EP 43: Semil Shah (Partner, Haystack) - The State of Venture, Investing in Figma, Hashicorp, Doordash and Almost Investing in Coinbase

In the 43rd episode Semil Shah, Partner at Haystack, joins to discuss whether the company brand name or partner matters more in VC, how he almost invested in Coinbase when it was at only $20M, the flywheel of VC and how it’s evolving and what he looks for in a founder. (0:05) Welcome Semil Shah(7:08) Early VC content creation(18:12) Brand name vs partners in VC(26:06) The VC flywheel(35:03) Your role in venture(45:00) What you look for in founders(54:12) Where do your deals come from(58:20) Open AI(1:02:45) Dry powder(1:06:27) How would you manage your third fund?(1:14:40) Semil’s take on crypto(1:21:02) Podcasting evolution(1:27:24) Outro Mixed and edited: Justin HrabovskyProduced: Andrew Nadeau and Rashad AssirExecutive Producer: Josh MachizMusic: Griff Lawson 🎙 Listen to the showApple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/three-cartoon-avatars/id1606770839Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5WqBqDb4br3LlyVrdqOYYb?si=3076e6c1b5c94d63&nd=1Google Podcasts: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5zaW1wbGVjYXN0LmNvbS9zb0hJZkhWbg Follow on Socials📸 Instagram - https://instagram.com/cartoonavatars🐦 Twitter - https://twitter.com/cartoonavatars🎬 Clips on TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@cartoonavatars About the ShowA Saturday morning podcast hosted by Logan Bartlett (Partner and Managing Director at Redpoint Ventures) covering the tech news with his friends and other people with industry expertise. Executive Producer: Rashad AssirProducer: Leah ClapperMixing and editing: Justin Hrabovsky Check out Unsupervised Learning, Redpoint's AI Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@UCUl-s_Vp-Kkk_XVyDylNwLA 🎥 Subscribe on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCugS0jD5IAdoqzjaNYzns7w?sub_confirmation=1 Follow on Socials 📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/theloganbartlettshow📱 X - https://twitter.com/loganbartshow🎬 Clips on TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@theloganbartlettshow About the ShowLogan Bartlett is a Software Investor at Redpoint Ventures - a Silicon Valley-based VC with $6B AUM and investments in Snowflake, DraftKings, Twilio, and Netflix. In each episode of The Logan Bartlett Show, we sit down with the people behind today’s most important startups and extract the tactics, lessons, and frameworks they’ve learned the hard way. Conversations span hiring to GTM, product, growth, fundraising and everything in between - collectively forming the ultimate playbook to make you a better CEO, investor or board member.Tap follow and enable notifications to stay ahead of the game.