Startup investing in a chaotic era

TheGP just kicked off our second fund, and I’ve stepped up as a partner.

Joining Phin, Dan, and TheGP in 2022 was an easy choice. After six years at First Round, I could help build a firm from the start, work with Phin again, and embrace Dan’s “sweat equity” approach to venture. At TheGP, engineers outnumber investors, and founders expect us to build with them, not just advise. We engage with new open-source projects by submitting PRs rather than checking star counts. I do my best work in the details, and I joined a firm designed to deliver high-resolution decisions and support.

My first few years at TheGP proved that decision right. I helped TheGP’s engineers launch new companies like Runloop, DeepStructure, Stepchange, and Libretto. I partnered with founders like Riley at Dexa, Justin and Ian at Cassidy, Kintan and JB at Olto, and John at Rysana. I saw the impact of dedicated, 1:1 support from our team of recruiters, designers, engineers, marketers, and sales leaders. Most importantly, I found a rare investment partnership with Phin, Dan, and AK where every voice counts, we honor the assist, and we pursue truth together. I believe this will drive outlier returns for our limited partners, and I know it makes work at TheGP way more fun.

I feel lucky to work with this team and to step into investment leadership at this moment in time. The same spring that I joined TheGP, GPT-3.5 went live. The venture chessboard tipped, many startup playbooks stopped working, and a new, chaotic period for technology businesses began. Some investors find this uncertainty uncomfortable, but I see it as a time when the returns on brave bets, speed, and optimism from startups have never been higher.

Years ago, Phin shared a John Boyd quote that I love:

“An entropy increase permits both the destruction or unstructuring of a closed system and the creation of a new system to nullify the march toward randomness.”

AI breakthroughs are unraveling the old system, and everyone — from startups to incumbents — is racing to shape what comes next. My job is to give the startups every edge I can, and I’m grateful to do this work at TheGP.