Tag: superclusters

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The Inside Peek Into How Family Offices Gather | Samira Salman | Superclusters | S5E11

samira salman

“The revenue and economic models for groups are misaligned with how human nature functions.” – Samira Salman

Samira Salman is a generational force—a rare blend of financier, strategist, and connector—revered for her ability to move capital, catalyze ventures, and cultivate the kinds of high-trust relationships that shape industries and define legacies. With over $5.5 billion in closed transactions spanning multiple asset classes, she is not merely a dealmaker—she is a trusted consigliere to some of the world’s most sophisticated families, investors, and visionaries.

Samira is the Founder & CEO of Salman Solutions, a bespoke advisory firm, and the visionary behind Collaboration Circle, an invitation-only global ecosystem recognized by Fortune Magazine as the premier “by families, for families” platform—curating aligned capital, deal flow, and meaningful connection across generations of wealth. She also serves as Chief Operating Officer of a private single-family office, overseeing a portfolio that blends venture capital, direct investments, and multi-generational governance.

Educated as a mergers and acquisitions tax attorney, Samira’s early career at Arthur Andersen, Deloitte, KPMG, and Shell Oil laid the foundation for her structural brilliance and financial fluency. She holds an LL.M. in Taxation, a JD, and a BS in International Trade and Finance—with a minor in Economics. Her legal acumen, combined with a deep intuition for human behavior, gives her a unique edge in structuring elegant, effective solutions that drive growth, mitigate risk, and unlock hidden value.

Samira’s proprietary methodology for business growth and ecosystem development has positioned her as one of the most connected and trusted figures in private finance. Her work spans advisory mandates, capital formation, co-investment syndication, family office strategy, and the orchestration of transformational events for UHNW families and industry trailblazers. She is the rare operator who bridges worlds—money and meaning, structure and soul, intellect and instinct.

Her multicultural upbringing and global exposure across dozens of countries have imbued her with a refined sensibility, cultural fluency, and a fierce commitment to authenticity. Samira doesn’t just build businesses—she builds trust-based systems that endure. Her work is rooted in the principle that Relationships Under Management (RUM) are the new AUM—and she is the embodiment of that thesis.

A passionate advocate for women’s economic empowerment, arts and culture, and global impact, Samira has served as an Honorary Advisor to the United Nations for Social Impact Projects and the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development. She has held board roles with numerous arts, education, healthcare, and professional institutions including the Houston Ballet, Center for Contemporary Craft, and Fresh Arts.

You can find Samira on her socials here:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samirasalman/
X / Twitter: https://x.com/samira_salman

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also watch the episode on YouTube here.

OUTLINE:

[00:00] Intro
[02:27] How did Samira find herself at TASIS?
[04:17] How did TASIS feel when she first arrived?
[07:27] From tax lawyer to family offices
[09:55] How did Samira decide to quit being a lawyer?
[17:12] Why did Samira want to be a tax lawyer?
[19:44] Journaling
[22:39] The blessing of a lawyer brain
[25:19] The Oprah episode that changed it all
[29:45] How did Salman Solutions start?
[33:28] Samira’s first interaction with family offices
[36:43] Show and tell with Samira’s journals and pens
[41:27] What did Samira mean that most family offices fall short of raising their own capital?
[42:54] What is the common family office hero arc into VC?
[44:05] Family office trends that Samira’s seen
[47:17] The starting point for families interested in VC
[50:13] Advice to a friend who wants to invest in VC
[53:31] Book, podcast and conference recommendations
[55:42] How does one qualify for Collaboration Circle?
[56:21] Content recommendations, continued
[59:57] How Collaboration Circle started
[1:06:59] The 3 pieces of Collaboration Circle
[1:09:49] Community economic models and human nature misalignment
[1:12:43] How to create safe environments
[1:18:02] The Dior bag tradition
[1:21:20] Reminders that we’re in the good old days

SELECT LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

SELECT QUOTES FROM THIS EPISODE:

“The very first thing everybody has to do is give themselves permission to lean into what they are interested in and what does it for them and what they understand and what they have an affinity for, regardless of what everybody else says you should be doing.” – Samira Salman

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” – Margaret Mead

“The revenue and economic models for groups are misaligned with how human nature functions.” – Samira Salman

“Numbers and volume are not what programs humans to feel safe and to be authentic and to create. In order for us to do our best work and be our most thoughtful, our most creative, we have to be fully dropped down into our bodies and safe in our nervous systems. And some of the environments our industry has curated are literally the exact opposite of that.” – Samira Salman

Follow David Zhou for more Superclusters content:
For podcast show notes: https://cupofzhou.com/superclusters
Follow David Zhou’s blog: https://cupofzhou.com
Follow Superclusters on Twitter: https://twitter.com/SuperclustersLP
Follow Superclusters on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@super.clusters
Follow Superclusters on Instagram: https://instagram.com/super.clusters

Stay up to date with the weekly cup of cognitive adventures inside venture capital and startups, as well as cataloging the history of tomorrow through the bookmarks of yesterday!

The views expressed on this blogpost are for informational purposes only. None of the views expressed herein constitute legal, investment, business, or tax advice. Any allusions or references to funds or companies are for illustrative purposes only, and should not be relied upon as investment recommendations. Consult a professional investment advisor prior to making any investment decisions.

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Should VCs Scale? | El Pack w/ Screendoor | Superclusters

screendoor

The entire Screendoor team joins me on El Pack to answer your questions on how to build a venture capital fund. We bring on three GPs at VC funds to ask three different questions.

Kyber Knight Capital’s Linus Liang asked about why LPs choose to bet on new managers as opposed to investing in more established funds.

NOMO Ventures’ Kate Rohacz asked about what parts of venture do LPs think is most opaque.

Articulate’s Helen Min asked if every emerging manager should scale into a larger firm.

The Screendoor team is a powerhouse of experienced LPs, bringing together institutional investment experience that spans over a decade. Lisa Cawley, Layne Johnson, and Jamie Rhode have each built institutional venture programs within innovative family offices, financial institutions, and pensions. They have invested in venture capital across stages, sectors, and geographies, and in particular are known as a go-to for emerging managers.

