General Partner @EarlybirdVC. Building @datadriven_vc. I study how outlier startups and investors win - and share their playbooks, tools, and AI workflows
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Andre Retterath | Decoding Outliers retweeted
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My prediction for venture capital:
AI will make average investors much better
But it won’t make them exceptional
The best investors will still win through access, judgment, and conviction
Just with a lot fewer spreadsheets
I’ve invested in European AI companies and worked with some extraordinary technical founders.
Talent isn’t the problem.
Our willingness to finance ambition at scale still is.
Let’s change this.
Now.
As many of you keep asking:
This does not at all contradict the data driven VC approach
Ever since my PhD on ML and the value of data for investing, I believe in an augmented VC approach:
AI for sourcing, screening, DD, memos etc
Human for final judgment, board work, emotional support in shit hits the fan moments, etc
Human + AI, not either or
The longer I work in VC, the less I believe in financial models and hard analytics.
And the more I believe in exceptional founders and gut feeling.
The best investments rarely look reasonable in Excel.
Timing your product releases is mission critical - for AI labs as much as for car companies
PS the comments made my day 🤣
A fork in Europe‘s innovation future. Let’s get this right!
AI is here to help - for investing, recruiting, and beyond 🤖
🦔Andreessen Horowitz laid off most of its 34 person team that helps its startups recruit talent, Axios reports. The few who are left will move into individual investing groups like growth and crypto, and the firm declined to comment.
My Take
I think a16z is bracing for a tougher stretch. In the past week CoreWeave’s bonds hit distress levels, Firmus pulled its IPO, and Character AI filed for bankruptcy three years after a16z led its $150 million round at a $1 billion valuation. The biggest venture firm in tech no longer paying a central team to help its companies hire means it expects those companies to need fewer people, or to have less money to pay them.
Venture firms collect management fees for years no matter what, so a cut like this usually reflects what they expect next. Some of it is AI taking over recruiting and the work itself, but I think most of it is money getting harder to raise for anyone outside the biggest AI labs. I expect more firms to quietly shrink their support staff over the next few months, and the startups that make it through will be the ones that can pay for their own hiring out of revenue.
Hedgie🤗
axios.com/2026/10/14/andrees…
Every public company statement these days
Credits to my friend @clauderitter who hit the nail with this chart
Andre Retterath | Decoding Outliers retweeted
Most VCs are aiming at a bullseye on a target they can barely see.
Last year the venture industry did about 15,000 deals. A typical early-stage firm backed twelve of them. The one that cost it most is the one it never saw.
Interesting to see many of the fastest growing companies only talk about the time from launch to 100m ARR, not the months and years of hard work put in between company formation and launch
Dilutes the picture, a lot, and makes it seem even more outlandish growth than it already is
Andre Retterath | Decoding Outliers retweeted
I think about this line often:
“You can beat someone smarter, better, and faster than you if you just work longer, harder, and in more focused ways than them.”
The market today:
VCs: We invest in contrarian founders.
Founder: I have a contrarian idea.
VCs: Interesting. Who else is investing?
I have so many emerging VC friends who struggle to raise their funds
One big blocker is to find and access the right LPs
Any trustful fundraising platform for funds out there that has verified LP dataset, network integration with CRM and LI, and a process management system?