They all want to dissociate from their China entities. That’s the main reason

Software Developer

Why do US VCs like Sequoia and Mattix rebrand to PeakXV and Z47 in India?  Is this just a politically correct way of exiting the market after realising India is not doing well for them?  https://te...

Welcome to Indian Startups's Private Community

Why do US VCs like Sequoia and Mattix rebrand to PeakXV and Z47 in India?

Is this just a politically correct way of exiting the market after realising India is not doing well for them?

https://techcrunch.com/2024/06/29/matrix-rebrands-india-china-units-for-organizational-independence/

Why do VCs rebrand?

Software Engineer

Why do VCs rebrand?- Grapevine

After PeakXV, Matrix now changing to Z47 in India

Investment Associate

Sequoia rebrands to Peak XV Partners. They are giving a positive spin in the press but not hard to connect the dots.

Program Manager

After Unicorns now it's VCs 😁

Any idea whether this happened in India as well for their new entity ?

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrickcai/2023/07/24/sequoia-talent-team-layoffs-firm-restructuring/?sh=5d3a78d925f4

Sequoia VC  Layoffs

Growth Manager

Welcome to Office Gossip's Private Community

- Most VCs are fraud, they never make any money and keep shifting from one fund to another to hide that they never made anyone any money. 
They also have usually no real input to add. 
They are no subject matter except negotiations which too mostly they just prey upon any founders. 

It's a thankless asset class. Most founders will always hate it as they will never get a dollar and most investors hate it as they will never net a dollar. 

Never chase VC, they are supposed to find opportunity .. Chasing them is useless, they judge you for it. 
So treat them from first day like your ex. Gf/bf. 

- Most tech startup founders are fraud,  they never make any money and keep shifting from one idea to another to hide they never made anyone any money. 
it usually takes 20 years to make a real $100 million dollar revenue company, but 20 months to be a unicorn. 
Any unicorn today is priced according to what they would make after 5-10 years... Yeah right. 

- Making real money is hard. Making fake money is easy. 
99% of startup Esops are fraud
If the company is homerun, then they won't get you stock easy. 
If the company is maybe homerun, they won't give you cash easily. 
If you get free cash and esops, just imagine it's an 18 month project. 

- Most of the humblebrags are fraud as half of them don't even understand the fine print of what they think is real money but not. 

- Most of the people who usually ask for change have no intention for it. They want to be seen as leaders, change is hard, negotiated and cried for. 

- you only live once. Go hard.. No one like people who have too much to talk but nothing to show.

Some observations after 10+ years of being in the system

Product Manager

Welcome to Business Roles's Private Community

Hey everyone. 

Thought I could do an AMA. A bit about me - have 4 years of work experience and graduated from a non engineering college. Was at a startup before (from Series B to Series D) before becoming a VC

Personally look at consumer and B2B investments here 

Happy to answer any questions around life as a junior VC, startup ecosystem, career growth etc.

AMA: I work at a large VC Fund focusing on early stage investments

This is the biggest problem with VC ecosystem 4 yoe kids taking calls on experienced, hardworking founders. Dude first learn the game then invest , judge people playing the game. VCs know nothing about how to run startups. Unless they have been entrepreneurs themselves. IMO It's a colossal waste of talent to become a VC for young PPL.

I will go first: 
Supam Maheswari, 3 unicorns, 2 of them are profitable (FirstCry, Xpressbees) (Globalbees)

Kishore Biyani, founder BigBazaar

Who are the people in Indian Startup space you greatly regard to?

There are essentially four parties in the startup economy:

1. The Consumer
2. The Enabler(read, Startup)
3. The Service Provider
4. The Investor

Now let's look at Game Theory motivations:

1. The Indian Consumer wants to minimise money spent per unit value extracted, the Western Consumer wants to maximise value extracted per unit money spent. (There's a massive difference.)

