Gabe Villasana

Wing Venture Capital's Founder Docs project is a unique collection of startup wisdom, by founders, for founders. The authors of the docs are talented founders themselves, sharing their experience on the topics they are most passionate about. I'd like to highlight the contributions of Edo Liberty, founder / CEO of Pinecone. Edo writes about the special opportunities for the scientist / founder (and he is one of the best of this breed!), as well as some of the risks and challenges they face. I got a lot out of reading Edo's stuff and I suspect you will too! https://lnkd.in/g_wyRMiE

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A new era of deep tech has emerged. First time funds will raise “unheard of” amounts of capital to fuel next gen deep tech startups - producing outsized, superior returns for LP’s compared to the rest. Prudent investors will act on this data and shift investment strategy as LP’s or risk being left behind savvy wealth managers and CIO’s / FO’s who saw this trend begin 4 years ago.

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Non-Engineering Roles at Early-Stage Startups Offering $120K+ Base Salary with Meaningful Bonus and Equity: Chief of Staff @ Milo (Consumer), Remote Biz Ops Lead @ Fractal Agriculture (FinTech), Remote; Backed by Virta Ventures Chief of Staff @ CakeAI (AI SaaS), NY; Backed by Primary Venture Partners Demand Generation Specialist @ Rootly (Consumer), Remote; Backed by YC, 8VC, Gradient Ventures Account Executive @ CommandBar (Enterprise SaaS), Remote; Backed by Soma Capital, YC, Insight Partners Product Marketing @ Slope (Enterprise), Remote; Backed by YC, Union Square Ventures, Liquid 2 Ventures Supply Planning Manager @ PROVEN Skincare (Consumer), Remote; Backed by YC, FJ Labs, Soma Capital, Social Capital Account Executive @ Accrue Savings (Consumer), NY; Backed by Ground Up Ventures, Tiger Global Chief of Staff @ UNIGRID Battery (Climate), CA; Backed by Union Square Ventures, LiquidMetal Ventures Job details and the full list (40+ opportunities) are in the comments below. If you're interested in non-tech jobs focused on specific industries like HardTech, HealthTech, Climate, etc., then DM me or let me know in the comments.

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Reminder: Tomorrow is the Mindstone #AI meetup in #NYC - in midtown at 6pm. Practical applications of AI - and I will be presenting our free tool for #startup #entreprneurs that helps you build out your startup strategy (#LeanCanvas), positioning (#ElevatorPitch) and #PitchDeck. Yup - that's right - a free tool that will take you from idea to pitch deck, with AI helping you along the way. For *FREE*. [The event, and the tool] Link to the signup page in the comments!

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Third and last part of my post with some insights from the #fundraising of our latest fund. Some of the tools we used and how we managed to get the finish line successfully!

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🚀 This one’s for the founders: a masterclass in execution and innovation. This week, I sat down with Adhemar M., founder and CEO of Kovi, a Brazilian company redefining mobility through car subscriptions and connected tech in a market plagued by high costs and limited credit access. Backed by ~$145M in funding from the likes of Valor Capital Group, monashees, MAYA CAPITAL, Globo Ventures, Norte Ventures and Peter Thiel's family office, Kovi is addressing high car costs, tough credit barriers, and insurance gaps in one of the world’s most exciting markets. What we covered 👇🏻 ​🔑 Driving innovation: How Brazil’s mobility challenges are powering market transformation ​🤝 Connect the dots: Building stronger founder/VC partnerships through transparency and market education ⚙️ Complexity doesn’t scale: Lessons in building efficient, scalable operations 🌐 Break down silos: Creating synergy between tech and operations in a startup ​⚡ Clean win: How Brazil’s renewable edge and gig economy lead the EV growth Link in comments—don’t miss this one! 🎧 PS: Thank you Vander Corteze, MD for the intro to Adhemar and for some excellent question suggestions 👏🏻

