20VC: Upfront’s Mark Suster on COVID Redefining What A Great Company Looks Like and What Valuations Look Like, Why Pay-To-Play Is Back On The Table & Why We Will See The Death of Party Rounds
The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
The Twenty Minute VC
4.4 • 637 Ratings
🗓️ 20 April 2020
⏱️ 47 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Mark Suster is the Managing Partner @ Upfront Ventures, one of LA's leading and largest venture firms with a portfolio including the likes of Bird, GOAT, Maker Studios and Ring.com to name a few. Prior to joining the world of venture, Mark was the founder & CEO of two successful enterprise software companies, the most recent of which was sold to Salesforce.com where Mark became VP, Products. Mark is also the author of one of my favourite industry blogs, Both Sides of The Table.
In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:
1.) How Mark made his way from founding enterprise companies to joining "the dark side" of venture with his move to Upfront?
2.) How does the current economic landscape change the world of B2B? How will renewals be impacted? How will customers approach discounting? Similarly, how will the world of B2C be impacted by COVID? How does this impact marketing and ad spend?
3.) How does Mark think about reserve allocation today with Upfront? How does that change in the face of COVID? Why does Mark believe this environment will redefine valuations? How should founders respond in the face of heavily changed valuations?
4.) Does Mark believe we will see a graveyard of new venture firms who have deployed too quickly and have too many hungry mouths to feed? How does Mark think about building temporal diversification into the portfolio? How can managers use reserves more intelligently moving forward?
5.) Does Mark agree with the Twittersphere that VCs remain "open for business"? How will we see deal volume impact? How will we see size of transaction impacted? What is the most important role a VC can play today? How will the M&A market also be impacte din the face of COVID?
Items Mentioned In Today’s Show:
Mark’s Fave Book: Disunited Nations: The Scramble for Power in an Ungoverned World
Mark's Most Recent Investment: Solve
As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Mark and on Twitter here!
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | We are back for another week in the world of venture with me, Harry Stebbings, and if you'd like to suggest questions or guests seat, Mark Suster, managing partner at Upfront Ventures, |
| 0:21.4 | one of LA's leading and largest venture firms with a portfolio, including the likes of bird, goat, |
| 0:26.5 | maker studios and ring.com, to name a few. Prior to joining the world of venture, Mark was the founder |
| 0:31.2 | and CEO of two successful enterprise software companies, the most recent of which was sold to |
| 0:35.7 | Salesforce.com, where Mark became VP of products. |
| 0:38.6 | Mark is also the author of one of my favourite industry blogs, both sides of the table. |
| 0:42.3 | If you have not checked that out, it really is a must. And I do also want to say a huge thank |
| 0:45.8 | to Kara Nortman, Greg Bettinelli and Kobe Fuller for some fantastic questions suggestions |
| 0:50.3 | today. I really do so appreciate that. But before we move into the show today, I want |
| 0:54.7 | to take a moment to mention HelloSign, a great example of a company that found success in building |
| 0:59.5 | a product focused on user experience. HelloSign is an effortless e-signature solution used by millions |
| 1:05.1 | to securely send and request legally valid digital signatures and agreements. They raised a total of |
| 1:10.6 | $16 million in funding |
| 1:12.1 | and recently got acquired by Dropbox for an impressive $230 million. Check out HelloSign.com |
| 1:17.9 | 4-2-0VC to join the thousands of companies and founders who value fast, secure and simple |
| 1:24.1 | e-signatures. And speaking of signatures and getting deals done there, you really need to |
| 1:28.3 | build that relationship and there's nothing like meeting face to face and there's nothing like |
| 1:32.1 | Zoom to make that happen. Zoom lets you connect and do business across town or around the world. Zoom ties |
| 1:38.1 | together all of your communication needs into one easy platform for video conferencing, phone calls, |
| 1:43.7 | group chat, webinars, and your |
| 1:45.4 | conference rooms. And connect easily from anywhere, your mobile phone, your laptop, or conference room. |
| 1:50.8 | Zoom is how business gets done. Get your free account at Zoom.com today. Meet Happy with Zoom. |
... |
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