Pete Kim

🌟Innovative VC Firm Overcomes Exits Drought with Secondary Sales🌟 ⛵Navigating a challenging landscape where exits are scarce, Santa Barbara Venture Partners (SBVP) has pioneered a novel approach to sustain its growth and attract investors for its second fund: secondary sales. Instead of waiting for traditional exits like IPOs or acquisitions, SBVP opted to sell shares of its portfolio companies, demonstrating its ability to generate returns for investors and stand out in a competitive market. 🎤According to Dan Engel, founder and managing partner of SBVP, these secondary transactions have been a game-changer, sparking investor interest and bolstering the firm's credibility. By leveraging its recent successes, including a lucrative stake in sports-betting company DraftKings Inc.' acquisition of digital lottery app Jackpocket, SBVP seized the opportunity to return profits to its limited partners (LPs) and pave the way for its second fund. 💡Engel highlighted the challenges faced by young VC firms in raising subsequent funds, particularly amid a downturn in exit activity and heightened investor scrutiny. With traditional exit routes becoming increasingly elusive, the pressure is on for firms to demonstrate tangible returns and establish a track record of success. ✨"For us, secondary sales have been a game-changer. They've helped us return profits to our LPs and attract investors for our second fund," said Dan Engel. 💰For SBVP, the decision to pursue secondary sales was driven by the need to provide liquidity to LPs and validate its investment thesis in the eyes of prospective investors. By strategically offloading portions of its holdings in high-performing portfolio companies like Bark Technologies and Rad AI, SBVP not only generated substantial returns but also bolstered investor confidence in its ability to deliver results. ⚠Despite the complexities and potential stigma associated with early share sales, Engel emphasized the importance of prioritizing investor returns and seizing opportunities to unlock value for stakeholders. With a focus on profitability and transparency, SBVP remains committed to its mission of delivering sustainable growth and maximizing returns for its LPs. 🔍 "Returning profits to our investors is our top priority. By strategically selling shares, we're proving our commitment to delivering results and driving value for our stakeholders," added Engel. As SBVP continues to explore secondary transactions and expand its investor base, the firm stands as a testament to innovation and resilience in the face of market challenges. 🚀 ✅ Looking to raise capital for your #fund and increase the international pool of your LP #investors?   🤝 Need warm #LP introductions?   📝 Selling #secondaries to increase liquidity?   🧐 Looking for co-investments?   ▶ G+QUANT's link for inquiries and fund decks: https://lnkd.in/gjC_EuTE #VCInnovation #SecondarySalesSuccess #InvestorReturns #ValueCreation 

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Great time on the Embracing Erosion podcast w/Devon O'Rourke! We talked about: 🚀 How to scale a company from concept to 9-figure exit 🔄 How to break away from the traditional consulting model and apply product approaches ⏩ Why it’s important to iterate quickly and often with messaging 💸📈What signals are important to pay attention to when investing in startups and much more!

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Having a Cars and Capital event tomorrow in Southern California with Oren Klaff. If you want to join message me. https://lnkd.in/gDQ4D39u Oren Klaff Bridger Pennington #InvestorEvent #FamilyOffice #InvestmentOpportunity #CarlsbadEvent #PrivateEquity #WealthManagement #InvestmentConference #CapitalRaising #NetworkingEvent #IndustryLeaders #FinancialGrowth #InvestorsMeetup #WealthBuilding #BusinessGrowth #InvestmentForum

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It is a great privledge to be backing Stella Garber for a second time, as well as her sensational co-founders Brian Schmidt and Justin Gallagher. It’s also great to working with Index Ventures again, too. One thing I have learned in my venture career is that humans are lazy, and software that does simple things can feel like magic. Hoop uses AI to automatically harvest to do items from all of your communication channels. Today it’s single player, and in the future it will be your whole team. Read more about why we invested: https://lnkd.in/geTy-kyZ

