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Sam Thorpe shared thisVery proud of what our teams are accomplishing and the value that we’re delivering to customers.Sam Thorpe shared thisWe are thrilled to announce that Nitro Sign has been named a Leader in GigaOm Radar Report for eSignature solutions! Learn more about how we were recognized https://lnkd.in/gZ6yPQn5 #leader #esignatures #workflowmanagement #documentproductivityNitro Sign named a Leader in 2022 GigaOm Radar Report for eSignaturesNitro Sign named a Leader in 2022 GigaOm Radar Report for eSignatures
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Sam Thorpe shared thisSharing an exciting milestone for Nitro and for The Nitro Productivity Platform. Wishing a very warm welcome to the entire Connective team.Sam Thorpe shared thisI'm incredibly excited to announce today that Nitro, Inc. has just completed our largest capital raising ever at A$140M (even larger than our 2019 A$110M IPO) and is acquiring Connective, creating a new global force in enterprise and high-trust eSigning. We are thrilled to welcome Nicolas Metivier and his amazing team to the Nitro family. Go NTO! 🚀🚀🚀 #esignature #esigning https://lnkd.in/gVGkdTx9Nitro + Connective: The New Global Force in Enterprise eSigningNitro + Connective: The New Global Force in Enterprise eSigning
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Sam Thorpe shared thisSam Thorpe shared this#ICYMI We acquired PDFpen (by Smile), a suite of PDF productivity apps for Mac, iPad and iPhone. This acquisition extends Nitro’s powerful document productivity solutions to even more users, platforms and devices! Hear more about it from our CPO, Sam Thorpe, who was featured in TidBITS Publishing yesterday: https://lnkd.in/gPWWBEa #PDFpen #PDFproductivity #documentproductivity #documentproductivityplatform #eSigning #digitaltransformation #macOS #workfromanywhere #acquisition
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Sam Thorpe shared thisWe're so excited to have the talented PDFPen team join the Nitro family and provide their powerful suite of Mac and iOS PDF Productivity apps to Nitro customers. Welcome aboard! https://lnkd.in/girMyjWSam Thorpe shared thisWe’re excited to announce the acquisition of PDFpen (by Smile), a suite of PDF productivity apps for Mac, iPad and iPhone. This acquisition extends Nitro’s powerful document productivity solutions to even more users, platforms and devices, and is another step forward in Nitro’s mission to make document productivity easy, powerful and available to all. Read more about it here: http://ow.ly/aE5W50FjtoG #gonitro #PDFpen #PDFproductivity #documentproductivity #documentproductivityplatform #eSigning #digitaltransformation #macOS #workfromanywhere #acquisition
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Sam Thorpe shared thisSam Thorpe shared thisWe're hiring at Nitro for a Senior PM for our Nitro Sign Integrations & API team. The role is a great opportunity to take ownership of an expanding product area, key to wider adoption of Nitro Sign. Reach out to me if you want to learn more! https://lnkd.in/eUytVMe
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Sam Thorpe shared thisFlow Kana's mission is to responsibly build the cannabis industry through sustainable, regenerative farming practices while preserving the independent farming community. ‘The Great Outdoor’ is a new film series that gives an intimate view into the lives of three farmers who we partner with (and are dear to me and our team), season over season. This is the second episode, Summer. Enjoy! https://lnkd.in/gyuatSP #farmers #cannabisindustry #farming #sustainable #outdoor #summer #mission #regenerative #film
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Sam Thorpe shared thisVoices to be celebrated...I learn something every time I interact with Dr. Amanda Reiman.Sam Thorpe shared thisOur VP of Community Relations, Amanda Reiman, is the cannabis industry's voice of reason... and so, so much more. Thank you Green Entrepreneur for this piece on this incredible woman! https://lnkd.in/g-x8Vqw
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Sam Thorpe shared thisTechnical420 talks cannabis banking legislation and how Flow Kana 'is an opportunity to be watching.' https://lnkd.in/gtrdD_N #cannabisbanking #flowkana #cannabis #legislation5 California Cannabis Stocks That Will Benefit From State Chartered Cannabis Banks5 California Cannabis Stocks That Will Benefit From State Chartered Cannabis Banks
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Sam Thorpe shared thisSam Thorpe shared thisFor the last 10 months, we’ve been supporting local food producers through a community supported agriculture (CSA) program for our employees who receive a box of fresh produce from farms in Mendocino, Humboldt and Lake Counties each month. This encourages our employees to live the message of caring where their produce – and cannabis – comes from. Follow the link below to learn more about this incredible vision from Happyday Farms and founders Michael Steinmetz & Flavia Cassani since Flow Kana’s inception. Read more 👉 https://bit.ly/2UNXnS8
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Sam Thorpe reacted on thisSam Thorpe reacted on thisI'm pleased to announce that I'm going to be standing as a candidate for Bradford Council in the local elections in May. After 48 years of moaning, I've decided to try to make a difference for the residents of Eastburn, Silsden and Steeton in their new Airedale Ward. I want to be a voice for them, be an advocate, and help them hold our local government to account and make the small improvements that make a big difference in our lives.
