GROW

From a venture investor’s diary #7: Being a “multiplier” to founders

(This is a companion piece to “3 things on founder-CEO excellence”) I am known for summarizing things into 3 bullet-points, and I’m finding myself doing it again. In the grand … Continue Reading

Stars_for_excellence

From a venture investor’s diary #6: 3 things on founder-CEO excellence

A most important topic: I often ask young technology company CEOs (typically founder-CEOs) what is his or her role. There are 3 almost-indispensable things that CEOs have to do and they … Continue Reading

Zero_alt

From a venture investor’s diary #5: is there a good doctor around?

The alternative title for this post was originally “A portrait of a company with a founder-CEO low in self-awareness and ability to take feedback and with especially aggressive early investors“. … Continue Reading

Search_for_cleanandsmartvc

The data-filled “clean and smart” world: the questions that still need to be asked

With GenAI and LLM (large language models) being the hot topics of 2024 and likely to continue into 2025, and with the recent launch of Open AI’s 01 and similar … Continue Reading

The_gen-AI_race_has_started

Being long on innovation – part 3: the (generative) AI and LLM race has just started

Should we be concerned about the dominance of Big Tech and its effect on the development of the AI industry?  This is quite a big question but with the launch … Continue Reading

Scale-up_dos_and_don'ts

From a venture investor’s diary #4: 7 scale-up dos and one don’t-do

To help young companies increase their odds of success, I continue to add to my typology of “scale-ups” mistakes to avoid: too early, wrong direction, lack of focus, and so … Continue Reading

Simplify

From a venture investor’s diary #3: a few scale-up lessons

My mind has recently been preoccupied by a number of founder-CEOs who have been doing too many things, or, more accurately put, having too many people doing too many things … Continue Reading

Leadership_ALT.jpg

From a venture investor’s diary #2: On leaders and leadership

Leadership is something that the pattern recognition machine that is me think a lot about, have a lot to say about, and don’t know when I will ever stop thinking … Continue Reading

Painkiller

Nuts and bolts #4: six more delightful things about product market fit

We are having more delightful thoughts about product market fit once again! We thought to revisit this topic because we really harbour the hope that young founding teams can cut … Continue Reading

Long-term_planting

From a venture investor’s diary #1: The power of thinking long-term, practicing a “craft”

Saw two companies that are not yet ready for their first institutional funding round. Reminder to myself: need to be a long-term minded investor.  Translation: there are always opportunities to … Continue Reading