Grant Harvey

Doing good.

Excited for this one.

One of the reasons I'm excited is because we're talking to Carta.

And Carta is one of those really interesting companies I've known a lot about for a while.

And it's been really cool to see their rise to the moment where they're at now.

In fact, according to them, some interesting data at our last look at it, we'll see what our guest has to say about this.

But startup seed deals are actually down 39% from their 2022 peak.

But here's what's wild about that.

The total dollars invested stayed roughly the same.

So that means bigger checks are going to fewer companies.

Nicole Baer is the chief marketing officer at Carta, where she leads brand, demand, and go-to-market across Carta's platform for companies, venture funds, and private capital.

Carta manages equity for tens of thousands of startups and thousands of venture funds, giving it one of the most comprehensive views into how the private market is actually behaving, or not just how people think it's behaving.

Me too.

So, Nicole, before we jump into the data, could you just give our listeners a quick background on you and what Carta does, as well as how you started at the company?

That's awesome.

That's awesome.

Well, the last data we saw was the state of the startup 2025 report.

And it said that the ecosystem is moving at two speeds.

What does that actually mean?

And what does the data show now?