Good morning 👋
I’m too young to remember VC 1.0, but I’ve lived and worked through version 2.0.
VC is no longer a cottage industry, and that’s obvious everywhere you look.
But you can feel that we’ve entered a new era, and I haven’t found an article that breaks down that change better than this one by the NFX team.
We break it all down in today’s piece.
P.S. 🌴 We changed the date of our Miami event to accomodate for Easter.
The new dates are April 24-27, and we have space for a few more folks before we close it off and start planning logistics.
If you like good weather, golf, boats, and meeting other allocators, you can apply to join here.
Today’s highlights
The evolution of venture capital
Bulls vs. bears vs. builders
Figure is about to raise at a massive markup
How to get a free audit of your business
TOP
VC 3.0 🔮
NFX shared this iconic piece a few days ago.
It’s worth reading, but we’ve recapped it so you can get the highlights.
VC 1.0
VC wasn’t an industry; it was just a small club of a few investors sharing deals
The bar to get funding was much higher
Founders would bootstrap their companies by racking up credit card debt and mortgaging their homes
Barriers to entry made it much harder to start and scale a company
VC 2.0
The invention of the browser changed things
VC industry grew from 150 investors to 32,000+ investors as a result
VC funds and iconic founders become household names
Wealth, status, and media attention drew more people to the asset class
Founder struggle became seen as a right of passage and the modern version of the American Dream (rags to riches)
VC 3.0
VC now touches all industries with 32k+ investors covering every industry over the sun
VC is already fast; AI allows funds to look at more deals in more depth, faster and more effectively
Why VC will continue to grow
The best funds will produce better returns that other asset classes because of how inefficient venture is
The asset class is still small
More VCs are needed because VC applies to all industries
More international venture capital demand
LPs have many different plays
VC brand drives investment
There are not many great alternatives for other asset classes as those other industries have become more efficient
New types of VCs will bring more money
Opaque reporting keeps VCs in business longer
Low barriers to entry; anybody with money can become a VC
Read more: https://www.nfx.com/post/venture-capital-3
GP / LP Mastermind
Miami, golf, padel, boat, and a small group of fund managers 🌴
We don’t like conferences, so we created our own version that we would actually look forward to going to.
📆 Dates: April 24-27, 2025
📍 Location: Miami, FL
ℹ️ Other details:
Small group of 6-10 LPs, GPs, and partners
Golf and padel
Boat charter
Private dinners
No outside sponsors
We only a few more spaces left, and we’re sending out early-access invites before the end of the week.
If you’re interested, we’d recommend letting us know sooner rather than later …
TWEET
HEADLINES
Level Zero Health banks $6.9M to prove wearable medtech can take the strain out of hormone testing (TechCrunch)
Figure AI is in talks to raise $1.5B at 15x its last valuation (TechCrunch)
With Turo Withdrawal, A Slim IPO Pipeline Gets Thinner (Crunchbase)
Slow Ventures Breaks Down Its New Fund Focused on Investing in Creators (WSJ)
TPG-spinout Greenfield Partners raises $400 million fund to back early growth companies (Fortune)
MEMOS
Chima: Interoperability for AI agents
Superpower: The all-in-one health membership for elite performers
Documenso: The DocuSign killer
LINKS
🔮 How the Future Looks by Jensen Huang: Guillermo Flor summarizes NVIDIA’s Jensen Huang’s interview with Cleo Abram where they discussed his insights on AI, GPU as “time machines”, and the rise of Physical AI
💪 The Venture Capital Apocalypse: The VC Corner lays out the cold, hard facts about an industry that is being forced to reset, and only the strongest will make it through
🤝 How to Make Connections That Count—Advice From a Silicon Valley Veteran (and Introvert): Karen Wickre, one of the most connected veterans of SV, offers insightful advice and no-pressure networking strategies on how to build meaningful networks
😊 35: Erik Torenberg shares his 35 pieces of advice he would have told his 20 year old self (list is focused on happiness)
☠️ Perfection is the Startup Killer: The highest quality companies aren’t built by overthinking—they’re built by iterating fast and improving over time
MEME
Thanks for reading this far and giving us a little bit of your attention this week.
Feel free to unsubscribe whenever this stops becoming valuable to you.
- Clay Norris
Founder @ Confluence.VC | GP @ Outlaw