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Sam Thorpe liked thisSam Thorpe liked thisYesterday I had the privilege of delivering a keynote and moderating a panel at an event hosted by Phrase and Argos Multilingual in London, with 50 localization leaders from right across the industry. The theme: Positioning Localization as a Strategic Business Partner. One thing that struck me from the conversations throughout the day: so many localization teams are still fighting to justify their existence - measured on cost per word and turnaround time while the business measures revenue and customer satisfaction. The frameworks I shared focused on a simple idea: while localization’s impact is everywhere, influence is often nowhere. Most teams have never mapped where their influence actually lives: where partnerships are strong, where alignment is broken, and where untapped opportunities exist. The panel discussion with Cristina Núñez Pardo (OURA), Alex Katsambas (OpenTable), Edmund O. (Phrase) and Antoine Rey (Argos) brought this to life with real examples of how their teams are navigating these exact challenges. Biggest takeaway from the room: localization’s strategic value isn’t proven through ROI formulas. It’s built through intentional cross-functional partnerships. Thank you to Patrick and the Phrase team and Antoine and the Argos team for putting together such a well-run event. Looking forward to more collaboration. #localization #internationalgrowth #globalstrategy #SaaS
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Sam Thorpe liked thisSam Thorpe liked thisI decided to put Claude Code agent teams to work exploring fringe scientific theories. If you've seen the movie Oppenheimer, I'm feeling like General Groves (Matt Damon) right now. Feels like I've tapped into what Dario Amodei is calling a "country of geniuses in a datacenter". I want to know what the shape of the electron is. I want to see some pretty pictures, and put my gaming GPU to good use. Gonna crack a beer and keep cracking the universe. My team: a Nobel Prize winner for the physics, a mathematician for the proofs, and a coder who will mass-parallelize the search for truth. https://lnkd.in/g9JmySpuGitHub - jeffmoss/electron-topology: An experiment with Claude agent teamsGitHub - jeffmoss/electron-topology: An experiment with Claude agent teams
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Sam Thorpe reacted on thisSam Thorpe reacted on thisHi friends - Today, I’m excited to share that Particle has been acquired by Digi International. Digi brings more than 40 years of experience delivering reliable, mission-critical connectivity for organizations around the world. Together, we’re combining Digi’s scale and long-term stability with Particle’s modern IoT platform and developer-first approach. For our customers, this is a meaningful step forward. This combination allows us to invest more deeply in the Particle platform, expand our global reach, and continue delivering the high level of service and support our customers rely on now with even greater long-term strength behind it. I’m proud of what the Particle team has built and excited about what’s ahead as part of Digi. 👉 Read more about what this means for our customers here - https://lnkd.in/g9vHYex2.
