Radically Reinventing Venture Capital
Last month, I moderated a panel discussion about reinventing the venture capital model. I’ll be doing the same next Friday in New York. In both cases, the underlying thesis was that the venture capital model is broken at worst, and dysfunctional at best. It’s a thesis with which I won’t argue, given that median fund returns since 2002 are underwater. When most LPs would have been better served by putting their money in the mattress, it’s clear that something must be done. Unfortunately, almost all of the discussion to date has been around the edges. Very reminiscent of the 2002-2003 “back to basics” era, which focused on things like reduced fund sizes, more conservative valuations and fewer investments into saturated spaces. Those were necessary steps, but in many cases slowed the bleeding rather than stemmed it. What we may need is something far more radical. The trouble with radical proposals is that they’re tough to come by. Luckily, a Boston-area VC has come up with one such suggestion, which I lay out below. For reasons that should become obvious, he asked not to be identified. There are obviously a lot of moving parts here – both pragmatic and philosophical – and I’ve already gotten feedback from some prominent LPs and GPs. I hope you’ll also contribute either via email or comments. And if you have a different concept for reinventing venture capital, please be sure to pass it on:
