
At Initialized Capital, Odd Couple Looks to Do VC Differently - prostoalex
https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexkonrad/2018/07/09/at-initialized-capital-odd-couple-alexis-ohanian-and-garry-tan-look-to-do-vc-differently/#456e13c43efe
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brandonb
Garry, Alexis, and the team at Initialized are the real deal.

In a world where most investors' first question is, "Who else is in?", the
hardest thing for a raw startup to find is someone with the conviction to
write the first check. They've built their whole firm on being willing to bet
on companies before other investors do.

Later on, when things get tough--and eventually, things always get tough--you
want somebody who's been in the trenches, knows how it feels, and can help you
guide the company between Scylla and Charybdis. Garry and Alexis have been
there, and they do that.

If you're starting a company and looking to raise funding, I'd strongly
recommend you speak with Initialized. There's a lot of talk in venture. Garry
and Alexis walk the walk.

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shanghaiaway
Can we get a disclosure on your relation to Initialized?

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brandonb
They invested in my first company, which went through YC's S11 batch.

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dxhdr
Article leads with a photo captioned "Garry Tan and Alexis Ohanian are looking
to a build a VC firm for 'the next 100 years.'"

The closest the story comes to expounding on this that the firm has their own
CRM software and that they "value doing our own research." A succinct summary
of the article may be the paragraph leading "Like most VCs, Initialized says
it isn't like the other VCs."

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rdlecler1
The irony about VC is that they don’t invest in lifestyle business (except
their own). Building your own CRM isn’t really rocket science. We’ve built
automation and AI into our deal flow and company tracking and a bespoke search
engine to help with competitive market analysis.

Want to be different? Run a VC firm like a startup: build proprietary
technology to outcompete incumbents and scale in a way not possible without
technology. It does’t even sound like they have a FT engineer.... Imagine
investing in a startup that didn’t have a FT engineer! But that’s exactly what
they (and most VCs) are asking of their Limited Partners! Sounds like a puffy
and carefully managed PR piece with a complicit journalist to prime the raise
of their next fund without triggering a Reg D 506c registration..

They may have great returns, smarter than most, and have higher conviction,
but it’s pretty much same old same old of catching the wave of good deal flow
from your celebrity network. Nothing innovative here.

~~~
garry
Actually I am an engineer, as is Vince and Brett in our partnership. Brett and
I implemented much of the software that runs YC today including the
application process and the internal social network.

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tixocloud
From the article, it mentions Matthew coming through a cold pitch but then
later on it also states that he went through a referral process to get to the
cold pitch.

Are you guys doing anything to vet startups minus the referrals?

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staunch
Seems like a good thing to have another VC firm that actually tries to make
its own decisions. It doesn't seem particularly new or ambitious though.

New and ambitious would be attempting to beat YC at its own game. Competing
head-to-head with YC for startups and trying to create a version of YC that
was meritocratic and scaleable. For the good of the world, startups, and for
profit.

Someone could create a version of YC that funds any startup that meets a
certain level of traction for example. Or it could do funding by directly
measuring the team's technical or other abilities. It could use a blind
admissions system that doesn't rely on judging founders in 10 minute
interviews.

YC funds just 3% of the founders that ask for funding. It's entirely likely
that they fund the wrong 3% and/or ignore a huge percentage of potentially
great startups.

There's only a few people in the world able to the raise money necessary to
compete with YC and they all seem afraid to even try.

~~~
dyarosla
If someone was looking to compete with YC one starting differentiator could be
to not force teams to relocate to SV for three months; something that YC has
proven time and again they’re not open to budging on (aside for the mini-not
quite YC program they ran). They’ve explained their rational but I don’t buy
it.

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nojvek
It’s easy to forget how important SV is compared to the rest of the world.

SV invests more in startups than the rest of the world combined. It’s the only
place in the world where people put big money where their mouth is.

I’d love to see YC definitely grow in other places but it boils down to a
couple of things. A high concentration of capital, talent and a good business
support.

Not a lot of places that have that or willing to cultivate that.

~~~
devdas
Or just white men investing in other white men.

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yeleti
I think the point here is, a Founder-VC is better than a traditional VC
because the Founder-VC understands ”the life and art of being in the
trenches”.

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kn0thing
And we ship. It's hard to unlearn solving problems via software when you've
done it, especially at scale successfully, and it makes everyone at the org
(and soon in the founder network) more effective and frankly happier doing
their jobs.

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seizethecheese
I've seen this plastered all over my twitter feed. Similarly, story for the
new book by Elad Gil.

The incestual promoting among the startup elite is a bit nauseating.

~~~
seizethecheese
I wish I could delete this.

In retrospect, it's perfectly normal to promote your friends' startups, funds
or books.

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Rjevski
GDPR-free version: [http://archive.is/9LH5U](http://archive.is/9LH5U)

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shanghaiaway
Submarine.

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grosjona
Exactly. I was thinking the same thing.

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ShabbosGoy
A real 100 year VC firm would be a DAO. Maybe they aren’t as forward looking
as they’d like to believe. Much respect to Alexis and Garry, though. It’s not
easy to go it alone.

~~~
geofft
Why would a VC firm be distributed?