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🙋 Why I started Socap.ai (YC W23) as the top YC founder and what’s next Thanks all for the support during last week’s Socap.ai (YC W23) announcement! A lot of you were curious why I decided to start it after transitioning from CEO to a Board Member at Mighty Buildings (a top Y Combinator company) — here’s why 👇 I’m a rare founder who has been at the other side of the venture table (just to remind you, I started as a VC having founded a number of firms — Ruvento Ventures, EnchantVC, and HaxAsia to name a few — and have famously invested in 2 unicorns out of 17 seed investments while at Ruvento). Being a VC was fun and all, but I wanted a more interesting challenge. When we started Mighty, I couldn’t have imagined how complicated this road would be. As a deep tech company, we needed to raise A LOT of funding and needed to raise it fairly quickly. So far, Mighty has raised over $150M all the way from YC W16 to Series B in 2023. During this journey, I learned from the best of the best — at the YC Series A program and from the unicorn founders who have angel invested in us/advised us. Hundreds of people have helped me along the way with their generous feedback and, most importantly, intros/connections. I don’t think we would have been able to get there if not for my meticulous approach to parallel fundraising and activating/growing my social capital. I started Socap.ai (YC W23) because I grew tired of seeing founders completely misunderstanding what the successful fundraise looks like as well as lacking a quality way of growing their network. Oftentimes it’s a one-time opportunity and if you fuck up the process, that’s it. My mission with this is to change the mindset and make it 10x easier with the help of AI and the right kind of infrastructure (e.g. community). The tech startups scene and fundraising as the use-case is just the beginning for Socap.ai (YC W23) — I, my partner Alexander Nevedovsky, and our team (former VC associates and finance leaders) are so well-connected and well-versed in this beachhead market segment, that it would be stupid to start anywhere else, especially seeing founders pain every single day (I get around 50 connection requests daily from founders seeking help). I’m proud that along with the official Socap.ai announcement we have started hosting regular Socap.ai fundraising bootcamps as the initiative where founders can learn from me and a slew of other top founders (Abakar Saidov, Aaron Holm, Michael Ma, Salman Ahmad, Sly Spencer-Lee, Eric Sanchez to name just a few, there are dozens more whom I'll tag in the coming posts) — for free. We’re pioneering a more streamlined way for these top founders to share their social capital and help companies/founders they like, all powered by the AI platform we’re currently beta testing. Excited to kick off our bootcamp cohort #1 this Thursday — we’ve already started sending out first cohort acceptance letters — check them out if you applied! #fundraising #startups #socap

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VC funding in healthcare has been more resilient than in other industries. Here are some key takeaways from recent Carta data: 👉 At the priced seed, Series A, and Series B stages, dilution for health startups has noticeably decreased, while dilution for SaaS startups has stayed flat or increased slightly. 👉 In priced seed rounds, median dilution for healthcare companies dipped to 14.2%, compared to 20% for SaaS.  👉 The frequency of bridge rounds surged in the health sector in Q1, jumping to 44.3% from 36.9% in Q4 2023. This is the first significant increase in bridge rounds in healthcare over SaaS since early 2022. 👉 More founder-friendly terms for health startups may result from enduring VC interest since COVID. Healthcare has remained strong through economic turmoil, enabling higher valuations with smaller round sizes. What are the implications? The healthcare sector might see a rise in new ventures due to favorable investment conditions and lower dilution rates. The surge in bridge rounds suggests that certain sectors within healthcare face unique challenges that require interim financing solutions. Founders and investors in the healthcare space- what are your thoughts on this? I’d love to hear from you. If you know a founder innovating in healthcare, tag them in the comments! The Artemis Fund is especially interested in groundbreaking care tech companies. You can check out Carta’s full blog linked in the comments. If you haven’t read our latest blog on care tech, you’ll find that there too. #healthcare #caretech #fundraising

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Hot take on a lot of early-stage digital health companies out there: You're not a tech company. Most tech-enabled care companies I've seen over the past two years are only tech-enabled in the sense that they use telehealth as their delivery mechanism for care. There are exceptions to this, of course - companies who build computer vision and applied AI tools to better the doctor-patient experience, companies who build tooling around risk scoring and stratification to enable more personalized medicine, companies who build truly novel intakes to better route patients to the appropriate care, etc. These companies have real technology chops and, if they sell it right to the market, can get credit for this from investors. But if you're truly a telehealth provider, you need to realize now that the goal post has shifted dramatically from 2021 and you're going to be valued at maturity at something like 3x EBITDA. That's profit. Not revenue. Throw a revenue multiple out the window. That's not the world we live in if you're a virtual doctor's office. Think of how that impacts venture math. If you're raising a seed round at $15M post-money (or $12M pre-money), it means you'll have to generate something like $150-200M in annual EBITDA to be a fund returner for your seed investors. Maybe even more with dilution, since telehealth businesses are not traditionally capital efficient and will likely need to raise material additional capital to reach that scale. You need to be ridiculously profitable (probably on $800M-$1B in annual revenue since you're likely going to be a 40% gross margin business). Here's the good news: you can set yourself up well (and probably be a contrarian founder relative to your peers), by talking about EBITDA growth and how you can grow into a fund-returning outcome based on realistic mature market comps. This will stand out for the investors you're pitching, even at the early stage. This is how you can beat the malaise of the tech-enabled care market. Focus on the right metrics and the right type of growth. You don't have to have all the answers (no founder does), but you need to make sure the ship is headed in the right direction. A focus on profitability for "tech-enabled care" (*ahem* telehealth) businesses is a good first step.

