314. 2022 Predictions P1: $100M Seed Valuations, Universe vs. Metaverse, Hottest and Coolest Sectors, Sequoia’s VC Shakeup (Ramy Adeeb)



Ramy Adeeb of 1984 joins Nick to discuss 2022 Predictions Part 1: $100M Seed Valuations, Universe vs. Metaverse, Hottest and Coolest Sectors, Sequoia’s VC Shakeup. In this episode we cover:

  • Ramy’s New $75M Fund
  • Bubbles in Crypto and NFT’s
  • Why Ramy is sticking to the Universe
  • Sequoia’s New Strategy & More!

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Transcribed with AI:

Welcome back to TFR! Today podcast veteran Ramy Adeeb is back to talk predictions for 2022 Ramy, of course, is the founder and general partner at 1984 Ventures, a co-investor of ours in a firm with one of the strongest track records amongst emerging managers. They recently closed a $75 million fund. So we’ll touch on that a bit to today’s conversation was a fun and lively one covering everything from global macro factors to specific sector sub-segments positioned for growth. And yes, we did cover web 3.0 And Jack Dorsey’s recent Twitter battle with Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon toward the end of our chat. In part one, we discuss exploding seed valuations and the renaissance of the party round bubbles and crypto and NFT’s why Ramy is sticking to the universe and skipping the metaverse the future for SPAC’s, Sequoia versus Benchmark’s positioning, Why software eating the world is only in the second inning, and we finish up with a quick fire round on sector trends. Here’s part one with the great Ramy Adeeb.

Ramy Adeeb of 1984 is back on the program. Ramy is a GP at 1984 Ventures who recently closed a new fund and has had tremendous portfolio success Ramy, a friend of mine, welcome back to the show.

Thank you for having me, Nick. 

Yes, sir. So give us the update on 1984 

Last year was pretty exciting for us, but also for the entire industry. And candidly, a rising tide raises all ships. And then as Warren Buffett likes to say, when the tide goes back, you see who has been swimming without shorts. So this has been a year of rising tides, our portfolios have been doing really well. We’ve had 12, our companies have raised serious be around, we’re obviously a seed fund. So we only invested the seed, then we are taking the a but a series B is a great, you know, 10x 15x markup for us are very happy with the number of portfolio companies that have raised to be now it’s a question of praying for exits.

12 Series B’s in one year? 

We have had eight series B’s and some Series C this year for a total of 12. Because we have had four. 

And how many portfolio companies 40? 

40. 

40. Total? Wow, amazing. Well, maybe today as we’re talking predictions, we can project who might be swimming without shorts and when the tide goes out. But before we get into that any changes or shifts in strategy or focus for you guys going forward? 

Well, we’re pivoting obviously the entire fund into an NFT. That’s gonna be trading on we’re trying to figure out whether we should do an open seat or somewhere else. It’s gonna have gamification, you’re gonna be avatars? No, I mean, look, the biggest changes in the environment is obviously there are changes in the environment and changes in the hot sectors that changes the environment are things we have to adapt to the valuations are higher. And you need to figure out how do we play in a world where the seed round is happening at 25 instead of 15? So there’s change for us there? And the short answer is we’re going to be more flexible in valuation. So we are in a fun one. Probably every investment we’ve made was an average of 12 to 14 million in valuation, and the cap was at like 16, if the price was above 16 million would typically not invest in this round in this fund. Fund II, we have increased it to 25, 16 to 25.

So every entrepreneur listening to this podcast now before just our next meeting was at 1984 ventures they were raising at 20, is like 25. So it’s a challenge, but we’re announcing it. But really, we have to draw the line somewhere. And we’ve decided to draw the line at 25 million in terms of sectors, a lot of exciting, interesting sectors, but also a lot of hype ones. And it’s hard to discern, but we have some thoughts, some views and are excited to share them in more detail.

So what does that mean, you know, increasing the valuation range, does that mean lower ownership? Does that mean a larger seed fund and you’re cutting bigger checks.