Lisa Cawley is the Managing Director of Screendoor. Previously, Lisa worked with a private multi-billion-dollar global investment firm where she was involved in all aspects of managing the firm’s private market portfolio, including sourcing and manager due diligence, asset allocation and forecasting, and creating and implementing the firm’s investment data tools and analytics. Lisa started her career at Ernst & Young, where she served on private equity, venture capital, and public CPG clients. Lisa earned an MBA and an MSF from Loyola University Maryland, and she obtained a BBA in Accounting with a double minor in Information Systems and Spanish from Loyola University Maryland. She is a CFA Charterholder and holds a CPA.

You can find Lisa on her socials here:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/31mml/

Layne Johnson is a Partner at Screendoor. Previously, she led the Venture & Growth Equity manager selection effort at the Teacher Retirement System of Texas (“TRS”). At TRS, Layne was responsible for setting the venture capital strategy, including portfolio construction, new manager sourcing and diligence, and increasing exposure to emerging venture managers. She had previously been at Goldman Sachs, since 2012, in the External Investing Group (“XIG”), based out of the New York and San Francisco offices. At GS, Layne initially worked on the hedge fund manager selection team and then moved over to the private side of the business to focus on technology and venture manager selection and secondaries. She also helped lead the Launch with GS Program, including sourcing, investing in, and building portfolios of diverse managers. Layne holds a BA in History from Yale University and currently serves on the St. David’s Foundation Investment Committee.

You can find Layne on her socials here:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/layne-johnson-4b71b571/

Jamie Rhode is a Partner at Screendoor. She previously spent 8 years at Verdis Investment Management, an institutional single family office that manages capital for generations 7 through 10. At Verdis, Jamie focused on venture capital, private equity, and hedge fund investment sourcing and diligence. Using a data-driven approach, she helped revamp the asset allocation strategy and rebuild these portfolios. Specifically, through Verdis’s first institutional venture fund program, Jamie played an integral role in shifting the portfolio’s exposure from multi-stage to emerging managers and early-stage VC. Prior to Verdis, she spent four years at Bloomberg, where she held roles in both equity research and credit analysis. There, she created, managed and leveraged an extensive library of statutory, financial and market data for buy and sell-side clients who use Bloomberg to make investment decisions. A licensed Chartered Financial Analyst, she earned her bachelor’s degree in Finance and Marketing from Drexel University’s College of Business Administration.

You can find Jamie on her socials here:
Twitter: https://x.com/lady10x
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jerrcfa/

And huge thank you for Linus, Kate, and Helen for jumping on the show.

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also watch the episode on YouTube here.

OUTLINE:

[00:00] Intro
[05:58] Enter Linus and Kyber Knight Capital
[10:06] Why take the risk of betting on an emerging manager?
[18:40] The types of pushback Linus got when he was fundraising
[19:47] The incentives of an LP when investing in VC
[21:49] How do GPs ask LPs how they’re compensated?
[24:47] Enter Kate and NOMO Ventures
[28:31] What part of venture is most opaque?
[38:18] The things venture LPs look at beyond the metrics
[43:47] “Bad” advice from LPs
[46:27] Enter Helen
[46:48] Helen’s new podcast, Great Chat
[49:34] What is Articulate?
[52:43] Should emerging funds scale?
[1:00:47] How often do GPs say they want to scale
[1:03:03] Layne’s advice for GPs
[1:03:39] Jamie’s advice for LPs
[1:04:55] Lisa’s advice for LPs and GPs
[1:07:35] David’s favorite moment from Jamie’s episode
[1:09:53] David’s favorite moment from Lisa’s episode

SELECT LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

SELECT QUOTES FROM THIS EPISODE:

“My original intention was never to target emerging managers. My intention was actually to target funds that were the first institutional check into a startup because I was looking for a way to compound capital at an extremely high rate. And that just led me to backing emerging managers because finding a fund that was willing to invest at the pre-seed/seed consistently over a very long term either meant by the time they had a track record that underwritable with DPI, I couldn’t get in or they were an established manager that was slowly creeping up into bigger and bigger fund size so they were closer to Series A and Series B. What I ended up realizing is to go access that part of the market, I had to do emerging managers.” – Jamie Rhode

“A lot of what we do in underwriting is backward-looking, but really in VC, you want to be forward-looking. So it’s really important to be taking in those datapoints, but if you’re making a majority of your decision on those backward-looking datapoints, I would argue that you’re probably missing the mark when it comes to emerging managers. You actually want to be asking how do I know this firm–this team–is still going to have an edge in, inevitably, what would be a new market environment. There are going to be new competitive forces. There are going to be new technologies–new innovation. New at every level.” – Lisa Cawley

“I’m a firm believer that if you are waiting to see the proof smack you in the face, you’re actually not participating in the proof. You’re not getting that performance. You’re not getting those returns. You’re sitting and you’re waiting. And by the way, everyone else is doing the same thing, so you’re competing against them. Just because someone can identify that’s a great brand at that point, it doesn’t mean just because you have capital, you can get access.” – Lisa Cawley

“Don’t get swayed by capital.” – Jamie Rhode

“You can’t be all things to all people.” – Lisa Cawley

“Scaling is not synonymous with increasing fund size. To me, scaling means you’re increasing in sophistication. You’re increasing in focus. And that’s really a sign of maturity and fund size is a byproduct of that.” – Lisa Cawley

“GP-market fit is so crucial and you want to make sure you’re setting yourself up for success by being able to shine in what you’re best at and what your background and experiences set you up for as well.” – Layne Johnson

“Speed to fundraise does not always equate to a strong investor.” – Lisa Cawley

Follow David Zhou for more Superclusters content:
For podcast show notes: https://cupofzhou.com/superclusters
Follow David Zhou’s blog: https://cupofzhou.com
Follow Superclusters on Twitter: https://twitter.com/SuperclustersLP
Follow Superclusters on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@super.clusters
Follow Superclusters on Instagram: https://instagram.com/super.clusters

Stay up to date with the weekly cup of cognitive adventures inside venture capital and startups, as well as cataloging the history of tomorrow through the bookmarks of yesterday!

The views expressed on this blogpost are for informational purposes only. None of the views expressed herein constitute legal, investment, business, or tax advice. Any allusions or references to funds or companies are for illustrative purposes only, and should not be relied upon as investment recommendations. Consult a professional investment advisor prior to making any investment decisions.

