American Dynamism (with Katherine Boyle)
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I think this the first time doing video in hotel rooms.

I know I know will be fun.

And the funniest thing is David and I are in hotel rooms down the hall, recording different rooms, so we get Better audio quality.

Man doing live in person events, again, is awesome, but yields a whole new level of complexity.

whole new level.

Hi.

let's do IT I. Busy, you wait, you wait, you who? Easy is down, say story. Welcome to this special .

episode of acquired the podcast about great technology companies and the stories and playbooks behind them. I'm then gilbert, and I am the co founder and managing director of seattle based pioneer square labs and our venture fund.

p. Sl ventures. I'm David din tall and I am an Angel investor based. And if IT is go and we are your hosts.

David, this should be a very fun. I fine, I say, should be. We recorded this already. I know that was a fascinating conversation.

We are speaking to you from the future. We had a great, great fun conversation here with my good friend Catherine boyle, who is a just a wonderful investor. She's a general partner, and addressing horror witz, where he leads their american dynamism practice.

We dive all into what that means, why this is an important vertical, both for venture investing in technology and the world in for america, but also for and reason why they decided to do this. Her background, her story is fascinating. SHE was a reporter at the washington post in the previous era, and then came out to silicon valley, went to G, S, P.

That's where we intersected, and then became a venture capitalist. SHE just has an amazing story. And we were pumped to get to do IT with her.

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Come join us in the slack. We are twelve thousand strong. We would love to have you there if you are not there already. And with that, none of this in his investment advice. David and I and any of our guests may hold interests in things discussed on the show and make sure you do your own research. All right, now onto our interview with Katherine boyle, a general partner at in recent horror, ds.

Catherine. Welcome to acquired IT is so great to have you here. Thanks so much for having me.

We've each other for a long time, but I am huge fed, so it's so great to be here.

I think we met just after you graduated from gsp, right?

Yeah, it's been a journey yet.

Totally has. Oh my god, we'll get all into that later. But let's start off with the most important, most interesting things going on right now, which for you and and in the whole technology landscape, which which is what you and and jesson call this, the pieces of american dynamism. IT brings me back till like a brick hathaway episodes, and believe in america, believe in the power that like make things Better yeah and there's a lot of the opposite side out there right now. So maybe to start, could you tell us what the american dynamism this is means to you and and reason?

sure. So the most simple definition is its companies that support the national interest. So it's everything from companies that sell directly to government like ero space and defense, these classic industrial sectors that have been supporting government since the in amid twenty of century, but then also things that every citizens cares about and takes part of.

So education, housing, transportation, infrastructure, these really big categories that we when we look back through kind of the history of technology, there's been so much technological innovation, but at the same time, in the last thirty years of software really hasn't touched a lot of these physical spaces. And so what we noticed through our portfolio is that some of the most important companies, some of the largest companies actually fAllen into this category. That's outside of consumer technology and its outside of enterprise technology.

It's outside of these categories that sort of venture capital has found themselves sort of creating. But these become big companies that affect most people in the country. So the kind of broader definition is these are companies that support the national interests.

Often times they sell a government, sometimes they compete with government, other times just heavily regulated by government, but they touch everyone. And so we're excited to build a practice around this thesis. Could also because we feel like the tail winds are unique for this moment that and especially coming out of code.

And Katherine, does that include things that supports the national interest that aren't necessarily sort of defense or foreign policy related on thinking health care and thinking education? Big swath of the american economy and american time spent domestically?

definitely. yes. So I mean, education and housing are you are two areas that I think venture capital hasn't touch as much as a health care lic.

If you look at like the last ten yours, digital health has just grown tremendously. And we have we have a separate bio and health fund. But the same camp, he said, for education and housing. And education is one of these things that I think, coming out of coffee.

People really realize that we are still Operating on a ninety century model, and that when the kind of world had to shut down, there were not that many good solutions for the vast majority of americans to educate their children. And whether B, K. Through twelve or things like hier education. One of the things we are noticing coming out of covet is that there's just a tremendous founder appetite for innovating a model that is really a twenty first century model of how we're going to educate people. You know that, that's going deeper into the now, but we really do see these big categories that can be transformative that are often times funded by government as needing the help of technologists and private sector in order to transform some of these categories.

So everything you're saying in some ways sounds a little bit like how could you possibly argue with that? This all seems obvious. Of course, we want prosperity, and at least those of us in america, the american way to be as prosper as possible.

And for as many people around the world who want that sort of lifestyle to have, that sort of life style freedom, democracy, that those sorts of things, free markets, what are the counter arguments? Why is this not a no brainer? And why are you a little bit out on a limb in our industry being a person who is beating this drum?

