EVCA Newsletter | December Edition - The Latest VC Jobs, News, Events
From the implosion of the crypto exchange FTX to the controversial takeover of Twitter by Elon Musk, an anxious energy has seemed to beset the tech industry as we approach the end of the year. Rather than linger on these stories of doom and gloom, however, I hope to refocus our attention to the promises of the future—that is, the future of venture capital, and relatedly, the future of tech. Accordingly, it is with great excitement and celebration that we at the EVCA share our first-ever EVC list showcasing the top 50 emerging investors charting the industry’s future. Produced in partnership with SVB and Terra Nova, the list is the culmination of an extensive quantitative and qualitative review conducted by 12 judges from leading VC firms. With a hearty applause, congrats to all the path-blazing investors who made the 2022 List! You can check out the full list of EVC investors at the button below.
And with that bit of introductory fanfare, welcome back to this edition of the EVCA newsletter!
Spotlight Feature: Meet Tony Liu, Partner at Costanoa Ventures
We had the chance to interview Tony Liu, who is a Partner at Costanoa Ventures. Tony shares his origins story—from deploying machine learning algorithms as a former data scientist, working as a product manager at companies including Expo and Databricks, and investing as a VC in the newest wave of data infrastructure startups. In this interview, Tony also shares his thoughts about life and career.
Featured Investors
This month we highlight Bryan Shill of Prelude Ventures and Ananya Vasagiri of Schematic Ventures as our featured investors of the EVCA community.
Bryan Shill is a Principal at Prelude Ventures, an early-stage venture firm that invests in and supports startups with the greatest potential to mitigate climate change. At Prelude, Bryan has led investments across the energy transition, food & agriculture, mobility, and the built environment. Before joining Prelude, he worked in investment banking in Credit Suisse’s Global Power & Renewables group, advising on mergers, acquisitions, and financings of large-scale energy assets and companies. Bryan holds a Bachelor of Science in Finance from New York University’s Stern School of Business.
Ananya Vasagiri is an investor at Schematic Ventures, an early-stage fund focused on industrial technology. She has worked at the intersection of finance and industrial technology throughout her career. Her experiences include industrials investment banking at Goldman Sachs, digital industrial growth equity investing at Activate Capital, and private market asset management at Adams Street. Ananya holds a BA in Economics and Psychology from The University of Chicago.
EVCA Leadership Spotlight: Corporate Venture Capital Vertical Lead, James Wu of M12 (Microsoft's Venture Fund)
This EVCA Leadership Spotlight Series is intended to help the broader community get to know what's going on behind the scenes at the EVCA, as well as highlight the valuable contributions of the roughly 50 individuals across the venture capital industry who make the EVCA possible.
James Wu is a Partner at M12 (Microsoft's Venture Fund), in the Bay Area. He started his career investing in infrastructure software broadly (DevOps, Data Science, and cybersecurity) but has been leading M12's web 3 thesis. James has led investments in Space and Time and Metrika and supports portfolio companies like Bakkt and Palm.io while managing M12’s growth-stage investments in existing portfolio companies. Outside of M12, he has angel invested in companies like Chaos Labs, Uplink, Mystiko Networks and Pipe. Previously, James was an investor with FTV Capital, a growth equity fund with $4B of assets under management. There, he sourced and executed on multi-stage investments in enterprise technology and services, including deals in cybersecurity, marketing technology, HR technology, and DevOps.
What We’re Reading
Here we share our favorite content produced from EVCA members across the world:
Introducing GPT-VC - Kenn So of Smartsheet, takes a shot at the question of “why can’t venture capitalists be automated?” You can access the app here
How will we write in 2030? - Marie Dollé of EuroQuity, reflects on the democratization of AI writing tools and how technology is shaping our words
What does it take to raise capital, in SaaS, in 2022? - Christoph Janz of Point Nine, walks us through an updated version of the SaaS Funding Napkin
Venture Capital Glossary - Jason Heltzer of Origin Ventures, helps you understand the dialect of venture capital through a comprehensive list of industry terms
The Reality of Being a Founder and VC - Daniel Kang of Flowbo.co, shares his experience as a Y-Combinator Founder and ex-Softbank Investor
What We’re Excited About: The Verticalization of B2B Fintech - Jillian Williams of Cowboy Ventures, delves into the need for vertical-specific fintech solutions and the opportunity for end-to-end SaaS solutions to solve those needs
Events
An informational session and Q&A with our partner EY | December 8 | Hosted by EVCA | RSVP on EVCA #Events channel
Fireside with Tom Steyer | December 14 | Hosted by Thomas Englis of EVCA | RSVP on EVCA Slack
How Tech Can Make 2023 More Fun (Even Business) | December 6 | Hosted by Austin Forum
Digital Tech Regulation Roundtable | December 6 | Hosted by Sidley
NYC Fintech Women's Holiday Party & IFF Celebration | December 7 | Hosted by NYC Fintech Women
The Helm Holiday Cocktail Party | December 8 | Hosted by Helm Ventures
Discussion of the Best Tech+Society Books of 2022 | December 14 | Hosted by Austin Forum
Jobs
Investment Associate Role in San Francisco, CA at Reach Capital
Investment Associate Role in Park City, UT at Drawdown Fund / Tiger Grass Capital. If interested, send your resume and cover letter to careers@drawdownfund.com
Investment Partner Role in New York, NY at Artist Capital Management. If interested, send your resume to Adam Dawkins at adam@evca.org
Connect with us: EVCA, Sam, Adam, and Isaac
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