for thinking it's weird.
No one talks about it because they want to continue raising. But I'm happy to stick my neck out there.
It is weird.
imagine you’re Travis Kalanick
you built Uber from nothing into a $70 billion company and changed how every city on earth moves
then in the worst three weeks of your life, family tragedies hit, and five of your investors hand you a letter demanding you resign
so you step down
the board replaces you, your successor and board sell off the self driving division you created, the thing you believed was Uber’s entire future
gone
$4 billion to Aurora
the mainstream media tries to write your obituary: toxic culture, bad leadership, and a cautionary tale
silicon valley moves on
as they always do
but you don’t
you don’t really forget
you go quiet, completely quiet
you take $150 million and buy a ghost kitchen company called CloudKitchens
you raise over a billion dollars, hit a $15 billion valuation, build a company with thousands of employees
and nobody even knows the name
eight years in stealth, employees aren’t even allowed to put your company on their LinkedIn
then today you rename the company Atoms, and it’s not a kitchen company anymore
it’s a robotics company
1. food
2. mining
3. transport
your first move?
acquiring Pronto
the autonomous vehicle startup
built by Anthony Levandowski, the same engineer you originally swooped away from Google to build Uber’s self driving program
oh and he went on to deploy 100+ autonomous trucks for one of the largest materials companies on earth
now he’s coming back to work with you
and the reports say Uber itself
the same company that pushed you out, is now backing you to go after self driving harder than Waymo
the guy they removed is the guy they end up needing
poetic justice
your framework aka everything in civilization is mined or grown, manufactured and moved
you call it the golden age
your manifesto ends with three words:
“I never left”
eight years of silence
then this
but here’s what people keep getting wrong about your situation
everyone wants to call it a comeback or a revenge story
it’s neither
you just went quiet and built for eight years while everyone who wrote you off had stopped paying attention
that’s not revenge, that’s just what true builder obsession looks like
most founders would’ve stayed bitter
most would’ve written a book and done a podcast tour, most would’ve taken the $2.5 billion in shares and disappeared off to a beach or Epstein’s island
you didn’t do any of that
you just kept building
and now the same people who pushed you out need you again
so whether you love him or hate him
the most dangerous person in any room is the one who goes quiet yet never stops building
karma is real
welcome back Travis
Glyphosate directive is national security. Keep PRC and its affiliates away from:
- chemical production
- seed genetics
- proprietary farm data
- farmland
- ownership is companies that posses these assets
many with PRC connections that invest here and own
Perfectly stated by @scottmcnealy … as a parent if a kid who actually has autism, the whole elite families or kids getting more test time by saying they are disabled. It’s become a game.
Stanford students are perfectly schooled to be in government. Good at gaming the system, no shame, horrible values. Defund Stanford and the rest. https://t.co/ZEt7SOlY1v
I actually like this guy watch the whole interview it’s pure comedy @CNBC defending the hedge fund guys tax status
I'm not dropping out of the race, says Republican NYC mayoral candidate ... https://t.co/UV0lHOiTCP via @YouTube