All I ever hear are horror stories. Can someone tell me a good story about VC that isn't Facebook or something?
As with all things, the horror stories just get the most attention. People love to rage. There are plenty of boring (good, even!) VCs out there. They just work more quietly, professionally.<p>I'll share a story, but its about a close friend and not me so I won't name any explicit actors and I'm going to round out the numbers. You either trust me or you don't, but this is a very direct relationship I have to both the founder and VC.<p>The story is this: the founder started their company outside of SV, so the lawyers weren't super familiar with startups and messed up the initial incorporation and stock plan stuff (actually super common: use Stripe Atlas or pay a startup-aware lawyer!). Went under the radar through years. This company ended up being bought for nearly $1B (with a B) after many rounds and a large board.<p>During the legal work to close the acquisition, they found out this messed up stock plan. Without going into the details, the effect was that instead of taking home $200M, the founder would take home ~$75M. The mistake the lawyer made almost a decade earlier was about to cost him $125M.<p>Most of the board basically said "too bad so sad, law is law." But one VC (the one I know, the one I'm talking about) basically strong armed and politicked the whole thing and eventually convinced everyone around the table to give up an equal share of their own holdings to make the founder whole.<p>Letter to the law: they didn't have to.<p>Spirit of being founder friendly: this VC went to bat hard and got everyone to yield to make things "right."<p>Also, look, you might argue $75M vs $200M is just "rich vs rich." Who cares? Sure. That's not the point.<p>You don't hear about stuff like this because honestly its not a big enough deal and feel good stories get way less clicks than pitchfork stories.
Thanks for that story.<p>I feel as if basic Personal Integrity is now considered an anachronistic weakness, in the tech industry, and it's heartbreaking. I know that VCs can probably share similar stories [to the OP] about some of the people that pitched them, or their behavior, after getting funded.<p>Lotta ass, being shown, all around.<p>At some point in the future, I may consider smaller-scale (local) angel investing, but it seems like such an ugly field, not sure if I'll ever do it. I don't need the money; I would do it to help folks get a leg up.
Right - and if I ever go to raise VC then that's a guy I'll want to talk to. Even if they themselves don't invest, their recommendation would be valuable.<p>Life's too short to screw people over - reputation is one of the few things that last after we're gone.
This is awesome!
My prospective co-founders and I were pitching to a VC firm that was, on paper, a really good fit for what we were trying to do. The partner we were pitching to was, 15 years ago, briefly my manager's manager -- some work relationship there, she remembered me and I her, but we didn't work super closely together and it had been a very long time. She had moved on at that company to more big-shot things and ultimately become a partner at a respectable VC firm.<p>About 10 minutes into the pitch, she cut us off, and basically said -- as absolutely kindly as something like this can be directly said -- "I am not going to invest in this, and furthermore I don't think what you're trying to do is investible at all". Then she took a bunch of her time to run us through <i>why</i>, help us understand some very fundamental things about the VC world we didn't quite have right, and generally be brutal but extremely useful in us framing what we were trying to do.<p>She didn't have to do that. She could have nodded along and then given us a polite "no" like everyone else. She could have cut us off and given us a rude "no". But she didn't -- she made sure to use the time we had to help us as much as she could, even if she very adamantly was not going to invest.<p>Not a big gesture or anything, but kind and helpful. There's a lot of that. But it doesn't make headlines.
The non-horror stories are usually pretty boring: VC heard the pitch, then either passed politely or wanted to be part of the round. If they joined, they wrote a check and wanted updates.<p>The VC landscape has changed a lot since some of these stories happened. Many years ago, there were few VCs and even good companies had a hard time getting funding. This created weird environments with some VCs raised funds and then liked having companies crawl to them to beg for the money.<p>There are still some VCs like that, but there has been an explosion of VC funds and money. Most VCs know they need to work hard to earn the trust of founders that they want to invest in. Leaving a bad impression could mean you're left out of the next round if you want it.<p>This goes against the popular idea of VCs, but most VCs I've worked with are actually pretty boring, normal, nice people.
I believe Eric Vishria is the best Series A board member of this generation. I've learned more from him about it what it means to be a great CEO over the last 10 years than anyone else. I haven't heard of another founder who has spoken as highly as their Series A investor.<p>I've been meaning to write up my story with him. Now is a great time with all the horror stories on others that have been coming out.<p>He sticks through his companies for over a decade, which is rare in this business: <a href="https://x.com/ericvishria/status/2051459386372149506" rel="nofollow">https://x.com/ericvishria/status/2051459386372149506</a>
There are tons and tons of mundane VC stories. They all mostly just go "we came, we presented, we were funded"
Tony Conrad [1] was the VC that guided our related content engine (Sphere: a vector database before vector databases were cool) through a $25 million exit. Chump change these days but he took really good care of us, leading us through a global recession and then two acquisitions.<p>[1] <a href="https://about.me/tonyconrad" rel="nofollow">https://about.me/tonyconrad</a>
Casey Aylward from Accel has been mentioned in all void0 company posts. So she must have been very useful for the founder. (I don't have any insider information about void0, I've met her a few times and she is amazing)<p><a href="https://voidzero.dev/posts/voidzero-cloudflare#acknowledgements" rel="nofollow">https://voidzero.dev/posts/voidzero-cloudflare#acknowledgeme...</a>
I was just an engineer at a vc backed startup but our interactions with the VCs were totally normal - they were no better or worse than when we worked with publishers or other external funding sources.
The <i>best possible</i> case is that you get a cash infusion now in exchange for giving up a huge percentage of your future revenue and control of the company.
i raised twice from USV. class acts all around. too many stories to count, but they always had my back.
Sure. They are usually just very boring: you made a pitch, got funded. The VCs used their connections to get you good advisors and/or introduce you to prospective clients.