Ah because I think these are hard sectors that cannot argument to investing in the physical world is that it's not your software. I think the argument against investing in defense, the argument against investment in a lot of these physical sectors is when they have been around for a long time. And so there's usually a lot of regulatory capture we can get into kind of what the defense sector looks like and White.

So to innovate into cancer, know in cases of transportation like these are important large sash with the economy, but there's entrenched interest. There's large players. So it's always been harder.

That kind of history of silicon valley, as you all know. And in many of the episodes that you've done, it's like a lot of people innovate on the things where there's not an existing sector. Sometimes there is a lot easier to innovate in the virtual world, in the physical. So I think there is sort of been a focus on how do we build some of these big sectors of the economy where there aren't intransitive sts, were software plugs and perfectly where the economics look perfect. And I think these companies are just harder to build, as we like to say, like these companies go deeper down the jay curve, they often don't look that good at series a to take curve.

of course, being an initial and investment in venture capital, you know it's going to a look bad. You're to your irr is going to go negative as your investing period before the returns come. But yeah, so I love that deeper on the j curve.

yeah. I mean, you look at space sex. And space sex is one of the most important companies on the largest private venture by companies. And yet for the first ten years of space there was a lot of fear and a of worried that investors wouldn't necessarily be returned to IT was often talked about its like you destroy three rockets before the fourth actually work said there was a ton of sort of questions even until very recently around the business model space said. So I think for a lot of these companies, they take extraordinary founders.

Sometimes they have some technical risks, sometimes as they require a more capital at front, sometimes they have longer periods of how we'll have to stay private or how they will be venture back. But ultimately, they are such brads of the american economy, as you have said. And also, they become holding companies earlier.

Like this is something we can get into about like why these companies are a little unique. But a lot of times, if you are looking at companies and consumer enterprise, we will see three or four different competitors going after a similar market, and they're all competing and IT. Often times you see one or aceves companies that look like that are able to go public, and that's fine.

These companies usually become holding companies pretty quickly and attract all of the talent. There's finite talent around things like airspace. There's fine light talent around things like defense.

So you don't see as many competitors. And as I said, they are harder build in the beginning in but towards like the middle part of these companies traducing. They're really just competing against themselves and really trying to compete against legacy.

And well, this is good. So maybe before we dive into some example companies, the specifics of the teases itself, i'm curious what was the intellectual process maybe for you personally, but also i'm cares like within a sixteen z, you have these as a firm, these vertical practices now, which has been done in venture before, but not nearly to the degree that you all are doing IT. Now how did this vertical kind of originally did IT start with. Mark, uh, time to build blog poster. You know, at the beginning of covet like what is IT look like within the firm of like, hey, I think we should create a vertical yeah .

IT certainly starts with its time to build. I mean, that was, I think, the impetus for everyone realizing that the story of silicon di precoe is very different than the story that is about to come. But I think we all very much believe that that the world fundamentally changed.

Anyone who doesn't believe that from a historical context or technology contexts in paying attention, the world fundamentally changed with covet and will be rein those of the positive aspects of IT and the negative aspects of IT for generations to come. So I think there was that understanding. But then I also think one of the observations that I had is that silicon valley very good at understanding kind of consumer businesses that are very good at understanding how to make businesses more efficient. But silicon valley has never touched government. That kind of narrative around how silicon valley works with government has always been like try to stay as far away .

as possible which is so ironic given you recovered somewhat to the origins of silent valley on on this show and like don valentine was selling the department of defense back in the day yeah that something .

that is not understood in the modern history of silicon valley and and of course, silicon value was built on defense investment. But this sort of view that software could actually ever work with government of the D. D.

But it's just viewed as the procurement of these types of technologies is almost impossible. And so there, husband, sort of I think this sort of twenty, thirty years sort of do not engage kind of modern wisdom from venture capital firms has been it's just too hard. There's so much other stuff to do. There's so much other time to build.

Let's make sure that we don't take off the regulators in some way and in some ways, like when you look at the geography of washington versus silicon valley, I think that is part of the magic of sick valley is that merged so far away from washington to emerge in a totally different part of the country with a totally different history, and IT sort of outside of the east coast establishment that are the seller, or that like very much understands how the world works. And so there is a reason why silk valley has emerged in a way that IT has. But I think my background, I ate at ten years in washington, I was sort of the center of my universe until I came out to sick bali.

