Venture Capital's FTX Mistake, Elon's Twitter Plan, Investing in Labor Tech— With Roy Bahat
Roy Bahat is the head of Bloomberg Beta, a venture capital firm that invests in companies building the future of work. Bahat joins Big Technology Podcast to explain why he — a VC — is investing in labor-organizing technology. We spend the first half speaking about how VCs trusted FTX, where the economy goes from here, and whether Elon Musk's plan for Twitter can work. Join us for a fun, lively discussion that takes some unexpected twists and turns.
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James Cham — Investing in the Intersection of Business and Technology
James Cham is a co-founder and partner at Bloomberg Beta, an early-stage venture firm that invests in machine learning and the future of work, the intersection between business and technology.
James explains how his approach to investing in AI has developed over the last decade, which signals of success he looks for in the ever-adapting world of venture startups (tip: look for the "gradient of admiration"), and why it's so important to demystify ML for executives and decision-makers.
Lukas and James also discuss how new technologies create new business models, and what the ethical considerations of a world where machine learning is accepted to be possibly fallible would be like.
Show notes (transcript and links): http://wandb.me/gd-james-cham
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⏳ Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
0:46 How investment in AI has changed and developed
7:08 Creating the first MI landscape infographics
10:30 The impact of ML on organizations and management
17:40 Demystifying ML for executives
21:40 Why signals of successful startups change over time
27:07 ML and the emergence of new business models
37:58 New technology vs new consumer goods
39:50 What James considers when investing
44:19 Ethical considerations of accepting that ML models are fallible
50:30 Reflecting on past investment decisions
52:56 Thoughts on consciousness and Theseus' paradox
59:08 Why it's important to increase general ML literacy
1:03:09 Outro
1:03:30 Bonus: How James' faith informs his thoughts on ML
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Connect with James:
📍 Twitter: https://twitter.com/jamescham
📍 Bloomberg Beta: https://github.com/Bloomberg-Beta/Manual
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Links:
📍 "Street-Level Algorithms: A Theory at the Gaps Between Policy and Decisions" by Ali Alkhatib and Michael Bernstein (2019): https://doi.org/10.1145/3290605.3300760
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💬 Host: Lukas Biewald
📹 Producers: Cayla Sharp, Angelica Pan, Lavanya Shukla
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Subscribe and listen to our podcast today!
👉 Apple Podcasts: http://wandb.me/apple-podcasts
👉 Google Podcasts: http://wandb.me/google-podcasts
👉 Spotify: http://wandb.me/spotify
Why Venture Capitalists Are Mad, With Bloomberg Beta Venture Capitalist Roy Bahat
Venture capitalists, founders, and others in the tech industry are feeling pretty raw these days. Once admired as upstarts fighting the status quo, they now feel under siege, under attack for the negative things their products do without being appreciated for how they improve our lives. Bloomberg Beta head Roy Bahat, a veteran venture capitalist, joins the Big Technology Podcast for a nuanced conversation about what's going with the tech world, how it's innovation may be connected to its problems, and how it should handle the criticism.
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E1043: News Roundtable! Bloomberg Beta’s Roy Bahat & Coelius Capital’s Zach Coelius on how tech is helping during the crisis, how startups should approach SMB loans, when VC funding will bounce back, Notion’s $50M raise, Zoom’s security issues, Luckin coffee & more!
0:54 Jason intros Roy Bahat & Zach Coelius, and they discuss their current quarantine situations
6:04 What is the timeline looking like for going back to work? What needs to happen before we can get back to normal?
14:51 Has government & media failed the public? How is tech (both big tech & startups) helping during the crisis?
28:33 How should startups approach taking PPP, EIDL & other SMB loans? Should startups begin working more closely with the government?
37:14 When should companies plan on being able to raise capital again?
41:37 Why Jason believes the VC market will bounce back strong & how he is planning on deploying capital?
46:12 Are we going through a generational change & witnessing the creation of "Generation V"?
55:06 Jason's thoughts on what the crisis will actually change
1:04:36 What should permanently change after the crisis: government reliance, UBI, listening to experts
1:11:45 Notion's $50M raise & $2B valuation
1:15:29 Is Zoom trustworthy? Is any software trustworthy?
1:19:13 Luckin Coffee fabricates sales and loses $5B of value in 5 minutes
20VC Exclusive: Roy Bahat on Bloomberg Beta's New Fund, The Truth About Valuation That Very Few VCs Will Tell You & Why Founders of Venture Backed Startups Make The Best Angels
Roy Bahat is the Head of Bloomberg Beta, one of the leading early-stage funds in the valley and NYC with a portfolio that includes the likes of Flexport, Kobalt, Textio, Rigetti Computing and more incredible companies. Prior to Bloomberg Beta, Roy was the Co-Founder & Chairman @ Ouya, the company that created a new kind of games console and raised over $33m from the likes of Kleiner, Alibaba and even $8.6m on Kickstarter. Before the world of startups, Roy held numerous incredible and fascinating roles including Director of International Strategy at New York's bid for the 2012 Olympic Games and also was a Senior Policy Director in the Office of the May of New York City.
