The investor pulse in Silicon Valley with legendary investor Theresia Gouw

Investor Sentiment, Market Conditions, AI, Super Apps, Diversity & Inclusion

Last week I sat down with Theresia Gouw, a veteran investor and entrepreneur to talk about where she sees market conditions and VC sentiment trending, her take on AI and Super Apps, and her long time passion supporting DE&I initiatives.

What the full discussion below:

Highlights from our chat:

Market Conditions & Investor Sentiment:

1:03 — Theresia is seeing signs of stabilization in private markets after the SVB failure. Valuations and multiples are coming more into line as investors focus on sustainable growth.

3:30 — At Acrew, Theresia’s fund takes a thesis-driven investment philosophy, to identify the right markets, strongest teams, and support companies with clear competitive differentiation.

This has led her to prioritize investments in three core industries:

• Consumer / Community Activated (like Super.com)
• Data Security & Infrastructure (Ketch)
• Fintech (Chime, Divvy)

9:08 — Theresia talks about how AI remains hot and is seeing the highest valuations right now making competition in this sector high.

Super Apps and the Evolution of Super.com:

15:37 — How Super.com evolved from SnapTravel, a chat-based hotel booking company

21:05 — Hear how we’re building a broader SuperApp within the theme of “savings and earnings”

30:00 — Theresia talks about how Elon Musk aspires to build a Super App for Twitter / X, but they are gravitating away from their foundational right to win: news and communication

How AI is Providing New Efficiencies:

15:37 — Super.com didn’t find early success with AI hotel bookings, as customers really wanted a visual interface for options, photos, and reviews. But we did find success with travel recommendations and faster customer service.

20:40 — As we build out our Super App, we’re using AI for a more personalized SuperApp experience for savings and earnings opportunities to drive retention in the ecosystem.

25:20 — Theresia is seeing efficiencies in other industries as well:

• Fintech is demonstrating more customized financial planning
• Digital Health providers are using patient data and their voice to identify early stage health conditions
• Marketing is leveraging AI as a copy co-pilot, using historic copy to make future copywriting more efficient

Diversity & Equity in Venture Capital

32:43 — DE&I has been a passion of Theresia’s for a long time, and ACrew’s Diversity Capital Fund specifically targets diverse startups.

34:50 — Founders and CEOs are now seeing that diversity makes them stronger. The data has actually shown that diverse companies and boards deliver higher return on equity.

Full Set of Notes:

0:10: Theresia Intro

• Entrepreneur prior to VC life (list some investments)

1:03: Investment Philosophy & Market

• Seeing signs of stabilization in the private market after the failure of SVB; Valuations and multiples have come more into line.

3:30: Philosophy: Sectors seeing momentum: AI is hot;

• Thesis driven investment philosophy: The right markets, Good teams, Tech / Competitive Differentiation
• Market Focus: Consumer / Community activated (super.com), Data Security / Infrastructure (Ketch), and Fintech (Chime, Divvy)

3:30: Super.com — Hussein

• Building a strong team — really important to growth stage success (and changes my focus areas as a CEO) — can link to prior shift / twitter post

9:08: AI — Theresia

• Starting to see a moderation in AI investment, but this sector is seeing the highest valuations and investments. Making competition high right now.
• We’ve been investing in Machine Learning (the precursor) 10 years ago, which led us into one of our core focus areas (Data & Security)

15:37: Super.com Evolution

• 6–7 years ago (when we were SnapTravel) we were only hotel booking via chat, and we built an early AI tool to support this, which turned out to not be the most effective use of AI (searching and booking). People wanted that visual view — to see all their options, to see room photos, to read reviews.
• But what we did learn is it could help drive efficiencies elsewhere, like providing travel recommendations to prompts, providing faster customer service, etc.
• We’re now starting to use AI on the UI level to build a broader SuperApp for savings and earnings opportunities across travel, fintech, shopping.

20:40: Theresia followup

• Importance of AI to make the UX easier (21:05) — whether Travel is still the entry point, and how to determine what other products and services to offer?
• Hussein: The reason you come in is for a very specific use case — and then we introduce them to the ecosystem. So each vertical has to stand on its own to bring customers in. Where AI then helps is to say “ok, you have the pay card, it seems like you’re filling up gas 3x a week — we have gas savings offers that we can prioritize in the UI” — personalization is key

25:20: Any other companies doing AI / ML well? (prompt to Theresia)

• Beginning to see AI in Fintech better customize financial planning; Health / Digital Health — for healthcare providers (vs. patients) to optimize health data (one company is using patient data and the patient’s voice to identify early indicators of health issues)
• Marketing: Copy co-pilot that leverages all prior copy to make future copywriting more efficient.

30:00: Hussein: Would over your take on Twitter/X and what chance there is for a superapp here

• Theresia: If we think about a “theme” for Twitter it’s really around news and communication, but that’s not where they’re really focusing right now… and to be successful you really have to start from a place of strength — to build that foundation and right to win.

32:43: Diversity

• Theresia: Passion for a long time — we have a Diversity Capital Fund, which allows me to take this passion into my “day job”.
• Founders / CEOs are starting to realize that a more diverse candidate pool and company demographics actually make them strong — and we’ve proven this with data (more diverse boards and companies have higher ROE long term)
• We also help our companies with finding great candidates to build this diversity — we have a group of 300 executives in our pipeline that we’ve built for this purpose
• Hussein: As a diverse founder (as is my co-founder) this really resonated with me when we were raising our last round. ACrew also helped us find a really great Board member to join, which has been so successful.