Scott Kupor Secrets to Silicon Valley Success

🔹 Everything starts and ends with market size.

🔹 Systems are better than goals.

🔹 Strong ethics and culture matter.

🔹 Be founder friendly to a fault.

🔹 Adapt as circumstances change.

🔹 Be secretly good at the boring stuff.
My co-founder @troutgirl and I believe that founders' values are baked into everything we do.

@skupor’s Secrets book leads by example.

Scott Kupor offers an extremely revealing look inside the culture and values of @a16z, and we recommend you read it.

amazon.com/Secrets-Sand-H…
1/ GREAT TEAMS FIND GREAT MARKET OPPORTUNITIES

For VCs, everything starts and ends with market size:

“You need to demonstrate to the next round investor that shows how you have sufficiently de-risked the business.”

2/ SYSTEM THINKERS SUPREME

Kupor breaks down the ENTIRE Silicon Valley venture capital ecosystem in detail:

🔹 Why Limited Partners put money into VC in the first place
🔹 The whole VC-entrepreneur relationship (like marriage without the love)
🔹 Returning money to the Limiteds
3/ TRULY FOUNDER FOCUSED, EVEN TO A FAULT

I know that several of Kupor’s stories about founders SUBSTANTIALLY understate how generous and thoughtful the firm was to them.

@a16z has done some extraordinary things for founders that literally no other VC firm has even considered.
4/ STRONG ETHICAL FOUNDATION

The best part of Scott Kupor’s book is actually the part most likely to be skipped, Chapter 13.

Trust me on this: I once had to hire all 3 corporate formation attorneys in Delaware for a reason related to this chapter.

Ignore ethics at your peril.
5/ RESPONSIVE TO CHANGING CIRCUMSTANCES

The tech industry is notoriously fast-moving and Scott Kupor is extremely good at explaining WHY things have changed.

For example: explanations of how YC was able to change the game at that moment.

A key to success is ability to adapt.
6/ SECRETLY GOOD AT THE BORING STUFF

Anyone who's seen Andreessen on a panel or Horowitz sitting courtside next to the Warriors bench thinks they're risk-taking shot-caller guys… but they're actually surrounded by one of the most meticulous teams in the biz, led by Scott Kupor.
Not all VC firms are like this.

Its culture and values set @a16z apart.

At @106Miles we also focus on governance, but from point of view of stories from when the VC-entrepreneur relationship went hideously wrong.

Trust but verify with other entrepreneurs and your own lawyers.
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