So you’re exactly right, if the font size is the same, you need to either write fewer checks or have lower ownership. In this instance, we have a larger fund. So we are going to write a similar number of checks as before, which is about 40. And we’re pushing for slightly higher ownership, but we are making one change. We’re investing more upfront. So a lot of our strategy and I think a lot of seed fund strategies have a reserve, right so we let’s say you raise $10 million, you invest, you know, say seven in seed, but then you get three millions for your pro rata or you get 4 million for your pro rata they end to be these and these are happening very quickly. These days. They’re happening at substantially higher valuations. And candidly, they’re no longer a great gauge for success because everybody raises the knee or everybody like it’s a I’m exaggerating…

But there is higher graduation rates, right?

Yeah. And then the valuation in that year is very high, right? So we invest that plenty in seed, they happen in seed, think about it. $1 at 20 is going to buy you x the dollar at 80 buys you a quarter of that. And so as long as more than one in four of your portfolio companies is going to raise money you’re better off leaving zero in reserves. Right. But because you know you’re buying a quarter if you can get the money in front.

If you can get the money in?

Exactly if you can get the money in. Absolutely. Which is probably the biggest theme for 2022. Yeah, how do we compete in a very competitive seed environment?

Well, it’s funny, you bring up portfolio construction, because I’ve noticed a number of VCs that are now changing their narrative. I won’t name names, but many are now pitching this very concentrated strategy, which I think is a function of, you know, rising seed valuations. And they’re probably adjusting the number of checks they cut, right? So they’ll cut their three to $5 million checks, or whatever it may be, and reduce portfolio size down to 10, or 15, instead of 25 to 35. 

Right, and I think it’s very tricky. Like, I think we yeah, we, we in venture capital. Obviously, when we’re fundraising and talking to LP, they asked all these questions about portfolio construction, how much are you keeping in reserves, pro rata rule of law, and sometimes people make it sound like it’s science, it’s really more art than science. And I don’t think any fund succeeds or fails because of its portfolio construction, per se, except when it comes to the concentration. We are in a business that is driven by outliers. And so the numbers need to make sense if you’re making 15 investments, but the fund will do great if the exit at a $200 million valuation is great. But if you’re hoping that you will hit a $10 billion business investing at 15 companies that seemed that a very low likelihood, you know, when I was getting started with the fund, I remember meeting was was Vinod, who I had worked for in the past, Vinod Khosla, and I shared with him our strategy and everything. And the one advice he gave me at the time we were going to our strategy was only to have 20 company companies, and I shared with him the whole fund and everything in the end, the one feedback he gave me was, hey, Ramy, maybe I would I would invest in more companies, maybe 4550. was the one feedback he gave me. Did you use I did I increase it to 40? So I have listened.

Okay, you know, while we’re talking about this, maybe we’ll go there first. So today we’re talking predictions, we will cover macro factors. So economy level factors, we can cover VC specific industry changes and issues and also sectors right that’ll be the fun part course. You know, Jack Dorsey and Marc Andreessen are going at it over web three would love to go deep on that. But before we do, you know, we’ve been talking about the VC structural changes, seed valuations are exploding right at a rate we’ve never seen. I’m looking at a chart from PitchBook right now. And there’s a steady incremental growth of postponing seed valuations from 2013 to 2020. All of a sudden, it becomes a very sharp curve in 2021. I think we’re going median of 8 million post money to now above 11. So it’s been a steep increase. What is driving, you know, the majority of the seed valuation increases, Ronnie

Money money money. Everybody wants to invest in venture capital right now. Supply everyone’s invest in private equity, public markets trickle down to the private markets. institutions want to come in family offices, corporates want to come in, hedge funds want to come in, and they are realizing that the yield in venture is higher than a lot of everything else. And more money increases valuations. 

