Ignite VC: Ben Black on Turning LP Chaos into a 2x DPI and Building Akkadian Ventures | Ep177

Ben Black is the co-founder and managing director of Akkadian Ventures, a pioneering secondary investor with a career spanning over two decades in venture capital. With a track record of building innovative investment strategies and founding the Raise Global Summit, he offers unparalleled insights into secondaries, fund management, and the evolution of the venture ecosystem. In this episode, he shares his journey from early-stage investing to creating one of the most respected platforms for emerging managers, and what he’s learned from decades in the game.In Today’s Episode We Discuss:00:55 Ben’s early VC journey and Round Zero origins03:28 Breaking into venture at Rosewood Capital04:45 Launching New Cycle Capital and early seed fund challenges06:55 LP default during the credit crisis—and how he turned it into a win08:22 Why Ben left seed investing and turned to secondaries10:46 The first secondary deals: DocuSign, Splunk, and a 6.5x DPI12:16 Building Akkadian Ventures to scale small secondary deals14:06 The evolution from SPVs to a $300M fund17:06 How Akkadian works with founders, CFOs, and companies20:22 The profile of companies Akkadian invests in22:42 Advice for fund managers: liquidity, DPI, and when to sell26:03 How to sell positions: rofers, timing, and GP strategies29:35 Navigating company permissions and secondary deal mechanics33:01 What’s happening in the secondary market today35:10 Pricing discipline vs. hype in AI and SaaS36:56 The MongoDB deal Ben regrets passing on40:12 Portfolio theory: betting on trends vs. picking winners42:44 Liquidity discipline: Ben’s 5x rule and early DPI47:45 The power of recycling in fund strategy51:01 Fund admin mechanics and returning capital to LPs55:06 The story behind Raise Global Summit57:30 How Raise grew into the leading LP-GP platform59:57 What makes a great deck—and what LPs ignore01:07:57 What GPs get wrong about LPs (and vice versa)01:12:35 The future of Raise and the shift away from mega-funds01:13:42 Closing thoughts and where to find BenSubscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/ignite-podcastSubscribe on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ignite-conversations-on-startups-venture-capital-tech/id1709248824Follow Ben Black on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/benblack/Follow Team Ignite on X: https://twitter.com/ignitevcFollow Brian on X: https://x.com/brianrbellFollow Brian on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bblinkedin/Visit Our Website: https://www.teamignite.venturesSubscribe to Our Newsletter: https://insights.teamignite.ventures/👂🎧 Watch, listen, and follow on your favorite platform: https://tr.ee/S2ayrbx_fL 🙏 Join the conversation on your favorite social network: https://linktr.ee/theignitepodcast//Our sponsor Byldd⁠ helps non-technical domain-expert founders build and launch tech businesses by providing a complete product team - that's everyone you need from designers to engineers to testers, all the way up to a CTO.We'll ship products while you focus on the other essentials: validation, sales, and distribution. Our portfolio companies have been backed by YC, Google, ERA, and other top-tier investors.Get Started Here: https://tr.ee/bylld