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Sam Thorpe liked thisSam Thorpe liked thisLisbon, RKO, and one of those weeks that reminds you why you love what you do. Still smiling 🇵🇹 From the stage to the hallway conversations, from deep dives on PDF, Sign, Smart Redact and Automation to laughter over dinner, there’s something special about getting everyone together. This RKO was truly about momentum, focus, and people. Always people. And that might be exactly what I love most. Proud of the work we’re doing, grateful to share the stage with my brilliant colleagues Darragh Ó Drisceoil and Colby Marques and most of all energised by the conversations we’re having with our customers and partners about what’s next. Huge thanks to everyone who made this week what it was and to Lisbon: Obrigado! You were the perfect backdrop for big ideas, warm connections, early morning McDonald's and some very welcome pastel de nata fuel. Excited for what 2026 is shaping up to be. 🤩 Nitro Software
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Sam Thorpe liked thisSam Thorpe liked thisYear 2 of Global10x complete. If 2024 was about diversifying - experimenting, building multiple revenue streams, seeing what stuck - then 2025 was about accelerating. Going deeper on consulting, leaning into workshops, and being more intentional about where I spend my energy. A few moments from the year that stood out: ⚡ Worked with leadership at MotionPoint/MarketFully Group, Workvivo by Zoom, and Braahmam International on go-to-market and international expansion. Each engagement surfaced different versions of the same truth: global growth is rarely blocked by ambition - it’s blocked by unclear strategy. ⚡ Ran GTM workshops with Enterprise Ireland, working with Irish SaaS founders on their first steps towards international expansion. I’ve realised how much I enjoy the workshop format - there’s something energising about helping founders think through hard decisions in real time. ⚡ Spoke at LocWorld in Monterrey and gave the keynote at Unlocked in Barcelona. Both were good reminders of how much I value this community - curious, pragmatic, and generous with experience. ⚡ Continued running Strategic Localization on Maven and writing Unlocking Global Growth on Substack, focusing less on theory and more on how international growth actually gets executed inside companies. What I’m still learning: Building a truly systematic lead-gen engine remains my biggest challenge. Balancing delivery with consistent pipeline building is a real tension, and one I'm still working through. Looking ahead: 2026 is the year to amplify. I’m launching Loc Tech Live in February - an online event designed around practical, lived experience rather than recycled best practices. I’m also doubling down on the workshop model and focusing on the work I enjoy most: helping B2B SaaS companies avoid expensive expansion mistakes by getting strategy and positioning right from the start. If international expansion is on your roadmap for 2026, let’s connect. And if you’ve followed along this year - thank you. I’m grateful for the conversations, feedback, and support. More to come.
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Sam Thorpe reacted on thisSam Thorpe reacted on thisBig day for CrewHero! We’ve been selected as one of five finalists for the 2025 NH Tech Alliance Product of the Year Award. At 4:00pm EST, my cofounder Dave Fairburn is giving a short presentation covering our product and vision. The event will be livestreamed here: ▶️ https://lnkd.in/ecmZV9wB Around 4:45pm EST there will be an **audience vote** to help choose this year's winner. I hope you tune in to see what I've been up to for the past year More to come...
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Sam Thorpe reacted on thisSam Thorpe reacted on this10 days until I drive to Ukraine. We're nowhere near our goal. I'm driving 1,200 miles with aid supplies to the Ukrainian border on November 21st. I can't do it without you. Read why I'm doing this 👇 Then donate or share: https://lnkd.in/eeCHAUdK Every bit counts. Dear network, can I count on you? 🚚🇺🇦 #Fundraiser #StandWithUkraine #SupportUkraine #DonateForUkraineI'm Driving 1200 Miles to Ukraine and I Need Your HelpI'm Driving 1200 Miles to Ukraine and I Need Your HelpRaphael Cohn
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Daniel Dart
Rock Yard Ventures • 10K followers
🚨NEW EPISODE: Recorded live at FUTURE TITANS 2026 - Jeff Perry of Carta sat down with the iconic Seth Levine, co-founder of Foundry. Seth has been in venture for 25 years, built Foundry from scratch as an emerging manager himself, and has backed about 50 emerging manager funds through his fund of funds. He has genuinely seen every side of this table. They went deep on building Foundry, why VCs are in the influence business, not the decision business, and why the concentration problem in venture is not only bad for LPs, but also for the innovation ecosystem overall. And why Seth's new book, Capital Evolution, is so important for the future of America. 🎧 Links to listen... Apple: https://lnkd.in/ehQUQ2EM Spotify: https://lnkd.in/eU4FExpg
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Ken Wilkinson
Legient • 7K followers
