Excited for LA tech
After 20 years in the Bay Area and the Silicon Valley tech world, my husband and I are packing up the kids and dog and moving to LA. Neither of us had jobs lined up in LA and it’s not like its possible to save money while living in SF with 3 kids, but I was having a #girlboss moment and feeling confident that I could move to LA and find my people… and find I did!
I did a whirlwind get-to-know-LA-tech tour. The universities are incredible (stay tuned for my class at Caltech on product management), the entrepreneurs are everywhere, the VC funds are all growing, and everyone in LA is high fiving. I am still a huge believer that the entrepreneurship in our country will lead us to great things, but the VC world of the Bay Area has started to feel manic. The past decade has seen less venture investment in LA, but no less innovation and no fewer entrepreneurs. As a consequence, the biggest difference between LA and SF tech may be that the LA companies tend to have grown with revenue.
In the course of meeting tons of founders, I grew to appreciate the truly collaborative approach the venture funds down here have taken to building the LA ecosystem — funding rounds are often shared, the partners all have great things to say about each other, and the ecosystem is working together and building a culture that I found distinct and more laid back, genuine and creative than SF in many positive ways.
But I was still thinking that I’d join a startup and continue as an operator until I met David and Austin at TenOneTen. TenOneTen does early stage investing, but it also feels like a startup itself. I’ve known Gil and Eytan since Google acquired their company and it became Google AdSense in 2003. The TenOneTen team are incredible investors (7 unicorns in less than 100 investments!), great operators (David took one of his companies public) and people I can learn from. They are techies who like to invest in engineer founders and their founders love them. I’m excited to join TenOneTen in a full-time role finding and supporting the great entrepreneurs in LA and beyond.
Thank you to @Dana, Kara, Eva, Emily, Jenny and all the women who’ve been forging this path and offered me a helping hand. I’m excited to be joining the small but growing number of women in VC.
