first check $500k-1M pre-seed (@ajhodls) on X (original) (raw)

recovering founder and self-loathing VC

• Pinned
  
  i've been getting *a lot* of inbound requests to check out founder pitches lately. we have 100+ portfolio companies, many of whom I meet with on a monthly basis. so my bandwidth for cold inbound is unfortunately pretty limited. of ~300 cold emails a month, i only take ~1-2
• 
  90% of VC deals are done because of social connections (friends, relatives) the earlier you understand that the better you can play the game
• 
  50/50 co-founder splits are the signal of a weak CEO
• 
  all my vc friends want to be founders all my founder friends want to be vcs how does it end
• 
  An average person with otherwise average intelligence and ambition has a 10x chance of getting rich if they move to SF. An exceptional person with exceptional intelligence and ambition has a 100x chance of getting rich if they move to SF.
• 
  the pre series A founder salary formula should be: $75k: single, no kids +25% SF or NYC 🌉 🏙️ +25% married 💍 +100% 1st kid 🧒 +10% per additional kid 👧
• 
• 
  one of the biggest alpha opportunities in early-stage VC is low charisma founders who don't pitch well, don't tweet, don't podcast, but just execute day in day out.
• 
  startups with a COO co-founder ☠️☠️☠️
• 
  elite founders send decks as PDFs
• 
  in any given YC batch 90% of the founders would be better off financially if they shutdown and joined the top startups in the batch
• 
  If you can’t build something without money you’re probably not going to build something great with money.
• 
  call me old fashioned but if someone invested in your company they deserve to get a “i’m still alive”email at least every 6 months this is the problem with YC deals with no real lead investor
• 
  talking to portfolio founder today about a 30Macquisitionofferforhiscompany,roughly15xARR.growthhasbeensteadybutnotoutstanding.heasked“won’tyoubeupsetthatwedidn’tgofor30M acquisition offer for his company, roughly 15x ARR. growth has been steady but not outstanding. he asked “won’t you be upset that we didn’t go for 30Macquisitionofferforhiscompany,roughly15xARR.growthhasbeensteadybutnotoutstanding.heasked“won’tyoubeupsetthatwedidn’tgofor1B?” my reply was that $15M (he owns about 50%) is a considerable sum for anyone,