Shows
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastPeter Walker as You've Never Seen Him Before | Peter Walker | Superclusters | S6PSE3“You’re making decisions in an incomplete vacuum. What I think many people should do more of, in terms of those mental models, is frame it in the reverse. Which of these decisions am I going to make that is the most regret-minimizing? That I have the least likelihood of regretting later on in life, assuming that in most cases, I will be wrong.” — Peter WalkerThe holiday season has always been a great time to celebrate the movers and shakers in our world. This season we're celebrating my personal favorites in the VC and startup world. This epi...
2025-12-2956 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Most Disappointing Podcast You'll Ever Listen To (ft. Allie Garfinkle)Warning: This is a brief-ish, but hopefully entertaining intermission from the usual Superclusters programming.When we passed the 50th episode mark more than a few episodes ago, Tyler (my editor) and I thought it'd be interesting to record an episode where I change seats. Instead of me asking the questions, someone else would ask me questions. And I couldn't imagine any better person to do so than my good friend, Allie, who in my humble opinion, is one of the best interviewers alive today.Allie Garfinkle is a senior finance reporter for Fortune, covering venture...
2025-12-221h 12
Investing in StartupsE45: Access, Picking VCs, and Tough Love with Superclusters' David Zhou
David Zhou is an investor in emerging managers, an angel investor, a blogger, and the host of the Superclusters podcast. We talked about how LPs can size up emerging managers, how VCs can stand out, portfolio construction, and which of sourcing, picking, and winning is the most important. We also explored:
+ Why David thinks that “access beats picking (then winning)” for most emerging managers—and how check size changes that calculus.
+ Follow-ons: when “all or none” makes sense, how signaling risk compounds past Series B, and why selling by Series C can be clean...
2025-12-1748 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastTimeless VS Just-In-Time Lessons | Earnest Sweat & Alexa Binns | Superclusters | S6PSE1The holiday season has always been a great time to celebrate the movers and shakers in our world. This season we're celebrating my personal favorites in the LP world. To start this mini-holiday series off, Earnest Sweat and Alexa Binns runs one of the most popular podcasts on venture capital limited partners, Swimming with Allocators. I was also fortunate enough to be on their podcast as well as a bonus crossover episode.You can find Earnest on his socials here:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/earnestsweat/X / Twitter: https://x.com/EarnestSweat
2025-12-1541 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWhen Do You Know If You've Grown Up as a VC? | El Pack w/ Ben Choi | SuperclustersBen Choi from Next Legacy joins David on El Pack to answer your questions on how to build a venture capital fund. We bring on 3 GPs at VC funds to ask 3 different questions.Gilgamesh Ventures' Miguel Armaza, also host of the incredible Fintech Leaders podcast, asks Ben what is the timing of when a GP should consider raising a Fund III.Similarly, but not the same, Strange Ventures' Tara Tan asks when an LP backs a Fund I, how do they know that this Fund I GP will last till Fund III.Arkane...
2025-12-081h 14
Superclusters - The Emerging LP Podcast"Venture Should Play More Like Moneyball" | Carson Monson | Superclusters | S6E9"The limiting downside is actually something a lot of emerging managers don’t think about. If you can turn all of your portfolio companies that don’t hit that exit velocity, if you can find a soft landing for those companies versus that’s a writeoff and they’re dead and done, that’s extra effort, but that’s an extra turn on your fund’s performance." — Carson MonsonCarson Monson is a seasoned allocator with nearly a decade of experience backing emerging and spinout GPs across large institutions, government entities, and family offices. After stints at Greenspring, SIT...
2025-11-241h 19
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastCan Your Check Size Win You Board-Level Transparency? | Apurva Mehta | Superclusters | S6E8“A manager doesn’t generally fit into their ultimate quartile until Year 6.”Apurva Mehta is the co-founding Managing Partner of Summit Peak Investments, a fund-of-funds that boasts a portfolio of both venture fund investments and direct investments, including the likes of Affirm, Anduril, Airtable, Opendoor, and Wish, just to name a few.Prior to starting Summit Peak in 2018 with his co-founder, Patrick O'Connor, he previously served as Vice President and Deputy Chief Investment Officer for the Children's Hospital Endowment Portfolio in Fort Worth, Texa. From 2008 to 2011, he was the Director of Portfolio Investments at The Juilli...
2025-11-1749 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWhat does GP-Friendly ACTUALLY Mean? | Caroline Toch Docal | Superclusters | S6E7“It’s a mathematical reality that the highest performing GPs in this part of the market often also have the highest kill rates, which means some things are incredible and other things are super wonky and you have to be cool with that. You can’t be doing a six across the board.” — Caroline Toch DocalCaroline Toch Docal backs early stage fund managers as the lead of BCV’s Emerging Manager Program. She believes in investing in funds as early as the first close, which is a rare focus in the LP landscape. She’s a lifelong early...
2025-11-1041 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWhere Does Intuition Come From? | Yiwen Li | Superclusters | S6E6“The intuition part comes from activities of creativity that change your perspective.” — Yiwen LiYiwen Li is a seasoned investor with a successful track record of investing in AI, blockchain, and healthcare tech while developing global business partnerships to fast-scale the business.Yiwen is currently Head of Venture Investments at Bayview Development Group, a global family office with diverse exposure public market, private equity, venture, and real estate. Prior, she was a Principal at Alumni Ventures, responsible for end-to-end multi-stage investments focused on blockchain and fintech. She was Director for Corporate Strategy at Masimo (Nasdaq: MASI...
