Voices of Women in Venture 🌊

Follow me @samirkaji for my thoughts on the venture market, with a focus on the continued evolution of the VC landscape.

Our guest today is Shauntel Garvey, co-founder and general partner of education tech focused Reach Capital. She has a long history investing in ed-tech companies stemming back from her time at NewSchools Venture Fund.

What I love about the Reach team is how thoughtfully they’ve constructed their firm and partnership which by far is one of the most diverse in all of venture. Currently Reach has $300 AUM and has invested in companies such as Mystery Science (acq by Discovery Education), Nearpod, Outschool, ClassDojo, and Epic.

Shauntel did her undergrad at MIT, and got a MA in Education and MBA from Stanford.

Listen to our conversation to learn more about how she’s seen the EdTech market evolve over the last few years and particularly since the pandemic, why they are active with portfolio companies after typical seed funds are, and how she thinks about investing thesis.

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In this episode we discuss:

01:29 Shauntel’s journey into VC

03:12 The decision to start Reach from NewSchools

04:39 Why they decided to go with a larger partnership in Fund 1

07:14 The challenges of raising a sector specific fund for a sector not well understood at the time

09:50 Pitching impact focused LPs vs return focused LPs

11:51 How sector-specific managers answer the question about being too narrow

16:18 Why despite being as seed fund, Reach stays with their companies throughout their lifecycle

20:06 How they think about hiring at Reach

21:51 How Reach looks at talent development as a part of its legacy

23:41 Things firms can do early to build a generational legacy

25:51 Developing and evolving an investment thesis

28:24 Creating systems to allow for proactive outreach and investment

30:03 Building strong a back office and operations

32:50 Shauntel’s greatest learning as an investor

33:55 What she’s learned from her misses

36:42 The investor she aspires to be more like

Mentioned in this episode:

* Reach Capital

We’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Shauntel! Follow @SamirKaji and give your insight and questions using the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop a direct message on Twitter.

Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency

Chang Xu is a partner at $140M fund Basis Set Ventures. We discuss everything from why open source is a good business model, how next gen infrastructure might look, what she learned at Upfront, and even practical advice for forming a startup board.

On this episode, Elio interviews Liz Todia, Senior Associate at Mutual Capital Partners, a Cleveland-based venture capital fund that invests in software and medical device companies. Liz manages all deal flow and due diligence for the fund, as well as supporting portfolio companies and overseeing LP relations. She has been on the team since graduating from the University of Dayton where she received a B.S. in Entrepreneurship and Finance with honors.  Prior to joining MCP and while at Dayton, she spent two years managing the Flyer Angels Fund, a $1 million seed investment fund investing in early stage, Ohio-based technology companies.  Liz also worked as a member of the Davis Center for Portfolio Management, a student-directed organization that manages over $20 million of the University of Dayton endowment invested in equity markets.  Liz currently serves as Executive Co-Chair of the young professional group VentureNext, the premier peer group of rising venture capital investors who work with, manage, and run venture capital investment funds. Under Liz’s leadership the group has grown to over 80 funds across the country with a collective $7.2B AUM, and has been responsible for over $800M of syndication in investments across the Midwest.  

Emily Zheng, Growth Investor at Brookfield Technology Partners, Proptech Vertical lead at EVCA and Board member at Nittany Lion Fund talks about what validation capital is and what it means to raise validation capital. We also discuss late-stage investing and the difference between growth investing and seed investing.

Emily's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ezheng3/

Brookfield Asset Management: https://www.brookfield.com/

EVCA: https://www.evca.org/3e7a2f0cac74410cab05b76216846cf4

Nittany Lion Fund: https://www.smeal.psu.edu/nittany-lion-fund

Our Article on SPACs - written by Luis Bravo, based on Joe Tannos' episode: https://www.fundraisingradio.com/blog/joe-tonnos-on-spacs-and-more/

Today I'm joined by Holly Maloney.

Holly is the Managing Director at General Catalyst

In this episode, we discuss Holly's focus on growth-stage investments in the fitness and wellness space, why General Catalyst led Tempo's $60M Series B, and Holly's "Management, Market, Model" framework for evaluating deals.

