Fred Destin

This month marks my 10 year anniversary in Venture, and what a ten years it has been 🎉 🤩 First stop: JamJar Investments Rewind 10 years and you’ll find me sitting at my desk at JamJar, operating under the alias of “Bread”, working my way through an inbox full of 1000 cold inbound pitch decks, reviewing and replying to every single one. Highlights included a hand drawn picture of a new ketchup sachet design with “target market: Nandos” written below it, and a concept for a drink that tasted like the leftover milk at the bottom of a cereal bowl. But there were also some diamonds in the rough, and it was here that I got my first experience of that lightbulb moment when you meet an exceptional founder that you want to back, making my first investment a few months in. JamJar was the best training ground I could have hoped for, and I'm so grateful to Katie Marrache and Adam Balon, Richard Reed & Jonathan Wright for welcoming me into the team. Second stop: Venrex In 2015, I joined Mark & Tom at Venrex alongside Pooja Patel. We clicked as a team immediately, and over the ensuing years launched 7 new funds, grew the portfolio to 180+ companies, built a brilliant team, moved from a small attic in West London to panoramic views in Fitzrovia, and had a lot of fun along the way. As well as the buzz of discovering new founders to back, I also discovered my love for supporting founders post-investment. With 11 board roles and a further 16 portfolio companies to support, the ex-strategy consultant in me had just enough to get my teeth into. Venrex’s people-centric and pragmatic approach to investing chimed with my own instincts about the type of investor I wanted to be. They gave me the most incredible platform to grow as an investor and roll up my sleeves with all of the operational sides of running a venture fund. To the entire Venrex team, new and old, thank you for an amazing chapter. Third stop: Circle & Co In June, I left Venrex to launch my own Venture fund, Circle & Co, which is on track for its first close next month. It's by total chance that this milestone falls on my 10th anniversary in venture, but what an incredible way to kick off the next decade. More details on the fund to follow, but for the moment I want to thank the amazing network of friends, fellow VCs, founders, LPs and family who have got me this far. You are the original Circle, and have been the inspiration & driving force behind this next step. Let's make it a good one.

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Learn a bit more about our DNA and how we operate at Acurio Ventures from Kate Cornell

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What do you do when a radical new technology puts your main product right in the crosshairs of disruption? Listen to David Okuniev — co-founder of Typeform | Ask awesomely — discuss the challenges of innovation within existing structures. David shared a game-changing insight: Radical innovation is really, really difficult to do inside your own product. He emphasized the need to break free from the constraints of familiarity and embrace change from outside the box. Henrik Werdelin and I have both seen our fair share of this in our respective careers. What struck us most was how David leveraged structure to overcome the innovator’s dilemma. By creating a culture of experimentation and providing space for bold ideas, he propelled Typeform beyond incremental improvements. What other hacks have you seen or employed to help your organization overcome the innovator’s dilemma? Share your stories below! 👇 And if you want to dive deeper into our conversation, click the link in the comments to catch the full podcast episode!

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If you're looking for VC funding in the UK, check out FundFinder.live If you're one of those people that likes to just play with all the circles on an Apple Watch because it's super satisfying, but struggle to pick one because playing with the interface is too satisfying, then maybe don't go to this website :) FundFinder has a similar interface to Apple Watches, but on web. Thank you Hector Mason, Jack Richardson, and the team at Focal for sharing this. Simultaneously showing me a very useful tool that could save me time in research, but also could waste lots of my time thanks to my brain (not sure if ADD or something else). And thank you to Concept Ventures and Justified Studio for building it. Oliver Kicks - who deserves the credit? #random #fundraising #startup #vc