Yeah, I mean, we’re even seeing the traditional multistage players right Index, Andreessen and Greylock , who am I forgetting, but they’re doing multi 100 million dollar seed funds now, right? They’re launching these huge vehicles to focus on seed, which is exacerbating an already, I think, for a while.

Yeah, I think maybe I wasn’t very clear. When I said trickle down. The late stage guys are coming earlier. And two, they’re coming into the turf of the traditional VC funds. Right? So an Insight or a Tiger. Yeah. Or an addition that you would have assumed in the past would be a serious CS, maybe Series B fund are now writing series as checks. Yeah. And they are obviously valuation insensitive, and dA. So now the series A funds are saying, well, how can we carve our ownership? How can we remain competitive and not pay up? Or the answer is go earlier and go to seed?

We’ve seen this before. I mean, it’s been a while, right? But the pendulum sort of swings and the later stage players go earlier until they get burned too much. And then they kind of return to their best fit stage. But the series A funds to your point they’re getting crammed from both sides. Right. 

See they are and we’re getting hammered from both sides too. I concur with you that the seriously you know, the for those funds coming earlier may not last forever, because it’s just not worth their time you have a billion dollar business do you really want to spend all that time assessing a half a million dollar check to ski founder and do the work it takes to really assess whether they walk on water or not that the dollars might not make sense for the two they will gravitate towards a proven founder second time founder who’s raising a $7 million at a you know at a 40 million valuation so that I think will be the seed that they play the best in. I do worry Nick for our profession, for Our specialization Seed Fund for getting squeezed from below from angels from party around a bunch of rich folks. Yeah, that are happening and very founder friendly terms. And I’ve seen a few of these I have seen founder themed. Hey, Ramy, I would love to have you involved and have raised a million and a half. I’m like, What’s the valuations like boats uncapped, a bunch of buddies, a lot of former overs, Edie had come in, I had 1.5 million in uncap notes. Wow. And uncap says, obviously, we can’t participate in that. And so it’s definitely can you raise 10 million bucks from individuals? No, but can you raise a million from rich folks pretty quickly with very fundamental terms, if you’re in the flow of things? Absolutely. And I wonder what the future of that looks like for seed funds?

Well, if you’re investing in proven entrepreneurs, as we just mentioned, or or folks that are in the flow and have the networks, that’s the trouble, right, you almost need to find folks that are off the beaten path. Funny enough, I just wrote about this in my investor update at the end of the year, but the Midwest was sort of long disparaged as the land of the party round. And I feel like that title and that distinction has shifted now. And curiously enough, it’s now the Bay Area that seems to be more of the land of the party round for pre seed and seeds, because there’s so many angels, and there’s so many different structures in different folks coming into the very earliest stages. 

Nick, Nick, Nick, that was a narrative of 2021. There’s nobody left in the Bay Area in 2022. I think I’m the last one here.

Everyone is somewhere in Miami Vegas, Texas, Washington state, Oregon, 

Latin America? 
If you count Puerto Rico, is that Latin America? It is. There’s quite a few of Puerto Rico as well know that I’m talking about investors.

Yeah, pointing myself out too. I mean, I was in Mexico City about a month ago, and we just made our first commitment to a Mexican based startup. Today, we’ve all been US based. But you got to find the outsiders and you got to go where, where other people aren’t to some degree. So good. So continuing with this. So party rounds. What about the later stage? You mentioned, the Tigers, the insights, they’re coming earlier, in some cases, you know, cutting series A checks, what happens at the growth stages with Softbank and Tiger and some of these other players? Do we see this bubble burst in 2022?

I try to see the President clearly. Instead of projecting about the future, I mean, look, will a bubble of some form burst? Absolutely. Will it happen in 22? And 23? I don’t know, you know, which bubble will burst first, this versus NFT is versus scripter. Money will be more like the problem was venture capitalists there is return in venture capital you’re about to see probably, you know, we’ve had a record a record return and a record number of IPOs. This year in 2021. Yeah, I think it’s 400 or something, and we’re about to see something similar in 2022. Some money would be I’d say maybe NF T’s would blow up first. But it’s funny

because in eight years of hosting this podcast, people have been saying, you know, the music is going to stop. Somebody has been there to say the music’s gonna stop every year, and it really has it.

