Hello, Neumann.

Also the AI video startup, Runway is raising a fund and Bluesky is finally open to the public.

Author

Adam Hardej
February 07, 2024

Daily(ish) news and live events for venture nerds.

Everyone who reads this newsletter is Seinfeld-aged-ish right? The more of you that don’t get this joke the older I will feel. Adam Neumann is back and he wants to buy WeWork. I’m dying for a WeCrashed sequel and am therefore supportive. Meanwhile, Runway - the AI video startup - is raising their own VC fund, which gives me Zirp flashbacks and Bluesky - Dorsey’s decentralized twitter - is finally open to everyone.

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Adam Neumann is trying to buy WeWork, but Third Point says financing not committed

“Neumann and his startup Flow had “consistently expressed” a “sincere interest” since December 2023 to buy WeWork and its leases out of bankruptcy or provide debtor-in-possession, or DIP, financing”

AI startup Runway is raising a venture capital fund

“Runway, an image and video-focused generative AI company, is raising a $10 million fund to invest in early-stage AI startups”

Bluesky is now open for anyone to join

“As a decentralized platform, Bluesky’s code is completely open source, which gives people outside of the company transparency into what is being built and how. Developers can even write their own code on top of the AT Protocol, so they can create anything from a custom algorithm to an entirely new social platform.”

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Upcoming Live Events

Up Next: Personal Finance Apps Post-Mint

Join us live next week - Thursday, February 15th - at 3pm EST to learn more about the role of personal finance apps in a post-mint world.

For context: Mint was one of the largest personal finance apps in the world and it is being sunset by Intuit, who bought mint for $170M in 2020.

On Deck: Anduril and Defense Tech

Join us live on Thursday, February 22nd to learn more about Anduril and the Defense Tech sector. We're excited to be joined by:

Scott Sanders - Chief Growth Officer @ RRAI

RRAI is an industry-leading vehicle autonomy company providing autonomous driving solutions for defense and commercial applications. Founded in 2002, the Company has leveraged twenty years of experience customizing autonomous solutions to apply best practices across verticals and become a trusted technology partner to the public and private sectors. From people to platforms, at home or overseas, RRAI is driven to make the way you move smarter, safer, and more efficient. To date, their vehicle-agnostic Autonomy Kit has been deployed on four continents in over 10 countries.

Ross Fubini - Managing Partner at XYZ Venture Capital

Operating under the belief that execution solves all problems, XYZ is a venture firm that invests in early-stage founders to help them go faster. XYZ aims to support entrepreneurs in building enduring companies in fintech, enterprise and tech-forgotten industries like insurance and the public sector. The firm primarily backs talented founders at the earliest stages of company building -- people who have discovered a key insight and have an unfair advantage from “doing the work” or based on their own lived experience.

More Details Soon: NYC’s Definitive Demo Day

Really excited to put this event together alongside our friends at Verci. Our goal is to make this a monthly window into the best of what the NYC startup scene has to offer. Great founders building exciting solutions with smart questions from active investors.

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Previously on Sandhill

Most recently: AI & B2B SaaS

This was really great! Thank you to everyone who came out live. For those of you who missed it we had a really insightful conversation with this group of operators:

  • ​​Wade Foster is the Co-founder and CEO of Zapier.

  • ​​Des Traynor is the Co-founder and CSO of Intercom.

  • ​Benjamin Gammell is the CFO at Brex.

You can check out the full recordings below and I’ll be sharing clips on social soon:

​Another shoutout to Walter Chen from Sacra for helping put this together!

Semi-recently: Howard Lindzon and This Is Not Financial Advice

This was great and I think I’m a better investor now after talking to Howard. We even broke the news that he is returning to Stocktwits as CEO after 8 years away!

Check out the full recordings below and stay tuned for clips + key takeaways soon:

It was a winding Friday afternoon conversation that covered everything from what This Is Not Financial Advice is really about to how it’s important to know yourself to be a good investor.

Letters From The Editor

Misc. (short for miscellaneous)

Newsletter-Market-Fit

Constantly thinking about how to be differentiated here. I think news curation is good for shared context, but not a “holy shit that’s great” value driver. I think our live events are unique and valuable, but we need to do a better job of bringing that value into the newsletter rather than just driving towards RSVPs. My commentary is unique (just by definition of it being my thoughts), but the “value” is arguable depending on your taste.

Planning to run through the “How Superhuman Built an Engine to Find Product Market Fit” process here - just need to find time to prioritize it. Fun fact: I think I have run through this process for the thing I was working on at least once a year since 2019. Worth a read if you haven’t already seen it.

As a teaser:

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Talk soon,
Adam

PS - Do you want to sponsor this newsletter or an upcoming live event? Reply to this email and/or shoot a note to [email protected] to learn more.