Avlok Kohli is the CEO @ AngelList. Under his leadership, Avlok has taken AngelList from an SPV provider to a company that is becoming the software platform for the entire industry. Today, AngelList supports over $15BN in assets and 40% of US unicorns have had a GP invest in them through AngelList. Prior to becoming CEO @ AngelList, Avlok founded 3 companies, all of which were acquired including by the likes of Square and eBay.
In Today's Episode with Avlok Kohli We Discuss:
1. From 3x Founder to Scaling AngelList to $15BN in AUM:
- How did Naval convince Avlok to join AngelList and be CEO?
- Does Avlok believe in startups having defensibility in the early days?
- How important does Avlok believe it is for companies to be "first to market"?
- Why does Avlok believe all the last-mile grocery delivery companies will go bust in the downturn?
2. What is Going On in Venture: New Funds, LPs, Secondaries:
- Are we seeing the amount of net new funds reduce in the downturn?
- Are we seeing the size of new funds being raised, being smaller?
- Is the time to first close increasing in time?
- Does AVlok agree that the fund segment hit hardest by the downturn is micro fund managers?
- Which LP class has pulled back from fund investing most significantly?
- Why does Avlok believe institutions have returned to fund investing more than ever right now?
- Are we seeing an increase in fund secondary positions?
3. What is Going on in Startups: Rounds, Valuations, Party Rounds
- Are we seeing the number of startups able to close their round reduce?
- Are we seeing the size of startup funding rounds reduce? How does this depend on the stage?
- What are we seeing for startup valuations? Why is seed as high as ever? What is the most hit?
- How is the composition of funding rounds changing? More or fewer party rounds?
- When does Avlok believe we will see down rounds and pay-to-play, really come into effect?
4. The Business of AngelList and its Future:
- What are the margins on AngelList products today?
- What is the best margin AngelList product? What is the worst?
- What product did AngelList do that in hindsight, Avlok wishes they had not done?
- Why did AngelList back out of Europe? Was it a mistake?
- How does Avlok think about AngelList's fierce competition with Carta today?