And I was stunned by the fact that there was sort of very little overlap between what people in northern california that sort of having we're talking about and people in washington cared about. And of course, when you look at IT from A D, C perspective, these markets are so large. They are the most important markets.

That's why they are regulated and because they touch everyone. Why are we so afraid of working with them? And so I think that was always just a question and intellectual question in my mind of, is IT possible for some of these companies to actually do the work of government.

And then I started doing these sorts of kind of research. I wrote piece for the washing and post twenty eighteen about how actually IT seemed like silicon valley was actually doing a lot of the work of government. They just didn't want anyone to know about IT or talk about IT. They didn't think of IT in those terms. Not everything from space ex and talented er with chew, our companies that really were helping intelligence agencies or NASA, you know the kind of classical ROM, but also things like lift and uber that were completely transforming public transport action and cities across america.

not to mention the cloud providers. There was a big jedi contract.

Oh absolutely, that's a whole other story because that was A A good example of, say, google point out of working with government because they had employees who didn't say early want to work with the dod. So yeah, there was a lot of just, I think, events happening that made people realize that silicon valley is actually a lot closer to working with government that people realized and that whether you think it's good or bad or or you know there's a value segment, I think, on IT from a lot of sides. But whether you think it's good.

bad at happening, he was already happening here.

Yeah and IT happens in a very organic way, and it's definitely not going away for a lot of factors i'm sure will get into well.

it's funny, even not thinking about the company serving government as a customer. You take plentier, for example, let's say you run an experiment where you have a bunch of people doing and building very innovative things. And then over the course of seventy years, that compounding at a high rate.

Well, at some point, that goes from being garage projects to creating a lot of the value and infrastructure in a society. And so at some point these things have to come to ahead because here we are. And i'm thinking about the time frame from one thousand nine hundred fifty eight to twenty and twenty 也是 a lot of the infrastructure that everyone outside the tech community uses in their data。 Day lives now are born of the tech community in silicon valley. And it's just it's just the math you're gonna keep compounding that capital that tell those innovations in our way of life is now based on the things built in this community.

yes. This is also a function of and this is one of the things that I think is actually kind of force the government to say OK, we're going to have to work with the private sector in a way that's probably a lot deeper than what we used to do in terms of a defense industrial base. Software is a revolution that he is completely touching every aspect of society.

But the people who are building the best forms of software are not going into government. And that is actually a radical change from how government used to work. I used to love to build internally that we sort of the thesis, we need tanks and battleships, and we can get those from the private sector.

We actually like to build our own international tools. And so anyone who's a student of history of company building in that sort of thing is like that is not what's happening in the best companies you can choose to build or buy. But like the vast majority of companies that are getting off the ground or using external tools is of a outsourcing, is sort of a decentralizing that happening even in company building that we can get in to.

But like the government has not realized that in terms of how IT precure software. And so if you talk to people who are in the bureaucracy of government, it's like their private life of catching the uber to go home, the door dash so they can get food delivered. They have this complete, Normal consumer internet private life that all of a share, and then they go into government and takes thirty minutes to start their computer.

It's like being back in the one thousand nine and eighties. And it's one of the biggest frustrations because there's a lot of great, I would say, especially the D, D, I think is the best example of the most forward thinking part of government that actually understands technology. I mean, this is the most frustrating thing for people to say.

I'm living in a time more of when I go to work and we can understand that as people who are you know kind of in this modern tech ecosystem of yeah we have these modern tools, we go to work. We're conversing right now and IT feels great and it's easy and it's simple like that is just not how the government works. And so it's one of the last hold outs.

To your point, we have this like mega theme on acquired of don't do stuff that doesn't make your beer taste Better. The origin of IT was with this is when he was launching A W S. At why combinator, know, fifteen years ago, but probably to seventy percent of our sponsors here. You don't find up modern treasury though. It's just in the water now that like, of course, the way you succeed, the way you build great products is you be really, really greater one thing and then you use the whole sweet of other products that are built in the ecosystem that are really, really grated everything else you need .

yeah even when we think about okay, why is the cost of starting to start up gone down? Tremendous slam, that is the case. Like you don't have to build everything from scratch, you can buy the one place that still does that is government. It's actually incredible. And of course, like how they're doing that, where where they're using taxpayer dollars to build internally.

So when we talk about the sort of why have defense budget blooded, you know, even if we're looking at education and sort of the kind of major changes that are going to come from, like why are these things that are civic goods expensive now? Is because IT is very difficult to use the technology that would actually make them cheaper. Then you look at I think there's a famous A I unlike everything has come down the coast curve like televisions are less expensive. Everything is less expensive in consumer land except for health care, except for housing and except for education. And it's really because technology has not touch the sectors and will not touch those sectors unless we do something about IT.