Well, it’s hard to, on the one hand, there is froth on the other software is really eating the world. Yeah, I mean, think about it, there is that fortune 500 and Dow Jones 3000 3000 publicly traded companies, many of which should not exist today. They’re antiquated. They don’t have proper website, let alone mobile, they don’t have good customer service. They are relying on antiquated business models and brokers and infrastructure. And software is just going after one after the next after the next and healthcare and logistics and supply chain and shifting and commerce and retail. So there was so much disruption, you add COVID on top and all of a sudden consumer behavior streaming so rapidly was you know, I was just gonna call earlier about the idea of doing full on IVF at home. Can you imagine that? You know, IVF is everything except the implantation. All the medication even was a Sonar device, handheld that you get home so you can manage your own follicle like, because it’s a very painful process. You go to the hospital every day, every day if you don’t need to. So you mentioned it, you know, a procedure of that complexity is going to be moving home, maybe not this year, maybe in two years or three years, but telemedicine, a therapy therapy. So people are doing online therapy right now, it’s almost hard to imagine going to traditional therapy and voting on the couch. There’s so much of these trends that we’re catapulted forward by so much. And so yeah, there’s so much value being created.

Amazing. I couldn’t agree with you more. We just made a commitment to a company that’s doing remote patient monitoring. And it’s more of the same, right? It’s like the next generation of revenue streams as well as homecare that’s often more effective in more real time, then this sort of episodic care that we often get without context.

Absolutely. And I think the key question is what happens in the metaverse on top?

I would suspect you’re very bullish on the metal.

It’s very bullish, very bullish, especially the metal part of the verse.

Oh, man,

I think there’s plenty of opportunities in the universe for us to invest in before going to the metaverse, the universe is still full of opportunity. And I’m staying there and I’m doubling, we’re doubling down the fund and the universe. Yeah, space as well. Nope. You’re right, space isn’t the universe. I, you know, when you reframe it, we’re doubling down on Earth. Two points well taken, we are doubling down on planet Earth for now.

Well, I mean, to your point earlier, all these legacy industries, when you see the pitch decks, and you see the products, and you see the existing solutions on the market, there’s just so much left to do in software. You know, when Marc Andreessen wrote however, many years ago that software was eating the world. That was the very, very beginning of the point 1% of software eating the world. And then now we’re probably I don’t know, what inning Do you think we are in of software as a service for b2b?

I would say we’re still the second inning, I really think we’re getting there is so every every business, every interaction you have in your daily life, or you’re wondering, wow, I can’t believe this is still done that way, whether it’s buying your pet insurance, or going to the vet, or just to take a blood sample from a front and patent. Anytime you have to wait in line for two hours. There’s an opportunity

100%. Well, before we jump, I want to talk about sectors, because that’s the fun stuff. But before we jump to that, a couple more quick ones, any opinions, thoughts, critiques of sequoias? New evergreen structure?

I mean, for you, if you could do it, we’d have done it. Good for them.

It’s good for them, right?

Look, I think Sequoia is, I have a ton of respect for the firm, they have stayed, you know, I would not want to work there. But they are phenomenal. They have worked really hard. They have tremendous judgment. And they buck, you know, they buck the hype and are able to look for real opportunities. And now they just changed their structure in ways that are very hard for most people to really understand what it means other than you just don’t get your money back. You keep putting money in. And they have so much under management, and they’re gonna hold the companies that they IPO and it’s going to be this evergreen fund distributed. Yeah, it’s gonna be it’s gonna be but really, it’s I think that’s how all that planning works. I believe, to some extent it’s, look, it’s phenomenal, it’s their institution, and they’re really one upping the ante.

