This episode was particularly a fun one to record in that we moved a bit away from our traditional interview format to more of a water-cooler format with Mac Conwell of RareBreed Ventures and Roy Bahat of Bloomberg Beta for a wide-ranging chat about the state of emerging venture capital.
As many may now, Mac is using the seldom used 506C provision of Reg D to publicly solicit capital for his new fund (RareBreed VC). While many rolling fund managers use the 506C provision, Mac is not conducting his raise on the AngelList platform.
Previously to starting RareBreed, Mac was an investor at the Maryland Technology Development Corporation’s Minority Business Pre-seed Fund, a partnership between TEDCO and Harbor Bank Community Development Corporation to address the needs of minority entrepreneurs in Maryland, who often lack access to Friends and Family rounds. He also has operating experience from his time as co-founder and CEO at Redberry Mobile and of Given.
Roy Bahat is the head of Bloomberg Beta, which invests in the main category of the future of work and has a portfolio that includes Slack, Kaggle (acq. By Google), and MasterClass. They occasionally also invest directly into emerging managers to help drive financial performance. Prior to his life as a VC, Bahat founded start-ups, served as a corporate executive at News Corp., and worked in government in the office of New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg.
In this episode we discuss the following topics:
01:18 The unique structure of RareBreed Ventures
03:09 How a Twitter following and new venture software made it possible for Rarebreed to launch a 506(c) structured fund
07:00 Roy’s view on investing
16:18 Raising a fund versus raising capital for a company. Is it different?
18:45 How the fundraising process helped Mac find his own unique brand.
22:01 Using LP feedback to your advantage
23:32 Searching not selling when looking for LPs
25:25 Is LP capital really scarce?
26:48 Questions LPs often ask to first time managers
29:22 What makes an exceptional GP
33:45 Giving up economics to early investors
36:40 Is the notion of a GP commit outdated when assessing GP-LP alignment?
42:08 What post-COVID VC will look like
Mentioned in this episode:
I’d love to know what you took away from this conversation with Mac and Roy. Follow me @SamirKaji and give me your insights and questions with the hashtag #ventureunlocked. If you’d like to be considered as a guest or have someone you’d like to hear from (GP or LP), drop me a direct message on Twitter.
Podcast Production support provided by Agent Bee Agency
Mac Conwell of RareBreed Ventures & Roy Bahat of Bloomberg Beta on the state of Emerging VC - Venture Unlocked 020