And there's mostly a regulatory capture in those sectors.

Yeah, I do think that is we can talk about classic regulatory capture, but IT is also this idea that like none of those sectors use technology yet. And so going back to sort of like what is the thesis if we truly believe software eating the world, which we do, this is like the last hold out and it's such a massive hold out, but it's something where it's a good IT is deeply tied to the physical world. IT is not something that you can do, just the virtual world alone.

So one of the core negatives I think we have on acquired that anybody use a long time listener is probably asking themselves right now is there's you know sort of three components of being right in a big way to an investment. This there is being correct. There is being non consensus incorrect.

But then there's also getting the timing right the line now. And I think that's the natural question right for you. And very sixteen and launching this vertical know was IT code they created this moment. Why is now the right time that this is finally gonna change?

Yeah, it's a fantastic question, I think especially when you put all of these sectors together, me and these are desperate sectors. The reasons for why education is compelling right now, we're very different than the reasons why manufacturing is compelling right now. So I do think bradley IT has a lot to do with coffee, but I also think there's a couple other things that make IT a really interesting time.

One is that the talent is very different in silicon valley and that it's not just an outpost. And I use the term silicon vali broadly. I should say i'm in miami like silicon valley is an idea, not a place.

But when I say silicon valley, I mean the people who are leaving the culture and going to the canner culture to build, and they're building with technology because they want to solve real problems. And that used to be like a bunches of nerds that used to be people who would major in computer science. And they were, you know, they were in the engineering department, and they were really interested in infrastructure, like technology infrastructure, not the infrastructure that i'm talking about.

And I think what happened and i've written about this, is, I think the myth of silicon valley hit everyone really hard to wear, like the culture and the counter culture merged. And now people who would have gone into government, people who would have gone into very different career, say, I have this problem and I want to solve IT. And and by the way, going back to a whole, you can take things off the shelf and build a company without necessarily knowing how to build your own infrastructure for the company like they can build companies to.

And so you see a lot of founders who are not your typical profile. They're not engineers. I've talked to founders recently who are former teachers.

I've talked to founders recently who you know have worked in the department of defense as procurement officers. And it's like they're not the Normal people we would say are the founders of ten years ago. I mean, there's a lot of reasons for that. And what that leads to is people are going into various different sectors. And the sectors that they went into.

most recently, you've talked about this before elsewhere. But the social network coming out now seven years ago, I think IT was which is wild yeah that really like started this moment, right of being a founder, like you say, the merging of the culture and the counter culture, even though the movie might have been intended as a cautionary tale. If you want to do, you can do this.

When you look at any good movies about industries and that sort of thing, it's like they're always yeah their cautionary tales. But then that leads to just a flood of Young people saying, I want to do that to me that certainly the kind of the eight guarding deco sort of, why did so many people look at a villain and say, always a superhero? I want to go do that.

But it's true. Like a lot of these movies, there's always a question of, do they create the myth or they responded to the myth. But I do think the social network came out at just the right time where Young people said, wow, this technology thing is really interested.

And maybe I want to be a part of IT and maybe I want to make up my own. Maybe I don't want necessarily create a social network, but oh, it's a real thing and I want to be part of IT. And I do think that, that would set off of the okay, that doesn't have to be the nerds.

Now it's become the thing that every kid who goes to a university and says, hey, I can go work in a kind of traditional job or I can work with a bunch of my friends to do this. So one, by the way, there's a blood of capital. And of course, we can talk about kind of the macro now.

But like for a very long time, we were the bull market where IT was a gloom of capital. Any kid with an engineering degree who had a bunch of friends could come out to see the convey an raised of money. So IT was actually like a very, I say, an easy way, but IT IT was a simpler way to solve problems.

And probably the only way that Young people could actually do something where they felt they were having an impact. You, I talk a lot about like if you wanted to be someone in washington to have an impact, you would go work for, like the ranking member of congress and you would get that person coffee. So it's like, does that really ambitious person who wants to change the world want to be delivering coffee of senators? Or do they want to come out to silicon valley and like work on an education product, work on a housing product? And so I think you saw ten years of Young people saying no turn anymore. Like I actually wants to solve some things and actually have the tidal CEO a founder. So I do think that is sort of a Young people's revolution that we're going to continue seeing that.

Do you think that silicon valley went from being counterculture to perhaps too much infrastructure on how to be a startup? And let me frame this question with a little bit more context. If you think about lots of institutions throughout history, they went from becoming an exciting frontier to becoming a bog down institution that perhaps brought people and who weren't looking for the frontier.

