The Bulletin #22: Lots of Layoffs, The Post-IC Diligence Process, & VWV Interview Tips
Van Wickle Ventures
VWV is a student-run venture fund that invests across all stages in Brown-affiliated companies.
To all the seniors that are still looking for jobs right now, wishing you the best of luck ?? The market downturn and massive tech layoffs are not making it easy for you all.
???Lots and Lots of Layoffs
This week’s bulletin is all about the layoffs, how the VWV team conducts diligence post-Investment Committee pitch, + some tips on interviewing with VWV.
If you submitted an application, congratulations! That’s amazing— wait to hear back in the next week for a possible interview.
???What We’re Reading
Tech layoffs are only expected to worsen before they get better ??
Nolan Church , CEO and co-founder of Continuum gives his thoughts on the current tech layoffs— having also helped execute Carta’s layoffs 2 years ago in 2020. In this podcast, there are a few main topics Church dives into:
And much more— read more and listen to the podcast?here!
What’s happening with all the fintech layoffs? ??
As mentioned above, Stripe ’s been laying off their workers— cutting?14%?of their workforce— followed by Chime at 12% and Brex at 11%. Spiros Margaris , fintech VC and founder of margaris ventures , explained that these layoffs are “caused by the challenging geopolitical market environment and inflationary pressures.” Not much of a surprise there.
Read more perspectives from various VC investors?here.
Sweden’s EQT Ventures Closes €1.1B Fund ??
Despite the market downturn and all layoffs in the States, Sweden’s massive fund EQT Ventures closes their third fund to double down on European early-stage startups just this past week. Their total raise since their launch in 2016 is €2.3 billion and have since backed 100 companies, which include 18 exits and 9 unicorns. Their growth arm, EQT Growth, also raised $2.4B earlier this year.
Read more on the firm’s raise?here.
???What We’re Listening To
Managing Director @ Insight Partners, Deven Parekh, talks about fintech investing
The Manager Director at Insight Partners , Anirudh Singh, discusses what makes the firm so successful, how fintech investing has changed over the past 10 years, and more.
Rashad Moore tells the story of his transition from engineer to founder of software consulting company
Listen to it?here?with a transcript, too!
???Post-IC Diligence Process
If you’ve been keeping up with our newsletters, you know that we’ve wrapped up our first phase of the diligence process and just pitched to our Investment Committee.
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Our IC is composed of?5 incredible members:
After pitching, the committee votes on whether or not our pitched investments go through. However, there are cases (like this time around) where we need to continue the diligence process just?a little bit more?before we come to a decision.
And the wonderful thing is, at the end of the day, our IC members are here to guide us and really listen to our own convictions— even if it doesn’t necessarily align with theirs.
So what does some Post-IC Diligence look like?
Well for one, Troy is sitting down with the entire VWV team to?really?understand what a good valuation means. ‘Good’ is incredibly arbitrary here, because it can mean good for the founder or good for the investor. And the two look very different (read?Venture Deals?by Brad Feld for more!)
When a founder gives us a valuation and cap, we want to understand how much our own capital in the pool will look like 7 years down the road. When a dozen more investors join in on the rounds, dilution is something to heavily consider. Surely, a 150x growth sounds amazing, but what do the actual returns look like for us?
More to come on this in next week’s newsletter after meeting with Troy!
Another post-IC diligence task is to speak to more investors or industry experts to get some answers. As we talked about how to back up gaming start-ups last week, we need more guidance and information on how to precisely evaluate the company at hand.
Thus, we’re hopping on more calls to get our answers!
???VWV Interview Tips
As mentioned in our info sessions, you don’t need to know anything about VC to join VWV.?Here is what we look for:
Some little tips:
Here are some resources, if you’re fresh to interviewing:
We recommend you take a read through?the?basics of VWV’s operations?and become familiar with our?portfolio company. Try thinking like an investor— which ones get you excited and which ones would you not have invested in?
Best of luck during the interview process! We’re all incredibly excited to meet you.
That’s it for this week, feel free to email me at?[email protected]?for any inquiries
???Follow us!!
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Twitter: @VanWickleV