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Wonderful article about Emily Knight and the whole The Engine Accelerator team on the amazing work their doing changing the world with #ToughTech!

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Excited to be starting the year with the first Europeans of NYC event, hosting the powerhouse Mario Schlosser, cofounder and CTO of Oscar Health. Mario’s had an incredible journey: from growing up in small-town Germany to co-founding a social gaming company in Brazil, and ultimately tackling the notoriously complex US healthcare system. Here’s a glimpse of what we’ll discuss: 💡 From frustration to innovation: The personal experiences that sparked the idea for Oscar Health and what it took to launch a company in a space as regulated as healthcare. ⚙️ Tech in healthcare: How Mario’s team is using AI and back-end automation to reshape the patient experience while navigating the unique challenges of the industry. 🤝 Lessons in leadership: From co-founder dynamics to evolving his role from CTO to CEO and back, and how he’s scaled himself alongside the company. 🌍 European roots in an American system: How his background as a European entrepreneur shaped his approach and helped him navigate the US business landscape. 🔥 Actionable advice for founders: Building trust in highly regulated markets, attracting top-tier talent, and thriving in the face of adversity. If you are a European founder in NYC, you've got one more day to apply: https://lnkd.in/ey6SVA3g.

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Did you know that YC founders get a secret weapon… and it’s not what you think. “Bookface” is YC’s internal social network. It was needed because YC had funded larger batches and the hardest part of a community is knowing who is in it and who you can trust and ask for help. On the platform, founders share real methods and advice that would break if it were shared widely It’s secret knowledge shared with a trust-first community - answering 80% of the questions a founder can have about building and selling a product, be it to clients, candidates or investors. Before the platform, if you had a B2B startup, you had to reach out cold to potential customers. Now there are over 1000 YC companies you can sell your service to and all of their contact information is in Bookface. As a result, YC alumni companies are often over 50% of your new sales during YC. It’s superpowers like this that make YC deals so attractive compared to the norm. You are investing in a founder with a 10x network already!

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One of my proudest moments as an investor occurred today as Alaffia Health announced its series A because it shows how the Aperture® Venture Capital vision of multi-level, multi-generational #impactinvesting is succeeding in the marketplace. Here’s the model in its most basic form : ✅As diverse fund managers with meaningful capital to allocate, we are changing the VC landscape every day just by doing our day jobs. ✅As Black/Brown investors with ~40 years experience collectively, Aperture GPs have access to talent /excellence that others do not, so our portfolio *organically* is more inclusive by race, gender and geography even while optimizing for financial outcomes (all about the alpha). ✅Our most successful portco’s are using financial #innovation to solve market problems that impact underrepresented demographics and underserved communities. Alaffia Health is a shining example of the impact portion of our overall fund thesis, and we couldn’t be prouder of TJ Ademiluyi and Adun Akanni, MPH, PMP - the dynamic brother-sister founder duo whose vision we have steadfastly supported on their journey. Congratulations to TJ and Adun from William Crowder and myself, as well as the whole Aperture team- Marjorie King Philip McKenzie Yves Louis-Jacques Tanvi Lal Michelle Dhansinghani Lisha Bell Katie Kelly Amy Chung Cindy Chong, CFA Brian Fernandes-Halloran Monroe France Jayden Pantel Darren Herman Evan Wladis Neal Triplett Thomas Scriven Peter Ammon Irina Bit-Babik Tim Milanich Rob Rahbari

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A common mistake early-stage VCs make is confusing good decisions with good outcomes. Good outcomes don’t always mean good decisions—luck often masks flawed reasoning. Focus on process over outcome bias. Invest in strong decision-making frameworks, not just duplicating “wins.”

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Founders’ agreements are like prenups for startups—most founders avoid them, but they’re essential. Daniel Ospina and I recently revamped our co-founder agreement at Pygma, covering everything from carry, salaries, and conflict resolution to non-competes, side hustles, and performance metrics. What started as a ‘business discussion’ turned into one of our best conversations as co-founders. This process forced us to align on the tough stuff: how to handle leaving founders (good leaver vs. bad leaver), conflict frameworks, and more. The result? A stronger partnership and even more admiration for my co-founder. Building something as ambitious as Pygma isn’t easy, but having the right person by your side makes all the difference. If you haven’t tackled your founders’ agreement yet, don’t wait. It’s not just paperwork—it’s an opportunity to build trust and set your foundation for success. Hopefully, my wife Emilia González Casabianca doesn’t get jealous. If you need help feel free to reach out! I'm happy to help in any way.