And that is probably a phenomenal example. You could look at the space race, lots of people who would have started companies today, we're going to work at NASA because, oh my god, we have a ten year mission or eight year mission to go land on the moon. And then you look at NASA, I actually think we should draw a hard line in the early two thousands because there's been a really big switch that we can talk about later. But let's say in the late nineties, it's a lot of like bureaucrats, process people, people who went to polish something for seven years to accomplish what used to take one, because we now have all this process in place. Do you think silicon valley has so much infrastructure now that IT is attracting the nineties NASA people instead of the sixty's NASA people?

Maybe three weeks ago, we could have that conversation. And or three months ago, we could have that conversation and bit a little more worried about IT. I do think markets are self correcting in that respect. So you can talk people who have been through downturns before. I have I, me I know not someone who was work, even silicon value in two thousand one but .

like you have some partners who were.

yes, yeah, the sort of natural corrections that happen to us often leave. And in sort of people realize that they have to think differently. There's, you know, the kind of famous than horis a peacetime CEO S S wartime C E O there sort like peace time and silicone vers work time and sick.

Well, I do think there is some of this question. Are we entering that now? And that leads to a lot of innovation, especially for early stage companies, I mean, companies that are built historically, companies that have been built in downturns become tremendous successes because they sort of have to rethink the playbook. I mean, you could make the argument that a lot of people are going to have to be going through that and that the most innovative things, kers will win coming up through what we're seeing.

I think this is the perfect place to switch. Gives a little bit big billing off the social network. You know that period, that time between I think IT was twenty eleven when I came out, and today is somewhere along that time.

You know, everything you are saying about Young people want to go build realizing old institutions. You weren't necessarily the place to have the that was also kind of your personal story. Could you tell us, uh, know about your background before coming to silicon valley and that personal story of why you did because they get super well in here.

Certainly, it's going to sound a lot more forward thinking in retrospect than IT was. The actual answer of why I left washington and why I left the washington post was that I was convinced I was going to be fired. And IT was a terrible, terrible time to be in journalism.

I was there from twenty ten to early twenty fourteen, and I actually left write us, jeff bazo, the washington post, which people look at the institution now and they think, well, it's really strugling along, its incredible. But when I was there, there was a fear that he would go under bankrupcy. Then that was kind of the fear that a lot of media companies were going through before the sort of great resulting man.

I was working at the wall street journal a few years before, and like we were like, think god were owned by news corner like otherwise, if dow Jones were still independent, like the post was at that point in time, there was no surviving. Has an independent entity totally.

It's entertainingly to look back on hindsight. But when I was there, I think the big thing that I was noticing this, you know, I was not a technology reporter, but every story I was writing had something to do with technology touching all institutions.

How do we deal with this modern ization? How do we bring tech into these various institutions in washington that have never had to deal with a texas I consumer? And IT was one of these things where I said, okay, like if i'm going to figure out with uncovering these stories and this is the biggest story of our time, why not be part of IT? So IT really did feel like I was fortunate to be able to come out to the valley and actually kind of studied IT as a student of history.

What is happening here? What is my own view of of what's going on with all of these movements? And I was, I think, the biggest culture shock I had ever experienced.

I sort of lived around the world at that point. And when I came out of silicon valley, I said IT in some way. I didn't even feel like the country I knew people were so heads down.

They don't read the news. That was another thing I was done about, like no one talked about what was happening on in the data day news of the world. People were just focusing on their own passions and projects. And that was new to be the other thing that was really new to me is in washington.

And and i'd say broadly y ever where else in the world there is sort of this weight, your term mentality, this sort of you can email someone, but if they're the C E O of a company, you are not going to really paid that much attention to a Young student and or to a Young person. I got out to silicon vali was extended, like people just wanted talk. And I was like, why do people want to talk? And I like because the incentives are aligned. They don't want to mix the next big thing. And so was incredible as a former journalist coming out and be enable to email anyone and realizing that, like people, would I answer my email IT was like sort of another shock of a different kind, like, people will actually let you in their office, you know.

IT should be the opposite, right? When a washington post journalist emails me like that. Much more interesting that I called email from someone with a gmail address, and most in areas. But perhaps you are feeling as a journalist that people were nervous to answer your emails for fear of being on the record.

Yeah, no one. And I also just think this is a different conversation about media that I think was evolving at the time when I move. There is no upside to talking to the media and the minds of people who are heads down building, but there's a lot of upside of talking to someone who might be your next employee.