California just changed the game for every premium developer. AB 1305, SB 253, and SB 261 are forcing carbon disclosure and decarbonization across commercial real estate. Other states are watching. This is the new baseline. Here's what most developers miss: Your technology decisions today determine your compliance for the next decade. Building automation systems. Energy management platforms. Carbon tracking infrastructure. If IT isn't at the design table now, you're building in compliance gaps that cost millions to fix later. The fix isn't complicated: Bring technology planning into schematic design. Tie every system to your ESG roadmap. Design for adaptability as regulations evolve. We've embedded compliance-grade tech into projects from day one for years. The ones who survive value engineering? The systems tied directly to regulatory requirements. ESG isn't a feature anymore. It's infrastructure. Is your tech stack ready for what's coming in 2026? #ESG #CarbonDisclosure #Decarbonization #BuildingCompliance #CommercialRealEstate #RealEstateDevelopment #PropTech #BuildingAutomation #SustainableDesign #ClimateTech #Layer10 #BuildingTomorrow
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Liron Brish 🎗️
Thombar • 4K followers
This weekend we began converting part of our avocado acreage to prickly pear cactus. Our acreage burned in the Thomas Fire years ago, with trees, irrigation, and other infrastructure destroyed. Since then, we’ve been evaluating long-term alternatives that can handle California’s wildfire and water conditions while still working economically for a specialty grower. Prickly pear cactus is a crop that could meet that bar. • The U.S. imports nearly $900M of cactus fruit and pads each year • It can be dry-farmed, which means no irrigation required • It serves as a living firebreak • It also has emerging uses, from high-value fodder to biofuel feedstock for sustainable aviation fuel We’re fortunate to be testing this hypothesis with Western SARE, Professor @johncushman at University of Nevada, Reno, and the Carpinteria-Summerland Fire District. This is the kind of applied research that specialty growers increasingly need as climate and economics shift. But for crops like this to scale, the financing system has to adapt. Specialty growers can’t transition to climate-resilient crops or new production systems if banking and credit products are still designed around assumptions built for commodity crops. That’s why we’re building Thombar (banking built for specialty growers). Growers need a financial partner aligned with the realities they face, not the models that overlook them. #agfinance #agriculture #specialtycrops #nopales #wildfireresilience
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Sunny Dhillon
Kyber Knight Capital • 56K followers
It's an analogy I hear often: VCs have the same high-risk, high-reward DNA as gamblers. From the gold seeking 49ers at Sutter's Mill to the naming of the largest podcast in our space (“All-In”), there's an undeniable connection between gambling and venture risk-taking. There's a certain "go west" or gambling spirit inherent in building a company from the ground up and backing lots of early startups. Sometimes, you do have to shoot blind, relying on gut instinct about a founder's compelling vision and little else. But here’s where the analogy breaks down: in venture, we aren't simply throwing chips on a roulette table. Our "adventure capitalism" is governed by structure: A Clear Target: Even when we have few signals to evaluate at an early stage, we are aiming at a fast-growing market and/or a proven founder profile. We are not shooting wildly; we're aiming in the right general direction. Due Diligence: We conduct market sizing, reference checks, financial modeling, etc. This is the opposite of blind faith. Fiduciary Responsibility: This is the ultimate check on the "gambler" impulse. This is not our money. We are custodians of other people's money—funds entrusted to us by LPs (current and former Fortune 500 CEOs, successful founders, etc.). Our job is to be disciplined allocators of capital, not reckless adventurers. We are risk-takers, but successful VCs are calculated ones as well. #VentureCapital #VC #Startups
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William Fry
American Operator • 5K followers
California has 6,000 metal fabrication shops and very few successors to run them. Jules Brenner is on a mission to fix that. Our manufacturing crisis is nationwide, but the succession problem is most acute in California. Many retiring owners also own the real estate underneath their shops. As tech and media boomed in CA, property values skyrocketed. Now, a typical owner might have an 8-figure parcel of land and a 7-figure business. With no children eager to take over, many choose the path of least resistance: close up shop and sell the land. That's where Jules comes in. He acquires small- to medium-sized fabs across the state, with a current focus on shops delivering critical infrastructure components (think telecom, transit, energy). He’s an engineer first, and knows how to modernize and grow a fab. Met Jules through his current raise on Mainshares and brought him on SMB15 for a crash course in metal fabrication: - Key roles in metal fabrication - The latest in automation - Importance of certs like AS9100 and ISO standards - The labor market - Competing against China If you're passionate about reindustrializing America, this is a good one. 🎙 Full interview live now (link below).