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Venture Capital is DEAD! | El Pack w/ Chris Douvos | Superclusters

chris douvos

Ahoy Capital’s founder, Chris Douvos, joins David on El Pack to answer your questions on how to build a venture capital fund. We bring on three GPs at VC funds to ask three different questions.

Pachamama Ventures’ Karen Sheffield asked about how GPs should think about when and how to sell secondaries.

Mangusta Capital’s Kevin Jiang asked about how GPs should think about staying top of mind with LPs between fundraises.

Stellar Ventures’ David Anderman asked Chris about GPs who start to specialize in different stages of investment compared to their previous funds.

Chris Douvos founded Ahoy Capital in 2018 to build an intentionally right-sized firm that could pursue investment excellence while prizing a spirit of partnership with all of its constituencies. A pioneering investor in the micro-VC movement, Chris has been a fixture in venture capital for nearly two decades. Prior to Ahoy Capital, Chris spearheaded investment efforts at Venture Investment Associates, and The Investment Fund for Foundations. He learned the craft of illiquid investing at Princeton University’s endowment. Chris earned his B.A. with Distinction from Yale College in 1994 and an M.B.A. from Yale School of Management in 2001.

You can find Chris on his socials here:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/cdouvos
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisdouvos/

And huge thank you for Karen, Kevin, and David for jumping on the show.

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also watch the episode on YouTube here.

OUTLINE:

[00:00] Intro
[01:03] The facade of tough times
[05:03] The last time Chris hugged someone
[06:53] The art (and science?) of a good hug
[08:32] How does Chris start his quarterly letters?
[10:35] Quotes, writing, and AI
[15:13] Venture is dead. Why?
[17:33] But… why is venture still exciting?
[21:13] Enter Karen Sheffield
[21:48] The never-to-be-aired episode with Chris and Beezer
[22:55] Karen and Pachamama Ventures
[24:19] The third iteration of climate tech vocabulary
[26:55] How should GPs think about secondaries?
[33:53] Where can GPs go to learn more about when to sell?
[36:53] Are secondary transactions actually happening or is it bluff?
[38:44] “Entrepreneurship is like a gas, hottest when compressed”
[42:26] Enter Kevin Jiang and Mangusta Capital
[44:21] The significance of the mongoose
[46:36] How do LPs like to stay updated on a GP’s progress?
[59:35] How does a GP show an LP they’re in it for the long run?
[1:03:57] David’s Anderman part of the Superclusters story
[1:05:41] David Anderman’s gripe about the name Boom
[1:06:31] Enter David Anderman and Stellar Ventures
[1:10:21] What do LPs think of GPs expanding their thesis for later-stage rounds?
[1:21:43] Why not invest all of your private portfolio in buyout funds
[1:25:48] Good answers to why didn’t things work out
[1:28:13] Chris’ one last piece of advice
[1:35:18] My favorite clip from Chris’ first episode on Superclusters

SELECT LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

SELECT QUOTES FROM THIS EPISODE:

“Every letter seems to say portfolios have ‘limited exposure to tariffs.’ The reality is we’re seeing potentially the breakdown of the entire post-war Bretton Woods system. And that’s going to have radical impacts on everything across the entire economy. So to say ‘we have limited exposure to tariffs’ is one thing, but what they really are saying is ‘we don’t understand the exposure we have to the broader economy as a whole.’” – Chris Douvos

“Everybody is always trying to put the best spin on quarterly results. I love how every single letter I get starts: ‘We are pleased to share our quarterly letter.’ I write my own quarterly letters. Sometimes I’m not pleased to share them. All of my funds – I love them like my children – equally but differently. There’s one that’s keeping me up a lot at night. Man, I’m not pleased to share anything about that fund, but I have to.” – Chris Douvos

“There’s ups and downs. We live in a business of failure. Ted Williams once said, ‘Baseball is the only human endeavor where being successful three times out of ten can get you to the Hall of Fame.’ If you think about venture, it’s such a power law business that if you were successful three times out of ten, you’d be a radical hero.” – Chris Douvos

“Tim Berners-Lee’s outset of the internet talked about the change from the static web to the social web to the semantic web. Each iteration of the web has three layers: the compute layer, an interaction layer, and a data layer.” – Chris Douvos

“Venture doesn’t know the train that’s headed down the tracks to hit it. Every investor I talk to—and I talk mostly to endowments and foundations—is thinking about how to shorten the duration of their portfolio. People have too many long-dated way-out-of-the-money options, and quite frankly, they haven’t, at least in recent memory, been appropriately compensated for taking those long-term bets.” – Chris Douvos

“Entrepreneurship is like a gas. It’s the hottest when it’s compressed.” – Chris Douvos

On communication with LPs, “come with curiosity, not sales.” – Chris Douvos

“Process drives repeatability.” – Andy Weissman

“The worst time to figure out who you’re going to marry is when you’re buying flowers and setting the menu. Most funds that are raising now, especially if it’s to institutional investors—we’re getting to know you for Fund n plus one.” – Chris Douvos

On frequent GP/LP checkins… “Too many calls I get on, it’s a re-hash of what the strategy is. Assume if I’m taking the call, I actually spent five minutes reminding myself of who you are and what you do.” – Chris Douvos

“One thing I hate is when I meet with someone, they tell me about A, B, and C. And then the next time I meet with them, it’s companies D, E, and F. ‘What happened to A, B, and C?’ So I’ve told people, ‘Hey, we’re having serious conversations. Help me understand the arc.’ As LPs, we get snapshots in time, but what I want is enough snapshots of the whole scene to create a movie of you, like one of those picturebooks that you can flip. I want to see the evolution. I want to know about the hypotheses that didn’t work.” – Chris Douvos

“We invest in funds as LPs that last twice as long as the average American marriage.” – Chris Douvos

“The typical vest in Silicon Valley is four years. He says, ‘Think about how long you want to work. Think about how old you are now and divide that period by four. That’s the number of shots on goal you’re going to have to create intergenerational wealth.’ When you actually do that, it’s actually not very many shots. ‘So I want to know, is this the opportunity that you want to spend the next four years on building that option value?’” – Chris Douvos, quoting Stewart Alsop

When underwriting passion… “So you start with the null hypothesis that this person is a dilettante or tourist. What you try to do when you try to understand their behavioral footprint is you try to understand their passion. Some people are builders for the sake of building and get their psychic income from the communities they build while building.” – Chris Douvos

