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Andreessen Horowitz is opening an office in SF

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Re: Andreessen Horowitz is opening an office in SF

#61

Post by adw »

seem_2211 wrote: post #44
adw wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, the South Bay is becoming/has become enterprise-land. As Silicon Valley startups increasingly aim towards the consumer market, it makes sense that they would locate themselves in the biggest media/consumer/tourist hub. (Even the biggest enterprise companies can be SF-based, though – SalesForce, for example...)

I don't know if that's true. A lot of B2B SaaS companies are in San Francisco, and I can't see a lot of them moving (Okta, New Relic, Twilio all come to mind). That said there are A LOT of old school enterprise companies in the South Bay / Peninsula.

B2B SaaS companies are in large part about addressing the enterprise without being Oracle or friends, though!

Re: Andreessen Horowitz is opening an office in SF

#62

Post by autotune »

jedberg wrote: post #57
autotune wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like “the ballpark” best, that name is timeless so won’t matter which company buys up naming rights next.

Yeah but then I don't know if you're talking about SF or Oakland. :)

Technically it'd be the "Oakland Coliseum," although I've never actually heard anyone else refer to it as that as I don't know too many folks who enjoy sports in Oakland, or I'd just call it "the Oakland Ballpark" to differentiate heh. Once the "the ballpark" in Mission Bay starts hosting games then I think we'll have to resort to alternative naming schemes but I'm sure something better than "Chase Center" will be figured out.

Re: Andreessen Horowitz is opening an office in SF

#63

Post by batbomb »

floatingatoll wrote: post #60

I used to live in California near A-H and the traffic at that location is easily some of the worst traffic they could possibly encounter on 280. I believe the local transportation divisions outright list their nearby 280/Sand Mill exchange as a critical priority to revamp. Imagine a 30 minute line of cars where someone unsafely cuts in every second you wait.

ah, that's because you don't know about the back way through Whiskey Hill Road to Cañada that you should take from 5-6:30 PM if you are going north. It's not bad if you are headed south. A-H is so far up the hill that it doesn't make much of an impact for them though

Re: Andreessen Horowitz is opening an office in SF

#64

Post by floatingatoll »

batbomb wrote: post #63
floatingatoll wrote: post #60

I used to live in California near A-H and the traffic at that location is easily some of the worst traffic they could possibly encounter on 280. I believe the local transportation divisions outright list their nearby 280/Sand Mill exchange as a critical priority to revamp. Imagine a 30 minute line of cars where someone unsafely cuts in every second you wait.

ah, that's because you don't know about the back way through Whiskey Hill Road to Cañada that you should take from 5-6:30 PM if you are going north. It's not bad if you are headed south. A-H is so far up the hill that it doesn't make much of an impact for them though

I was definitely only talking about that traffic with respect to A-H, since this is a post about A-H, to try and offer some context for people who haven’t experienced that for why A-H might not favor what seems like prime real estate during non-rush-hour hours.

Re: Andreessen Horowitz is opening an office in SF

#65

Post by nostrademons »

jedberg wrote: post #49
paxys wrote: post #26

Almost every big tech IPO of 2019 (Uber, Lyft, Pinterest, Slack, Postmates, Airbnb, Instacart) is headquartered in SF. It's undeniable that the center of silicon valley is slowly shifting north.

Back in the day, the name Silicon Valley came from the fact that most of the companies worked with actual silicon. Most of them were based near Mt. View because 1) The land was a lot cheaper than SF and 2) Most of the capital was there. The "new" SV is north because all the consumer websites set up shop in SF since all they needed was office and not chip fabs, and they were mostly being worked on by younger folks who…

Facebook, Google, Apple, Yahoo, Adobe, Intuit, and Microsoft & Amazon's Bay Area offices are all in SV.

I'd really divide it by era. Anything founded before 2005 is in Silicon Valley; after that is in San Francisco. I actually think YCombinator is a big driver of that; they funded younger startup founders (largely Millenials rather than Gen-Xers) who wanted to live in the city.