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Neil Tewari
Conversion • 17K followers
Martin Eberhard played a key role early at Tesla and even brought in Elon Musk. Then he was pushed out of the company for pennies. Founders get most of the attention in Silicon Valley, but the ecosystem is built on the people who take a chance and join early stage ventures. Unfortunately, those same people are often the easiest to cut out. Founders can dilute early employees, change vesting terms, and restructure equity with little effort and zero consequences (you can literally do it in Carta in 5 minutes). Daniel Kottke was a close friend of Steve Jobs and helped build the Apple I and II computers. He got no equity (Steve Wozniak eventually gave him a few of his own shares). Brian Acton co-founded WhatsApp and stayed through the Facebook acquisition. When he left Facebook over privacy concerns, he had to walk away from $850 million in unvested stock. There’s more awareness now around how vesting works, what happens during a liquidity event, and how to think about re-ups and dilution. That’s good. But the truth is, if someone really wants to screw you, they can. It still comes down to one thing: trust the people you work with. Or don’t work with them at all.
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Jonathan Greechan
Founder Capital • 16K followers
Proud to support Esusu as it enters its next phase of growth with a new $50M Series C fundraise! Wemimo Abbey, Samir Goel and team continue to lead the industry in credit building and economic mobility for millions of renters nationwide. Esusu (Founder Institute San Francisco portfolio company) is setting a new standard for combining economic and societal impact. By helping renters get credit (literally) for paying their rent on time, they are increasing financial access and empowering more people to become homeowners - in fact, they have already empowered over $30BN in new mortgages from renters across their system. I'm especially excited about how they plan to leverage their massive dataset to create even more impact. By making rental payment data a more prominent feature in mortgage underwriting, Esusu will be able to increase the number of people that can buy homes and build generational wealth. This is a truly inspiring company 🙌 Read more here: https://lnkd.in/guUKsGtY
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Brendah Njiru
HOMY Robotics • 2K followers
At HOMY Robotics , we’re building caregiving robots to help seniors age in place safely and independently in the comfort of their homes for as long as possible, while giving families support and peace of mind. We’re currently deploying in senior living communities across the Bay Area. If you have aging loved ones or are connected to senior living communities, please reach out at homyrobotics.ai. 🤖💙 Thank you, Adewale Yusuf , for featuring HOMY Robotics!
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TatianaSFcom 🌉🟧
HackathonSF • 14K followers
At Dreamforce 2025, Salesforce and the Benioffs announced over $139 million in new grants — pushing their total lifetime contributions to the Bay Area past $1 billion. 💙 $100M — to build a new UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital and expand care for families in Oakland. 💡 $39M — to public schools, educators, and nonprofits focused on STEM and AI education. This milestone reaffirms Salesforce as San Francisco’s leading corporate philanthropist — blending innovation with deep local impact. From AI readiness in classrooms to world-class pediatric care, the company continues to prove that business can be a platform for change. 👉🏻 https://lnkd.in/g2Td2N3t #Salesforce #Dreamforce #AIeducation #philanthropy #SanFrancisco #innovation #UCSF #Benioff #AIforGood #community #leadership #STEM #healthcare #education #techforgood #CSR #impact #agenticAI #tatianasf #futureofwork #BayArea #dreamforce2025
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Christophe Perih
France fil international • 5K followers
Project Vend reads less like a capability story and more like a governability story. Phase two improved because institutional scaffolding (tools, procedures, role separation) reduced predictable judgment failures—persuasion, compliance blind spots, boundary confusion, values drift. The board-level question isn’t “can an agent run a business?” but “what governance primitives must exist before we delegate authority.” Until incentives, escalation rights, and refusal boundaries are structurally enforced—not merely prompted—agents remain high-performing managers, not autonomous executives.