“There’s pre-spreadsheet and post-spreadsheet investing. For me, it’s a very different risk-adjusted return footprint because once you are post-spreadsheet—you talk about B and C rounds, companies have product-market fit, they’re moving to traction—that’s very different and analyzable. In my personal opinion, that’s ‘super beta venture.’ Like it’s just public market super beta. Whereas pre-spreadsheet is Adam and God on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel with their fingers almost touching. You can feel the electricity. […] That’s pure alpha. I think the purest alpha left in the investing markets. But alpha can have a negative sign in front of it. That’s the game we play.” – Chris Douvos

“Strategy is an integrated set of choices that inform timely action.” – Michael Porter

“I’m not here to tell you about Jesus. You already know about Jesus. He either lives in your heart or he doesn’t.” – Don Draper in Mad Men

“If there are 4000 people investing and people are generally on a 2-year cycle, that means in any given year, there are 2000 funds. And the top quartile fund is 500th. I don’t want to invest in the 50th best fund, much less the 500th. But that’s tyranny of the relativists. Why do we care if our portfolio is top quartile if we’re not keeping up with the opportunity cost of equity capital of the public markets?” – Chris Douvos

“In venture, the top three funds matter. Probably the top three funds will be Sequoia, Kleiner, and whoever gets lucky or whoever is in the right industry when that industry gets hot.” – Michael Moritz in 2002

Follow David Zhou for more Superclusters content:
For podcast show notes: https://cupofzhou.com/superclusters
Follow David Zhou’s blog: https://cupofzhou.com
Follow Superclusters on Twitter: https://twitter.com/SuperclustersLP
Follow Superclusters on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@super.clusters
Follow Superclusters on Instagram: https://instagram.com/super.clusters

Stay up to date with the weekly cup of cognitive adventures inside venture capital and startups, as well as cataloging the history of tomorrow through the bookmarks of yesterday!

The views expressed on this blogpost are for informational purposes only. None of the views expressed herein constitute legal, investment, business, or tax advice. Any allusions or references to funds or companies are for illustrative purposes only, and should not be relied upon as investment recommendations. Consult a professional investment advisor prior to making any investment decisions.

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We Need Mega Cap VC Funds | Nicky Sugarman | Superclusters | S5E10

nicky sugarman

“All these sorts of things that are quite frankly boring, monotonous, tedious, unglamorous, or not sexy, they are the sorts of things that can make or break whether a fund is good or not. Because you can be a great investor, but if the experience of the LP is awful, it doesn’t matter how good the fund is.

“Ultimately, somebody’s got to deal with you. They’ve probably got people to report to themselves. If you’re giving them a headache because you can’t do the aspects of it, then that’s where you’re going to lose LP appetite. That can tell apart who sees themselves as an investor and who sees themselves as a fund manager.” – Nicky Sugarman

Nicky Sugarman is a highly sought after advisor to both family offices and venture investors. Prior, he was also a partner at Stanhope, a $40B multi family office, running their private equity and venture practices. Moreover he, along with Jonathan Hollis at Mountside Ventures, launched the program for the emerging manager to learn the institutional lens.

You can find Nicky on his socials here:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicky-sugarman-98188636/
X / Twitter: https://x.com/NickySugarman

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also watch the episode on YouTube here.

OUTLINE:

[00:00] Intro
[02:36] Nicky and LEGOs
[05:24] LEGOs or cars
[05:59] What Nicky’s dad taught Nicky
[06:45] Why does the world need another fund accelerator?
[08:35] The curriculum at the fund accelerator
[10:21] The difference between a fund manager and investor
[12:04] Thoughtful examples to the previous question
[14:12] Diligence vs stalking
[16:29] Nicky’s most used app
[17:28] Why are mega cap funds necessary?
[21:21] Why VC becoming PE is inevitable
[24:48] The best types of LPs for multi-asset portfolios
[26:33] Why do LPs speak in IRR, not multiples?
[29:06] Understanding a GP’s valuation policy
[33:46] Communicating news from GPs to LPs
[36:03] How does Nicky know if a GP is in for the long haul?
[38:33] Nicky’s favorite answers to how a firm scales
[39:48] First critical hires at a VC firm
[40:45] Ideal traits of a VC COO
[41:38] How much should a good COO get paid?
[42:50] Should people get paid at the 50th percentile?
[45:28] How much should GPs pay themselves?
[48:30] The one what-if that keeps Nicky up at night

SELECT LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

SELECT QUOTES FROM THIS EPISODE:

“All these sorts of things that are quite frankly boring, monotonous, tedious, unglamorous, or not sexy, they are the sorts of things that can make or break whether a fund is good or not. Because you can be a great investor, but if the experience of the LP is awful, it doesn’t matter how good the fund is. Ultimately, somebody’s got to deal with you. They’ve probably got people to report to themselves. If you’re giving them a headache because you can’t do the aspects of it, then that’s where you’re going to lose LP appetite. […] That can tell apart who sees themselves as an investor and who sees themselves as a fund manager.” – Nicky Sugarman

On GPs answering questions on operational excellence… “The best answer I could ask from a GP is for them to be super honest and say, ‘These are the people I’ve leaned on to help me understand what best practices look like.’” – Nicky Sugarman

As an LP… “If you’re hearing [your portfolio news] in the news first, that’s a bad sign.” – Nicky Sugarman

Follow David Zhou for more Superclusters content:
For podcast show notes: https://cupofzhou.com/superclusters
Follow David Zhou’s blog: https://cupofzhou.com
Follow Superclusters on Twitter: https://twitter.com/SuperclustersLP
Follow Superclusters on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@super.clusters
Follow Superclusters on Instagram: https://instagram.com/super.clusters

Stay up to date with the weekly cup of cognitive adventures inside venture capital and startups, as well as cataloging the history of tomorrow through the bookmarks of yesterday!

The views expressed on this blogpost are for informational purposes only. None of the views expressed herein constitute legal, investment, business, or tax advice. Any allusions or references to funds or companies are for illustrative purposes only, and should not be relied upon as investment recommendations. Consult a professional investment advisor prior to making any investment decisions.