Re: Andreessen Horowitz is opening an office in SF

#66

Post by paxys »

jedberg wrote: post #49
paxys wrote: post #26

Almost every big tech IPO of 2019 (Uber, Lyft, Pinterest, Slack, Postmates, Airbnb, Instacart) is headquartered in SF. It's undeniable that the center of silicon valley is slowly shifting north.

Back in the day, the name Silicon Valley came from the fact that most of the companies worked with actual silicon. Most of them were based near Mt. View because 1) The land was a lot cheaper than SF and 2) Most of the capital was there. The "new" SV is north because all the consumer websites set up shop in SF since all they needed was office and not chip fabs, and they were mostly being worked on by younger folks who…

The "back in the day" for silicon you are referring to was pre-80s. You skipped an entire generation of software companies headquartered in South Bay that have gained prominence since then — Google, Facebook, Oracle, eBay, Cisco, Adobe, Nvidia, Netflix and lots more.

Re: Andreessen Horowitz is opening an office in SF

#67

Post by jedberg »

paxys wrote: post #66
jedberg wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Back in the day, the name Silicon Valley came from the fact that most of the companies worked with actual silicon. Most of them were based near Mt. View because 1) The land was a lot cheaper than SF and 2) Most of the capital was there. The "new" SV is north because all the consumer websites set up shop in SF since all they needed was office and not chip fabs, and they were mostly being worked on by younger folks who…

The "back in the day" for silicon you are referring to was pre-80s. You skipped an entire generation of software companies headquartered in South Bay that have gained prominence since then — Google, Facebook, Oracle, eBay, Cisco, Adobe, Nvidia, Netflix and lots more.

Yes, I did skip a section, but only because it didn't feel super relevant. Having worked at two of those companies myself, I'm well aware of the phase in the middle (although Cisco and Nvidia are actual silicon companies).

As a fun side note, the only reason Netflix is in Los Gatos is because the founder wanted it in Santa Cruz, where he lived, but was convinced no one would work there because it would be too far, so he picked the city closest to Santa Cruz that people would still consider Silicon Valley.

Re: Andreessen Horowitz is opening an office in SF

#68

Post by paxys »

2arrs2ells wrote: post #36
Judgmentality wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have any of those companies gone public yet? While I believe there is a shift north, I also believe a lot of the newer companies won't exist in 5 years. I guess I feel SF is still a lot more ephemeral than its southern neighbors.

Twitter, Atlassian, Eventbrite, Okta & Dropbox, are all pubic & in SF. Facebook, Google, Microsoft (Github) have a sizeable SF presence.

Square and Salesforce as well

Re: Andreessen Horowitz is opening an office in SF

#69

Post by jedberg »

autotune wrote: post #62
jedberg wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but then I don't know if you're talking about SF or Oakland. :)

Technically it'd be the "Oakland Coliseum," although I've never actually heard anyone else refer to it as that as I don't know too many folks who enjoy sports in Oakland, or I'd just call it "the Oakland Ballpark" to differentiate heh. Once the "the ballpark" in Mission Bay starts hosting games then I think we'll have to resort to alternative naming schemes but I'm sure something better than "Chase Center" will be fi…

> although I've never actually heard anyone else refer to it as that as I don't know too many folks who enjoy sports in Oakland

That's what I call it. But I spent eight years living in the East Bay, so that may be why.

Re: Andreessen Horowitz is opening an office in SF

#70

Post by lquist »

I was recently grabbing dinner with a group of CEOs and the unanimous sentiment was that they would never take money from a16z (3 founders had already and one other had a terrible experience with them during the pitch). It seemed to come down to how combative and unhelpful the partners were. I am sharing because it was a bit of a surprise to me (bootstrapped) and I think it’s important to share insight into VCs—-there is so much opacity for such an important decision.
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