Beezer Clarkson

If you’ve never been exposed to a great fund or firm, it’s hard to understand what they look like. And they don’t all look the same.

🆕 Origins minisode: @nchirls & I dug into our convo with @CarnegieMellon's @Curiousjorge65 to explore what it takes to be an exceptional picker - in both the LP and GP seats.

Nick asked me: “When's the first time you saw great?” - and a pretty distinct memory came to mind.

I remember sitting in a @usv LPAC and thinking: wow... these minds are really extraordinary.

It wasn’t just how thoughtful they were ab the tech they were investing in, but also how deliberate they were about what they wanted to be as a firm. I got to watch these minds ideate in real time, and it was a moment of clarity on how truly special USV is.

For an LP, saying no is a big part of the job. Those experiences help you understand what you’re holding out for, even when the next great firm looks very different from the last. 💎💎💎

Quick listen here: youtube.com/watch?v=Krk2Rg…

Given the current concentration of capital into venture ‘megafunds,’ we wanted our next LP guest on Origins to speak to how they are investing into this market and what their return expectations are.

Welcome @Curiousjorge65, who manages @CarnegieMellon's $4B endowment

NEW Origins! 🧵

As much as the venture industry has changed over the past 20+ years, @usv has remained remarkably consistent.

And thanks to the way they have documented and openly shared their investment theses since day one, you can physically look back and see this is true. With every change in the market and pivot from platform shifts, it’s never been a re-invention with USV, always an evolution.

The firm is unusually codified in the work that they do and how they do it, and as a long-time backer of the team, it’s one of the things I’ve always greatly appreciated and admired. 

Congratulations to @fredwilson, @rebeccakaden, @nickgrossman, @mignano & the entire USV team on the next chapter! Grateful to be on this journey with you, and excited for what’s ahead. 💚 🙌

Another outstanding piece of analysis from @credistick 👇

If an LP wants to build a diversified venture portfolio, part of the job is then finding managers who bring a range of opportunities. In today’s concentrated market that can be tricky, as you can invest in five different funds and still end up with a lot of the same bets. Which is great if they all work out. Less great if they don’t.

Dan puts some data behind this. Across 5 megafunds’ seed portfolios, he saw an avg of ~87% of labelled investments were in AI. EMs covered more ground… Still a focus on AI (avg of 55% in one example), but more than twice as likely to back a wider ranges of businesses.

There's so much talk about how tough it is for EMs right now (and it is), and this data illustrates the important role they play inthe ecosystem. They’re willing to put the time (and 💸💸) into ideas that aren’t yet obvious to the rest of the market.

1/ Throughout my 20+ yr career in venture, one question consistently comes up:

Can venture work as a public-market product?

@SPintoPeyronel thinks so... And she's making it happen at Robinhood Ventures.

NEW Origins 👇