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22 Years in Venture Secondaries | Abe Finkelstein | Superclusters | S5E9

abe finkelstein

“Buying junk at a discount is still junk.” – Abe Finkelstein

Abe Finkelstein, Managing Partner at Vintage, has been leading fund, secondary, and growth stage investments focused on fintech, gaming, and SMB software, among others, leading growth stage and secondary investments for Vintage in companies like Monday.com, Minute Media, Payoneer, MoonActive and Honeybook.

Prior to joining Vintage in 2003, Abe was an equity analyst with Goldman Sachs, covering Israel-based technology companies in a wide variety of sectors, including software, telecom equipment, networking, semiconductors, and satellite communications. While at Goldman Sachs, Abe, and the Israel team were highly ranked by both Thomson Extel and Institutional Investor. Prior to Goldman Sachs, Abe was Vice-President at U.S. Bancorp Piper Jaffray, where he helped launch and led the firm’s Israel technology shares institutional sales effort. Before joining Piper, he was an Associate at Brown Brothers Harriman, covering the enterprise software and internet sectors. Abe began his career at Josephthal, Lyon, and Ross, joining one of the first research teams focused exclusively on Israel-based companies.

Abe graduated Magna Cum Laude from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania with a BS in Economics and a concentration in Finance.

Vintage Investment Partners is a global venture platform managing ~$4 billion across venture Fund of Funds, Secondary Funds, and Growth-Stage Funds focused on venture in the U.S., Europe, Israel, and Canada. Vintage is invested in many of the world’s leading venture funds and growth-stage tech startups striving to make a lasting impact on the world and has exposure directly and indirectly to over 6,000 technology companies.

You can find Abe on his socials here:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/abe-finkelstein/

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also watch the episode on YouTube here.

OUTLINE:

[00:00] Intro
[03:18] Abe’s first investment
[06:19] The definition of quality secondaries in 2003
[09:37] How did Abe know there would be capital to follow?
[15:45] Valuation methodology in the 2000s
[22:28] Minimum meaningful ownership for secondaries
[26:17] Why did founders take Vintage’s call in Fund I?
[30:41] The old-school way of tracking deal memos
[32:06] Our job is to play the optimist
[32:31] The headwinds of raising Vintage Fund I
[36:32] Moving Vintage’s physical books to the cloud
[39:06] How does Abe assign discounts to secondaries?
[42:23] Proactive outreach vs reactive deal flow
[46:18] What does Vintage do to stay top of mind?
[49:49] What’s changed in the secondaries market since 2000?
[55:32] Founder paranoia
[57:56] What does Abe want his legacy look like?

SELECT LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

SELECT QUOTES FROM THIS EPISODE:

“Buying junk at a discount is still junk.” – Abe Finkelstein

“Everything that’s going on in the market today, I actually feel people are overreacting to it because there are these ups and downs. Hopefully this current situation doesn’t get people too freaked out because these are the times you want to be investing in. People just don’t think that way. They see the blood on the streets and they run from it first, instead of going in.” – Abe Finkelstein

Follow David Zhou for more Superclusters content:
For podcast show notes: https://cupofzhou.com/superclusters
Follow David Zhou’s blog: https://cupofzhou.com
Follow Superclusters on Twitter: https://twitter.com/SuperclustersLP
Follow Superclusters on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@super.clusters
Follow Superclusters on Instagram: https://instagram.com/super.clusters

Stay up to date with the weekly cup of cognitive adventures inside venture capital and startups, as well as cataloging the history of tomorrow through the bookmarks of yesterday!

The views expressed on this blogpost are for informational purposes only. None of the views expressed herein constitute legal, investment, business, or tax advice. Any allusions or references to funds or companies are for illustrative purposes only, and should not be relied upon as investment recommendations. Consult a professional investment advisor prior to making any investment decisions.

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Inside the 100-Year Family Office | Josh Kanter | Superclusters | S5E8

josh kanter

“The more you can create that context in the family owner’s manual, the more important it is and the more it is NOT the ‘in-case-of-emergency’ file. Because the in-case-of-emergency file is going to say I’m an LP in Fund VII from so-and-so and my withdrawal rights are such and such. Or here’s the document. You go figure out what my withdrawal rights are, if I have any.” The owner’s manual teaches future generations what to prioritize and why. – Josh Kanter

Josh Kanter is the family office principal at Josh Kanter Wealth Advisory Services. He is also the founder & CEO at leafplanner, a comprehensive solution on planning for the 100-year time horizon for a family office, birthed out of his own need with his own family of creating an everlasting institution.

After decades as a lawyer, he went on to focus on his family business where he also currently serves as President of Chicago Financial, Inc., a single family office overseeing a complex organization of trusts, investment and philanthropic entities for a multi-branch and multi-generational family.

You can find Josh on his socials here:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshua-kanter/

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also watch the episode on YouTube here.

OUTLINE:

[00:00] Intro
[04:01] Art, sculptures and Jun Kaneko
[12:30] The inception of Walnut Capital Corp
[15:36] How Josh defines creativity
[17:03] Creating the “freedom trust”
[17:56] Where did the name leafplanner come from?
[20:03] How did Josh get involved in the family venture business?
[23:22] Top lessons from being startups’ legal advisor
[25:48] Lessons as an investor and LP
[27:57] Investing in America’s biggest fraud
[30:01] The origin of leafplanner
[38:15] How do you start a family owner’s manual
[40:03] The importance of prioritization and context in the manual
[45:35] How do you make a owner’s manual searchable?
[49:50] The five kinds of capital (intellectual, human, social, financial, spiritual)
[53:15] What is the role of luck in Josh’s life?
[54:31] Josh’s primary vice when saying no
[56:51] Post-credit scene

SELECT LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

SELECT QUOTES FROM THIS EPISODE:

“You’ve got great founders. That doesn’t make them great CEOs.” – Josh Kanter

“I may not be the CEO of this company at some point. If I am not the person to take this forward, then let’s bring in the person who is. Success is more important than my ego.” – Josh Kanter

“The more you can create that context, the more important it is and the more it is not the ‘in-case-of-emergency’ file. Because the in-case-of-emergency file is going to say I’m an LP in Fund VII from so-and-so and my withdrawal rights are such and such. Or here’s the document. You go figure out what my withdrawal rights are, if I have any.” – Josh Kanter

On cloud storage providers like Box, Dropbox, Google Drive and so on: “Every one of those systems relies on the brain that built the architecture of how you organize them. So I use Box. I have 225,000 documents in Box. Those 225,000 documents are organized on how Josh’s brain works, so the folder structure [etc.].” – Josh Kanter

“Financial capital should be looked at merely as a tool to grow the other capitals: [Intellectual, human, and social].” – Josh Kanter

Follow David Zhou for more Superclusters content:
For podcast show notes: https://cupofzhou.com/superclusters
Follow David Zhou’s blog: https://cupofzhou.com
Follow Superclusters on Twitter: https://twitter.com/SuperclustersLP
Follow Superclusters on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@super.clusters
Follow Superclusters on Instagram: https://instagram.com/super.clusters

Stay up to date with the weekly cup of cognitive adventures inside venture capital and startups, as well as cataloging the history of tomorrow through the bookmarks of yesterday!