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Investors often get asked what we’re currently looking for as we evaluate early stage companies - how do we build conviction that a company can succeed? This is how I think about it ⤵ There are lots of different aspects that can and should be underwritten when evaluating an early stage company. These aspects range from team > traction > TAM > product > incumbent dynamics > product > competitive landscape > cap table > valuation and the list goes on. My current framework is to spend most of my time on one of two things: > Previous experience > Current traction When I think about previous experience, I’m particularly interested in how the founder handled challenges while building a previous business. I had a conversation recently with another founder-slash-investor, and we talked a lot about how being a successful founder is all about pain tolerance. Like how many proverbial punches in the mouth are you able to take before you give up, surrender, wave the white flag and move on? This founder-investor told me he will really only work with founders who have already gotten beat up. The founders who are battle-tested. This is important for a couple of key reasons. > First, it’s easier to believe battle-tested founders have the pain and stress tolerance required to be able to build a big business and endure all of the highs and the lows and the ups and downs that come with it. > Second, I'm very interested in working with second- and third- and fourth-time founders because they know where the landmines are. The good ones have made the mistakes, and they've learned lessons from them that make them even better the next time around. Now let’s look at traction: If you’re a first-time founder, the traction bar for me is considerably higher. If I can’t check the battle-tested box, then I am looking for a lot more traction than I might from a repeat founder in the early stages of building. Unpacking this a little further, these two buckets are my answer to the “what are you looking for” question above: > Battle-tested, repeat founders who have a big disruptive vision in a market that has dynamics that allow you to build a moat. Earlier on in their journey is fine in this scenario. > Founders who have positive unit economics and meaningful traction with a product, service or good in the market, ideally growing their number one KPI by 20% MoM. If you’re a founder building in the Built World and fit one of those buckets, let’s connect. For investors, I’m interested in how you think about this framework and what you spend the most time on during your diligence process. #builtworld #venturecapital #startupfounder

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TL;DR “VCs who haven't been founders themselves don't know how founders should run companies, and C-level execs, as a class, include some of the most skillful liars in the world.” Paul Graham’s way of communicating has always felt right to me. Link below to his latest gem.

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Insightful look into bioplatform strategy, and what it takes to raise a Series A from my partner, Omri Amirav-Drory: https://lnkd.in/dFv7GbF6

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My apologies to all the entrepreneurs to whom I told that they could not address (institutional) investors before having at least an MVP, an incorporated company, and the beginning of some traction, i.e., the pre-seed stage. I was wrong, and I just discovered it. Boldstart Ventures founder Ed Sim, one of the top ten seed investors in 2024 according to the Forbes Midas list, has introduced a new category for VC investing called 𝙞𝙣𝙘𝙚𝙥𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣 𝙞𝙣𝙫𝙚𝙨𝙩𝙞𝙣𝙜. "𝘐𝘯𝘤𝘦𝘱𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘐𝘯𝘷𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘮𝘦𝘢𝘯𝘴 𝘦𝘯𝘨𝘢𝘨𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘧𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘸𝘦𝘭𝘭 𝘣𝘦𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘪𝘯𝘤𝘰𝘳𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘦, 𝘩𝘦𝘭𝘱𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘮 𝘣𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘭𝘦 𝘵𝘦𝘴𝘵 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘪𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘴𝘦 𝘪𝘥𝘦𝘢𝘴, 𝘩𝘦𝘭𝘱𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘮 𝘱𝘳𝘦-𝘴𝘦𝘭𝘭 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘪𝘯𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘢𝘭 𝘩𝘪𝘳𝘦𝘴, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘭𝘦𝘢𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘴𝘦 𝘳𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘴 𝘶𝘱𝘰𝘯 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘱𝘢𝘯𝘺 𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘮𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘴𝘰 𝘧𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘳𝘶𝘯 𝘧𝘢𝘴𝘵 𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘨𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘴𝘱𝘦𝘯𝘥 𝘮𝘰𝘯𝘵𝘩𝘴 𝘵𝘳𝘺𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘰 𝘳𝘢𝘪𝘴𝘦 𝘤𝘢𝘱𝘪𝘵𝘢𝘭." "𝘍𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘸𝘩𝘰 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘣𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘱𝘢𝘯𝘪𝘦𝘴 𝘯𝘦𝘦𝘥 𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘤𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘨𝘰 𝘵𝘰 𝘢𝘷𝘰𝘪𝘥 𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘧𝘶𝘴𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘰𝘧 𝘨𝘰𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘰 𝘢 𝘗𝘳𝘦-𝘚𝘦𝘦𝘥 𝘧𝘶𝘯𝘥, 𝘚𝘦𝘦𝘥 𝘧𝘶𝘯𝘥, 𝘮𝘶𝘭𝘵𝘪-𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘨𝘦 𝘰𝘳 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳. 𝘛𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘯𝘦𝘦𝘥 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘸𝘩𝘰 𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘪𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘮, 𝘨𝘪𝘷𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘮 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘧𝘪𝘥𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘪𝘯𝘤𝘰𝘳𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘦, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘣𝘦𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘢 𝘭𝘦𝘨𝘢𝘭 𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘪𝘵𝘺 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘩𝘢𝘷𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘳𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵 𝘢𝘮𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘤𝘢𝘱𝘪𝘵𝘢𝘭 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘯𝘦𝘦𝘥 𝘵𝘰 𝘴𝘶𝘤𝘤𝘦𝘦𝘥 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘣𝘦𝘨𝘪𝘯𝘯𝘪𝘯𝘨." Inception investing highlights the increasing competition among investors to find good deals at the earliest stages - and consequently, "the race to be first". If this approach gains traction, it may redefine the role of VCs and BAs, risk-taking, company valuation methods, and exit strategies. Let's see! #Inception #First #Investors

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49 founders and senior startup leaders respond to a survey from Sifted on the relationship between founders and VCs. Are expectations off from the start as VCs try too hard to pander to their founders with over promises of "value-add" and extensive platform teams? Do founders need to be reminded of their primary role - execution?

