Masayoshi Makes A Quick $16 Big Ones

Also Disney bet big on Epic Games and OpenAI is getting into the "agent" game.

Author

Adam Hardej
February 08, 2024

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

Masa has the same energy as that one “Bitcoin is the future, bro” friend we all have, except he’s at the helm of basically unlimited money. Masa and the Bitcoins bros are both looking pretty smart nowadays. Meanwhile, Disney is betting big with Epic Games and OpenAI is getting into the “agent” game.

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SoftBank nets $16 billion on Arm earnings pop, exceeding its total losses in WeWork

“Masayoshi Son’s SoftBank made more in Arm’s after-hours trading on Wednesday than the total amount the company lost from its disastrous bet on now-bankrupt WeWork.”

Disney takes a $1.5B stake in Epic Games to build an ‘entertainment universe’ with Fortnite

“Epic and Disney announced today that the companies will partner on an “all-new games and entertainment universe” that will bring characters from Disney’s deep catalogue to life through a tie-in with Fortnite.”

OpenAI developing software that operates devices, automates tasks

“The new assistants - often called "agents" - promise to perform more complex personal and work tasks when commanded to by a human, without needing close supervision.”

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.

Sign up for updates right here right now.

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.

I wonder if Masa and Neumann ever text

Letters From The Editor

Misc. (short for miscellaneous)

Secondaries Picking Back UP

Some quick notes from the trenches: The secondaries market is loving this Epic Games deal and we’ve seen bids jump quickly from almost a year hanging in the mid-$400s per share range up into the $500s or even $600s. This feels like another point for the “we’re back” team and the general feeling among participants (buyers, sellers, brokers, etc.) is that 2024 is setting itself up to be an exciting year. Not everyone will win, but liquidity is rising.

Newsletter-Market-Fit Poll Results

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~20% in the “Very disappointed” and "~20% in the “Somewhat disappointed” isn’t too shabby! I’ll take it. As you would likely guess given the 50k subscriber count - not everyone loves it, but I think that’s how it goes. A few responses:

Very disappointed: “Life without Sandhill memes would not be worth living”

Not disappointed (it isn’t really that great): “Literally all the same "silicon valley" news that every other startup/silicon valley focused newsletter has. With more or less the same irreverent tone. And given your rebrand, sometimes I forget who you guys are or what newsletter I'm reading because the whole thing is so undifferentiated from every other "town rag" for the tech capital.”

Somewhat disappointed: “As someone new to following VC, your insights and commentary are valuable to me. I also enjoy your style and humor. That said, I don't live and breathe VC for my day to day and I'm probably not even your target audience.”

Thank you to everyone who responded and gave feedback!

I will kick off a more formal process here soon :)

Talk soon,
Adam

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