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Create Health Ventures Launches Inaugural $21M Fund for Early-Stage Digital Health Startups  Create Health Ventures, a venture capital firm focused on early-stage digital health companies, has closed its debut fund, raising $21 million, surpassing its initial target. Launched in 2024, Create Health Ventures is based in Austin, TX, and Chicago, IL. The firm focuses on technologies that enhance healthcare access, improve patient experiences, and deliver value across payers, providers, and pharmaceutical companies. *Its primary focus includes:   1. Payer-Facing Technologies: Solutions that improve member experiences, enable seamless data and workflow integration, and scale technology across geographies.   2. Clinical Trial Enablement: Tools to help pharmaceutical companies recruit and retain participants for late-stage clinical trials as demand increases. *Founders and Approach:   Create Health Ventures was co-founded by Emma Cartmell and Amit Aysola, healthcare veterans with over 45 years of combined experience. They bring operational expertise, regulatory insight, and an extensive network to portfolio companies. The firm exclusively invests in startups led by healthcare industry founders, leveraging its unique value-added platform for scaling businesses.  *The platform includes: - Business development support   - Access to executive coaches   - Connections to healthcare leaders   - Cross-selling opportunities among portfolio companies  *Key Quotes by GPs:  - Emma Cartmell: “Founders from the healthcare industry understand the challenges and opportunities to improve patient outcomes. Supporting them is the most impactful way we can positively transform healthcare.”   - Amit Aysola: “Payers and pharmaceutical companies are driving demand for connected, scalable solutions, and we are investing in companies to meet these needs.”  *Investments and Impact:  The firm has made five investments so far and partners with foundations, impact investors, and strategic healthcare veterans to mentor portfolio companies.  *Portfolio CEO Feedback:   - Dr. Chip Grant (Watershed Health): “Create Health Ventures has been invaluable in scaling operations and fundraising.”   - Shara Cohen (Carallel): “They are the most collaborative and active investor team I’ve worked with.”   - Neil Batlivala (Pair Team): “They’ve helped us manage growth and reach underserved communities.” If you are experiencing difficulties in raising fresh capital and would require warm introductions to new LPs, contact G+QUANT     ▶ Please use G+QUANT's link for inquiries and fund decks, or send your inquiry directly to [email protected] #VentureCapital #DigitalHealth #HealthcareInnovation #Startups #ClinicalTrials #PatientCare #HealthTech #HealthEquity #CreateHealthVentures

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Notion vs Glean reminds me a lot of Tesla vs Waymo... Just like I think Tesla is going to solve the 'software' problem of autonomous vehicles before Waywmo solves the 'hardware' problem... I think that Notion is going to solve 'enterprise knowledge search' before Glean solves the problem of document and knowledge creation... Why? A couple reasons: 1) Just like Tesla, Notion has a huge advantage when it comes to the amount of underlying data and documents to train on... They already have 100M+ users, and likely 10x that in terms of the number of documents, files, etc. in team's workspaces. 2) It's very hard to change people's behaviour re: where/how they create 'work'. It's why a lot of companies have come and gone in that category... As exciting as Glean's AI writing assistants might seem, most people are just fine (or even prefer) a good old fashioned editor/writer. I could be way off here, but this will be an intersting one to follow. Thoughts? Where am I getting it wrong? #ai #enterprise #knowledge #management #notion #glean

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We gathered dozens of operators from the MGMT Boston Operators Club and local founders alongside the 186 Ventures team this October to discuss the evolution of our dear software markets, the status of some predictions for 2024 (all looking good!), and what’s on deck for next year. General Partner Giuseppe Stuto led us through the following predictions for 2025 to share with you all.. ↕ We will see more vertical AI applications manifest themselves within the Enterprise in a similar ways that SaaS moved from horizontal to vertical use cases 🔔 We will see services business models more common and software budget purchasing models less common - SaaS may even be given away for cheap/free as a “way in” ⚖ Capital efficiency, on a relative basis, will almost be required to create enduring & compounding defensible enterprise value. Details like procurement cycle lengths and creativity with non-dilutive financing, like leveraging revenue based financing tools for example, will all matter 💡 Specific to AI, premiums will be placed on applications that can actually get “reasoning” right. All purpose LLMs still have a ways to go and there are multiple approaches with the “jury still out” on how to get context and reasoning right. Infrastructure solutions that use general purpose or customizable knowledge graphs to help application developers get to 100% (enterprise acceptable accuracy) will emerge OR savvy application developers will fill the gaps themselves. We will likely see both, depending upon the specific case! Thank you Giuseppe, Julian, and Sophie for a great discussion and evening!

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Kettleborough VC has been active for ~6 years, invested in ~30 companies, gone through ~80 funding rounds, witnessed ~12 exits including ~4 instances of partial principal erosion, seen ~4 seed to $100M journeys, tracking ~29% XIRR across the portfolio. A couple of IPOs from the portfolio surely seem very much in line ahead.

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