In Today's Episode You Will Learn:
1.) How Roy made his way from policy director for Mike Bloomberg to entering the world of venture and leading Bloomberg Beta?
2.) What is the big news when it comes to Bloomberg Beta? Roy has previously said, "your fund size is your strategy", what did he mean by this? What does that mean for BB moving forward? How has Bill seen what founders want from their VC change over the last 6 years? How is being "founder-friendly" vs the founder being your "customer" different?
3.) Investment Decision-Making: Does Roy believe that speed is the biggest determinant in winning deals today? What else does Roy believe is crucial? What have been some of Roy's biggest lessons in how to build trust early with founders? How does Roy and BB approach investment decision-making on initial investment? How does this change when it comes to reserve allocation decisions?
4.) Price sensitivity: Roy has said before that, "price is the dependent variable", what does he mean by this? Why is it wrong to assume that the price a VC is willing to pay shows their level of belief in your company? How does fund size change this? How does Roy think about large multi-stage funds playing at seed? How has it impacted seed?
5.) Boards: Why does Roy call boards "b-o-r-e-d-s"? When does Roy think it is important to instil a board? Why is it dangerous to have a board too early in the life of a company? What have been some of Roy's biggest lessons from sitting on a board with Alfred Lin @ Sequoia?
Items Mentioned In Today's Show:
Roy's Fave Book: Ain't No Makin' It: Aspirations and Attainment in a Low-Income Neighborhood
Roy's Most Recent Investment: States Title
As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Roy on Twitter here!
E981: Roy Bahat, Head of Bloomberg Beta, shares the myths of venture capital, the great value of founders turned investors, why VCs reject startups, searing insights on fundraising & valuations, and predictions on the future of enterprise, AI, work & automation @ LAUNCH Accelerator
1:00 Jason Demant intros Roy Bahat
3:14 Roy's thoughts on raising venture capital
4:14 Debunking the myth of pitching VCs
9:24 Two questions VCs ask themselves after hearing a pitch, and how founders can apply them
15:33 The startup paradox
18:04 Does Bloomberg Beta keep up with companies they passed on?
19:51 Selection bias in Silicon Valley
25:32 Why Angel $ from venture-backed founders is so valuable
28:30 Top reasons Roy rejects companies
31:38 Importance of trust founder-investor relationships
34:41 How Roy thinks about valuation & pricing
40:13 Understanding how investors make money
44:18 Roy's thoughts on pitch decks
47:45 How to tell if a VC is interested based on emails
49:40 Pre-qualifying VCs based on your business
51:04 Importance of Founders taking secondary
54:00 How does Roy process upside?
55:40 Roy's views on the future of work regarding creatives
1:01:10 Difficulty of raising different rounds
1:02:00 Investment thesis of Bloomberg Beta
1:05:50 Dealing with rejection from VCs
1:07:40 Raising children in the technological age
What is the meaning of work? | Roy Bahat and Bryn Freedman
Roy Bahat was worried. His company invests in new technology like AI to make businesses more efficient -- but, he wondered, what was AI doing to the people whose jobs might change, go away or become less fulfilling? The question sent him on a two-year research odyssey to discover what motivates people, and why we work. In this conversation with curator Bryn Freedman, he shares what he learned, including some surprising insights that will shape the conversation about the future of our jobs.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
20VC: Greenfield Opportunities For Machine Learning, Why Massive Corporates Finally See It's Potential & Why VC's Investment Decision Making Process Needs To Change with James Cham, Partner @ Bloomberg Beta
James Cham is a Partner @ Bloomberg Beta and one the pre-eminent thinkers in the machine learning space. Prior to Bloomberg, James was a Principal @ Trinity Ventures and before Trinity, James was a VP at Bessemer Venture Partners. At Bessemer, James was a Board Member of CrowdFlower and Open Candy. However, James has not always been a VC as he was originally a programmer receiving his degree in Computer Science from Harvard.
In Today's Episode You Will Learn:
1.) How James made his way into the wonderful world of VC from being a programmer?
2.) How are organisations and corporations thinking about machine learning? How are they looking to incorporate it into their current infrastructure?
3.) Kieran Snyder @ Textio said, 'the writing is on the wall for enterprise to embrace machine learning'. What are James' thoughts and how does the business model vary from licensed and SaaS?
4.) How is building machine learning models different from software development? On the topic of software development, how does James perceive the productivity differences between software developers?
5.) Moving to VC and how does James approach the investment decision making process as a VC? How does James relationship to religion intertwine with his investment career?