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🔥 🔥 🙌 🙌 🎆 🎆 I'm *fired up* to share this. #VentureIQ by the 9point8 Collective is officially live. We've heard from investors of every size and type that it takes too long and costs too much to evaluate deal flow; this limits the scale and speed at which these capital allocators can operate. To address this problem, we've created an innovative solution which delivers high fidelity diligence information near instantaneously. From a time and cost perspective, VentureIQ immediately creates leverage to look at more deals - and creates space to focus deeply on the most meaningful opportunities. To learn more, you can reach out to me directly or visit VentureIQ.ai. I'll close with some thoughts on my team, to whom I'm so grateful. Blair Merlino, Neal Ghosh and Evan Allen don't just talk about interesting concepts, point out problems or pontificate on what could be. Instead, they identify a problem, frame and validate the solution, and do the work to bring it to reality. VentureIQ is the best example I've seen of this, to date. #VentureCapital, #FamilyOffice, #PrivateEquity #CorporateDevelopment #Startups

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💸 Founders, do you have a burning question you would love to ask a VC about fundraising? If so now is your chance! ❓ Each week we will ask the founder community for their burning questions they would love to hear answers from the VC community. 🤔 We will pick 3 questions and ask some members of our VC community for answers. 📨 We will then publish the answers on Linkedin and in our Newsletter. 👇 So Founders, what questions do you have for VCs on fundraising?

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Trigger warning. UK founders to VCs: "you (generally) suck". I was taken aback by the intensity of comments made during an exit fireside chat organised by our friends at ARGO, Jeff and Aneesh. Room full of founders, we're talking about the importance of starting exit planning very early (say 3 years+ prior to exit) and the message is: "I would never feel comfortable bringing this topic up to my board, I just would not trust them to handle any of it well". Ensued a discussion about Tier II board vs. Tier III boards, how much VC boards suck, how VC's just do not know how to interact with founders and how a number of key topics are best actively avoided. Nods across the room. The Tier I Board, the kind of place where you could actually bring up strategic topics like, you know, "who might actually want to buy us some day and how do we start building the right kind of relationships today" seemed to be a sort of faraway land, as if sitting with the Knights of the Round Table or the Jedi High Council would actually be easier to achieve. Damn. So we can say all we want about founder-friendly blah blah but if this is still the prevalent reality for UK and European founders, what the heck are we doing and when do we start the topic of "being a great board member" seriously? We need to collectively get out shit together and start training investors to be better board members.

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“RIP Good Times all the time” Roger Ehrenberg’s top guidance to founders references Sequoia’s 2008 RIP Good Times presentation (https://lnkd.in/eaD4RkaU). He encourages pre product market fit founders to be super cash conscious and hyper metrics driven. They should plan for 30 months of runway with the seed raise and not ramp up spend until they demonstrate real customer traction. “Overpower uncertainty by controlling what you can — burn is one of those things.” — Before Roger even writes the first check into a company, he spends a lot of time with the founder(s) aligning on the metrics and measures of success for the next round. They codify this into a hypothesis document, where they: 1) List the hypotheses and secrets the founders think they know that others don’t and articulate how they can be validated in 12-18 months 2) Identify the 2-3 key questions they want to answer with the seed round as they reach for product-market fit (which may overlap with the list above) — How does Roger define product market fit in a B2B context? “Product-market fit is when you’re able to sell in a way that’s not heavily consultative or requires over-servicing accounts to ensure success.” — What if founders don’t find product-market fit in 18 months? Roger recognizes that some of the most exciting companies have platform-like characteristics that take years to play out. Some of their best companies needed extensions — The Trade Desk needed a few before raising their Series A. How does Roger decide when to bridge a company? He looks at a combination of how the founders have performed and the likelihood that the company can bridge the gap between current state and a Series A: Founder attributes for bridge: 1) Have they been great at executing? 2) Are they resourceful? 3) Do they move fast? 4) Do they have grit? 5) Have they found a pocket of willing early adopters that prove their early hypothesis? Future state: 1) Founder is clear on what the future state of the company needs to look like to raise the Series A 2) Founder can articulate what the gap is between that future state and where they are now If there is a clear line of sight to that Series A, then an extension makes sense -- Tomorrow, I'll dig into IA Ventures' fund model. Thanks for reading! You can keep up with all the posts at https://lnkd.in/eXbktFxZ

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Very intriguing insights on the resurgence of startup growth following a period of caution and scaling back by VCs over the past 2+ years. Is now the opportune moment to initiate scaling, recruitment, and drive for expansion? #StartUps #BusinessGrowth What are yout thoughts? is the reawakening happening? is it too early? Do you agree?

