#004 Sequoia Capital: Five Questions

A few weeks ago, we looked into why Sequoia invested in Apple, Yahoo, LinkedIn, Airbnb, and Whatsapp, how they won the deals, what Sequoia’s general investment thesis is, how you as a founder can position yourself to get funding from Sequoia, and discuss some regrettable passes they have in their anti-portfolio. After studying my notes on Sequoia Capital, I realized I had more information to share beyond just why they invested in the companies they did. I realized I could recycle some of my notes to produce a new type of episode I intend to start releasing weekly, which will be five questions I’d ask founders if I were a partner at the VC firm of focus for this week. While I don’t know whether they ask these questions, I have many direct quotes from current and former partners about what they look for in founders and questions they ask founders when determining whether to invest in a company.  I think this will be a helpful thought exercise for founders who intend to raise to think about your answers to some of these questions as I believe they are questions an investor would ask whether Sequoia or not, so It’d be good to think about. For investors, it’s good to think about the questions you like to ask founders and why and read some of these quotes from Sequoia partners, who are certainly some of the best investors in the world, so it’s worth reading this information and maybe adding some of these questions to your list if you think they’re effective. More All Things VC: To read this podcast in an abbreviated format, check out the substack: All Things VC. It has the same content as the podcast, just a little more direct with less improv. To read more about Benchmark and 15 other companies they invested in that we didn’t discuss, more on their general investment theses, what makes a good VC, what they look for in founders, and general advice for founders, head to allthingsvc.blog to read more. You can also follow me on X at Justin_Pryor for more information I post throughout the week based on what I discussed in this episode. Likewise, you can find All Things VC on YouTube to see clips of these episodes separated by each major topic I discuss.

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