Is it safe to say around me that every established venture fund? If they could do it, they would?

I mean, look, I think so in terms of different structures, I think the biggest question is what will benchmark do right, so Andreessen was the first or one of the earliest to say, you know, we’re just going to be a registered investment advisor. So you know, for those not familiar with the concept, most VCs are exempt from being a registered investment advisor, right. And we do that by virtue of being a venture capital firm was either in less than 100 investors, and only investing in primary issuance and a whole bunch of restrictions. By the SEC, once you become a registered investment advisor, you can do more, but you have to report so much on everything you need, like CFO and a full army of people to be a registered investment advisor. And reason, we’re the first to say, You know what, we’re just gonna get all right. And that allows them to do so much to buy crypto to buy coins to sit on it to get tokens, you name it. And it’s funny, because Andreessen was always wonder what what was going to do, and this guy’s like, well, we’re gonna be an evergreen fund, and we’re gonna have you just give us money. And then we advocated to particular funds, and then those funds returned to the main fund. And more importantly, we don’t need to sell the company, we’re gonna hold that company’s IPOs and well beyond. And it makes a ton of sense. Think about it. You know, Google companies like Google, like Facebook, like Tesla, like Amazon have gotten upset, X 20x 30x Since IPO, so why not hold it for a few more years, and get that yield, and give it back to your investors. It’s a brilliant move on their part in one Benchmark is to the five partners, no services, not an IRA investing. But you know, and they are, arguably have been the most looked up to firm one with probably the best returns in the past decade with Uber and Snapchat and many more. And the question, I think, right now was really what

Do you think Benchmark is trying to build a brand, a legacy of the size, scale and duration of Sequoia?

I have no idea. You know, I think if there was a good chance that that’s fine. We’ll just keep doing what I’ve done best. And I would love for them to do that. Just stay small, focused, nimble. And just to put things in perspective, Benchmarks has a 400 million fund that’s like peanuts in this day and age, right? At least, or 500, or whatever it is the most, you know, it’s like Andreessen has billions and billions under management. Sequoia is like, everybody, you know, this guy’s like, oh, we have this small fund, but we have this 8 billion this fund and this Growth Fund, and the benchmark is just we’re just too serious, a firm, very focused, very simple value proposition and I like it a lot. It’s a firm I really look up to much more so than any other and so I’m very curious what they will do and if and if they do, and I think that that in and of itself is a statement.

Okay, so moving on from the Sequoia and Benchmark showers of praise here. How about Spax what thing happens with specs. You know, it was kind of an interesting year, they lost a lot of their steam. But according to the data that I’m looking at there were still there were as many specs, successful specs in 2021, as there were in 2020. What do you think happens in the spec market?

So with specs, I mean, the whole thing always smelled fishy. It’s just the whole thing. It sounded like a hack.

Was a bunch of companies that couldn’t go public otherwise, right? 

Yeah. And then it’s like, well, what are you doing, oh, who discovered this thing? I could create an entity and then acquire the companies that doesn’t have to do so it can do future reporting, and like future forecasting, instead of backward reporting. And I’m like, that sounds like a workaround. You know, it doesn’t sound like illegal, but sounds like a workaround that is not in the spirit of the law. And as a result is a temporary backdoor for shit to go through. And the answer is, that’s exactly what it is, for the most part. Yeah. So you know, with fax, it’s it almost looks like a backdoor. And the SEC is coming down and saying, Hey, we’re not sure this is kosher. And investors are coming down realizing these companies aren’t doing really well. Well, if they were they would have

IP owed to us. The SPAC window closed, do you think?

