Arjun Sethi is the co-founder of Tribe Capital, a venture capital firm built by engineers and scientists. Arjun sits on the board of Carta, Relativity, and Bolt. As a founder and operator, he has also been an active angel investor in over 100 tech companies, including Lyft, Opendoor, Gusto, and Front.

Success is never a straight line and involves failure and unsuccessful attempts. Achieving success requires exposure to the people and community where you’re involved. Ultimately, it’s then about the arrival of an inflection point where you decide whether to push forward or stagnate. Silicon Valley offers exposure because of the vast community of like-minded individuals in close proximity. Lessons learned from previous unsuccessful start-ups can help create an even stronger team, where each member brings distilled ideas. “There was a set of folks that I would say, had shared DNA around thinking about iterating innovation and what could you build that's different around looking at technology companies.”

When considering whether to invest in start-up companies, it is important to recognize one’s own thought patterns and biases. Focusing on what is known about a company instead of a person’s background or network is important in avoiding those pitfalls. “We have a motto internally, which is, ‘how do we focus on what versus who you know?"

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Moderated by Anthony Scaramucci.