2025-11-0338 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP Podcast$80M vs $800M vs $8B Endowment | Trish Spurlin | Superclusters | S6E5“Once you hit a billion dollars, you should probably consider some sort of internal team. Just to mitigate risk. There’s audit risk involved when you have such a small number of people managing a huge pool of capital. It’s going to differ for everyone. That’s probably a good benchmark.” — Trish SpurlinTrish Spurlin is the Investment Director at Babson’s $800M endowment, covering private markets investing with a large focus on venture. In fact 70% of their private equity portfolio is venture capital. Quite a unique strategy for an endowment to take. Why? An endowment is required to...
2025-10-2652 min
Swimming with AllocatorsNavigating the Supercluster: Finding Signal in Venture’s NoiseThis week on Swimming with Allocators, David Zhou, Founder of the Superclusters podcast and seasoned investor, joins Alexa and Earnest to discuss the art of venture capital from the LP perspective. Topics include how allocators differentiate true signal from noise, the value of qualitative insights vs. quantitative data, strategies for evaluating fund managers, and the importance of founder relationships. The conversation also touches on best practices for standing out in VC, the evolution of the industry, and actionable advice on track records and building a lasting reputation. Listeners will gain practical wisdom and fresh perspectives on navigating today’s ve...
2025-10-2240 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Seneca of Investing | Jacob Miller | Superclusters | S6E4“There’s this thing called alpha, which is returns driven by skill not market return. And when you start to think about what does that mean, skill means you’re doing something that other people aren’t. You have to be different from the average. What can drive that? How are you going to have that be positive expected value? You need to have unique information, unique insight, unique access, or get uniquely lucky." — Jacob MillerJacob Miller is the Co-Founder and Opto’s Chief Solutions Officer, a key figure in its leadership team and central to its growth s...
2025-10-2040 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHelpful is a 10-Letter Word | Eric Sippel | Superclusters | S6E3“I hate checklists. I like outlines. I don’t like checklists. A checklist says ‘I have to have this, and then I’m good. An outline is ‘This is my starting point. These are the kinds of things I want to talk about or kinds of things I need to look at.” — Eric SippelEric Sippel currently runs his family office and is an active investor in and adviser to many venture capital, private equity, hedge and real estate funds. He is a member of the RAISE Global selection and steering committees (the premier emerging VC manager conference) an...
2025-10-131h 04
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Most Frequent VS Most Important LP Conversations | El Pack w/ Adam Marchick | SuperclustersAdam Marchick from Akkadian Ventures joins David on El Pack to answer your questions on how to build a venture capital fund. We bring on 3 GPs at VC funds to ask 3 different questions.Cocoa VC's Carmen Alfonso Rico asks what belief Adam held firmly for years but changed his mind recently on.Good Trouble Ventures' AJ Thomas asks about how GPs can better communicate risk to first-time LPs.1517 Fund's Danielle Strachman asks about the world view Adam has that shapes his investing thesis.Over the past twenty years, Adam Marchick has...
2025-10-061h 21
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastNO Diligence is Ever Enough | Anurag Chandra | Superclusters | S6E2“There are a thousand ways to put lipstick on the pig and there are a thousand skeletons [in the closet]. I’ve only seen five or six because I’ve only seen three startup experiences. And so you need to deputize as many people as you possibly can to essentially triangulate.” — Anurag ChandraAnurag Chandra has spent over two decades in Silicon Valley as an investor, operator, and allocator. He has helped lead four venture capital funds, managing over $2.0B in aggregate AUM. Anurag has also been a senior executive in three enterprise technology startups, two of which were...
2025-09-291h 13
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHow to Not Get Fired When Changing Your VC Strategy | El Pack w/ Beezer Clarkson | SuperclustersBeezer Clarkson from Sapphire Partners joins David on El Pack to answer your questions on how to build a venture capital fund. We bring on four GPs at VC funds to ask four different questions.Precursor Ventures' Charles Hudson asks what is the one strongly held belief about emerging managers that she no longer believes is true.NextView Ventures' Stephanie Palmeri asks how much should an established firm evolve versus stick to their guns.Humanrace Capital's Suraj Mehta asks what the best way to build brand presence is.Rackhouse Venture Capital's...
2025-09-221h 09
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHow to Read Investors Like a Book | Thorsten Claus | Superclusters | S6E1“You need to make space for weird types of conversations to happen on the fringes that really inform you what’s going on at the frontier.” — Thorsten ClausThorsten Claus is a venture investor and builder with more than 15 years of private equity and venture capital experience. He has raised nine funds, managed over $4.8B across global platforms, and led or overseen more than 120 direct investments, generating returns of 3x–7x net to investors.His current work focuses on dual-use technologies at the intersection of defense, security, and national resilience. Guided by the discipline of Howard Mar...
2025-09-151h 17
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHow to Increase Dialogue with your LPs | El Pack w/ Kelli Fontaine | SuperclustersKelli Fontaine from Cendana Capital 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.The Council's Amber Illig asked what happens when a solo GP is incapacitated or passes away.Oceans Ventures' Steven Rosenblatt asked why most LPs follow the decision-making of other LPs.NeuCo Academy's Jonathan Ting asked what LPs think about GPs asking for help.From investing in great fund managers to data to investor relations, Kelli Fontaine...
