20VC: Lightspeed's Jeremy Liew on Why It Is More Important To Be Right Than Contrarian, The Most Common Mistakes Made By Hyper-Growth Companies & 3 Characteristics That Make An Individual Incredible At Sourcing
The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
The Twenty Minute VC
4.4 • 637 Ratings
🗓️ 22 April 2019
⏱️ 36 minutes
🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Jeremy Liew is a Partner @ Lightspeed Venture Partners, one of the leading firms of the last decade with a portfolio including the likes of Snapchat, Mulesoft, Max Levchin’s Affirm, AppDynamics and many more incredible companies. As for Jeremy, he is best known for being the 1st investor in Snapchat and has also led investments in StitchFix, Affirm, Ripple, Giphy and Bonobos just to name a few. Previously, Jeremy was with AOL, first as SVP of corporate development and chief of staff to the CEO, and then as general manager of Netscape. Due to his incredible investing success, Jeremy has been featured on the Forbes Midas List multiple times.
In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:
1.) How Jeremy made his way into the world of venture with Lightspeed and came to be one of the valley's leading consumer investors and minds?
2.) How does Jeremy think about and approach sourcing today? How has mindset on sourcing shifted over the last decade? For a new VC, what would Jeremy advise them in terms of building them benchmark for distinguishing between good and great? How does Jeremy distinguish between good and great? Who does Jeremy believe is the most naturally gifted sourcer and hunter he has worked with?
3.) What does Jeremy mean when he says, "it is more important to be right than contrarian"? From winning some of the hottest deals, what have been Jeremy's lessons on what it takes to win the most competitive? What does he mean when he says, "you have to find your home advantage"? Should investors spend time amplifying their strengths or improving their weaknesses? How does Jeremy think about the round compression timelines on hot deals today? How can investors and founders build relationships fast?
4.) Why does Jeremy believe that founder to VC engagement can be similar to a driving instructor and student? What are the biggest mistakes startups make when they hit initial traction and start to scale? WHat patterns has Jeremy seen? How can founders avoid them?
5.) How does Jeremy fundamentally structure his week and time? What time is devoted to internal meetings and partnership meetings? How much time is allocated to the existing portfolio? How much time is spent with new prospective companies? What is Jeremy's favourite and least favourite activities within the role?
As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Jeremy on Twitter here!
Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome back to another week in the world of the 20 minute VC with me, Harry Stebbings. |
| 0:03.6 | I would love to see you on Instagram at H. Stebbings, 1996 with 2Bs, for all things behind the scenes from us. |
| 0:09.4 | However, to the episode today, and I have to admit, I always feel incredibly lucky when I think of my job. |
| 0:14.3 | Think about it, I'm likely one of the biggest venture nerds out. And when you think about my job, it allows me to interview and build relationships with some of the |
| 0:21.1 | most incredible people in the industry who I would pay huge amounts of money to ask these questions |
| 0:25.3 | to and have these conversations. Today's guest I interviewed over two years ago, since he's been an |
| 0:30.2 | incredible source of advice and guidance to me, and I'm just so thrilled to be able to welcome Jeremy Liu |
| 0:34.8 | back to the hot seat today. So Jeremy is a partner at Lightspeed, one of the leading firms of the last decade, with a portfolio including the |
| 0:41.0 | lights of Snapchat, Mulesoft, Max Levchin's a firm, App Dynamics and many more incredible |
| 0:46.0 | companies. As for Jeremy, he's best known for being the first investor in Snapchat and has |
| 0:50.3 | also led investments in Stitchfix, Affirm, Ripple, Giffy and Bonobos, just to name a few. |
| 0:55.6 | And before Lightspeed, Jeremy was with AOL, first as SVP of corporate development and chief of |
| 1:00.2 | staff to the CEO, and then as general manager of Netscape. |
| 1:03.1 | Due to his incredible investing success, Jeremy's been featured on the Forbes Midas list, |
| 1:06.9 | well, what can I say more times than I've done podcast episodes. But before we jump into |
| 1:11.2 | the show's date, I want to spend a minute to talk about Brex, the first corporate card for |
| 1:15.0 | startups. Brex founders Enrique and Pedro built a payments business in Brazil, but found themselves |
| 1:19.8 | rejected for a corporate card when they were in Y Combinator. They decided to build Brex, |
| 1:24.3 | with instant online sign-up, no founder liability required, and limits 10 to 20 times |
| 1:29.2 | higher than standard cards. Pretty incredible, I know, and you can sign up for Brex and get fees |
| 1:33.5 | wavered by entering the code Harry during sign-up. Honestly, it really is such a special service. |
| 1:38.8 | And speaking of Brex, an incredible high-growth company, well, a lot of what we do on the 20-minute |
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