Founders Coop

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What went wrong at Techstars

Founders Coop

tl;dr + Techstars was once one of the world’s leading accelerator programs, but has steadily been eclipsed by Y combinator. + Techstars recently announced a string of executive departures and program closures – including termination of the Seattle program, one of its oldest and most successful. + Despite similar beginnings, Techstars chose a different strategic path than Y combinator – those changes compounded over time to strengthen YC and weaken Techstars. + This post unpacks offers an i

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15 Years of Founders’ Co-op

Founders Coop

Founders’ Co-op turns fifteen this year. We started the firm in 2008, on the cusp of the Global Financial Crisis, and it’s somehow fitting to be entering our 15th year as the laws of financial gravity reassert themselves once again. Our firm’s original premise was – and remains – dead simple: Seattle is a global gravity well for engineering talent, thanks to the sustained excellence and corresponding human capital needs of Amazon and Microsoft.

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Zen Capitalism

Founders Coop

We all need a kick in the ass once in a while. I got one Wednesday when I read the New York Times article on Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard’s decision to put his family’s entire $3B ownership stake into a perpetual trust , with 100% of future company profits dedicated to protecting the environment. I worked for Yvon and Malinda in the mid-’90s, first heading up the “technical” products group (all the sport-specific products requiring specialized fabrics and construction), and then leading the

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All the Ways We Were Wrong About Mystery (and the One Key Thing We Got Right)

Founders Coop

To celebrate Mystery’s blockbuster Series A fundraise led by Greylock Partners we decided to review and reflect on the April 2019 investment memo that we wrote in support of our first $500k investment into the company. To date, we’ve now invested $2.5m, a full 10% of our fund. Our third “all-in” position, alongside Ally.io and Logixboard.com.

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Welcoming Goodbill to the Founders’ Co-op family (and the best compliment a VC can ever receive)

Founders Coop

We’re excited to announce our investment in Goodbill , a new consumer advocate that spots and fixes overcharges in hospital bills. We’re even more excited to be sharing this investment with our friends at Maveron, a Seattle-based venture firm with an amazing track record in consumer-first investing. And we’re over the moon to be working with Goodbill co-founders Patrick Haig and Ian Sefferman for the second time.

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Thank you Ally.io

Founders Coop

Only two-and-a-half years ago we welcomed Vetri and Ally.io into the Founders’ Co-op family. Today, we’re congratulating them on joining the Microsoft family , where their vision to bring purpose and alignment to the employee experience will continue towards global scale, but now on a radically accelerated timetable. While we’ll miss spending time in the trenches with Ally.io’s fantastic leadership team in this next stage of their growth, Microsoft is and always was the perfect long term partner

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Reflections on Overnight Success

Founders Coop

Today Seattle fintech unicorn Remitly (NASDAQ: RELY ) begins its journey as a public company. This is obviously a huge milestone for the founders, not to mention the 1,600+ employees who have joined them along the way. It’s a different kind of milestone for me as an investor: 10 years ago I led the company’s Seed round and joined the board, where I served until the Series C.