What It Actually Takes to Get a Venture Capitalist to Say Yes | Max Kilberg (Village Global) & Michael Hochberg (Periplous)

Michael Hochberg is a semiconductor entrepreneur, Caltech-trained physicist, and network investor with Village Global. He's founder and president of Periplous LLC, and has built and scaled hardware and deep tech companies through multiple market cycles, giving him a front-row seat to both the chip industry and the venture capital that funds it.Max Kilberg, Investment Partner at Village Global, sits down with Michael to unpack the state of venture right now, starting with the widening split between mega funds chasing billion-dollar checks and early-stage investors still doing artisanal, relationship-driven deal-making. They get into why Michael believes traditional moats around data and customer lock-in are eroding while speed and talent become the real differentiators, why patents rarely matter for early-stage founders, and the "VCs are stupid, scared, and reductive" framework Michael uses to coach founders on fundraising. The conversation turns to AI's economic impact, including the CapEx buildout already locked in for the next several years, the emerging question of legal liability for autonomous systems and embodied robotics, and a surprisingly detailed debate on whether commercial SaaS survives an era where founders can generate their own software from a prompt. They close on where Village is finding opportunity in Europe and what it actually takes to win a competitive allocation of a VC's limited checks per year.Thanks for listening. If you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at www.villageglobal.com or get in touch with us on X @villageglobal. Want to get updates from us? Subscribe to get a peek inside the Village. We'll send you reading recommendations, exclusive event invites, and commentary on the latest happenings in Silicon Valley. www.villageglobal.com/signup