I think a lot of entrepreneurs I have been speaking with who were considering SPAC are no longer considering it. Interesting, which is great, because they recognize they need to build the business a little bit longer. Okay, so we’ve

dabbled in it a bit Ramy, I want to move on to some sector thoughts, analysis critiques. After we do that, we’ll jump into some macro level issues. There’s legislative policy, you know, Q SPS carried interest. There’s some COVID and Omicron related effects, the macro level that I want to touch on, but before we go there, let’s talk sectors. And what I’d ask of you Ramy is, I’m going to give you a sector, I want you to first tell me, are you bullish? Are you bearish? And then if you can talk specifically if there’s sub segments or aspects of each that you’re excited or skeptical about within each of these sectors, so we’ll kind of do a quick fire, you know, one to two minutes each starting off with FinTech X crypto, just FinTech in general. 

Very bullish great research opportunities. Look, the new bank is slowly people realizing and just a lot of money in banking, but a lot of it is also goes into marketing and customer acquisition, but FinTech infrastructure still broken. Every time you swipe your credit card, you’re still paying 3% 2.9% where does that money going? And why? When you can Paypal somebody 0% cost team it’s a ton of opportunity, ecommerce, very bullish on it as a future ecommerce direct to consumer ecommerce plays. It’s not a great investment sector, we actually made a couple of investments in that space but stopped halfway through the funnel one, what we’re realizing is a company’s plateau. They struggle the margins are small, a lot of the margin and going marketing to Facebook and Instagram. I’m sorry to matter. But the but e commerce as a future so ecommerce infrastructure, we’re really excited about

Is there anything left in ecommerce infrastructure?

Absolutely. I mean, I say, near instant delivery. consumer expectations have changed so much from I want it next week. I wanted to two days buy more. 

How about it’s delivered before you know you want it? 

I know. 

Well, however, many years ago, Larry was presenting to his employees in the Google audience, and they were trying to get down to nanoseconds of search results. And somebody says, Well, what happens when we get zero? And he said, well, negative, right. And that became predictive texting Google search. So yeah, I think it’s conceivable especially with Amazon having an Alexa in many different houses. They can probably know what’s on your mind and in what you may order.

And I think in both FinTech and E commerce, global expansion, right in the US we’re getting so used to seeing the delivery other parts of the world it hasn’t happened yet. It’s only a matter of time before many of these countries for the same trends.

So ecommerce DTC we covered those. How about digital health>

Huge telemedicine users willingness to embrace telemedicine is mind boggling. I think what are the aerospace right now more folks are wondering why should I go to the hospital? If I can do this on Zoom? from the comfort of my home, there is obviously big problems that are yet to be solved. Phlebotomy being one you go to the hospital to see a doctor and then they take some blood out of you that could also happen at home. And then some more at home diagnosis and remote patient monitoring, which is sounds like an area that you just invested in. So super bullish.

What are your thoughts on psychedelics?

I think a lot of these areas are hyped. So like when when California legalized pa I mean, my God, the number of pitches pitches that were receiving, and I just didn’t think it really I mean, everybody California who wanted to smoke to eat to have marijuana before Governor mana, but you look at what happened in YC 2019. I think there were like three or four pottery companies there was like a cannabis drink. And there’s all these promise like, Oh, we’re gonna make cannabis cool. So, you know, soccer moms could drink a bottle of wine Cannabis, consumers didn’t didn’t buy it. A lot of it was a hinged on consumer behavior that didn’t materialize. So candidly, I think people who like psychedelics today already have access to psychedelics. I’m not sure if you legalize shrooms tomorrow, if like all of San Francisco is going to be insurance anymore than it does today. I think,

granted, the cannabis industry has done quite well. Right. There are some massive companies like you’re in Chicago, Cresco and multi billion. But to your point, you know, it hasn’t become a dominant sector in tech investing.

Yeah. And I love the VC backed ideas did not do well. A lot of the VC cannabis funds did not do well. 

Okay, so we’ve covered cannabis. How about supply chain? You talked about logistics before supply chain.

