Hello and welcome back to Equity, a social experiment regarding how many acronyms an audience can endure before passing out. Each week we dive into the world of venture capital, looking to understand exactly what’s going on behind the money.
This week Katie Roof, Matthew Lynley, and myself — Alex! — were joined by Samuel Angus, a partner on the corporate team of Fenwick and West, where he represents a number of venture-backed firms including Airbnb and Github.
But before we could bring Angus on, we had Uber to get through. The ridesharing company wouldn’t leave us alone this week, as per usual, dropping a sheaf of news items since the last time we came together.
Let’s see: Uber has a new CEO, after he accepted the job this week. Also, the Benchmark lawsuit is heading to arbitration. Oh, and one of Uber’s early investors lost his dang mind when writing a comical memo at 4 am. That’s not all: Uber is apparently under the eyes of regulators curious about foreign bribes. And, the company’s new CEO wants to take it public inside the next 18 to 36 months.
But nothing much, really.
With the help of Angus, we then chewed through the dynamics that are keeping a host of private companies private, looking backwards through time to understand how the market got to be where it is today. And, to cap things off, we dove into the ICO pool, discussing what an ICO is, should you invest in them, and just how trustworthy they may be.
All that and we got to bring up signaling risk. Hit play, and let’s go!
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