There's a ton of upside if you're an investor to talking to a Young person who might build a new company, but like talking to someone who was only going to get information about what's happening and derail europe plan. So that was something where I think had I thought more about IT, I wouldn't have been as surprised. But I was just like, people want to talk to a student you like, good.

This is why silicon valley is the most peculiar place in the world because it's the only place where incentives are aligned with that sort of positive some mentality where IT places like dc, no one ever turns down talking to the press because it's information trading. It's a consulting ass. It's a group of people who very much see as zero us and mindset and like the process, a lot of power there because of that. So the incentives of the ecosystems are so diametrically opposed. I actually think, coming back to the faces that one of the reasons why we haven't seen that much innovation in washington, I mean, they are so different as ecosystems.

So you know, when you made the choice to make that transition out to silicon valley, the choice to have the reaction to like, well, shoot, things are not going so well here i'm going to go see what it's like on the other side versus, i'm gonna complain about IT and, you know, bit on hope is a strategy and stay here. What did all of your networks in washington say? Like, I mean, that must have been a really very non consented choice to make.

It's interesting because trying to put myself in the shoes of myself a very long time ago. And what i'll say is like most people in silicon valley have not experienced what IT is like to be in a dying industry for one. I think people were happy that there were Young people choosing to leave because it's like was a constraining environment.

IT was like, okay, great. Like we don't have to fire this person now. You know, it's like, IT was really, really bad. I can't stress mean there were these things called caky. We even had a name for IT.

And it's any time that someone was forced to take a buyout or forced to leave, they would bring in a cake, they would wheel and cakes. And sometimes, like on fridays, they would be like just cakes going across the newsroom and people crying and like people celebrating all these great colleagues who support more like winners of the people. surprise.

These are not people who should be fired. But IT was such a bad ecosystem. So no one really said anything. They were just like, okay, at least you got out.

You know, if you found a life raft, that's great you know, I will say, like six months before I left, my editor took me to lunch. This is like great management. She's like, it'll be painful for you to leave like gonna pay to have someone who, you know.

I was one of the Younger people on the team. I would work seven days a week. Sometimes I would write three stories in the section and they were just bleeding people.

She's like, IT will be painful, but you were Young enough to do something new with your life and i'm forever grateful to her for like saying IT wasn't your bad at your job. It's actually was reflecting on this recently that maybe three years ago we went out to drinks. I visited the new improved news room.

and IT was this.

Now it's marble columns, and we went out for drinks, said she's like, you were good, but you could have been great and I, like, sort of brought me to tears. I was like, like SHE actually told me I should leave because he saw what was happening probably before I actually realize that you know what it's like a journalist. I will think they're going to be like the next bob wood word.

But I think, why did I go? It's sick. Well, if you're going to start ever from scratch in some ways, like you're going to start over from scratch when I go to california, like that always been sort of the the american dream is move west and find something new.

But IT really was IT say OK like, I need to understand this tech thing. And I had have been exposed to the culture, but I don't have a reaction that IT was a bad thing. I had a reaction more that I was the future and the bigger story of our time.

What were you covering at the post? So it's .

interesting with the style section .

reporter at the post that a big deal.

It's interesting. The style section has a very storied history of being where writer is, right? So there's always this question of, are you a writer? Are you a reporter? And I think the number of people at the style section who would say that they are writers first in reporter second, is actually quite high.

So and that was when I was there, it's changed a lots ince i've left. But for people who really enjoyed language and enjoyed doing three thousand and five thousand word stories about just random things, one of the famous pieces style section publish when I was there was the difference between sheet and wala. And I was a ten thousand word piece on, just like, convenient stores on the interstate.

the best.

But you would read these like, you know, great tom wolf sort of meditations on just american culture. But I was a Young reporter there. It's like that's what you aspire to do.

You aspire to write these ridiculous pieces about random things. But I was more like the joy of language and the joy of culture than even the kind of reporting aspect of IT. So I was a general assignment reporter. I wrote about culture and it's interesting because people often ask me they are like, what's the connection between venture capital and journalism and I think people often think about like, oh, you know, the hard knows journalists .

who is doing diligence yeah, yeah. I think don valentine said mike Martin and Steve jobs with the two best question asks I ever met yeah and I believe that.

I mean, that's one of the aspects where they're similar. But I also think the sort of similarity of what I saw in my colleagues and what I did is it's like trying to get at the forefront of cultural shifts, even if you don't know what they mean, just trying to see how these, like, these weird movements that are happening in society. And like, maybe you should be the first person they are to talk to these weirdos, these random people.

