Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Three of our worst VC stories

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 170 posts

Re: Three of our worst VC stories

#51

Post by snowwrestler »

giancarlostoro wrote: post #20

The first I heard of Cloudflare was a recommendation from someone who used to DDoS websites (and yes they've been arrested for related crimes, long story), and I thought "what the heck is Cloudflare" then over the coming years, I kept seeing other friends using it. It's really interesting that Cloudflare was able to pop into a market that Akamai could have snagged for themselves or outright tried to buy out Cloudflar…

Cloudflare is fantastic at marketing, and pretty good at technology. I evaluated them twice for enterprise contracts and both times picked a competitor. The first time, it was DosArrest for DDOS protection, which was a much better value per dollar (but they sucked at marketing.) The second time, we needed a CDN with particular features and Fastly was a better fit.

My point is that it’s very very hard to know in advance that a startup is going to be awesome at marketing. Their tech was not, on its own, a giant moat or a “must have” standout. So I can see why some VCs shrugged.

Re: Three of our worst VC stories

#53

Post by tty456 »

I hear story #1 periodically, but almost never see a quote. How is this stuff said specifically? It always seems like hearsay. I'm sure it's authentic, but I'd love to hear the details on how that stuff is actually said in conversation.

Re: Three of our worst VC stories

#54

Post by jphil529 »

tty456 wrote: post #53

I hear story #1 periodically, but almost never see a quote. How is this stuff said specifically? It always seems like hearsay. I'm sure it's authentic, but I'd love to hear the details on how that stuff is actually said in conversation.

Really sad that people are still walking around with those beliefs.

Re: Three of our worst VC stories

#56

Post by root-parent »

toxic wrote: post #26
cowthulhu wrote: post #4

#3 is insane, if for no other reason than the VC is signaling that he’s likely going to try and do the same thing to you some day… even if you were totally willing to screw over your team, why would you ever get involved with that VC given you’ll then have to watch your back until the end of time?

Because if you get involved with most VCs, you will then have to watch your back until the end of time. None of those "worst experiences" seem all that unusual to me (though nobody will say #1 out loud anymore until after they've invested), and #3 is completely in character for Vinod.

If one partner is the core of the company, and the others the VC thinks are useless ( I am not saying in this case they were...just that the VC might have that perception) what should the VC do?

After all its just business decisions like Cloudflare recent layoffs no?

https://blog.cloudflare.com/building-for-the-future/

Re: Three of our worst VC stories

#57

Post by carefulfungi »

I doubt VCs have different distribution of personal character from other professional groups.

In my experience, a more interesting friction is that VCs are pursuing a diversification strategy while founders are pursing a singleton strategy.

Re: Three of our worst VC stories

#59

Post by stackghost »

root-parent wrote: post #56
toxic wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because if you get involved with most VCs, you will then have to watch your back until the end of time. None of those "worst experiences" seem all that unusual to me (though nobody will say #1 out loud anymore until after they've invested), and #3 is completely in character for Vinod.

If one partner is the core of the company, and the others the VC thinks are useless ( I am not saying in this case they were...just that the VC might have that perception) what should the VC do? After all its just business decisions like Cloudflare recent layoffs no? https://blog.cloudflare.com/building-for-the-future/

If they truly are useless that's one thing, but the ability to "impress" some asshole in a 30 minute pitch has little to do with running a successful tech company.

With what authority are VCs claiming to be capable of being an accurate judge of talent or character in less than an hour?

Sounds like said VC in your example is doing insufficient due diligence and just investing based on vibes.

Re: Three of our worst VC stories

#60

Post by flawn »

tty456 wrote: post #53

I hear story #1 periodically, but almost never see a quote. How is this stuff said specifically? It always seems like hearsay. I'm sure it's authentic, but I'd love to hear the details on how that stuff is actually said in conversation.

The fact that you hear this often (also not only from the victims of this) should signal that, even without quotes, there is likely some truth to it.
Post reply on HN