The views expressed on this blogpost are for informational purposes only. None of the views expressed herein constitute legal, investment, business, or tax advice. Any allusions or references to funds or companies are for illustrative purposes only, and should not be relied upon as investment recommendations. Consult a professional investment advisor prior to making any investment decisions.

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THE Most Entrepreneurial LP Out There | Narayan Chowdhury | Superclusters | S5E7

ritujoy narayan chowdhury

“This is one of the big issues of a bunch of data work on venture is insights from some periods don’t mean anything or are not translatable to present time. It’s really frustrating. So we go back to people, reputations, and experience.” – Narayan Chowdhury

Ritujoy Narayan Chowdhury is the co-founder and Managing Director at Franklin Park, where he focuses on private equity investment opportunities, monitoring clients’ portfolios and conducting industry research. He also plays a key role in the development and implementation of Franklin Park’s technology platform, and regularly interacts with clients on investment and portfolio matters.

Prior to Franklin Park, Narayan worked with Hamilton Lane and Public Financial Management. He is a CFA Charterholder and a member of the CFA Institute. Narayan received a B.A. in Mathematics and Economics from Bucknell University.

You can find Narayan on his socials here:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/narayan-chowdhury/
X / Twitter: https://x.com/RNC76

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also watch the episode on YouTube here.

OUTLINE:

[00:00] Intro
[02:27] Why my parents moved to the US
[03:43] Narayan’s dad
[08:54] The friction that Narayan has with his team
[11:59] Why current analyst training creates bad habits
[15:00] What Narayan does when his family goes to bed
[16:37] When did Narayan first start playing with code?
[17:34] Narayan’s entrepreneurial origins and how much he got paid
[19:54] “Never sit alone at lunch”
[22:54] The Mike Maples story
[25:48] When Narayan realized VC is very different from PE
[30:05] The difference between underwriting VC and buyout
[34:28] What do you do when you’ve pigeonholed yourself in one industry?
[37:02] How do you know if a GP is a core part of an alumni network?
[38:32] A 2025 micro trend of misleading operating metrics
[43:40] How has VC changed in the past few decades?
[53:58] What do most people underappreciate about hockey?

SELECT LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

SELECT QUOTES FROM THIS EPISODE:

“Every moment that [my daughter] is here and I’m not with her is a moment we’ll never get back.” – Narayan Chowdhury

“Every action should not be a wasted action, should not be duplicative, should be the best use of a person’s time. So any tool that we build that is contrary to that should be reevaluated constantly.” – Narayan Chowdhury

“What do you do when you don’t know anything, you haven’t met anybody, you have no context, the human brain starts inventing rationale.” – Narayan Chowdhury

“Never sit alone at lunch.” – Alan Patricof

“Looking backwards on track records in venture can be very scary decisions. It could be that the prior funds were completely passive throw-ins on a cap table where they were following some social cues in a ZIRP environment and perhaps they got lucky. Whether they were part of a giant outcome [or not], it sort of meaningless for the future because neither the syndicate nor the founder really know who that person ever was. And so, the go-forward benefit of that investment decision is zero versus ‘We were the trusted investor for that founder.’ Not all prior track records are the same. We have to go back to why, going forward, are founders going to seek out or accept those dollars.” – Narayan Chowdhury
*ZIRP: zero interest-rate policy

“I’d rather go bankrupt than lose this AI race.” – Larry Page

“The problem is that the barriers to entry on that strategy [to deploy a lot of capital] are pretty low. And you get killed – death by a thousand cuts – when you’re not the only one trying to flood the market with capital and outcompeting on price.” – Narayan Chowdhury

“This is one of the big issues of a bunch of data work on venture is insights from some periods don’t mean anything or are not translatable to present time. It’s really frustrating. So we go back to people, reputations, and experience.” – Narayan Chowdhury

Follow David Zhou for more Superclusters content:
For podcast show notes: https://cupofzhou.com/superclusters
Follow David Zhou’s blog: https://cupofzhou.com
Follow Superclusters on Twitter: https://twitter.com/SuperclustersLP
Follow Superclusters on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@super.clusters
Follow Superclusters on Instagram: https://instagram.com/super.clusters

Stay up to date with the weekly cup of cognitive adventures inside venture capital and startups, as well as cataloging the history of tomorrow through the bookmarks of yesterday!

The views expressed on this blogpost are for informational purposes only. None of the views expressed herein constitute legal, investment, business, or tax advice. Any allusions or references to funds or companies are for illustrative purposes only, and should not be relied upon as investment recommendations. Consult a professional investment advisor prior to making any investment decisions.

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How to Bet on the Underdog | Matt Curtolo | Superclusters | S5E6

matt curtolo

“The bigger you get, the more established you get, the more underwriting emphasis goes into how this team operates as a structure rather than is there a star?” – Matt Curtolo

Matt Curtolo, CAIA is a seasoned private markets investor and allocator with over two decades of experience at leading financial institutions. Throughout his career, he has been directly responsible for allocating more than $6 billion in commitments to private market investments and maintains relationships with hundreds of general partner relationships across the full spectrum of private capital strategies.

Most recently, as Head of Investments at Allocate, a venture-backed fintech startup. Matt built the investment capability from the ground up, broadening access to top-tier venture capital opportunities for the private wealth market. Prior to this, he served as a senior leader at MetLife, serving on the investment committee, co-managing their global alternatives portfolio and leading the firm’s US Buyout portfolio. Earlier in his career, Matt led all private equity activities as Head of Private Equity at Hirtle Callaghan, a large independent outsourced Chief Investment Officer (oCIO). Matt’s foundational experience was gained at Hamilton Lane during its early growth phase, before it became the world’s preeminent private markets allocator, in research, investment and client-facing roles. Matt currently holds several advisory positions that span start-ups, asset management firms and fund of funds. He also manages his own advice practice, providing GPs with strategic guidance on strategy, fundraising and investor relations.

