Last week we hit a nice milestone: my first venture fund, from the particularly tough 2021 vintage, has officially crossed 1.0x DPI. With over 30 companies remaining in the fund that could return many multiples again.
In venture, we spend a lot of time celebrating markups. But I've always believed DPI is the best measure of success.
It's a philosophy we've carried into building @ProtagonistXYZ where we started investing a few years ago and are about to cross $1B in AUM.
Our focus remains the same: backing the best founders in the world, while generating actual returns for our LPs.
Thank you to all the founders who let me invest with them back in '21. And thank you to some of the earliest believers who became LPs before there was much of a track record: @alexisohanian, @DavidSacks, @naval, @avlok, @rick, @spencerrascoff and @LeyrerDave.
Proud investor since the very first round! Congrats @2112Power and team.
Today we're announcing our Series D: $1.37B in new capital at a $7.87B valuation to Reindustrialize America.
Thank you to all our investors. WCM Investment Management, @WashingHarbour, Valor Equity Partners, @137ventures, and @BaillieGifford led the round. @jpmorgan Chase's Strategic Investment Group acted as anchor co-lead, investing through the firm's Security and Resiliency Initiative. The round also included major participation by @1789capital, as well as participation from @MorganStanley Wealth Management, @apolloglobal, @TRowePrice, @a16z, @CapitalG, @foundersfund, @lux_capital, @AltimeterCap, @constructcap, and existing investors.
This round confirms our belief in a few simple things: America needs to Reindustrialize, Physical AI is real, transforming the world of atoms matters 100x more than the world of bits, and, most importantly, that the New American Workforce is the center of everything we do.
Here's what we've built, and what comes next.
Harry retweeted
huge announcement from @Nic__Muller and team
insane to see how much progress they've made in only two years, and they're just getting started
cc @harryhur5t @ProtagonistXYZ
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Congrats to the whole @pipe team on a huge partnership with Uber to bring capital to businesses across the country!
cnb.cx/47CFI9o
Harry retweeted
👋 Meet Arago
📍HQ: Paris, France
👥 Leadership: Nicolas Muller, Eliott Sarrey and Ambroise Müller
🌐 Website: arago.inc
🚀 Vision & Opportunity: Arago has built an energy-efficient AI chip powered by light, codenamed JEF, designed to run AI workloads with 10x to 30x lower energy and cost overhead. Its mission is to drive the course of history forward. Based in France, North America, and Israel, Arago has assembled a world-class team of engineers, scientists, and operators from leading companies and research labs, and is backed by executives from Apple, Arm, Nvidia, Microsoft, and Hugging Face, as well as prominent deeptech venture firms and exited founders.
💸 Round: Seed
Congrats to the whole @pipe team on this one! And a warm welcome to the Glean AI team. @LCSVoiles continues to piece together the dream product suite for our partners and their customers. The execution has been phenomenal, excited to see this one close.
I’ve long held the belief that the person who cares less about the outcome of a negotiation, wins said negotiation. I’ve also long been the person who typically cared more about the outcome of a negotiation.
Having my first child just a few weeks ago has made me care less about the outcome of anything else other than his happiness and safety.
This has had a profound effect on my thinking in a work context. It’s not that I don’t care, it’s that I care about things differently. If something doesn’t work out, I still have my sense of purpose in my family that I’ve created, and that makes me better at business.
I never understood this until a few weeks ago, everything changed for the better.
Congratulations to @LCSVoiles and the @pipe team on their new partnerships to accelerate #smallbusiness finance! I spoke with Luke to learn more about Pipe's evolution and continued growth in the embedded finance space. Read more at @Forbes. Story link in comments. #fintech
Excited to back @exowatt305 and @HaPi31415 in building a next generation renewable energy company for the AI era. Partnering with co-investors and friends @jackabraham @sama @KTmBoyle 🚀
@ProtagonistXYZ 📈
wsj.com/tech/ai/sam-altman-i…
Very excited for this. To see @LCSVoiles double down on the founding vision for @pipe is a special feeling. The numbers and the impact will continue to do the talking 📈 congrats to the whole team!
For years, limited access to capital has been the #1 issue for SMBs. Pipe's Embedded Capital-as-a-Service is our answer to this pressing need. By turning live transaction data into more inclusive funding, we’re helping Payfacs and ISVs solve their merchants’ biggest problem.
Congrats to @LCSVoiles and the whole @pipe team!
Harry retweeted
Biggest win of my early career was @harryhurst @joshmangel and @zallarak hiring me to lead finance for Pipe early on. my financial modeling opened the door.
in external conversations with investors and partners the 4 of us quickly found that while having a great 3-5 year operating model was table stakes, it really was not all that useful.
all conversations focused on unit economics and simple formulas to gauge the market opportunity.
Here my thoughts of what one should do instead lwgnr.com/startup-financial-…
Harry retweeted
Technology is reshaping financial services and access for business owners, with generative AI and LLMs accelerating the shift. Pipe CPTO @namrataganatra shared her thoughts on the future of AI in financial services with Datanami.
Check it out: datanami.com/2024/02/23/leve…