I mean, looked at container right now from China used to cost I think, used to cost $2,000, which isn’t dollars. Now. It’s $15,000 to the West Coast. And it’s and it’s not dropping, it is a shitshow of an operation. When you have a beta, we get more visibility. We need more infrastructure. We need more automation. I’m very bullish. It might be like a lot of a lot of startups are doing really well. It is a hard sector to crack into. It’s not something you understand as enterpreneur overnight. And so I think people who are already have experienced already are playing in it have an edge

bBllish, bearish or neutral on the metaverse? 

Oh my god, what is the metaverse? It’s between ANZ that was when we’ll get there. I’m very bearish on the metaverse where people look like avatars running around. I think there was a great podcast actually, by Bill Gurley and the founder of Second Life talking about how all of the years in Second Life he recognized people don’t there is a very unique, small group of people that would like to see an avatar of themselves on the screen. I think the so much of our life has already moved online. We’re using zoom, you and I are recording this call remotely.

This is the metaverse, this is the refresh. 

Yes, actually, I don’t think I need to have a little avatar sitting across from a little avatar view with arms but no legs and a VR headset. I would take this one step further and say, you know with all due respect to Facebook, they have not made a single innovation in the past decade that was not ad related. They’ve bought Instagram, they copied Snapchat and they have copied Tik Tok, and they’ve copied Snapchat very successfully and copied Tik Tok was, you know, you know, his stories and then they have copied Tik Tok was really sort of decently but not not very successful yet. So I don’t think it’s a company that we can look to for innovation on social issues. If they did, if they were that creative, and that futuristic. They would have invented stories, you would have invented this. Didn’t even see it. It was such a small, like story is such a, you know, incremental from posts. And then reels is another incremental thing from stories that you guys didn’t see that you have to wait for somebody else invented and incompetent. But now you’re talking about a future of metaverse. So do they, I really I hate to say it. Facebook is like Microsoft, they’re optimizers give them something and they will run a billion experiment and tweak it and improve the performance. But see the future. No. Wow.

So 2015 wasn’t the time for VR and 2022 not still not the time? 

Yeah, I don’t I don’t again, you know, I tell people a simple story that think of that. Yeah, there. There might be applications that are exciting. But I would say don’t read the headlines, look for what users are doing. Yeah, right. You know, people like Pokemon Go, which was an augmented reality game. I find that was really interesting application. There’s a lot of teens who are, you know, in fortnight? Yeah. So I think there’s very interesting stuff happening in fortnight for the younger demographic, predominantly male, but mainstream applications outside of gamification clear?

Yeah, yeah. Bullish bearish education?

I mean, Ed Tech as a investment category for VC. Yeah. I mean, I’m no, I’m bearish on the entire allocations are crazy. I mean, see, schools increasingly realize they don’t really need to exist near New universities for education, but then the parents are realizing they need to exist for childcare. So I’m not sure how that’s gonna get clean. What’s the learning from 2021

I was reading through Fred Wilson’s predictions for the year and he mentioned quote, here is key 12 systems around the US and around the world face teacher shortages and desperate to erase several years of learning shortfalls will increasingly adopt online learning services in the school building in lieu of in addition to in class learning runs a little bit counter to your point around, it’s also childcare, not just education. Alright, now we get to the fun stuff. So you mentioned somewhere.

Always a pleasure to have Ramy on the program and hear his insights. Tune in next time for part two of our discussion where we cover the web three Twitter wars and get the inside scoop from Ramy Kryptos killer app Omicron in the endemic what it means for the future of work, what to expect regarding antitrust and regulation for tech giants. And finally we wrap up with our optimistic thoughts for the coming year. Hope you can join us for part two. Until then over prepare, choose carefully and invest confidently See you next time.

A special thanks to all of you out there who have left us a review on iTunes or Spotify. And for those who haven’t yet left a review, it would be awesome at the beginning of 2022 If you help us with a quick five star rating, I appreciate you all and I’m super grateful to you for making this podcast one of the most listened to media in all of VC. Thank you so much and I hope you have an amazing 2022 full of new adventures and successes. We’ll see you next time.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai