VCs, investors, entrepreneurs, don't miss this great 1h video talk betweeen Guy Kawazaki (a great moderator) and probably 2 of the top 10 best investors in the world Mike Moritz (Sequoia Capital) and Paul Graham (founder of Ycombinator)
This talk illustrates so well the difference between the old and new generation of investment vehicles. The monster VC behind Yahoo, Cisco, Google and Youtube and the Startup Academy funding totally unknown, unexperienced but highly talented guys before they event come to VCs. This is no surprise btw that Sequoia recently decided to invest in Ycombinator which funds about 50 startups a year.
I really enjoyed this talk. full of insights (specially from Graham which is always to the point, man of few words but spot on)
Some snacks from this talk
- Investing in proven entrepreneurs is a fake. Proven means nothing in early stage. We invest in passion.
- Passion can't be faked. Don't use the word passion in your pitch. Show you are passionate about what you do.
- Is there a reason why so many enterpreneurs are 25-ish years old and not 35-ish? It's easier to start when your young. Moritz "Mozart died at 35" [brilliant]
- How do you detect Bullshit in entrepreneurs? it's all about sincerity [but honestly i felt that their answers was kind of BS-ish]
- Where do you help entrepreneurs when they start? Graham:in deciding what to build first [seems obvious, but SO important indeed]
- Next trends? Graham: if we knew we would build the startup...See where hackers are spending their time and you'll gean idea (eg iPhone, Twitter, Facebook,...)
- Would you invest in a wife/husband business? Moritz: Cisco was the case. Graham:yes, if the persons are right for the business and not here because of the relation
- How do you set valuation? Kawazaki: for each engineer in the team add 500k USD. for each MBA take off 250k USD (so funny)
