Roelof Botha

Actual IPOs or M&As north of a billion.

Not the paper write-ups.

Only 20 companies.

More money doesn't create more great ideas or more great founders.

So I think there is way too much money in the industry.

The industry does provide a lot of value.

It provides some of the know-how for entrepreneurs to succeed and obviously leads to job creation and all the attendant benefits for America.

But there is too much money and too many people who want to be investors.

I've been wondering that for 20 years.

This problem was a problem 20 years ago.

It has only gotten worse.

The more successes there are, there's just a... Yeah, everybody wants to go to Vegas and strike it rich.

It doesn't happen.

That's part of the dynamic is that you get a firm that has one success in their fund, and then they attract more capital because people think it's repeatable, and it's not.

I think people will still hide behind the Drake curve effect.

And they'll say, yeah, my fund is only at 1.5x right now, but it's only four years in and the winners are going to emerge.

And so I think this hope springs eternal dynamic and such a long time period of gestation before the companies get realized that I don't think that will change that dynamic, unfortunately.

That's a great question.

The industry has changed a lot since I got into venture just over 20 years ago.

If you go back to the proverbial 1990s venture firm, it was a dozen people sitting around a table making investment decisions with very lightweight staff.