In order to bet on the current wave of the startup, Matt Hartman believes that the venture capitalist needs to deepen the technology that the startups are built.
HARTMAN (photo above) spent nine years as a partner Betaworks before starting a new company. There, we have developed another approach to identify startups with the most promising technological innovation. His mantra: “To invest in software, you need to know the mechanism of software.”
Other VCs are not ignoring technology. However, Hartman said that most companies have already been built to evaluate consumer brands and other businesses that have already achieved the product market. Normally, technical diligence is at the end of the trading process, often limited to CTO consulting of existing portfolio companies.
This approach is inadequate in Hartman's views, especially for AI and other sectors where technical differentiation is important.
“Technology startups are looking for capital from those who understand what they are building, and most venture companies today have been established to actually understand the market compatibility before technology. He didn't, “he said.
Of course, it is unlikely that the only VC has the technical expertise needed to seriously evaluate various startups, so each of them will raise their own networks and areas of their own transactions. It depends on the technical founder's network. Special knowledge.
The CEO of the AI startup CEO Clement Delague (supported while being in Betaworks) was Factial's first procurement partner. Currently, the company has announced some of the other partners. Alex chung, Venmo's co-founder IQRAM MAGDON-Ismail, Delague's co-founder JulieN CHAUMOND and THOMAS WOLF, FAST FORWARD Hilary Mason, and BEME Matt Hacket, a co -founder.
According to Hartman, these founders say, “Ideal for identifying products suitable for the truly novel technical team and product market.”
Magdon Ismile added that he was “excited to return to an incredible founder like a substrate. [and] Modal through this partnership. “
“The founder loves the job with the founder, and the factors make it possible,” he said.
Hartman is not the only investor who bets on active founders to create more investors than full -time VCs. TechCrunch recently wrote about PowerSet. PowerSet is an investment program provided to a small group of founder of $ 1 million to invest in a startup.
In the case of Factial's Sourcing Partners, Hartman states that he can write checks individually and often invests his money with the company. However, if they bring a transaction to the fact, they can make a bigger bet (the company usually invests $ 500,000) and receive half of the interest brought from those transactions.
Hartman has not yet disclosed his first fund, but he is targeting 30 startups. (There is no quota for individual sourcing partners.) He added that the factor model has been able to cover much of a large company by investing early in the promising AI startup. 。
The factor portfolio includes the above -mentioned substrates and modal, and the factory AI, pika, modal, modal, patronus, flores, and adaptive ML.