Digest #66 | Investing in Crypto, Opportunity for an Energy Unicorn & more

Mar 7th–13th | Insights from Sapphire Ventures, Equal, Work-Bench, Insight, and others

Ali Afridi

Mar 13, 2022

An Ask!

Hi Everyone,

In the coming month we’ll be launching a series highlighting the best agencies & freelancers that work with startups. If you, or a portfolio company, have worked with a provider that you felt did a great job please let us know via this form or by replying to this email. Providers could be across development, design, recruiting, growth, or another area that startups often require support.

We’ll share the full list in a few weeks with everyone who contributes.

Thanks!

Ali

Investment Themes, Theses, & Outlooks

Investing in Crypto: A Look into 2022 (Apoorva Goyal, Deven Parekh, & Caitlin Pintavorn, Insight)
Lessons from Plaid for a future energy unicorn (Rick Zullo & Simran Suri, Equal Ventures)

Industry Developments & Analyses

The Future of AI Infrastructure is Becoming Modular (Casber Wang, VC @ Sapphire)
The State of Multiplayer Application Development (Priyanka Somrah, Work-Bench)
Identifying Authentic NFTs (Especially Against Attackers) (Michael Blau, VC @ A16Z)
Getting to Know GIS: How Spatial and Geographic Intelligence Is Making Sense of Our Changing World (Morad Elhafed, Zak Ewen, & Max-Julian Kaye, Battery)
Talking Shop: The Transformation of Commerce (Part II) (Rex Woodbury, Partner @ Index)
A Journey Through 100 Influencer & Creator Startups — Part 4: Web3 (Nicole Quinn, GP @ Lightspeed)

Guides, Case Studies, and Best Practices for Operating

Accelerating Value with Value Gap Mapping (Pablo Dominguez & Matt May, Insight)
“Give it away, give it away, give it away now” — Counter positioning in legacy industries (Rick Zullo, GP @ Equal Ventures)
Building a startup at the end of the world (Micah Rosenbloom, GP @ Founder Collective)
Flexible Work, Compensation Demands, and Hiring Trends: First Annual State of SaaS Talent Report (Steve Melia & Maggie Crean, OpenView)
The Three Types of Customer Success Teams (Tomasz Tunguz, MD @ Redpoint)
The People Roadmap for Startups (Tomasz Tunguz, MD @ Redpoint)

Additional Reads

Fighting the Russian Invasion of Ukraine (Albert Wenger, GP @ USV)
Why we won’t tell you who led an Eniac deal (Hadley Harris & Anthony Ha, Eniac)
7 options for family offices to invest in technology companies (David Teten, Partner @ Versatile VC)
Why Most VCs Suck At Talent (Kyle Harrison, ex-Principal @ Index)
On Hustle Culture (Erik Torenberg, Partner @ Village Global)
The Range Anxiety Weekend (Fred Wilson, GP @ USV)
Reality Crash (Mike Solana, VP @ Founders Fund)

Did we miss something?

We’re now pulling posts from over 650 Medium writers, Substack newsletters, and blogs (full list here). Let us know if you notice someone we’re missing and we'll include their content starting with our next digest! Just respond to this email with their URL if that’s the case.