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Two weeks ago I spent 3 days with brilliant human beings discussing the state of AI investment with other angel syndicate leads, angel investors and VCs at Hustle Fund's #camphustle in Los Gatos. It was brilliant. Truly awesome to learn so much from insanely accomplished investors. But was so clear to me again is that the US and the UK are two countries divided by separate languages of ambition. Aspiration and ambition underlined by the cluster effect of successful exits, incredible talent and venture capital driven by operators and founders rather than accountants. But one reason why the US often trumps (pun not intended) the UK is they learn from failure. Run a startup that didn't reach the dizzying heights of venture-scale returns? Learn, reset and go again. What they certainly do not do is look at failure with glee and an "I told you so" attitude. Which is what I sense when I read most of the narrative around the failure of Cazoo. Alex Chesterman swung and missed. The business was flawed, unit economics didn't add up and in reality - there was very little innovation outside the vertical alignment of a well-understood business. But when we look down upon what he tried to do and 💩 💩 it all we're doing is making it harder for someone else to be equally as ambitious. Focus on what went wrong. Focus on the fundamental underlying business models that drive efficient use of capital and the push for profitability. But let's celebrate people shooting their shot and not celebrate the failures.

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So great to speak to Mohammed Islam on The Mo Show podcast last week! Watch the full episode here!

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I had a lot of fun recording a podcast episode with Shiva Singh Sangwan. We discussed the evolution of Humba Ventures & Susa Ventures; tips for raising and building a fund; how to improve investment sourcing & picking; the role of luck in investing, and so on. https://lnkd.in/eiqsStej

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Goldcast's startup journey has perfectly mapped the last 4 crazy years of SaaS. Palash Soni and his cofounders first started the company in 2021 to build great, customizable virtual event solutions for enterprise marketers. While their business kept growing past the pandemic, it was clear that overall spend was shifting back to IRL events fast. However, video consumption continued to rise and quickly became the best way to build your brand and an audience in software - if you knew how to operationalize video marketing. Goldcast's product evolution from a virtual events platform to an AI-native video marketing solution has been incredible to watch. The company had its best quarter yet, adding customers like OpenAI and Coupa Software and I couldn't be more proud. Here's Palash talking about their product evolution and the future of video marketing in an AI-native world.

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Today, I’m excited to share a pivotal moment in Lissun’s journey. We’ve successfully raised $2.5 million in our Pre-Series A funding round, led by RPSG Capital Ventures , with support from our new partners, Multiply Ventures and Atrium Angels, and continued backing from IvyCap Ventures Advisors Private Limited, Rainmatter by Zerodha, and SucSEED Ventures. Especial thanks to Sambit Dash, Abhishek Goenka, Vikram Gupta, Aashish Gupta, Raveen Sastry Dilip Kumar, Nithin Kamath and Vikrant Varshney. You are not just investors behind these names—you are individuals who believe in the power of mental health and its transformative impact on society even more than we do. I’m also deeply grateful to everyone who has supported us since our inception on August 15, 2021. Your belief in our vision continues to drive us forward Rest, for me, this milestone is more than just numbers—it’s about our mission to make a meaningful impact in mental health care. When we started LISSUN, Tarun Gupta's and mine Mission was clear: Solve Mental Health at Scale. Solving for these Six Syndromes—Awareness, Acceptance, Anonymity, Access, Affordability, and Assurance—have guided us every step of the way. And our unique phygital model, combining physical and digital mental health support, has been crucial in reaching people where they are—whether they’re dealing with workplace stress, exam anxiety, or more complex issues like chronic illness. One area that’s close to my heart is our work with children through Sunshine by LISSUN. Our child development and care centers (CDCs) are built with care and compassion, designed to provide comprehensive support under one roof for children with neurodevelopmental and behavioral disorders such as Autism, ADHD, and learning challenges. But Sunshine is more than just a network of centers—it’s a lifeline for families, offering them the care they need, exactly when they need it most. This new round of funding is not just a financial boost; it empowers us to go further in our mission. We’re planning to expand our services & centers, grow our team, and dive deeper into technology—especially AI—to enhance how we deliver care. At LISSUN, we’ve always believed in the power of data-driven solutions, and with our physical centers and partnerships, we’re ready to create AI-driven products that will truly make a difference. Reflecting on where we’ve come from, I’m filled with gratitude. We’ve already partnered with over 300+ B2B Clients, opened 4 SUnshine Centers and impacted 75,000 lives across 20+ cities. But I know this is just the beginning. We’re ready to scale up, reach more people, and set new standards in mental health care.. #upwards #onwards #mentalhealth https://lnkd.in/gyk8HCns

