Invest in Lines, not Dots (2010)

Invest in Lines, not Dots (2010)(bothsidesofthetable.com)

48 points by josephpmay 3 years ago | 7 comments

josephpmay 3 years ago |

I'm submitting this to HN because I think as the pace of funding slows down, this is going to become increasingly important advice

alangibson 3 years ago |

What he says is all probably true, but the idea of dropping in to chew the fat with investors seems like very SV-centric advice.

12 years after this was written I'd like to read an update on strategies for fully remote entrepreneurs.

kelnos 3 years ago | |

I suspect most investors (most anyone in a professional setting, really) didn't really want you to just "drop by". They wanted you to call in and make an appointment to drop by. Which you can still do remotely now, just that dropping by is a (scheduled) video call instead.

the_arun 3 years ago |

The title is a great punch line in real life too.

jhgb 3 years ago | |

In real life it sounds like we're being advised to prefer cocaine over LSD. ;)

jerf 3 years ago | |

I am often thinking in first and second derivatives in real life as well. Even if I can't put real numbers on them you can often tell if they're at least "positive" or "negative". Most people think in the zero'th derivative, or to put it less math-y, that tomorrow will be the same as today, indefinitely. If you directly ask them "Do you think that is the case?", of course they will say "No", and in some sense it'll even be true they believe that. But I mean, look at their actions, look at their reactions to possible futures when they try to think about them, look at what contingencies they plan for and how hard they commit to them, and by their actions you can tell they are zero-derivative thinkers at heart. While this is hardly a recipe to predict the future with total certainty, it is at least a way of grappling with it more effectively than zero-derivative thinking.

I suppose super geniuses beyond my level could operate in third derivatives and beyond, though I think the utility starts to diminish quickly after the second. (I think it starts getting swamped by your uncertainty.)

graycat 3 years ago |

Yes. investors like to see a graph, "up and to the right".

Two remarks from a startup entrepreneur:

(1) Even just for the initial dot, the entrepreneur had to have for himself some good evidence of potential, i.e., that a good line was on the way. This evidence was maybe based on an observation that there was a need in the market and maybe some of his unique technology with a competitive strong advantage for meeting the need.

It is this thinking that has the entrepreneur working on his startup and his creation of the first dot. And if the entrepreneur develops a pitch deck for VCs (venture capitalists), he may explain this thinking. But VC M. Suster in the OP is essentially saying, in my experience I'd say confirming, that he and any VC will ignore such thinking and pitch deck. I.e., that thinking is not "up and to the right".

(2) Now suppose some time has passed and an entrepreneur has several good dots, enough to make a good line "up and to the right", and hears that he might do better to accept some VC equity funding, in the analogy in the OP, to get "married".

(a) The VCs didn't want to do the basic thinking back at the beginning during the construction of the first dot. As the company grows, there stand to be more needs for thinking, for more dots. The entrepreneur may be concerned that such a VC on the BoD (board of directors) who was not ready, willing, and able to think effectively early on still won't be and, thus, will be a drawback to progress for the business.

Or, to be more clear, the entrepreneur, now founder and CEO, can see the situation clearly like on a train track with 5000 HP of Diesel power in an engine coming toward him at 80 MPH: Some months have passed and for various reasons the CEO wants to bet much of the company on some idea for another dot. The CEO has been thinking hard and has some ideas, maybe some back of the envelope arithmetic, but nothing like a line "up and to the right" for the idea. So he has to present his thinking to the BoD, with some VCs who long ago showed that they are not ready, willing, and able to do good thinking and, instead, want only "up and to the right". Did I mention the Diesel engine?

(b) It used to be that for an Internet/Web startup, the entrepreneur needed some expensive capital equipment, from Sun, Cisco, etc. and for those expenses needed VC equity funding. Now, not so much: By the time the entrepreneur has the line VCs want to see, he may no longer need VC cash.

E.g., the first server I plugged together for my startup has a processor from AMD, an FX-8350, with 8 cores and a standard clock of 4.0 GHz, for $100 at Amazon. How does that compare in cost per instructions per second with one of the Sun servers? Similarly for mass storage, router and ISP (Internet service provider) data rates, etc.?

Looks like some VCs what to place a bet at long odds on a horse that just won the race. "Sorry, that race has already been run. You can bet on another race if you want to."