Richard Lin

VC world can be cruel and unforgiving. With LPs more and more pushing for distribution and liquidity, fund managers in the mid-tenure of their fund with zero DPI and TVPI around 1.0 would have much more difficulty to raise new fund. The ability to fundraise is one of the crucial indications and validation of the job for VCs. Key highlights from the article below: Thirteen percent of venture General Partners (GPs) no longer plan to raise another fund due to LP pullback. This rate has doubled since H1 2023 when only 6% of GPs had no plans for another fund. Nearly 44% of venture firms surveyed in mid-2023 had previously postponed their fundraising plans due to concerns about overexposure to the asset class. Many emerging managers entered venture capital in 2019 or 2020 when the LP market supported more funds. However, slow exits in the first half of 2024 have led to challenges in raising second funds without significant cash distributions to LPs. Some venture GPs are now actively participating in the secondaries market to demonstrate returns. Despite the challenges, GPs who secured fresh capital remain optimistic. They expect the 2023 and 2024 vintages to be the strongest return years since 2019. 🚀📈 #VC #VentureCapital #Fundraising #LPs #EmergingManagers #TechInvestment #MarketTrends #CountdownCapital #IndustryInsights #JetVentures #JetInvestment‍‍‍‍‍‍

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Venture capital had a challenging start to 2024. The latest "Venture Capital Q1 2024: Preqin Quarterly Update" shows weak exit activity and fundraising struggles, with 235 exits totaling $14.6bn in Q1. Although there were some successful IPOs, fundraising remains difficult, with VC funds raising $20.7bn in the first quarter. Get insights into the state of venture capital, including deal activity, regional trends, and why investors are making smaller commitments. Download the full report for more details: https://okt.to/oK2XLN #VentureCapital #InvestmentTrends #Q12024Update #MarketInsights

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Lume (YC W23), co-founded by Nebyou Zewde, Robert Ross, and Nicolas Machado, has raised $4.2M in a Seed round led by General Catalyst, with participation from Khosla Ventures, Floodgate, Y Combinator, and Soma Capital. Lume (YC W23)’s AI-powered platform automates data mapping and integration, helping companies in industries like e-commerce, insurance, and finance streamline onboarding, data normalization, and complex data workflows. By leveraging large language models, Lume enables faster, more efficient data mapping and management across unique systems. The new funding will allow Lume to make strategic hires in AI research and data infrastructure to handle the growing data needs of its customers and tackle the industry’s long-standing challenges in data integration. Collin Montag Puneet Kumar Brad Flora Quentin Clark Max Rimpel Vinod Khosla Mike Maples, Jr Nikhita Jaaswal Fouad Farhat Sabrina Hahn Devvret Rishi Sam Stone Ana Clara Martins Sigalit Perelson Scharfstein John Bautista

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We are so excited to announce our investment in Misha van Beek and Sebastian Janisch, CFA Janisch, and their company, Bayesline, Inc. Bayesline is a risk management software built for the speed of markets - not for the speed of humans. The challenge? The world is in constant flux, with countless interdependent variables changing all the time. Building and updating risk models can take days - or even weeks. An eternity in the world of asset management. Enter Misha and Sebastian. They’ve built an AI-powered platform capable of delivering risk assessments in seconds. For those old enough to remember, it feels like the introduction of spreadsheets with Lotus 1-2-3 (for Gen Z: Microsoft Excel) in the 1980s - revolutionizing financial planning and modeling forever. Their product is as transformative for traditional assets as it promises to be for digital ones. Creating something as sophisticated as Bayesline requires a rare blend of IT, risk management, and quantitative expertise - paired with experience at institutions like BlackRock and Bloomberg. During our due diligence, one expert estimated that only about 20 people worldwide possess the skill set to tackle what Misha and Sebastian are building. Now that’s a moat we like. We’re proud to join Misha and Sebastian on their journey alongside wonderful co-investors like Y Combinator, 468 Capital, and Multimodal Ventures. #bayesline #riskmanagement #blockchainfounderscapital #startup #venturecapital #fintech

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Benchmark (YC W23) is the fastest way to screen deals and analyze investment data. Each year, investment teams spend thousands of hours reviewing investment opportunities that die. Not only are those hours lost, but so is all of the valuable data that is tied to those opportunities. As a result, investment teams spend way too much time focusing on low-probability opportunities, digging through old files for comps, and redoing old analyses. Founded by Alec Dunn, Connor J., and Joshua Kerber, Benchmark allows investment teams to screen deals in minutes while automatically aggregating all of the valuable deal data for future analysis. With it, investors can focus on high-probability opportunities and build permanent institutional knowledge that gives them a significant edge over their competitors.

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Seed VCs are turning to new ‘pro rata’ funds that help them compete with the big firms Alpha Partners, SignalRank and now SaaS Ventures help seed VCs pay for shares when big VCs try to price — or push — them out Lee Edwards, partner at Root VC, has a saying at his firm that “pro rata rights are earned, not given.” That may be a bit of a stretch since pro rata refers to a term that VCs put in their term sheets that gives them the right to buy more shares in a portfolio company during consequent funding rounds to maintain an ownership percentage and avoid dilution. Still, while these rights are not exactly “earned,” they can be expensive. One of the latest trends in VC investing these days are funds dedicated to helping seed VCs exercise their pro rata rights. https://lnkd.in/dRM3RvdA By Christine Hall

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What Dave McClure is building resonates well what we are doing with our Siena Secondary Fund. Although one focuses on fund stakes and the other company positions, the journey is the same - need to educate the market about what is #VC #secondary and how to benefit from it...

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8 templates for founders looking to fundraise. See below. Also, if you have any that you’ve found valuable, please share them in the comments. 1️⃣YC’s SAFE Financing Documents: https://lnkd.in/eUjN6gZn 2️⃣Lenny R’s Fundraise Timeline Spreadsheet: https://lnkd.in/eSgGdHj5 3️⃣Lenny R’s Investor Outreach List Spreadsheet: https://lnkd.in/ek2sJeGG 4️⃣Wing’s Top 100 Angel Investors: https://lnkd.in/esgWa-Nh 5️⃣Ramp’s VC & Angel Investor Database: https://lnkd.in/ehzzA-H9 6️⃣Foresight’s Financial Modeling and Forecasting Spreadsheets: https://lnkd.in/e-Gd5XPX 7️⃣Bplans’ Business Plan Template: https://lnkd.in/ePhj6ErR 8️⃣Notion’s Top Fundraising Templates: https://lnkd.in/e9EW5Cki ----- ♻️Like, Comment, Share Follow Startup Vencha for more, Stop Thinking & Start Doing

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💼Company: Meridian 💰Funding: USD 4 Million ⚡Round: Seed 👥Investors: ParaFi Capital, Borderless Capital, The Amber Group, Saison Capital, Interop Ventures, and Oak Grove Ventures Meridian secured $4 million in seed funding. The Amber Group, Saison Capital, Interop Ventures, and Oak Grove Ventures were among the participants in the round, which was co-led by ParaFi Capital and Borderless Capital. Meridian intends to lead Movement Labs’ network of blockchains called Movement, which is home to the Move-based DeFi ecosystem. Meridian intends to use this cash infusion to grow its worldwide workforce by actively hiring for positions in the field of engineering, product, and advertising. The platform’s aggressive roadmap will be supported by this expansion, which will also quicken its go-to-market plan. rushi manche Alpen Sheth, Ph.D. Read more - https://lnkd.in/gY5Q5qWx To share your startup story write us on - [email protected] #meridian #fundraising #funding #News #startup

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#PaaS Northflank, a developer workload platform, has secured $22.3 million in funding, comprising a $6.3 million seed round led by Vertex Ventures US and a $16 million Series A round led by Bain Capital Ventures (BCV). Other investors in these funding rounds include Kindred Ventures, Tapestry VC, Pebblebed, and Uncorrelated Ventures. This financial backing positions Northflank to advance its mission of becoming the go-to platform for engineering teams deploying and managing software. Northflanks production workload platform allows developers to create, deploy, and scale workloads on their preferred cloud through a self-service interface. The company aims to address inefficiencies in the software development lifecycle, where manual, complex processes between coding and cloud deployment slow down release cycles and hinder developer productivity. Engineering teams would often face a choice between investing heavily in custom internal developer platforms or relying on rigid third-party solutions. Northflank presents a third option: a flexible, real-time platform that eliminates the need for piecing together fragile solutions while enhancing the developer experience. Our goal is to let developers do what they do best: write code and release new features, said Will Stewart, Northflanks CEO and co-founder. Infrastructural complexity often gets in the way. Customers dont pay you to produce YAML, and our platform abstracts those complexities, enabling platform and DevOps teams to manage infrastructure more effectively while automating deployments. Rancher, Mesos, Kubernetes The Northflank platform would integrate seamlessly with Kubernetes, providing developers with the tools to design, deploy, and scale applications, processes, and databases across any cloud environment. By utilizing a user interface and Infrastructure as Code to deliver decoupled processes, Northflanks platform enhances both consistency and reliability. This approach gives businesses control over their infrastructure without compromising flexibility or the developer experience. The platform has been adopted by a diverse range of businesses, from major sports leagues to software companies such as Sentry, Writer, and Chai Discovery. Tens of thousands of developers would use Northflank in production, benefiting from its ability to lower barriers to entry while elevating the potential for all engineers working with cloud infrastructure. Northflank made it easier for us to develop and implement new products, said Waseem Alshikh, co-founder and CTO of Writer. Using their fully functional APIs, we quickly implemented a secure multi-tenant runtime in our cloud powered by Northflanks BYOC (Bring Your Own Cloud) solution. Their APIs have provided us with the flexibility, speed, and control we need. Former Chief Architect Keith Adams praised the developer platforms unique capabilities, stating, Northflank is the first batteries included…