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Looking forward to diving into the state of the late-stage venture market at TechCrunch Disrupt next week with Karthik Subramanian. With late-stage companies facing tougher paths to exit, we’ll be debating whether the market is actually rebounding, sharing our thoughts on the outlook for future IPOs, and discussing how founders can navigate these shifting dynamics. Hope to see you there! #TCDisrupt #VC

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If anyone is in North County San Diego, on Thursday May 2nd, we will be hosting a tech entrepreneur and investor meet up at 5:30pm. We’ll have a couple speakers, one of which is a fin-tech start-up raising a round, followed up by a presentation on the state of the stock & crypto market. We host these events quarterly and usually get a lot of founders and investors to attend. If anyone is interested, please message me and I can send you the details. LaunchPad San Diego #startups #startupincubator #entrepreneur #investing #crypto #meetup

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At some point, we all hope our startup goes from launch phase to momentum phase. But, as I learned, that phase requires a new set of skills 👇 In 2007, my co-founder and I launched our first startup. The first two (2) years were tough, but looking back it was really fun "building" something new. The leadership challenges started when the business went through a rapid growth phase in 2010, 2011, and 2012.  We went from 1 employee to 70+ employees... We went from $2 million in revenue to $12.5 million in revenue... We were still doing cash flow on an excel spreadsheet...  We didn't have the systems, playbooks, or processes in place to scale the business to $25M, $50M, or $100M.  We had a great Purpose. We had amazing People. We had some rockstar Partners. We had Profit. But, we were missing a "P". How's your 5P equation looking? Purpose + People + Partnerships + Playbooks = Profits

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Team San Diego! I though you may find this as surprising as I did...we are not alone. Read this quick article from Jon Prentice's (Silicon Valley Bank) interview with with James Newell (Voyager Capital), published in GeekWire on Seattle's innovation ecosystem....they lament the SAME issues as we do in San Diego: * Lack of angel investors, (Especially, it calls out, given the local giant tech co's) * "We need low-conviction check writers." * Lack of "cachet associated with being an angel investor" - We have similar efforts (as described in the article) to drum up angel activity: NuFund Venture Group and, Interlock Capital (read the article and you'll see why the Interlock effort is tops as relates to "paying back into the ecosystem") Connect.org strives to 'connect' innovative companies with investors of all types (angel, VC, PE...) - just see "Innovation Day". Their Springboard program provides another great way for experienced entrepreneurs to give back through mentorship...as for the companies going through Springboard: "Ask for advice, and you often get $$" Your thoughts on the article or San Diego innovation ecosystem? https://lnkd.in/gfwq6mfq

