Drizly proves startups are easy and should be taken lightly (jk)

Scoop: Uber shutting down alcohol delivery service Drizly

“Uber has decided to shutter Drizly, an alcohol delivery service it bought three years ago for $1.1 billion, Axios has learned.”

After acquiring Drizly for $1.1 billion in 2021, Uber has decided to shutter the company (which was operating independently for the last 3 years). Uber is planning to consolidate their Uber Eats offerings, which will including everything from groceries and alcohol.

Quick opinion piece at the bottom.

Full article from Fast Company

Crypto firm Ripple explored IPO outside of U.S. because of ‘hostile’ SEC, won’t go public soon

“In the United States, trying to go public with a very hostile regulator that’s approved your S-1, that doesn’t sound like a lot of fun to me,” Garlinghouse said.”

Ripple has been eyeing the IPO market for years now, but with an SEC that is still trying to warm up to crypto, it has been a uphill battle. Instead, they went with a traditional route and have started buying back some company stock. They have already bought back $1 billion worth of shares.

Full article from CNBC

Amazon launches generative AI tool to answer shoppers’ questions

“The feature could keep shoppers from scrolling through pages of reviews or reading through a listing to find information about a product.”

As companies race to find ways to integrate AI in smart ways, Amazon seems to have jumped off to a head start. They started by integrating a chatbot into individual products so consumers can ask questions about the product and reviews.

Full coverage from CNBC

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Demo Days Are Back!

Tune in on January 25th at 3pm EST to watch 5 exciting founders present what they’re building to a great group of panelists and a live virtual audience.

Slots are starting to fill up and I’m excited to share more details about who’s due to present. Quick teaser above from a founder who’s seeing a big pivot pay off. Tune in next Thursday to learn more.

Click here to RSVP!

Want to present? Apply here! (fundraising not required)

More Events Coming Soon!

We’re in the midst of finalizing dates for these events:

• NYC focused Demo Day (first of a city focused series)

• The role of AI in B2B SaaS with the founders of Intercom and Zapier

• What’s happening in LatAm?

• Personal Finance Post-Mint with 3 well known fintech founders

Stay tuned! The schedule will always be live here as well.

[Key Takeaways] Carta and the Future of Liquidity

In the fast-evolving world of private equity, the recent Carta controversy stands as a stark reminder of the fragile balance between innovation and trust. Carta, a company that once heralded the benefits of using cap-table data in secondary markets, now faces backlash for what many see as a breach of trust. This discussion isn't just about Carta; it's a reflection on the entire private market ecosystem… Check out the full post here.

Letters From The Editor

“It’s my [newsletter] and I can [pontificate] if I want to” - Lesley Gore (sandhill certified bop)

Opinion

Startups are hard and should not be taken lightly.

Here are a few hard things about startups off the top of my head:

• The actual decision of what to build (ongoing).

• Assembling the right team to build it (ongoing).

• Keeping the team together while you build it (ongoing).

• Balancing growth and profit margin (ongoing).

• Timing (binary).

The timing part is especially interesting because unlike the other hard parts of startups that are ongoing challenges - timing happens at specific moments and cannot be undone or adjusted after the fact. I’m talking about macro timing more than specific features or campaigns. Things that are much larger than any specific company. Things like market sentiment and the technology paradigm.

You either launch at the right time or you don’t. You either raise at the right time or you don’t. The especially hard part is that founders don’t actually have a lot of control over most of this. A lot of it is set in motion at the very beginning of the journey before founders even know what they’re doing. Pre-destined.

The relatively new development here seems to be that timing is not only important at the beginning of the journey, but also at the end. It sounds obvious now, but it turns out startup valuations can also go down. They’re not some sort of checkpoint in a video game where if you fail you’ll only fall back to that point rather than having to start all over.

Events like the Drizly shut down or Invision make this painfully clear for shareholders and go against the HODL mentality of most of VC. It now seems that you also either sell at the right time or you don’t. Some VCs have known this for a long time (see USV).

The best investors in bigger markets (public equities, private equity, real estate, etc.) have exit targets. Shouldn’t VCs? Shouldn’t founders and employees?

Talk soon,
Adam

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