The High Road

w.207 | Expanding US to Europe, Data layer for AI, Irving Grousbeck, Hitchens

Dear Friends,

I hope you had a lovely week. I read a bunch of fiction, which was a nice mental reset to start the year's second half.

Bluesky, the decentralized social network, announced its $8M seed round this week, and I am proud to be an enthusiastic angel investor in the round. Bluesky’s mission is to provide technology for better public online conversations that users can own and control. I met CEO and founder Jay Graber this fall and was compelled by her vision, technical acumen, and a strong commitment to an open and decentralized internet. If anyone needs an invite to the network, please let me know!

Also, if you are in Seattle this Thursday, I am co-hosting an investor-founder get-together (RSVP here). Yes, there will be nametags.

Today's Contents:

• Good Reads: Sensible Investing

• Tweets & Videos

• Song of the Week: The High Road

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Good Reads: Sensible Investing

Businesses Expanding from the US to Europe is critical for company growth. This report is impressive and full of facts and data from Frontline VC.

The report analyzes over 200 US tech companies that had IPO'd and how they expanded to Europe before the IPO. Some interesting findings (e.g., usually 40% of revenues at IPO for US tech companies will be coming from Europe; that 47% of the people they initially hire to lead Europe don't make it to their second year; and that 90% of first offices are in London, Dublin, or Amsterdam). H/T William McQuillan.

The chart below shows the development of the European startup ecosystem on the global stage. In 2020, the US and Europe were almost at parity.

Databricks and Snowflake Face Off as AI Wave Approaches

Interesting commentary from Battery Ventures about the ongoing discussions on whether this next generation of AI productivity will be model-driven or data-driven continues. As use cases mature and AI developer tool stacks materialize, what’s becoming increasingly clear is that ML models can only be as good as the underlying data feeding them. Data is going to be a key differentiator.

The biggest takeaway from the two conferences was the theme of bringing models / computing closer to the troves of proprietary enterprise data that already exist inside Databricks and Snowflake.

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Tweets & Videos

Quick meditation on death:

Irving Grousbeck (Stanford GSB Talk): I found the video and notes on Off-Piste Investing, a blog for value-oriented investors interested in Asian markets. It seemed like a thoughtful reflection on career and work. A few notes from Off-Piste:

• One of our goals in life is to die young, as late as possible.

• Many of us have hoped that someday we might become entrepreneurs, yet statistically, most [Stanford GSB] graduates don’t pursue entrepreneurial careers. Fewer than 35% of graduates 25 years out classify themselves as having pursued something entrepreneurial or having been self-employed.

• You have to be determined to own your life, not lease it out in sections. Your life is not for sale. When you go to work everyday, you should not have to leave your heart at home.

• But new ventures demand first class, morning energies. So you need to be able to leave your current position and live for some period of time while you translate your dream into reality.

I’ve thought a lot about my entrepreneurial career and my devotion today to investing in founders and companies that support our thesis in this vein, i.e., that everyone is an entrepreneur or they’ll need to learn to think like one. This video resonated:

Semi-Viral Tweet of the Week:

A quick note here. Yes, of course, some consumer education and learning technology exists. People have made various models work. Duolingo is an interesting example, maybe Udemy, or Codecademy, also. But the most essential aspect of getting engagement and discussion going on Twitter is throwing out a binary, absolutist statement as a provocation.

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Song of the Week: The High Road

Video on YouTube.

I originally picked up this album at a Starbucks in 2010 while working on a project for McKinsey and listened to it on mostly repeat while working on a study. I have a car now in Austin and have been zipping around the city listening to Austin City Limits Radio. Last week, this song popped on the station, and it took me back a decade. What a gem.

“The High Road” by Broken Bells

'Cause they know, and so do I
The high road is hard to find
A detour in your new life
Tell all of your friends goodbye

It's too late to change your mind
You've let loss be your guide

Selfie of the Week

Hello from Taos, New Mexico, for the Fourth of July.

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Thanks for reading, friends. Please always be in touch.

As always,
Katelyn