2. The Startup depending on the stage wants to maximise User Growth and Free Cash Flows.

3. The Service provider wants to maximise financial incentives.

4. The Investor is wants to maximise the XIRR of their fund. For this they need to reach a multibagger liquidity event.

Now let's look at what happens when:

1. The Consumer gets f'ed over: 

The startup attains pricing power through deep competitive moats allowing for monopolisation. They can jack up the prices to ensure nice FCF, greater rewards for Service Providers and great returns to their investors. (Think, Uber can charge anything to you now)

2. The Startup gets f'ed over: 

The users get bang for their buck, the service providers get good incentives, the investors push for higher growth but unfortunately the startup does not have enough capital to service their Cost of Operations through their unit economics, so they will either run out of cash or investor patience. Either ways, they are doomed. (Think every legit startup that failed)

3. The Service Provider get f'ed over: 

This is the likeliest scenario as they have the least power in this dynamic. Rewards will be reduced over time or made harder to achieve. They have no option because they got no option for sustenance. (Think any on-demand service providing app)

4. The investor gets f'ed over: 

Now imagine there is a startup that can balance the act very well. They have a service that users are willing to pay a margin on. They pay their service providers fairly and have decent unit economics. Now, the investor will do halla about destruction of shareholder value from little growth. (Is this the case with BluSmart?)

Maybe that's why building in India is tough.

[Rant] Here's why someone usually ends up f'ed over, for a startup to get successful in India

PeakXV (sequoia) has a history of firing CEOs and changing leadership when they become an investor.

At least in this case they'll have full support.

PeakXV (sequoia) should by RCB

Is this behaviour by VCs very common in Indian startup ecosystem? Have heard of more such stories from founder friends

Project Manager

In a landmark deal, Silicon Valley powerhouse General Catalyst has acquired Venture Highway, a seed-stage investment firm with a track record of backing winners like Meesho and Mobile Premier League.

The Deal:
- Rare instance of consolidation in the Indian VC market
- VH to be rebranded as General Catalyst India
- GC plans to invest $500 million to $1 billion in India over the next three years
- Acquisition driven by desire to build strong local team and tap into local LP network

But the move also raises important questions. Will this trigger a wave of consolidation in the Indian VC market? Will other global firms follow suit and snap up local players to gain a foothold in the country? And how will this influx of foreign capital shape the trajectory of India's startup ecosystem?

As the dust settles on this landmark deal, one thing is clear: India's startup scene is entering a new era, one where local innovation and global capital are increasingly intertwined.  Always long on India 🇮🇳

Image Credits: The Arc

General Catalyst's Venture Highway Acquisition: A Strategic Play for India 🇮🇳

Journalist

I'll start - One of the older VC firms with an office in Indiranagar (also probably planning to shut their scout vehicle fund after a few employee exits) reels of toxicity at the helm. GP who comes from a rich family has the habit of arm twisting employees and putting them down even on the smallest of the mistakes. What's your toxic VC story?

Let's discuss toxic VCs

Founder’s Office

https://anonymfile.com/NEEXl/tiger-global-draft-of-new-yorker-story-doing-the-rounds-in-nyc.pdf

TLDR: Tiger Global may pass soon.

Leaked NewYorker Article on Tiger Global

A few summary points:
- LP risk is over exposed to VC funds (Tiger, for these LPs)
- Tiger has had abysmal investments and returns these last few years
- They've actively looking to pass on their assets to buyers where they can find them 
- Lee Fixel, the most prolific investor they had left a few years back
- The fund has been led by Scott Shleifer; who has reported to been an alcoholic, hosts drug parties, and invests with very little DD/deep dive.

All in all, this is scary stuff. With Softbank and Tiger both seeing difficult times, this feels like the Lehman moment for the VC industry.

Corporate Strategist

During the bull run folks were investing in all kind of creator companies right from merchandising, community platforms, audience management to payments. 

Interesting to see only a few creator focused companies globally succeeding. 

What went wrong?

Creator economy rocketsip went down pretty quick

Starting a small tradition of our own on Boxing Day: a roast of the Indian startup ecosystem!

Through the year, have seen some of the most Top Kek comments here, and I thought it’d be nice to do this for fun! 

Let’s keep it in good jest, no getting personal 🫣
Looking forward to some really creative burns!

PS: I do realize there’s no real correlation between Boxing Day and actual boxing :)

Boxing Day: A roast of Indian Startups 🥊

A very harsh year indeed 
 Almost 261k techies got laid off, and only 261 got laid :/ 
  
 (Sorry)

Founder

Starting an India centric podcast focused on venture capital. Personally based in SF but keep hearing a lot of chatter about India VCs here so interested to unpack it. Who are the top firms and investment partners in the market?

Top VCs in India?

Product Owner

Asking this on behalf of many founders like myself, wanted to collate across multiple inputs: what is it that VCs really want to hear/see from a startup? 

Would love to get inputs from VCs and other founders alike - basis your experience on what has worked what hasn't worked.

The usual suspects: obviously the founder credentials, TAM, insights, metrics. But, what else? 
Look forward to informed answers.

Why do VCs rebrand?

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