Our analysis identified how these once-small startups set themselves apart in design, launch, customer experience, and marketing to achieve their enormous growth, from avoiding “sneaker feature creep” to creating viral infographics.
An illusion of truth
In a conversation about ICOs, Fred Wilson (the #11 VC in our rankings with the New York Times) commented that regulating away risk regulates away opportunity.
He follows it up with a comment that this type of over-regulation has kept small investors (I’ll assume he means individuals) out of startups and given most of the gains to VCs.
But this comment that individual investors have lost out to VCs is one I’ve seen many smart people in tech say with no empirical evidence behind it. And then others parrot the influencers, blindly creating an illusion of truth. Basically, enough influential folks say it that people just believe it is true.
The reality is even most VCs don’t make money for their investors (their LPs) on their investments (and most VCs get fat on management fees). So I’m unsure how individuals would do better than the pros here? Has anyone actually ever empirically shown this? (If not, it’s probably something we’ll do but don’t want to reinvent the wheel.)
The added reality is that individual investors are not going to see the dealflow that Union Square Ventures or Sequoia Capital or A16Z see as those firms simply fish in a better pond. And even if they did, getting into those deals is a very insider game.
So if you’ve seen any evidence either way on this claim by Fred, we’d love to see it.
Last chance
Today is your last chance to vote in our bracket, which asks, what is the best company to invest in and hold for 10 years?
From 64 original contenders — ranging from Starbucks and Nordstrom to Tesla and Alphabet — we’re down to the final two, in a battle of e-commerce giants: Alibaba vs. Amazon.
With drug overdose deaths at record highs, opioids are on the minds of public company execs. We analyzed this trend, looking at opioid mentions in public company earnings calls over the past 10 years.
P.S. On Thursday, we’re diving into the consumerization of healthcare, looking at the future of urgent care, retail care, telemedicine, and more. Join us for the briefing.