2025-08-111h 23
Superclusters - The Emerging LP Podcast81% of America is Underfunded | Vijen Patel & Grady Buchanan | Superclusters | S5PSE1“19% of our GDP attracts about 55% of capital inflows, aka venture activity, and 81% is underinvested.” – Vijen PatelVijen Patel is an entrepreneur and investor. He founded The 81 Collection, a high growth equity firm in boring industries. Previously, he founded what is now known as Tide Cleaners. He bootstrapped what eventually became the largest dry cleaner in the country (1,200 locations) before selling to Procter & Gamble in 2018. Before Tide Cleaners, he worked in private equity, McKinsey & Company, and Goldman Sachs. He lives in Chicago with his wife and two kids.You can find Vijen on his socials here:Linked...
2025-08-041h 00
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHow Many Exceptions Are Too Many? | El Pack w/ John Felix | SuperclustersPattern Ventures' John Felix 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.Atria Ventures' Chris Leiter asked about the common mistakes LPs make when underwriting solo GPs.Garuda Ventures' Arpan Punyani asked how quickly do most LPs get to conviction. First 10 minutes? First meeting?Geek Ventures' Ihar Mahaniok asked how LPs evaluate Fund IIs when the Fund I has no distributions.John Felix is a General Partner and Head...
2025-07-281h 14
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastUncompensated Risks in VC | Wendy Li | Superclusters | S5E12“It’s not the probability; it’s the consequence. It’s not the probability when something goes wrong. It’s the consequence when it goes wrong.” – Wendy LiWendy Li is the co-founder and Chief Investment Officer at Ivy Invest, a fintech investment platform bringing an endowment-style portfolio to everyday investors.Before Ivy Invest, Wendy was Managing Director of Investments at the Mother Cabrini Health Foundation, where she built the Investment Office from the ground up and managed a $4 billion portfolio. Prior to Mother Cabrini Health Foundation, Wendy was Director of Investments at UJA-Federation, investing across a broad...
2025-07-211h 01
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Inside Peek Into How Family Offices Gather | Samira Salman | Superclusters | S5E11“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 SalmanSamira 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...
2025-07-141h 25
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastShould VCs Scale? | El Pack w/ Screendoor | SuperclustersThe entire Screendoor team 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.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...
2025-07-071h 14
The Data MinuteHow LPs Think: Taste, Timing, and Saying No With Style | David Zhou (Head of Investor Relations, Alchemist Accelerator)This week on The Data Minute, Peter sits down with David Zhou, Head of Investor Relations at Alchemist Accelerator and the host of Superclusters, for a deep dive into how LPs choose, and say no to, emerging managers.David shares what hundreds of GP conversations have taught him about building trust and avoiding the "sea of sameness.” They talk about why charisma can be learned, how LPs think about relationship-building versus returns, and why fund managers should spend less time pitching and more time listening. Plus: the strange origin of venture capital as we know it, the st...
2025-07-031h 06
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastVenture Capital is DEAD! | El Pack w/ Chris Douvos | SuperclustersAhoy 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.
2025-06-301h 38
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWe Need Mega Cap VC Funds | Nicky Sugarman | Superclusters | S5E10“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...
2025-06-2355 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP Podcast22 Years in Venture Secondaries | Abe Finkelstein | Superclusters | S5E9“Buying junk at a discount is still junk.” – Abe FinkelsteinAbe 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 theIsrael team were highly ranked...
2025-06-161h 02
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastInside the 100-Year Family Office | Josh Kanter | Superclusters | S5E8“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 KanterJosh Kanter is the family office principal at Josh Kanter Wealth Advisory Services. He is also the found...
2025-06-091h 03
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastTHE Most Entrepreneurial LP Out There | Narayan Chowdhury | Superclusters | S5E7“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 ChowdhuryRitujoy 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...
2025-06-021h 00
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHow to Bet on the Underdog | Matt Curtolo | Superclusters | S5E6“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 CurtoloMatt 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 vent...
2025-05-261h 12
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastYou're Looking at Networks Wrong | Albert Azout | Superclusters | S5E5“Networks are more persistent than performance.” – Albert AzoutAlbert Azout is the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Level VC, 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://albert...
2025-05-191h 02
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWhen an Olympic Daydreamer Becomes an LP Whisperer | Asher Siddiqui | Superclusters | S5E4"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...
2025-05-121h 21
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWhy Individuals Can Be Better than Teams | Sean Warrington | Superclusters | S5E3“Some of the best investments, as we look back in history, were never obvious at the moment the investments were made. You may not have to be contrarian, but you have to have a variant perception than the rest of the market. Maybe you saw the team differently. You saw the space growing differently. That, to us, inherently, is a single decision maker-type thought process at the earliest stage, when it’s less about metrics. It’s more about how you evaluate the talent and the team.” – Sean WarringtonSean Warrington leads private market investing at Gresham Partners...
2025-05-0553 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastYou're Doing Diligence Wrong | Raviv Sapir | Superclusters | S5E2“Most [references] will not give a negative reference about someone, but you will have to understand and listen between the lines. What is a good or a bad reference? They might say, ‘I really like him as a person. He’s really nice.’ But this is a person that’s worked together with you in a team, and you’re not saying he’s great with founders or finding the best deals. Maybe he’s not that good.” – Raviv SapirRaviv Sapir is an early-stage investor at Vinthera, a fund of funds and venture firm with a hybrid strategy that...
2025-04-281h 01
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHow to Start a Single Family Office | Scott Saslow | Superclusters | S5E1“A lot of family office principals, unless they’ve worked in finance – they should not be solely making the decision on which RIA to hire.” – Scott SaslowScott Saslow is the founder, CEO, and family office principal for ONE WORLD. He's also the founder and CEO of The Institute of Executive Development, as well as the author of Building a Sustainable Family Office: An Insider's Guide to What Works and What Doesn't, which at the time of the podcast launch is the only book written for family office principals by a family office principal. Scott is also the host o...
