"The Most contrarian thinker in VC" & Father of Modern Venture Capital. VC, Angel, LP. prev: @Google @Oracle @ucberkeley @Columbialaw
New York, NY
Joined September 2012
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Del Johnson retweeted
Be extremely intentional with your friendships — not acquaintances, not business partners, actual friends
Try to pick high-integrity people — the right people
Invest time in those relationships
Cut or downgrade folks who are transactional or who don’t show up for you
Reallocate that time and energy to the right people who do
It's ok to be cutthroat about this, as life is the memories you create with your friends and family.
Invest in making moments.
Del Johnson retweeted
More than any time in my career, VCs seem to be underwriting other investors’ interest rather than the company itself.
Del Johnson retweeted
anyone even remotely familiar with the valley is not surprised foreign actors have embedded agents who conduct industrial espionage on US technology companies
there is a literal FBI branch office dedicated to this problem
it *is* funny to try to turn this into a product marketing story when the guy in question was cartoonishly incompetent tho
Lots of new details on the OpenAI spy in this piece. The company's newsroom thanked AI for helping identify the culprit, but seems like case really cracked open when the guy *checks notes* LEFT HIS BAG UNATTENDED WITH HIS ID AND ANOTHER LISTENING DEVICE.
"One of the keys to the case was finding an unattended bag in the company’s offices that allegedly contained Alfozan’s wallet and identification as well as a recording device, according to the US Attorney’s office in San Francisco."
Del Johnson retweeted
I speak to 3-5 LPs every week for different manager reference calls. Three takeaways from calls this week.
1. The mega platforms raised way more than expected this year.
2. They are investing much faster than expected. They raised this year and will be back in market next year.
3. Budgets for smaller managers $200M and seed have been cut almost entirely as a result.
Across all 4 calls this week. Same message.
Yeah, there's this budding idea that by pushing domestic emerging manager competition out of the industry, large VCs leave a capital vacuum that is readily filled by spies, cults, and foreign adversaries. But maybe we're not ready for that conversation yet.
Del Johnson retweeted
The man arrested for planting a secret recording device at OpenAI's headquarters is a Venture Partner of a VC firm alongside the son of a senior Saudi intelligence official:
Del Johnson retweeted
BREAKING: We have obtained the footage.
Full episode tonight @ 9pm Eastern. Live on our YouTube. See you there.
Del Johnson retweeted
That's the point! Large VCs want to push out competition. They have organized the industry to do just that, and it's going to take legislation to fix it, unless you want 5 large risk averse funds to control even more of global VC-backed business formation. wired.com/story/to-save-the-…