Get to know Holly:

Holly Maloney is a managing director at venture capital firm General Catalyst. She works with

GC's Executives-in-Residence (XIRs) to create a new business or identify an existing growth-

stage business to accelerate their trajectory and transform with them. Her portfolio of

investments includes Allego, Teamworks, Tempo, The Predictive Index, and SonderMind. Prior

to joining GC, Holly was a principal at Guidepost Growth Equity (FKA: North Bridge Growth

Equity), working closely with companies such as WP Engine and Dyn [acquired by Oracle

(NYSE: ORCL)]. Outside the office, Holly is very active (running, hiking, biking, exploring) and is

a novice surfer. Holly received a BA in Economics from Bowdoin College.

More from Fitt Insider

Fitt Insider is a weekly newsletter and podcast about the business of fitness and wellness.

From product launches and funding news to game-changing innovation, Fitt Insider provides listeners with insights and analysis on this ever-evolving industry.

Join your peers and colleagues from companies like Equinox, Apple, Peloton, Goldman Sachs, Nike, and ClassPass by subscribing.

Website: http://insider.fitt.co

This week we had on Ronnie Martinez at CEAS Investments.

CEAS is a single family office that invests aggressively across stages. The fund focuses primarily on B2B SaaS, established marketplaces, logistics, and robotics, and within her role, Ronnie spends her time sourcing, evaluating, and supporting companies within these categories.

In this talk, we discuss:

đŸ“« For weekly insights from the next era of investors and operators, make sure to subscribe to Confluence.VC Weekly.

My guest today is Robin Li, Principal at GGV Capital. GGV is a global venture capital fund that invests in seed to growth stage companies. Some of their companies include Airbnb, Poshmark, Alibaba, and Peloton. We discuss how GGV makes decisions on a global scale, what opportunities in consumer internet Robin is most focused on, and bringing small businesses online.

You can follow Robin on Twitter @robin_p_li

Some of the questions I ask Robin -

1. What attracted you to venture capital and how did you wind up at GGV?
2. When it comes to evaluating early stage consumer companies, what are some of the elements you look for that are positive signs that there is traction and how do you evaluate companies when you have to make decisions very quickly?
3. Are there metrics that you focus on that might often be overlooked by founders?
4. What are some major turn offs or deal breakers from startups when they pitch their business to you?
5. In the due diligence process, how do you assess if the product is solving a real problem?
6. What are current trends that you are focused on?
7. What have been changes in consumer behavior during COVID that you are most surprised by?
8. What are some of the challenges when it comes to evaluating consumer startups?
9. How has consumer technology and ecommerce evolved differently in China vs. the United States?
10. I know that GGV invests in both the U.S. and China. In ecommerce, retail and social media China is far ahead of the United States with technology. What do you see as consumer technology that exists in China and that will crossover to the U.S.? What consumer technology won’t cross over?
11. What are some of the key differences between the Chinese consumer and the American consumer relating to internet behavior?
12. Communities - Chief - have over three thousand women, connecting Fishbone around professional communities
13. Round sizes have increased dramatically over the past few years with huge funds into venture capital. Now we have pre-seed, mico funds. How has this influenced you as an investor?
14. What are some consumer trends that you are excited about?
15. What is one company that you recently invested in or worked with that you are excited about?
16. What is one company that you should have invested in but didn’t?
17. What is one piece of advice that you have for founders of b2c companies that are looking to raise capital?

The Long Way Round with Meagan Loyst

👋 Hey! Thanks for checking out the GoingVC Podcast: Uncovering new paths into VC, diving deeper into alternative models, and addressing areas of weakness every second Monday with Austin and JJ MacLean (@jjmaclean) from the GoingVC team. 

We're really excited to be bringing to you today our conversation with Meagan Loyst (@meaganloyst). 

If you've got any questions, feedback, guest ideas, or just want to say hey, don't hesitate to shoot us a message at [email protected]!

Episode Chapters

On this episode, Elio interviews Amelia Gandara of Nationwide Ventures. Amelia is a Principal at Nationwide Ventures. She has a dual role, spending time managing the fund’s operations and investing alongside the team. She focuses on Nationwide’s early-stage investments with a passion for insurtechs. Amelia has additional experience in investing, operations, strategy and partnerships with stints at GE and a pre-seed funding program. She received a BS in chemical engineering from the University of Louisville. As a former professional ballet dancer, Amelia continues to explore all types of movement and is an avid advocate for the performing arts.