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Insightful breakdown from my great Partner Omri Amirav-Drory on the simple factors that really separate the top 1% of investors from the rest, and how more operators should become investors! https://lnkd.in/gEiZdT2h

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Our view on the current venture capital markets. Curious to hear other investors' thoughts but I feel like seed stage valuation, at least in the gaming and entertainment sectors, has finally come down to the pre-covid level. Since February or March this year, we started seeing that the founders are willing to raise a $1-2m seed round at a $10m-ish valuation, not like $4-5m at $20-25m in 2022 and 2023. What are you guys seeing?

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Big things on the horizon, we are motivated and blessed to be at the dawn of a new age for the internet. Read more about our journey below or listen to the podcast: https://lnkd.in/eJeNhvVa

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In his recent post, our CIO, David Clark, shares an important reflection on what to expect in the VC industry over the next 3-5 years. As we are forecasting to see fewer and larger exits, with the most ones producting even stronger returns, it becomes even more important to have exposure to these winners and their managers. Similarly, looking at 2008/2009 data, we have seen a similar divergence, where VenCap’s Core Managers were the ones that were able to massively outperform the market even in moments of crisis. This was mainly driven by the quality of their portfolio companies, availability of capital and willingness to invest during challenging times. If you want to learn more about how VenCap’s Core Manager strategy and how to access the Core Managers, visit on our website: https://www.vencap.com or get in touch with the team.

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As we enter a period of fewer but larger exits, VenCap International plc's David Clark shares his take on the three 🔑 factors that will contribute to outperformance in VC over the next 3-5 years: 1️⃣ Quality of portfolio companies 2️⃣ Availability of capital 3️⃣ The willingness to keep investing during challenging periods Read more 👇 #VC #LPInsights

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📢📢 Dive into "The Quarterly Checkup: Q2 2024 Market & VC Landscape," authored by Jason Robertson : An insightful analysis of the current market dynamics and venture capital landscape, highlighting the mixed signals we're experiencing. Key Takeaways: > The evolving state of inflation and interest rates. > Public market resilience amidst economic uncertainty. > The challenges in exit markets and the rise of buyouts. > Insights on venture capital trends, including early-stage investments and digital health funding. 🔗 Read the full post here:  https://lnkd.in/g9HZFCPj #MarketInsights #VentureCapital #InvestmentTrends #Q22024

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Let's talk about fee structure for SPVs. In this environment, SPV's (and syndicates) have gained in popularity. There are some fantastic ones such as Beyond Earth Technologies Sydecar and Companisto to name just a few. Plenty of emerging GPs raising their funds partake first in SPV syndicates when fundraising to build track-record and co-investment opportunities with future LPs. But sometimes the fee structure can be more opaque than with a fund. The median fee for sub-US$10M SPVs is 1.8% versus the traditional 2% for US10M+. Typically, pre-seed sub US$1M deals don't charge management fees- however the vast majority charge fees based in LP committed capital (not GP commit). The question is- why are management fees on SPVs increasing and what does it mean for LPs? One of the simple answers is that as the number of deals and VC funds have declined, SPVs are being used as a substitute to a fund. I don't think this is problematic if there are great deals and active management of the SPV portfolio from the leads and transparency in fee allocation. It does become a potential issue for LPs if there are: ⛔ Double fee layers & uncommunicated hidden costs ⛔ Above avg. carry that increase fee burden on per deal basis ⛔ Minimal clawback provisions ⛔ Lack of transparency on fee allocation Ask questions to avoid this. How are fees allocated? Do the fees make sense vs. size of allocation? How does that impact positions and potential follow-on? Does the lead plan to manage the portfolio? #SPV #syndicate #familyoffice #VC #venturecapital #LP

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