You can find Matt on his socials here:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matt-curtolo-caia/

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also watch the episode on YouTube here.

OUTLINE:

[00:00] Intro
[04:24] What town did Matt grow up in?
[04:37] Why is that town significant from a sociological perspective?
[08:43] Why is Matt fascinated with the Detroit Lions?
[11:08] What is it like cheering for the underdog?
[13:02] How does Matt break down deal attribution in partnerships?
[18:04] GPs’ karmic bank account
[21:29] What is the kindest thing anyone’s done for Matt?
[23:24] How did tennis enter Matt’s life?
[26:35] Historical examples of VC management/leadership structures
[29:33] Underwriting track record between senior and junior investors
[32:23] How Matt approaches diligence after reading the data room
[39:30] How do you know when you’ve asked enough questions?
[42:37] The three classes of questions for GPs that influence investment decisions
[45:34] Remote culture
[50:16] Cadence of in-person gatherings in remote teams
[52:48] The two (and a half) types of conversations to always host in-person
[58:37] The last great idea Matt had on a walk
[1:02:05] The legacy Matt wants to leave behind
[1:04:37] Post-credit scene

SELECT LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

SELECT QUOTES FROM THIS EPISODE:

“Partnerships are incredibly hard to evaluate because not only are you evaluating each of the individual’s capabilities independently, but is it a one plus one equals three situation?” – Matt Curtolo

“The bigger you get, the more established you get, the more underwriting emphasis goes into how this team operates as a structure rather than is there a star?” – Matt Curtolo

“Data gives me questions, not answers.” – Matt Curtolo

“The dopamine you get from planning something versus the actual experience itself are wildly different.” – Matt Curtolo

Follow David Zhou for more Superclusters content:
For podcast show notes: https://cupofzhou.com/superclusters
Follow David Zhou’s blog: https://cupofzhou.com
Follow Superclusters on Twitter: https://twitter.com/SuperclustersLP
Follow Superclusters on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@super.clusters
Follow Superclusters on Instagram: https://instagram.com/super.clusters

Stay up to date with the weekly cup of cognitive adventures inside venture capital and startups, as well as cataloging the history of tomorrow through the bookmarks of yesterday!

The views expressed on this blogpost are for informational purposes only. None of the views expressed herein constitute legal, investment, business, or tax advice. Any allusions or references to funds or companies are for illustrative purposes only, and should not be relied upon as investment recommendations. Consult a professional investment advisor prior to making any investment decisions.

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You’re Looking at Networks Wrong | Albert Azout | Superclusters | S5E5

albert azout

“Networks are more persistent than performance.” – Albert Azout

Albert Azout is the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Level Ventures, a technology investment firm built on software and data science and invests in both entrepreneurs and venture capital managers, including the likes of Air Street Capital, Emergent Ventures and Work-Bench, just to name a few. Prior to Level, Albert has been a serial founder, starting analytics businesses and even a social media company before Facebook.

You can find Albert on his socials here:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/albertazout/
Substack: http://albertazout.substack.com/

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also watch the episode on YouTube here.

OUTLINE:

[00:00] Intro
[02:36] The origin of Albert’s blog
[04:45] How did Albert first start coding?
[07:43] Albert’s interest in networks
[13:10] Entrepreneurship around Albert
[16:27] What is collaborative filtering?
[22:18] How complexity economics affect the networks of VCs?
[27:14] Fear and greed regimes
[28:51] Telltale signs that inform the kind of regime you’re in
[30:31] Why it’s the wrong time to be investing in defense tech
[34:53] What are most LPs missing about GP networks?
[37:31] How is Level Ventures looking at networks differently?
[44:42] Archetypes of GPs that Albert likes
[46:43] The 3 advantages GPs need to have
[55:02] How does Albert balance over- vs under-diligencing?
[57:15] Albert’s view on luck
[57:47] Albert the “consciousness expert”

SELECT LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

SELECT QUOTES FROM THIS EPISODE:

“You have to have an understanding of the regime you’re in for you to make good decisions as an investor.” – Albert Azout

“Price reflects the inefficiencies of the market.” – Albert Azout

“What really matters is what you’re hearing around you. When you hear overly coherent narratives, that’s a big thing for me. And it happens in subcycles as well. […] But when people are behaving and making decisions based on narratives that are overly coherent, that’s a big sign. That’s a very social problem.” – Albert Azout

“What you want to see in a venture company which you’re looking for huge outliers, is you want to see increasing returns to scale. You want to see demand-side feedback loops, where you have very low marginal costs of distribution. And that requires mostly winner-take-all, or winner-take-most kinds of markets.” – Albert Azout

“You want to be pre-narrative. You want to position your capital in an area where the supply of capital increases over time and where those assets will be traded at a premium.” – Albert Azout

“Networks are more persistent than performance.” – Albert Azout

“Venture is simple but hard.” – Albert Azout

“We look for GPs who have one, a network advantage and two, a knowledge advantage – both of which have to be not redundant and economically important. And the third thing is the fund strategy itself. There’s a lot of nuances but there are two things that are important. One is that it has to be an outlier. […] It has to have the right construction for us. […] My second point is more important. It involves game theory, which is the competitive dynamics in the market. ” – Albert Azout

Follow David Zhou for more Superclusters content:
For podcast show notes: https://cupofzhou.com/superclusters
Follow David Zhou’s blog: https://cupofzhou.com
Follow Superclusters on Twitter: https://twitter.com/SuperclustersLP
Follow Superclusters on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@super.clusters
Follow Superclusters on Instagram: https://instagram.com/super.clusters

Stay up to date with the weekly cup of cognitive adventures inside venture capital and startups, as well as cataloging the history of tomorrow through the bookmarks of yesterday!

The views expressed on this blogpost are for informational purposes only. None of the views expressed herein constitute legal, investment, business, or tax advice. Any allusions or references to funds or companies are for illustrative purposes only, and should not be relied upon as investment recommendations. Consult a professional investment advisor prior to making any investment decisions.