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Startup founders care a lot about data and metrics, but in the conservative VC market of 2024, understanding what 'good' looks like is more important than ever to navigate pre-seed -- > seed --> series A and beyond. In my new post on 2023-2024 B2B SaaS Benchmarks, I collated the latest data from 20VC/ La Famiglia, Emergence Capital, Serena and OpenView as well as the definitions for what are considered the most important metrics to track in SaaS. There are many acronyms - you've been warned 😀 😳 Don't get too stressed if your startup is not exactly top quartile at the time of raising and keep in mind that benchmarks change, so what was right in 2023 might already be out of date (for example, growth significantly cooled from 2022-2023) and only one-fifth of companies grew at least 75% year-over-year. Link to the post on VC Cafe in the first comment 👇

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The profitability sanity test for VC-backed unprofitable cos. Ask this question: How much revenue would it take to be breakeven if: - gross margin % is held constant - all opex spend is held constant on a $ basis Is that revenue achievable with no additional cost? In the attached example, the company needs to grow revenues from $50,000,000 to $87,500,000 with no additional expense to be breakeven. That's $37,500,000 of incremental revenue with $0 of added expense. The question for this business is whether that's possible. If the gap seems too large, then to make the gap more attainable there are two levers: - increase gross margin % - reduce operating expense The best means to do that varies by business, but those are the two levers. And this needs to happen while the company is growing revenues. If the gap seems impossible, then you may have a fundamental business model issue that will make profitability a remote possibility. Of course, there are means in which companies can grow to achieve scale which will help with the profitability likelihood over time - but that will require outside capital which should never be treated as categorically attainable.

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Let's face it, as a SaaS founder, your biggest fear is pouring your blood, sweat and tears into building an amazing product...only for it to flop harder than the Fyre Festival. 🔥 You put everything into making your vision a reality - countless late nights, mounting tech debt, arguments with your co-founder. And for what? To sell 2 measly subscriptions and contemplate taking that corporate job after all? But what if I told you there's a way to practically guarantee your SaaS idea will be a raging success before you even write a line of code? It's called pre-selling, and it's the secret weapon used by savvy startups everywhere. Pre-selling means validating demand and creating buzz for your product months ahead of launch. It's about systematically warming up your audience until they're foaming at the mouth desperate to buy from you. Sounds too good to be true? Let me break it down with 8 battle-tested pre-selling strategies: 1️⃣ The "Soft Pitch" - Get people interested without looking thirsty 2️⃣ The Drip Campaign - Dangle feature teasers to build crazy anticipation 3️⃣ The Waitlist Hustle - Everyone wants what they can't have, use scarcity 4️⃣ The Bonanza Bundle - Fatten your offer with irresistible extras 5️⃣ The Social Proof Play - Bake in testimonials from respected figures 6️⃣ The FOMO Accelerant - Urgency is your best friend, light a fire 7️⃣ The Free Preview - Give them a taste to leave them craving more 8️⃣ The Pre-Order Power Move - Capture real $ commitments upfront Using the right combo of these tactics, you could have a rabid mob fighting to be your first customers. No more struggling to get those critical early adopters on board. The best part? You don't need a massive audience or marketing budget to make pre-selling work its magic. So if you're ready to de-risk your SaaS idea and set yourself up for success from day 1, get pre-selling. It's the ultimate force multiplier for your startup hustle. Want help pre-selling your next SaaS idea?! Drop an emoji below with your questions, and let's get tactical! Like this post? Want to see more content like it, be sure to follow me for more and join 11k+ other founders by subscribing to my weekly newsletter. Link in my profile

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Fine insight, founders have to be self propelled and find a way of getting "the" meeting with investors, prospects, customers and talent you are pursuing. There is no single playbook - but a crisp and authentic mail/message, sharing a short summary of your venture and what you aim to achieve by the meeting, helps, in most cases. Reduce friction, ask for a short call, video meet, even an email exchange.

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