2025-04-2148 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastTalent Networks are your Greatest Asset | Adam Marchick | Superclusters | S4E9“When investing in funds, you are investing in a blind pool of human potential.” – Adam Marchick
Over the past twenty years, Adam Marchick has had unique experiences as a founder, general partner (GP), and limited partner (LP). Most recently, Adam managed the venture capital portfolio at Emory’s endowment, a $2 billion portfolio within the $10 billion endowment. Prior to Emory, Adam spent ten years building two companies, the most recent being Alpine.AI, which was acquired by Headspace. Simultaneously, Adam was a Sequoia Scout and built an angel portfolio of over 25 companies. Adam was a direct investor at Menlo Ve...
2025-01-1345 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Dao of Investing in VC Funds | Jay Rongjie Wang | Superclusters | S4E8“The first layer is setting up your own strategy. The second layer is portfolio construction. How do you do your portfolio construction based on the strategy you set out to do? And then manager selection comes last. Within the portfolio construction target, how do you pick managers that fit that ‘mandate?’” – Jay Rongjie Wang
Jay Rongjie Wang is the founding Chief Investment Officer of Primitiva Global, where she runs a family-backed Multi-asset Strategy. She also works extensively with emerging VC managers, and sits on the Selection Committee of Bridge Funding Global.
Jay's background uniquely combines software e...
2025-01-061h 29
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Pension Fund Perspective on Buyout Strategies | Charissa Lai | Superclusters | S4E7“Diversification is your one free lunch.” – Charissa Lai
Charissa has experience in Investing, Strategy and Relationship Management across Private Equity and Investment Banking. She's gained global perspective from having worked and lived in South Africa, England, Canada, China and the USA. Her expertise includes selecting fund managers and co-investments, developing alternatives strategies and building relationships. She's a recipient of 2016 Women in Capital Markets Emerging Leaders Award with CPPIB. She serves as a Board Director at the Toronto Humane Society.
Charissa holds an MBA from Northwestern University and an HBSc. from University of Toronto.
You ca...
2024-12-3056 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe 4 P's to Evaluate GPs | Charlotte Zhang | Superclusters | S4E6“Executional excellence can get you to being great at something – let’s call that top quartile – but it really is passion that distinguishes the best from great – top decile.” – Charlotte Zhang
As the director of investments, Charlotte Zhang oversees the selection of external investment managers, conducts portfolio research, and helps to institutionalize processes, tools, and resources. Experienced in impact investing, she previously served as a senior associate at ICONIQ Capital and, before that, Medley Partners. Investing on behalf of foundations affiliated with family offices, her investments supported a variety of nonprofit work, from early childhood education to autism researc...
2024-12-2349 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Holiday Special | Nakul Mandan and Ben Choi | Superclusters | S4PSE1“VC is more about the ground game than the air game.” – Nakul Mandan
“Entrepreneurs think it’s going to be like the Michael Keaton version, and the good ones, they actually have to work through the Christopher Nolan version of Batman.” – Ben Choi
Nakul Mandan is the founder of Audacious Ventures. Audacious is a seed stage venture firm managing ~$250M. Audacious' foundational belief is that ultimately startup success comes down to two key ingredients: Large markets and A+ teams. Accordingly, the Audacious team focuses on two jobs: 1/ Invest in force of nature founders; 2/ Help them recruit an A+...
2024-12-161h 13
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastLPs Should Get Paid More | Ashby Monk | Superclusters | S4E5“Innovation everywhere, but especially in the land of pensions, endowments, and foundations, is a function of courage and crisis.” – Ashby Monk
Dr. Ashby Monk is currently a Senior Research Engineer, School of Engineering at Stanford University and holds the position of Executive Director of the Stanford Research Initiative on Long-Term Investing.
Ashby has more than 20 years of experience studying and advising investment organizations. He has authored multiple books and published 100s of research papers on institutional investing. His latest book, The Technologized Investor, won the 2021 Silver Medal from the Axiom Business Book Awards in the Busine...
2024-12-091h 14
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastListening to the Heartbeat of the Market | David York | Superclusters | S4E4“Markets have a mind of their own.” – David York
David York's thirty plus years of industry knowledge and networks uniquely equip him to be a liaison and international ambassador not only for Top Tier’s brand, but also the broader venture community. In 2000, David joined Phil Paul to lead the fund of funds team at Paul Capital, which spun out in 2011 to form Top Tier.
David has been active in the global venture capital community since the early 1990s. As a founder of Top Tier, he has led the developm...
2024-12-0142 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Difference Between GPs who Can and Should Raise | Dan Stolar | Superclusters | S4E3“GPs and LPs are both equally busy, but different kinds of busy where on any given day, we’ll probably have the same amount of calls and all these things going on, but [LPs are] going to know [they’re] busy three months ahead of time and a GP won’t.” – Dan Stolar
Dan Stolar is a Principal at Colibri Equity Ventures, a single family office based in NYC and San Diego. Dan leads the venture capital strategy and also participates in all alternative private investments, including sports investing and private equity. As part of the venture strategy, Da...
2024-11-2550 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Case for Concentrated Portfolios | Jeff Rinvelt | Superclusters | S4E2“The line that sits for me is you got to pick well, you got to coach well, and then you got to finance well – and the financing includes the exit.” – Jeff Rinvelt
Jeff Rinvelt is a partner at Renaissance Venture Capital an innovative venture capital fund of funds. Jeff’s diverse background in venture capital and technology and his experience working in various start-up ventures uniquely position him to advise startups. In addition, Jeff is quite active in the Michigan start-up community, volunteering his time to mentor young entrepreneurs, judge pitch competitions, and guest lecture student classes and organi...
2024-11-1850 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe GP Data You've Never Collected Before | Kelli Fontaine | Superclusters | S4E1“Neutral references are worse than negative references.” – Kelli Fontaine
From investing in great fund managers to data to investor relations, Kelli Fontaine is a partner at Cendana Capital, a fund of funds who’s solely focused on the best pre-seed and seed funds with over 2 billion under management and includes the likes of Forerunner, Founder Collective, Lerer Hippeau, Uncork, Susa Ventures and more. Kelli comes from the world of data, and has been a founder, marketing expert, and an advisor to founders since 2010.
You can find Kelli on her socials here:
X/Twitter: https://x.com/kells_bells
LinkedIn: https...
2024-11-1158 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWhen VC Funds Become Firms, Part 3 | Lisa Cawley, Ben Choi, Jaclyn Freeman Hester | Superclusters“When you bring people in as partners, being generous around compensating them from funds they did not build can help create alignment because they’re not sitting there getting rich off of something that started five years ago and exits in ten years. So they’re kind of on an island because everybody else is in a different economic position and that can be very isolating.” – Jaclyn Freeman Hester
We're doing a three-part series with some of our fan favorites over the last three seasons on the LP perspective of succession-planning and VC firm-building.
2024-10-0743 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWhen VC Funds Become Firms, Part 2 | Lisa Cawley, Ben Choi, Jaclyn Freeman Hester | Superclusters“We overcomplicate almost nothing as LPs. And this is a criticism of myself. And I think we oversimplify almost everything. Because by definition, we’re the customer of the end product. [...] LPs watch the movie, but don’t read the book.” – Ben Choi
We're doing a three-part series with some of our fan favorites over the last three seasons on the LP perspective of succession-planning and VC firm-building.
Lisa Cawley is the Managing Director of Screendoor, a highly respected LP of GPs, investing in firm-builders by firm-builders, with a unique mod...
2024-09-3047 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWhen VC Funds Become Firms, Part 1 | Lisa Cawley, Ben Choi, Jaclyn Freeman Hester | Superclusters“You can map out what your ideal process is, but it’s actually the depth of discussion that the internal team has with one another. [...] You have to define what your vision for the firm is years out, in order to make sure that you’re setting those people up for success and that they have a runway and a growth path and that they feel empowered and they feel like they’re learning and they’re contributing as part of the brand. And so much of what happens there, it does tie back to culture [...] There’s this amazing, ama...
2024-09-2338 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHow to Build an Emerging Manager Community | Rick Zullo | Superclusters | S3PSE1Rick Zullo is the Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Equal Ventures. which invests into the future of four verticals: climate, insurance, retail, and supply chain, and boasts a portfolio including the likes of Threeflow, Leap, Smarthop, Ghost, Starday, David Energy, Leap, Odyssey, Vquip or Texture, just to name a few — many of which Rick serves on the board of.
Prior to co-founding Equal Ventures, Rick was an investor at Lightbank, an early-stage venture fund based in Chicago, where he led investments in companies like Riskmatch (acquired by Vertafore), Vettery (acquired by Adecco), Neumob (acquired by...
2024-09-091h 44
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHow to Get Access into Top Tier Funds | Felipe Valencia | Superclusters | S3E9Felipe Valencia is one of the co-founders of Veronorte, a venture capital investment firm based out of Colombia. In the first decade, Veronorte focused on managing Corporate Venture Programs for some of the largest Corporations in Latam.
These days, they’re diving into a Fund of Funds investment strategy in the Venture Capital space. For the last 12 years, Veronorte has invested in over 25 startups across the U.S., India, Europe, Mexico, and Colombia, and in more than 12 Venture Capital funds, primarily in the U.S.
With over 20 years of experience under his belt, Felipe has dabbled in various fields li...
2024-08-261h 45
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWhy Trust is Built from the Small Things | Ben Ehrlich | Superclusters | S3E8“If you want to build trust with someone [on your team], if they screw up, you have to be okay with them screwing up because you put them in the situation.” – Ben Ehrlich
Ben Ehrlich is the founder and General Partner of First Momentum Capital, where he helps seed a new generation of venture capital firms. He is also the Director of Strategy at the Long Term Stock Exhange. Previously Ben worked across the venture ecosystem supporting companies in the Canadian Technology Accelerator, OutCast Communications and Cribspot (YC 15). In his free time Ben takes his Ir...
2024-08-191h 12
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastAn Inside Peek into the Mind of an Individual LP | Susan Kimberlin | Superclusters | S3E7Susan Kimberlin builds and invests in things that are Good & Useful. She is an angel investor, limited partner and product leader with a career that is equal parts building SaaS software products, and investing in companies, funds, teams, and projects that promote social equity with practical solutions for real-world problems. She is committed to bringing more diverse people into investing and the innovation economy. With a background in building search and natural language products for companies like PayPal and Salesforce, she leverages her experience to help her portfolio companies with product and fundraising strategies. Susan believes that bringing diverse...
2024-08-121h 01
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Art and Science of Reference Checks | Raida Daouk | Superclusters | S3E6“The more constraints you have, the more conviction you will have in each manager.”
Raida started her career in banking before moving to the investment team of BY Venture Partner, a venture fund with offices in Beirut and Abu Dhabi. She quickly climbed the ranks within the company and ultimately became a Venture Partner.
Recognizing a void in the market for personalized venture consulting services, Raida established Amkan Advisory, a boutique consultancy firm specializing in assisting family offices and high-net-worth individuals in identifying venture funds that align with their specific strategies. Given that...
2024-08-051h 09
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWhy an LP of GPs is Uniquely Valuable | Lisa Cawley | Superclusters | S3E5“If you are governing things from a point of a legal document, whatever that may be and having to refer to that in order to trigger a behavior, that often to me feels emblematic of a transaction, not a relationship.”
Lisa Cawley is the Managing Director of Screendoor, a highly respected LP of GPs, investing in firm-builders by firm-builders, with a unique model for partnering with allocators to access the emerging manager ecosystem. She’s been covering venture capital for more than a dozen years, since 2010 at Ernst and Young, a private investment firm, and no...
2024-07-291h 27
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastOperational Due Diligence Like You've Never Seen Before | Evan Finkel | Superclusters | S3E4“In venture, we don’t look at IRR at all because manipulating IRR is far too easy with the timing of capital calls, credit lines, and various other levers that can be pulled by the GP.”
Evan currently serves as Head of Venture Capital Investments and Research for Integra Global Advisors, a multi-family office. Prior to Integra, Evan served as Senior Manager of Data Science for Anheuser-Busch InBev where he oversaw data science and strategy for the US marketing organization. Prior to Anheuser-Busch, Evan spent two years as a Management Consultant at Marketing Management Analyt...
2024-07-221h 36
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Inner Workings of a Sovereign Wealth Fund | Ian Park | Superclusters | S3E3Ian Park is a Partner at Primer Sazze, a firm dedicated to investing in ambitious talent across East Asia and North America. Prior to Primer Sazze, he was a venture capital allocator at Korea Investment Corporation (KIC), one of the largest sovereign wealth institutions in the world, where he focused on investments into venture managers and founders. He’s also amassed a fervent following of AI, VC, and LP fans over the years through writing his newsletter and his YouTube channel. Prior to KIC, he's built his investing repertoire at VMG Partners and Bertram Capital after leaving the world of...
2024-07-151h 18
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastVC Fund Secondaries Unlocked | Dave McClure | Superclusters | S3E2Dave McClure has been a Silicon Valley entrepreneur and investor for over 25 years. He has invested in hundreds of startups around the world, including 10+ IPOs and 40+ unicorns (Credit Karma, Twilio, SendGrid, Lyft, The RealReal, Talkdesk, Grab, Intercom, Canva, Udemy, Lucid, GitLab, Reddit, Stripe, Bukalapak).
Prior to launching PVC in 2019, he was the founding partner of 500 Startups, a global VC firm with $1B AUM that has invested in over 2,500 companies and 5,000 founders across 75 countries. Dave created 20 VC funds under the 500 brand and invested in 20 other VC funds around the world.
Dave began his investing career at...
2024-07-081h 29
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastBringing the Endowment Approach to Emerging Managers | John Felix | Superclusters | S3E1John Felix is the Head of Emerging Managers at Allocate where he leads manager diligence and product innovation within the emerging manager ecosystem. Prior to joining Allocate, John worked at Bowdoin College's Office of Investments, helping to invest the $2.8 billion endowment across all asset classes, focusing on venture capital. Prior to Bowdoin, John worked at Edgehill Endowment Partners, a $2 billion boutique OCIO. At Edgehill, John was responsible for building out the firm's venture capital portfolio, sourcing and leading all venture fund commitments. John started his career at Washington University's Investment Management Company as a member of the small investment...
2024-07-011h 13
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Limited Partner Game Show | Beezer Clarkson & Chris Douvos | Superclusters | S2 Post Season EpisodeBeezer Clarkson leads Sapphire Partners‘ investments in venture funds domestically and internationally. Beezer began her career in financial services over 20 years ago at Morgan Stanley in its global infrastructure group. Since, she has held various direct and indirect venture investment roles, as well as operational roles in software business development at Hewlett Packard. Prior to joining Sapphire in 2012, Beezer managed the day-to-day operations of the Draper Fisher Jurvetson Global Network, which then had $7 billion under management across 16 venture funds worldwide.
In 2016, Beezer led the launch of OpenLP, an effort to help foster greater understanding in the entrepreneur-to-LP tech ecosystem. Be...
2024-05-2059 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastQualitative Signals to Look for in Emerging GPs | Jaclyn Freeman Hester | Superclusters | S2E9Jaclyn Freeman Hester is a Partner at Foundry. She joined in 2016 with a passion for supporting the next generation of entrepreneurs and investors. Jaclyn leads direct investments in early-stage companies, often collaborating with Foundry’s partner funds. She loves working closely with founders to solve hard problems and think about the human elements of business. She invests across B2B and consumer companies that exhibit strong end-user empathy and use technology to empower individuals, unlock potential, and improve experiences.
Jaclyn helped launch Foundry’s partner fund strategy, building the portfolio to nearly 50 managers. Bringing her unique GP + LP perspective, Jacl...
2024-05-061h 21
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastAn LP's Guide to the European VC Ecosystem | Ertan Can | Superclusters | S2E8Ertan Can is the Founder of Multiple Capital, a fund of funds focused on investing in micro VC funds in Europe and has been a limited partner in top funds you’ve heard of including Entrepreneur First and Angular Ventures, just to name a few. He's done his tour of duty in the asset management world at JP Morgan to covering investor relations topics at Thomson Reuters to investing in startups at a family office. Ertan is also a founding member of 2hearts, a community dedicated to building tomorrow's tech society with cultural diversity.
He...
2024-04-291h 37
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHow to Get Six Top Quartile Fund of Funds in a Row | Aram Verdiyan | Superclusters | S2E7Aram Verdiyan is a Partner at Accolade. Previously, he worked on the investment team at Andreessen Horowitz. Before that, Aram worked in BD, sales and marketing at Aviatrix, a cloud native enterprise software company. Aram worked at Accolade from 2012 to 2015 as a Senior Investment Associate and at Deloitte Consulting LLP. He holds an M.B.A from the Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB) and a B.S. from the George Washington University.
You can find Aram on his socials here:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/aramverdi
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aram-verdiyan-8099186/
And huge thanks to this episode's...
2024-04-221h 01
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastExit Windows Matter More Than Entry Windows | Jaap Vriesendorp | Superclusters | S2E6Jaap Vriesendorp is one of the managing partners of Marktlink Capital, an investment manager from the Netherlands investing over $1b into private equity and venture capital funds. Marktlink Capital’s LPs are almost exclusively Dutch (tech) entrepreneurs from companies such as Booking.com, Adyen and Hellofresh. At Marktlink Capital Jaap focusses on selecting venture and growth funds across Europe and the US. Before Marktlink Capital, he spent the majority of his time at McKinsey where he was one of the leaders of McKinsey’s practice for Venture Capital, Unicorns & Startups in Europe. Besides work, Jaap enjoys sports, mountains, technology, comi...
2024-04-1557 min
StartupableHow to Raise from Emerging LPs: A Guide for GPs | David Zhou, AlchemistThis week I talked to David Zhou, Head of Investor Relations at Alchemist Accelerator, to understand who emerging Limited Partners (LPs) are and what motivates them, and how General Partners (GPs) can raise capital from them.Over a year ago, David wrote “The Non-Obvious Emerging LP Playbook”, which has become one of the best blog posts on the somewhat obscure world of Limited Partners, the money behind the Venture Capital industry. Since then, David has become one of the best community builders in Silicon Valley, focused on helping emerging Limited Partners think and invest like the m...
2024-04-081h 20
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWhen Helpful is an Action Verb | Aakar Vachhani | Superclusters | S2E5Aakar Vachhani is the Managing Partner and a member of Fairview’s investment committee. He is involved in research, due diligence, investment monitoring, and business development for Fairview's venture capital and private equity partnership and direct co-investment portfolios.
Prior to joining Fairview, Aakar was with Cambridge Associates, a leading investment advisor to foundations, endowments and corporate and government entities. He was responsible for analyzing private equity and venture capital investments in support of the firm's clients and consultants. In addition, he led research and data analytics projects on the firm’s private equity and venture capital database. Aakar also spen...
2024-04-081h 15
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHow a Pension Fund thinks about Venture Capital | Peter Teneriello | Superclusters | S2E4Peter Teneriello has been a career-long investor in the private markets. He has experience as an allocator across a range of institutional types, from wealth management firms to pensions and endowments, and helped launch the venture capital program for the Texas Municipal Retirement System. Other past experiences of his have included leading finance/operations for a venture-backed startup, in addition to vetting investments for a family office and working with their portfolio companies. Over the years he has also written about his investing experience on Medium and Substack.
He is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame as...
2024-04-0155 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Questions that Form an LP Investment Thesis | Winter Mead | Superclusters | S2E3Winter Mead is the Founder and Managing Member of the investment firm Coolwater Capital, which exclusively focuses on emerging managers and technology investments. Coolwater is an academy for training, building and scaling emerging managers, a curated community of VC investors and early-stage investment specialists, and an investment firm. Coolwater has helped launch over 175 emerging managers, establishing strong ties and trust with these managers, who form the foundation of the Coolwater community. Winter is also the author of "How To Raise A Venture Capital Fund".
Prior to Coolwater, he played a key role in an evergreen investment fund at SAP...
2024-03-251h 12
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastDiligence Questions: As Simple As They Are Complex | Youngrok Kim | Superclusters | S2E2Youngrok Kim is a Partner at GREE LP Fund, a Fund of Funds operating in the US and Japan. Previously, he held the position of SVP at Recruit Strategic Partner, the strategic investment arm of Recruit Holdings, a major internet company in Japan. Youngrok began his career as an engineer at Goldman Sachs before transitioning to a VC career at ARCH Venture Partners in Chicago. He earned an MBA from the University of Chicago and received his degrees in Information Technology from Aoyama Gakuin University in Tokyo.
You can find Youngrok on his socials here:
Twitter: https://twitter.com...
2024-03-181h 19
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHow One of VC's Biggest LPs Builds Relationships | Abe Finkelstein | Superclusters | S2E1Abe 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...
2024-03-111h 20
Venture with Grace6 ways to build relationships with your LPs ft David Zhou
David Zhou is the Head of Investor Relations at Alchemist Accelerator, a startup accelerator focused on investing the first check into rockstar B2B companies, where we were the first investors in companies like LaunchDarkly, rigetti, moengage, Retail Zipline and more. Prior to Alchemist, David ran operations and community for On Deck Angels, a community of the world's most ambitious angels and first-time fund managers. On the side, David is an active angel, LP in VC funds, blogger on Cup of Zhou, and the host of Superclusters, a podcast that demystifies the money behind the VC money.