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When an Olympic Daydreamer Becomes an LP Whisperer | Asher Siddiqui | Superclusters | S5E4

asher siddiqui

“What I hear from LPs is that the market is important. And of course, the market IS important. And I think that that’s true. But if you truly believe in venture as a purist, then all of it is irrelevant because at any point in time, someone will come and have this unique insight. And the timing is against them. The world is against them. They’re in the wrong place at the wrong time, and yet, they have this unique insight at this point in time. They have the opportunity to invest at this point in time. And so, just because the timing is wrong doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be backing them. Because they might be right. And you might be missing out on the best opportunity in your lifetime.”

Asher Siddiqui is a global tech investor, M&A dealmaker, and venture fund builder with over 25 years of hands-on experience across venture capital, entrepreneurship, and more than $15B in executed M&A transactions.

He began his career as a software engineer and entrepreneur in the US and UK before spending a decade leading M&A and corporate venture at Etisalat Group (now e& Group), one of the world’s largest listed TMT investment groups. There, he led acquisitions, exits, and strategic transactions across multiple continents.

In 2016, Asher joined the global leadership team at 500 Startups in San Francisco, helping scale the platform to $2B+ AUM, with a portfolio that includes 35+ unicorns and 160+ centaurs.

Since then, he has helped launch and scale several institutional VC firms—including Race Capital, Lumikai, Sukna Ventures, Zayn VC, and Humanrace Capital—and serves on the advisory boards of funds such as FootPrint Coalition Ventures, Merus Capital, and The Treasury.

To date, Asher has made 100+ venture investments (both direct and LP), raised hundreds of millions in LP commitments, mentored hundreds of emerging VC managers globally, and advised countless founders.

You can find Asher on his socials here:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashersiddiqui/
X / Twitter: https://x.com/ashercdkey

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also watch the episode on YouTube here.

OUTLINE:

[00:00] Intro
[03:36] Why doesn’t Asher like the saying ‘The sky’s the limit?’
[07:20] The launch of CNBC Africa
[15:25] How do two competing personalities create one of the largest media empires in the world?
[17:39] Combining vision and execution
[21:22] Asher’s framework for executing on a vision
[31:00] Why Asher was the youngest Global Head of M&A of a major telecom business
[43:57] What sets a great investor apart from a great fund manager
[45:27] Roleplaying a GP thinking about secondaries
[51:44] What do most LPs underestimate and overestimate
[58:24] Most telling predictors of outperforming GPs
[1:07:13] The best wine and food for each situation
[1:12:25] Asher’s Vinod Khosla story

SELECT LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

SELECT QUOTES FROM THIS EPISODE:

“The best opportunities are the opportunities that aren’t obvious to anyone.” – Asher Siddiqui

“Execution is nothing without a vision, and vision is nothing without execution.” – Asher Siddiqui

“If only there was an Olympic sport called daydreaming, then Asher will be a gold medalist every time.” – Asher Siddiqui’s mom

“What was less relevant was the number; what was more important was the process.” – Asher Siddiqui

“If you ask the baseline obvious questions, you get the obvious responses.” – Asher Siddiqui

“You have to be thinking about exits because if you’re so laser-focused on building your portfolio and not thinking about exits, then maybe you’re a great investor, but not a great fund manager.” – Asher Siddiqui

On investors selling secondaries… “You may choose to take some off the table. And this is a market risk, not a specific lack of belief in the founder. I cannot tell you what the right answer is. What I can tell you is what I’m interested in backing are fund managers that are in the pursuit of truth, and they’re making the best judgment calls in the pursuit of truth that they can at this point in time, based on the data they have available.” – Asher Siddiqui

“There is no right or wrong answer. Because you may get it right this time – you may get it wrong this time – what matters is-… This is Fund III, right? What about Fund VI or Fund VII or Fund VIII? Are you building a culture for you to continue to build a team that has this culture to continuously follow and pursue this pursuit of truth for the best outcomes based on the process that you have, as opposed to just shooting from the hip and gut instinct, which is great while you’re around. But when you retire and your firm’s going on, you’ve basically created a culture where people shoot from the hip and maybe the people who come after you are not as good as you.” – Asher Siddiqui

“Exiting a position in a company to return DPI to LPs is not a reflection of your stance on the company, but your stance on the market.” – Asher Siddiqui

Why LPs should go to annual meetings… “I’m looking for a minimum of one insight that I can take away, and I’m hoping to ask one intelligent question that will stand out as a credible LP in the minds of the GP.” – Asher’s Swedish pension allocator friend

“What I hear from LPs is that the market is important. And of course, the market IS important. And I think that that’s true. But if you truly believe in venture as a purist, then all of it is irrelevant because at any point in time, someone will come and have this unique insight. And the timing is against them. The world is against them. They’re in the wrong place at the wrong time, and yet, they have this unique insight at this point in time. They have the opportunity to invest at this point in time. And so, just because the timing is wrong doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be backing them. Because they might be right. And you might be missing out on the best opportunity in your lifetime. And that’s what is beautiful. That it is a people game.

“So, when I hear people talk about scaling venture, what the fuck are you talking about? Venture is not scalable. There are things that you can scale. There are processes that you can scale. But ultimately, you still have to rely upon finding those people and finding them at the right time – and the right time could be the ‘wrong’ time – but finding them when they find that opportunity and when they see that meaningful insight. I’ve heard people say it’s not thesis-driven; it’s market-driven. No, I disagree. I think it’s both of those. But actually it’s individual-driven if you can find that person.” – Asher Siddiqui

Follow David Zhou for more Superclusters content:
For podcast show notes: https://cupofzhou.com/superclusters
Follow David Zhou’s blog: https://cupofzhou.com
Follow Superclusters on Twitter: https://twitter.com/SuperclustersLP
Follow Superclusters on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@super.clusters
Follow Superclusters on Instagram: https://instagram.com/super.clusters

Stay up to date with the weekly cup of cognitive adventures inside venture capital and startups, as well as cataloging the history of tomorrow through the bookmarks of yesterday!

The views expressed on this blogpost are for informational purposes only. None of the views expressed herein constitute legal, investment, business, or tax advice. Any allusions or references to funds or companies are for illustrative purposes only, and should not be relied upon as investment recommendations. Consult a professional investment advisor prior to making any investment decisions.

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