Items Mentioned In Today's Show:
James' Fave Book: Man Who Lied To His Laptop
James' Fave Blog or Newsletter: Rob May, Jack Clark, Tyler Cowan
James' Most Recent Investment: Netlify
As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and James on Twitter here!
Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.
Angelloop is the leading post funding management platform for private market investors and their portfolio companies. They help investors manage and track their portfolio companies on the cloud while providing them with access to their investments performance data. Angelloop helps founders of startups track their performance, manage their cap table and keep their investors in the loop. Investors get free access while their portfolio companies pay only $49/Month. Use or share the promo-code 20MinVC to get your portfolio companies online with a two month trial.
This episode was brought to you by DesignCrowd, the online marketplace for custom graphic, logo and web design that helps startups, entrepreneurs, web developers and agencies outsource design projects to designers from around the world.
20VC: Why Machine Intelligence Will Eat The World Of Software with Roy Bahat, Head of Bloomberg Beta
Roy Bahat is the head of Bloomberg Beta, a new venture fund backed by Bloomberg L.P. Prior to Bloomberg, Roy was chairman of OUYA, a new kind of game console, where he was the first investor. Before that Roy spent five years leading News Corporation’s IGN Entertainment, an online media company with a monthly audience of 70 million people, a top 10 YouTube channel, and the leading website in its category in almost every market globally. Roy served on the board of Revision3 (acquired by Discovery) and was a board observer at Flixster (acquired by Warner Bros). Before joining News Corp., Roy was in the public sector in the office of New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg and at New York’s 2012 Olympic bid.
In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Roy made his way into the world of VC from working alongside Mayor Michael Bloomberg?
2.) What do all these definitions within AI mean? What does artificial intelligence include? What is machine learning? What is deep learning?
3.) When we talk about AI are we talking pure AI , with the likes of Watson and DeepMind or are we talking consumer centric software with elements of AI?
4.) With data playing such a huge role in the efficiency of AI, do large incumbents like Google and Facebook not have a massive advantage? How can startups get access to datasets? Is AI not fundamentally an acquihire industry?
5.) How important has open source in allowing and encouraging the progression of the machine intelligence ecosystem? What more can be done to further it's growth?
6.) With the rise of machine intelligence, what does the future of work look like? How will we live in a world where 47% of white collar jobs will be replaced by machines and AI?
Items Mentioned In Today's Episode:
Roy's Fave Book:
Watershed Down
Roy's Fave Blog or Newsletter:
Media ReDefined by Jason Hirschhorn, Asim Azar, the exponential view
As always you can follow The Twenty Minute VC, Harry and Roy on Twitter here! If you would like to see a more colourful side to Harry with many a mojito session, you can follow him on Instagram here! The Twenty Minute VC is brought to you by Leesa, the Warby Parker or TOMS shoes of the mattress industry. Lees have done away with the terrible mattress showroom buying experience by creating a luxury premium foam mattress that is order completely online and ships for free to your doorstep. The 10 inch mattress comes in all sizes and is engineered with 3 unique foam layers for a universal, adaptive feel, including 2 inches of memory foam and 2 inches of a really cool latex foam called Avena, design to keep you cool. All Leesa mattresses are 100% US or UK made and for every 10 mattresses they sell, they donate one to a shelter. Go to Leesa.com/VC and enter the promo code VC75 to get $75 off!
Product Hunt Radio: Episode 23 w/ Roy Bahat & Dan Strickland
This week's PHR comes from the beautiful Bloomberg Beta HQ on the Embarcadero with Roy Bahat (Head of Bloomberg Beta) and Dan Strickland (Operations at Bloomberg Beta). Roy shares his secrets to get to inbox 0, keyboards, we discuss invisible apps, and a preview of what’s to come at Product Hunt. - Keyboardio (http://www.keyboard.io/) - Making keyboards better - Nudgemail (http://www.nudgemail.com/) - The easiest way to send yourself reminders - Zapier + Product Hunt (http://www.producthunt.com/posts/zapier-product-hunt) - Create your own Product Hunt notifications - Jarvis (http://www.producthunt.com/posts/jarvis) - A personal assistant for $100/mo - Digit (http://www.producthunt.com/posts/digit) - SMS bot that monitors your bank account & saves you money - RubCam (http://www.producthunt.com/posts/rubcam) - Minimal iOS camera for taking pictures by rubbing the screen - Frontback (http://www.producthunt.com/posts/frontback) - Tell stories with photos - Checkr (http://www.producthunt.com/posts/checkr) - An API to Do Background Checks - SaviOne (http://www.producthunt.com/posts/savione) - A revolutionary delivery robot for the services industry - Jobr (http://www.producthunt.com/posts/jobr) - Tinder for job hunting - Two Margins (http://www.producthunt.com/posts/two-margins) - Annotate financial documents (ex. SEC filings) w/ the crowd