Topics:
...
2024-02-0945 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastA Case Study on Why LPs Pass on Great Funds | Jeff Rinvelt & Martin Tobias | Superclusters | S1 Post Season E1Jeff is a partner at Renaissance Venture Capital an innovative venture capital fund of funds. Jeff’s diverse background in venture capital and technology and his experience working in various start-up ventures uniquely position him to advise startups. In addition, Jeff is quite active in the Michigan start-up community, volunteering his time to mentor young entrepreneurs, judge pitch competitions, and guest lecture student classes and organizations. Through Jeff’s work on the Fund, his volunteer efforts, and his role as the chair of the Michigan Venture Capital Association’s board of directors, his passion for fostering a productive environment for ve...
2024-01-1555 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastAn Individual LP's Guide to Investing Like an Institution | Samir Kaji | Superclusters | S1E8Samir Kaji is the CEO and Co-Founder of Allocate, a private markets technology company that pairs origination with portfolio management tools to allow investors to efficiently construct and manage their alternatives portfolios.
Prior to Allocate, Samir spent 22 years in venture banking between SVB and First Republic Bank and closely worked with and advised over 700 venture capital and private equity firms. During this time, he completed over $12B in structured debt transactions and has invested personally in over 75 funds and companies, including early-stage investments into Carta (seed), Side (seed), PolicyGenius (Series A), and FanDuel (Series B) as well as Growth i...
2024-01-081h 11
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHow Being Weird is a Deal Flow Superpower | Howard Lindzon | Superclusters | S1E7Howard Lindzon has over 20 years of experience in both public and private market investing. He previously founded and managed the hedge fund Lindzon Capital, and is currently the founder and General Partner of the early-stage venture capital firm Social Leverage. Through Social Leverage, he and his partners have been seed investors in startups like Robinhood, Beehiiv, and Manscaped to name a few. Howard was the founder of Wallstrip (acquired by CBS), and is the the co-founder and Chairman of Stocktwits, the leading social platform for traders and investors. Throughout his career, Howard has strongly advocated for and helped drive...
2024-01-021h 18
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastHow to Build a Multi-Fund VC Firm | Ben Choi | Superclusters | S1E6Ben Choi manages over $3B investments with many of the world’s premier venture capital firms as well as directly in early stage startups. He brings to Next Legacy a distinguished track record spanning over two decades founding and investing in early-stage technology businesses. Ben’s love for technology products formed the basis for his successful venture track record, including early stage investments in Marketo (acquired for $4.75B) and CourseHero (last valued at $3.6B). He previously ran product for Adobe’s Creative Cloud offerings and founded CoffeeTable, where he raised venture capital financing, built a team, and ultimately sold the co...
2023-12-261h 16
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWhat Great Questions to LP Questions Sound Like | Courtney McCrea | Superclusters | S1E5Courtney Russell McCrea enjoys over 30 years of venture capital and private equity investment experience including 13 years of fund investing and 18 years of direct principal investing.
Courtney is Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Recast Capital, a 100% women-owned platform investing in and supporting emerging managers in venture, with a focus on diverse partnerships.
Prior to co-founding Recast, Courtney was a Managing Director of Weathergage Capital, a boutique fund of funds that provided its clients with access to premier venture capital, growth equity and micro-VC partnerships. Venture fund commitments included both brand name funds and emerging managers. In addition to fund investment...
2023-12-1852 min
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Bull and Bear Case of Early Distributions | Jamie Rhode | Superclusters | S1E4Jamie Rhode is Principal at Verdis Investment Management, focused on venture capital, private equity and hedge fund investment sourcing and due diligence.
She joined Verdis from Bloomberg, where she held roles in both equity research and credit analysis. There, she created, managed and leveraged an extensive library of statutory and financial and market data for buy and sell-side clients that 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://twit...
2023-12-111h 12
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Adventures of an LP Whisperer | Eric Woo | Superclusters | S1E3Eric is co-founder and CEO of Revere, where he leads product development and investment analysis & due diligence efforts.
Prior to starting Revere, he was Head of Institutional Capital at AngelList, the world's largest online venture capital investment platform that supports over $10B in assets and has participated in the financing of over 190 "unicorn" companies. At AngelList, Eric worked closely with investors to curate early-stage fund and deal opportunities. He also developed systematic and data-driven strategies for institutional investors.
Over the last 12 years, Eric has helped allocate over $160 million in venture funds and direct co-investments. Notably, he played a key...
2023-11-201h 20
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastThe Art and Science of VC Metrics | Beezer Clarkson | Superclusters | S1E2Beezer leads Sapphire Partners‘ investments in venture funds domestically and internationally. Beezer began her career in financial services over 20 years ago at Morgan Stanley in its global infrastructure group. Since, she has held various direct and indirect venture investment roles, as well as operational roles in software business development at Hewlett Packard. Prior to joining Sapphire in 2012, Beezer managed the day-to-day operations of the Draper Fisher Jurvetson Global Network, which then had $7 billion under management across 16 venture funds worldwide.
In 2016, Beezer led the launch of OpenLP, an effort to help foster greater understanding in the entrepreneur-to-LP tech ecosystem. Beezer ea...
2023-11-201h 07
Superclusters - The Emerging LP PodcastWhy You Should Be Wrong and Alone | Chris Douvos | Superclusters | S1E1Chris 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...
2023-11-2059 min