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David Willbrand
University of Michigan Law… • 32K followers
#TheTenYearFixedTerm. It drives the entire startup ecosystem. Here’s how. Week 4 of “Venture Capital” at the Santa Clara University School of Law. LPs don’t want to be trapped in an illiquid venture capital fund forever, paying annual management fees. How can they get out? There is a secondary market for those interests, but it’s primarily opportunistic, and targets desperate sellers. So without a structural endpoint, they could be trapped forever. And there is: the 10 year fixed term. On that anniversary, subject to possible but limited extensions, the fund must terminate and wind-up, distributing its final assets to its investors. Seems benign, but the impact is massive! 1️⃣ Our #VC and #startup culture is defined by SPEED. Startup-to-growth-to-liquidity, as quickly as possible. Market dynamics are most certainly relevant, and prevalent. But there’s a structural driver as well: yes, the 10 year fixed term. If you are going to fully harvest your fund in 10 years, you need to front-load your investment activity (to ensure that your portfolio companies have at least some time to grow and ripen). So VCs race to deploy their capital within the first 5 years. But that’s not all - they then apply pressure on founders to drive toward exit. Which in virtually all cases, is M&A (sale of the company). The need for LP liquidity within 10 years drives the need for startup speed. 2️⃣ #AgencyCosts refer to the inevitable conflicts-of-interest that arise when one party (the agent) is tasked with acting on behalf of another party (the principal). In the #VC context, the ultimate principal is the #LimitedPartner, and their agent is the #VentureCapitalist. Limited partners want big returns, and liquidity. But what’s to stop the VC from diverting focus (and capital) toward an unending lifestyle instead? In other words, people have their own agendas and motivations. Always. So how does this principal, here, ensure that incentives are aligned and agency costs minimized? Yep. The 10 year fixed term. By dramatically limiting the space for self-dealing by creating a brief window of active existence, the VC is forced to focus on getting to liquidity. They simply do not have the opportunity to selfishly create an endless, self-perpetuating empire underwritten by the limited partners. Bracketed with their carried interest, the VCs are incented to focus on big returns in a concentrated period of time. Exactly what the LPs want! I was on the road this week, and so I recorded the lecture for the students. I normally can’t provide access to my lecture recordings, because they live behind university firewalls, but this week I bootlegged it and uploaded them to my YouTube channel. If you are interested, this lecture (broken into 3 segments) is available there for free - no agency costs in sight! #DWProf
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Chris Gonzales
Pro Partner Capital • 10K followers
Are we seeing a fleeting Silicon Valley: It’s not just about the taxes. For years, the narrative of tech leaders "fleeing California" was blamed on a single number: the 15% (now 5%) tax rate. But the real conversation in the Valley right now is much more human—and much more complex. According to a recent deep dive by TechCrunch, the "Great Dispersal" of 2026 is being driven by three things that money can't fix: 📍 The Rise of the "Micro-Hub": Founders aren't just moving to Austin or Miami anymore. They are seeking "identity-rich" communities in places like Bozeman, MT, and Bentonville, AR, where high-speed satellite internet has made "the middle of nowhere" the new "center of everywhere." The "Quiet Life" Pivot: After a decade of "hustle culture," there is a massive shift toward lifestyle stability. The move isn't just a tax play; it’s a search for better public safety, shorter commutes, and a tangible connection to local community—things that have become increasingly scarce in the Bay Area. The End of Geographic Density: With the 2026 breakthroughs in AI-driven remote collaboration, the "collision of ideas" no longer requires being in a Palo Alto coffee shop. Innovation is becoming decentralized, and for many, California is now a place you visit for board meetings, not where you raise a family. The Takeaway: Silicon Valley isn't dying—it's evolving into a state of mind rather than a zip code. The tech industry is finally learning that you can build the future without losing your sense of place. https://lnkd.in/gtNN7Bn5 #SiliconValley #TechTrends #FutureOfWork #DigitalNomad #CaliforniaExodus #Innovation
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Jonathan Userovici
Headline • 22K followers