And that was sort of the like, what's the weird, interesting thing that's happening? And now most of that happens on the internet. That I think is the real shift is that like all the weird, interesting movements in the world now come as internet born movements. And that's often times what venture capitals are looking for as well.

Clearly, you can still have such love and reverence for that world and for the post the world weren't today, especially you know with the injuries in horror, IT does feel like in some ways they're on the other side and there's like a battle going on now, specifically battle between the old world media and technology. The world of media .

has completely changed since I was a journalist. There was in a sense that you were at war when I was a journalist. And I think that, of course, changed with a number of things, like everything from trump being elected to the types of people that are going into journalism, even the idea of what journalism means.

I mean, a lot of the people that I worked with when I was a journalist had this very old school view, and it's talked about a lot. It's the, are you reporting the facts or are you an activist? And there are a lot of people who will point blank say, now they are going into journalists to change the culture, to change the world.

They are activists, and they will use that word. They will say, I am an activist. You know, I was part of a generation of people who would have bzzzz at that. There were people when I was at the washington ton post that wouldn't vote in elections because they didn't believe that they should be voting in elections if they were covering certain stories.

And I had such admiration for that, that if you are going to be the person who is on the sidelines of the culture, reporting on the culture, that you should really do your best to take a neutral stand. And I took a lot of pride in that as well, covering things that were uncomfortable for me. That was something that I actually revealed about sort of a old style view of journalism that I think has completely transformed and changed in terms of the people who are now at the forefront.

I think there's reasons for that. I think a lot of IT is twitter. I was pre twitter actually becoming what IT is when I was at the washington post. And there was still a view that social media should be second to our actual reporting.

I think that is if you read the recent reports from the new york times about how they are kind of curtail their twitter use because we've realized that, that it's completely changed how they report. I think, the kind of biggest trend in media. And I can talk about another one of our investment sub stack, which I think has sort of benefit from the trends that people are now brands, they are identities.

And the individual journalist is ultimately more powerful than the institution. And I think that that's just one of many trans or institutions are collapsed in and and kind of individuals mean you all know there's look at what you've built that individuals will capture an audience and be more important than an institution. Now so when I talk about being a former journalist, i'm really talking about the stone age that was ten years ago. But that type of journalism does not exist anymore.

So funny. Feel the same way. Thinking back on by time at the wall street journal, even though I was on the business side not ringing, I know exactly what you're talking about with that style of journalism. The people who were the managing editors, the deputy managing editors, the section editors at the journal of the time, like they were those people. And IT, yes, it's so different than today.

I was only there for a few years now. I've been invested twice as long as i've been a journalist at this point. You know, it's something that captures people's imagination and IT sort of like, how did IT affect you? And IT really is.

It's like, I think the greatest way that IT affect to me was, I think, starting your career off and a dying industry gives you a different perspective. Then if you start your career off and a company that is just filled with abundance, you understand what death looks like versus momentum. And that was probably very formative for me, coming out to the valley and then seeing what good looks like.

It's the same thing as as child psychology studies of people that always not necessarily grew up with a tremendous amount of wealth, but who did not come from scarcity. And so there is a general underlying belief in every subsequent decision that gets made that always be OK totally.

And I think the same .

sort of translates to career decisions and people being willing to take risks and believe that there is a growing pie rather than I need to fight for my corner of IT and also just understanding culture.

I don't think people understand the difference between a culture of scarcity and a culture of abundance unless theyve experienced both. And I do think i've been really fortunate now. I'm definitely part of a culture of abundance.

And an abundance culture leads to, yes, IT leads to how you can try that. The idea of building an american dynamism practice can only come out of a place that IT has movement and that has growth. Those types of things cannot be built in a culture of scarcity.

And I do think washington is a culture of scarcity just by its nature that the incentives are every two years there's an election and half the people who are in charge believe in the other half will come in and the people who are kicked out, we will go to think tanks. And IT is very zero sum and it's every two to four years. IT is not a long term cycle because that just just not how we structured our democracy.

okay. Here's a niki response though. How is IT a culture of scarcity when every decade since one thousand and thirteen, the government has a bigger budget and significantly more employees than i've ever had before?

So if that is very true, I mean, we could very much talk about the blow of government, the fact that IT doesn't feel like a culture of scarcity when we look at taxpayers. But in terms of who that gets power. And remember the currency, washington is not money that is power.

Power is scarce and that is extremely hierarchical. There can be in multiple winners. Someone wins the new cycle every day.