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chpter. , founded by Tesh Mbaabu and his friends, raised $1.2 million pre-seed last week in a round that was led by former investors in their previous startup, MarketForce. I saw a comment from X, saying that the product that chpter. has out there so far, has so many problems, that it is basically a waiting list with a poorly-designed landing page. Which is true. I went to see the live site myself and the observation was not far off. HOWEVER. I think a lot of people who have never built startups don't really know how startups work. I lead a team of talented individuals building Mentorlst and I have picked up a few lessons. First, chpter. raised pre-seed funding, which means at this point, investors were looking at four things: the team, the idea, the total addressable market (TAM) and the go-to-market strategy. And looking at chpter. , it nails down these four perfectly, except one, which I will explain. The team, led by Tesh Mbaabu has experience running a busy startup operating in many markets, and this experience cannot be substituted for anything else. It is also the reason why even after WeWork failed after allegations of financial misappropriation, Adam Neumann, the CEO and founder, still managed to raise money from investors for his subsequent ideas. It doesn't matter whether a founder fails in his first or nth startup, as long as he has the experience of building products, managing teams and raising funds. Investors value the experience and network above everything else. Second, the TAM. chpter. is building a product to enable e-commerce businesses to automate customer relationship management at its basic. Social/e-commerce is the new zone of commerce and the African market is untapped. I don't know whether customers really need a chpter. like product vs what they are already using such as WhatsApp Business, but it remains to be seen. This is why I have doubts with the product, but products can always grow and even pivot. The market they are after is there, the only challenge is to grab a share of that market from social media giants and existing players. Third is GTM. I won't comment much on this but this is what a lot of founders struggle with, given that many founders confuse GTM strategy with marketing. GTM is the whole strategy of taking a new product to market and driving demand for it, and marketing is just part of it. I haven't seen much activity from chpter. in the socials, and I am hoping that the funding they have acquired will boost their GTM efforts in the coming months. One last thing: When investors give you money, they don't deposit that money in your account and give you a debit card to spend it. Such funding always come with conditions that must be met, which includes figures and milestones you have to hit before you unlock more levels of that funding. It is the same way the IMF works. This is why startups sometimes die shortly after raising funding, because they failed to meet these conditions. #mentorlst

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Orb (#uncorrelated) raised $25M to continue building their pricing and billing platform that lets companies automate a range of different billing modes e.g., usage-based, subscriptions, or a mix, marry analytics and billing, collect and meter product usage data, invoice customers, generate revenue reports, draw on product usage insights to find revenue opportunities, model out alternative pricing plans (thus enabling experimentation), orchestrate changes in real time, schedule future price changes for certain customer cohorts or contract renewals, directly embed draft invoices into product billing portals, surface past-due invoices, and recover failed payments automatically. "Orb gives companies a single source of truth that can connect every unit of product usage to revenue. We’ve found a particularly strong fit in AI, cloud infrastructure, fintech, and dev tools, and have seen most of our growth come from those verticals.” Orb’s revenue grew 5x in the past year, and the customer base tripled to include brands such as Vercel, Replit, Pinecone, and Perplexity. https://lnkd.in/gYh4y2tg

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🚀 It’s a big day at Hoop! We’re excited to share we’ve raised $5m led by Index Ventures with participation from Origin Ventures, Chingona Ventures, Divergent Capital, and an inspiring group of angel investors. Two years ago, Justin, Brian, and I got together and started brainstorming. We had worked together as early executives at Trello for 7.5 years! We wanted to recreate the magic of the early days of Trello and respond to the epidemic of distraction we were seeing in the workplace. When I left Atlassian, I was in back-to-back meetings most days. Slack was constantly buzzing. My whole day was spent going between apps and praying I wouldn’t miss something important. I would wake up in the middle of the night remembering that DM I forgot to respond to. In an age of AI, this kind of mental fatigue across tools drains humans of our energy to do the work that really matters: the focused and creative work that comes when we can feel secure that we’re on top of all important work. Hoop is the product I wish I had. It connects to Zoom, Google Meet, Slack and email and automatically captures tasks for me using AI. It then centralizes everything in one spot so I never miss a task. Our vision is to rethink task management with an AI first principles mindset. There’s so much we can do now that we couldn’t have imagined back when we were building Trello. It’s an exciting time to be building in the space, and we’ve got a world class team taking on this challenge. Now’s the time to try Hoop out and let us know what you think! We couldn’t be more grateful for all the amazing support from our community, investors, and friends. Let’s go team! 👏🏼 Special thanks to our investors for all their belief and support - Damir Becirovic Neil Rimer Katie Shea Samara Mejia Hernandez Jason Heltzer Andy Dunn Wade Foster Linda Lian Michael Pryor Kristen Habacht Elizabeth Hall Barry Clark Nikita Miller Mihika Kapoor Jiaona Zhang (JZ) Maggie Adhami-Boynton Sonia Sahney Nagar Sean Harper Darren Murph Mike Arauz Job van der Voort Annie Duke Jay Simons Maria Christopoulos Katris Ezra Galston Sheel Mohnot Ilya Fushman #futureofwork #ai #startups #fundraising

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