The Headline family is experiencing incredible momentum, and today our portfolio company DeepIP is announcing a $25M Series B, bringing total funding to $40M. This is the kind of company that doesn’t just add AI to a workflow, but it sets the standard for an entire category. The momentum speaks for itself: 1️⃣ 10x ARR growth in < 18 months 2️⃣ Trusted by 400+ law firms and leading corporate IP teams globally 3️⃣ 2M+ chats on the DeepIP platform We’ve had the chance to back FX (Francois-Xavier) L. and Edouard D., leading their Seed round with Headline. Watching them take on a problem as complex and high-stakes as patent work has been genuinely impressive. And working with them has been an absolute pleasure: these 2 are coupling very high ambition and humility. Tech built in Europe, but opening the US office very early and FX starting a life in NYC with his family with 0 hesitation in order to build a global category leader in the IP industry. What convinced me early is still what stands out today: patent teams don’t need another standalone AI tool. They need something that fits the way the work actually happens: documents, long-running matters, multiple stakeholders, and zero room for sloppy context handoffs. Big congrats to the whole DeepIP team + Korelya Capital, Balderton & Serena Proud that we’re doubling down at Headline and continuing the support for what’s next!
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Patrick Hunt
New Industry VC • 4K followers
Software needs California. Hardware not so much. The US is a large, diverse place and there are so many great places to build factories. You can start a hardware company in California, but don't plan on scaling it there. https://lnkd.in/gEkHc-BM
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Chris Magaña
IMS Capital Management, Inc. • 3K followers
Good read // The Pacific Northwest is standing at a once-in-a-generation crossroads. If you care about economic development, infrastructure, energy policy, or job growth in Oregon, read up! A massive power demand surge is already underway. The next wave of growth, data centers, EVs, AI infrastructure, advanced manufacturing, and housing, will flood into the regions that can offer inexpensive, reliable, and resilient electricity. A few pulls... >>> Oregon’s electricity demand is projected to jump 30% in the next decade. <<< This is driven by data center expansion, EV adoption, population growth, and advanced industry. >>> Grid capacity is lagging, but Google and CTC Global are stepping in with a solution: advanced transmission conductors that can double power capacity without building new lines. This is about jobs, competitiveness, and unlocking economic opportunity for the next 20 years. I would love to see my beloved PNW and Oregon lead on this.
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Yifan Zhang
AI2 Incubator • 6K followers
Seattle VC panels are not exactly known for being spicy, which is why my AMA with Brooke and Rolanda at AI House last night was so refreshing. We got into the questions founders are too embarrassed to ask out loud. How do VCs actually decide behind closed doors? What counts as traction when you have zero revenue? Is enterprise SaaS dead? Do Seattle founders actually have a shot against the Bay Area? A few takeaways that stood out: ✅ Associates can't get to yes without a partner sponsor — but partners often can't reach deals without associate diligence. Arm them with the facts to fight for you internally. ✅ Expect 50-70 investor conversations before a term sheet. Send your deck a day early but assume nobody read it 😎 ✅ Enterprise SaaS isn't dead, but it's shifting from seat-based to usage and outcome-based pricing. Large orgs still need governed software. ✅ Traction isn't just revenue. How excited are your customers? Would they advocate for you? Paying pilots with automatic, KPI-specific conversion > free trials, every time. ✅ Learning slope > starting background. The strongest founders they've backed adapted fast — not started perfect. Brooke and Rolanda WILL take a second meeting even if you whiff the first one! ✅ Seattle has fantastic enterprise buyers and founders with sales relationships into them. But the equity-vs-cash culture gap is real, and hiring against big tech is still hard. What made it different was how candid Brooke and Rolanda were about what actually happens after your pitch ends, aka the internal deal dynamics most founders never see. Shoutout to the room full of 100+ early-stage founders who went against the Seattle grain and asked hard questions live to the VCs. That energy is what makes AI House work. Huge thanks to Brooke B. (FUSE) and Rolanda Fu (Madrona) for keeping it real! More AMAs like this coming. Tag a founder who we should invite for the next one! #AIHouse (photo credit to Jonathan G. Blanco 🛠)
