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Back to COVID-19 & Impact on Startups, Venture Capital & Public Markets.

Are Startups Doomed to Fail Amid the Coronavirus Turmoil

Some advice to startup founders on what to do, in order to remain alive.

@Jason: If you've got a deal on the table, take the money. Assume no money will get raised for 3-6 months. Take salary cuts and extend your runaway. Get everybody to safety. Make sure your company is alive. "Take the medicine."

@Friedberg: Figure out where your customers are heading, and adjust your strategy. Stop focusing on growth and focus on sustainability.

@Chamath: Venture capitalists and their limited partners are currently over-leveraged in their other investments. As they are trying to stay afloat, they will force venture investments to a lower capitalisation, to preserve their overall portfolio thesis. As a result, startups need 36-months of runaway, in order to stay alive. Don't take the risk, if you don't have to.

Transcript

COVID-19 & Impact on Startups, Venture Capital & Public Markets ·

All-In

More from this episode

  1. What Risks Did Coronavirus Lockdowns Raise?Health: We need to ramp up testing to get a better idea of who is infect and how the virus is spreading. Policy: It is frightening.
  2. Are There Any Good News About SARS-CoV-2There are several data points that are showing us that there may be an unexpectedly high number of people that get this disease and don't have any symptoms…
  3. Why Aren't We Using Experimental Drugs to Cure This CoronavirusWe have not done proper medical studies to validate if these drugs actually work and what we have is anecdotal evidence collected by doctors on the front-lines.
  4. What Is the Death Rate for Covid-19The Wu Han data was estimated to be 1.4% of the infected population, and Wu Han was the worst data out of China.
  5. Is the Lockdown NecessaryIt's a nuanced question and it should be a little bit more involved in terms of treatment, testing and containment strategy.
  6. How Can We Get Back to a Normal LifeChamath - "Now we have to decide that a short term suspension of typical civil liberties is worth the trade off.
  7. How Accurate Is the Data on This CoronavirusIt is not representative.
  8. Does Chamath Support Bailouts for Big Companies?If the big business use this money to buy-back their own shares, the companies will look fantastic on paper, but it won't do much for the economy.
  9. Is This Virus Going to Change Our Outlook on LifeChamath think this is a great time to reset your view of the world.

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