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Jose Adrian Luna Maya
Official Moon Cookies • 4K followers
San Francisco’s Paradox I walked the streets of San Francisco recently. Between boarded-up storefronts and billion-dollar unicorn offices, I saw the strangest paradox: a city collapsing and reinventing itself at the same time. For every person leaving, one more arrives with a startup dream. For every store that shuts, another AI lab opens. That’s the strange alchemy of this city: decay and innovation happening in the same zip code. Entrepreneurship thrives in paradox. Great founders look at broken systems not with despair, but with hunger. The cracks become entry points. The collapse becomes opportunity. If cities have souls, San Francisco has one made of contradictions—and maybe that’s why it’s still the epicenter of big ideas. Hashtags: #Innovation #Startups #SanFrancisco #SiliconValley #Cities
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Patrick Henry
EvoNexus • 11K followers
Some great thoughts from my friend Neal Bloom🎩 about the critical importance of Founders in the starting and building of companies, and a startup ecosystem in a community. Sometimes we lose sight of this important fact. Service providers, non-profits, Angel investor, and venture capitalists are here to service the startup companies, and they are anchored by founders. He references a great book written by Brad Feld, “Startup Communities”. For those that don’t know, Brad is an entrepreneur, author, blogger, and venture capitalist at Foundry Group in Boulder, Colorado, a firm he started with partners Seth Levine, Ryan McIntyre, and Jason Mendelson. #sandiego #startups #venturecapital
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Andrew Miller
ATM Holdings, Inc. • 7K followers
Random Sunday Thoughts #197: CEO edition 1. This week, I spoke with a Founder/CEO friend who runs one of the fastest growing companies in tech. We met when I oversaw the acquisition of his company's exact match .com domain. While I represented the seller, I worked with both sides to get to an outcome everyone was excited about. On our call, he emphatically said, "we were a very successful, profitable company before we acquired the domain, but within days of doing so, it became apparent to me that it is the arguably the most important strategic decision I have made since I founded the company over 4 years ago". He went on to recite the many reasons why, and most of all, he said his investors (tier 1 VCs) have applauded the decision (a mid 7 figure asset investment) more than anyone. It got me thinking... 2. Every scaling company eventually has the same conversation, usually in a board meeting, often later than they expected. It starts with a domain. Early on, nobody worries about it. There’s a workaround. A hyphen, an extra word like “join” or “hello" or "the", or god forbid a secondary TLD that seems serviceable as a compromise , at least for now. At the start it works, as growth hides a lot of inefficiency. Then the company scales, and there’s real spending behind the brand. There are real enterprise decisions, customers, and investor conversations. This is when small things creep up and start getting expensive; traffic leaking to search and the exact match domain, branded keywords getting bid up, URLs that need explanation, and emails that go to the wrong place. Case studies show the costs massively exceed the cost of the exact match domain name asset. Users don’t remember modifiers, hyphens, and alternate extensions. They remember the brand, and they default to .com, which has been ingrained as part of the brand every single day across all mediums. A domain isn’t just a website. It is your brand, your signature, your email address. It’s spoken out loud. Every time someone asks “is there a dash in that"?, or "is that .io or .co", when they intuitively assume you mean and only hear .com”, creates friction, and friction compounds ,especially at scale. As Jeff Bezos says, "people default to .com because it's what they trust” and USV's Fred Wilson has noted, "every time you have to explain your domain, you're creating friction". 3. Last Saturday was the moving memorial service for Bobby Weir in SF. It was sad, inspirational, and touching. Highlights were Bob's daughter Chloe saying, "In 30 years, I hope a 60 year old says to a 20 year old, I saw them with Bobby",and John Mayer leading the crowd and family in a moving Ripple. John’s deference & appreciation for being chosen for Dead and Co is evident https://lnkd.in/eiSkxdxg 4. I had a blast on this week's Domain Sherpa. It was a pod worth watching, https://lnkd.in/ebTe6QGx 5. For all the category and exact match brand domains we own or rep, www.ATMHoldings.com Until Next Week #domainames
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