That's another part like we have to remember that news is part of the washington establishment. There's a reason why it's called the forth. The state IT is part of the anchor of government.

So all of these things are very scarce. Only one story can be the front page story. Only one percent can hold the most power.

And that is anathema to silicon valley and the culture. Silicon valley is equity, IT is money, IT is success. That is building in bigger businesses faster. And there can be as many of those as possible.

Yes, you could argue that in certain sectors, there will only be one winner, but this is why you see founders helping other founders, venture capitalist and have a portfolio winners. There is a culture of abundance. IT changes the incentives, structures and IT changes how people think about solving problems.

Quite interesting thinking about that. There is this idea of, if everybody in a sector is paying attention to the same thing, call IT, whatever political reporting on, or whoever has the most air time on cable news that day, that means that no matter how large had counts and budgets get, there is a fix supply of the thing people want, which is attention in power. But when the thing people want is money, and we can say IT a nicer terms than that, but financial success telly, what that is that is not a finite supply. We're not hedged fun managers.

This is something that I think often times as misconstruction washington is like, oh, I remember talking to some reporters are used to work with. They're like all you people who think you're changing in the world, like at least the hedge fun guys didn't think they were changing the world. And in my response was, do you not see the difference? no.

I actually think one of the biggest, biggest problems with how we've been lumped in with other asset classes. I remember when I first moved to the valley and I was private equity and venture capital. Private equity and venture capital as a category could not be more different from what they are doing.

Venture capital is creating new things from nothing, and that is creating more jobs. IT is pouring money into companies if they can grow, expand and solve new problems with the most modern technology possible. And private equity is the death of old companies, and it's consolidating them, firing people and ensuring that are going to be able to create value from things that have already existed.

Man, the heads, fun people sounds pretty good now at least they're neutral.

Yeah, you could fly like that, argue IT. When you look at those, everything is lumped together in the minds of washington. It's like you're all just making money.

So when I say like equity, ity is the currency. What I mean is like people come here and they actually build things and the incentives driving how things are built. It's a system that actually works and encourages growth and encourages creation.

I think we have to be very about that, which is very different than east coasts, private ugly. And it's very different than hedge funds in which that is not what people are focused on. And I think one of the greatest tragedy uses that we're all on together.

I think so much of our audience is like a complete outsider to washington. Link is IT gosh, to talk about, like making money, starting things building, like is that like looked down upon?

You know, I recently moved to miami, and one of things that I love about miami is that there is no shame. And I actually think this is one of the big problems of silicon valley like miami. It's like, IT doesn't matter what you are doing, everyone is dressed to the nines.

IT doesn't matter if you're someone who works an hourly job or if you're someone who is, you know a real estate mogo who'd like to those people before all the tech people. But it's like there are all these kind of weird things that people were doing in miami, but everyone took pride. It's like IT is a culture.

I've been proud of what you have earned. And I do think that comes from IT is the city in the us. With the largest born born population.

A lot of the people who come to miami have come from countries that have collapsed. They're proud of capitalism. Mean, because of the cuban population, they are extremely anti communist. And there's just this view that like if you work hard and it's like a culture of hard work and is a culture of hustle, you should celebrate that. And I actually think silicon valley has the .

hardest st problem with that. interesting.

That was always stunning to me in silicon valley. It's like you don't see the same displays of we're proud of what we have built. In fact, like there's a lot of people, silicon valley, who build something and then apologize for IT. And it's .

like they're ashamed. Seattle is far worse at this.

Seattle is far worse living up here.

It's like the bay area except even your shoes aren't nice. There's billionaire walking around on hiking pants.

We're talking about personal displays of wealth, I think yes, that is go tian, so you can value definition atal. People are proud of the companies that we've built and the size of, like my company did one hundred million in revenue or I get a unico status evaluation, my people are proud of that.

That's true. And IT goes back to this. We are creating something. IT is we are creating something.

And you all know this Better than anyone in the number of founders that you have interviewed. It's like founders, especially the best founders, are so obsessed with that creation story. Even the incentives that are used to a line people on the mission.

And that's more what I met when I said, like equity and that what is the currency? What is the thing that is traded that makes the system go IT is equity. But why people come here IT is so much more IT is driven to create something real.

And it's usually driven to write the wrongs of whatever you've experience in a previous industry or you know, like that so much, yes, of what is driving people. But one of the things i've been pleasant, surprised with in an ecosystem like miami is that people are not ashamed to be successful. And I do think that that is uniquely kind of american dream, part of what silicon valley should be, what IT is and what a historically was. And as that people were really proud of what they're achieved and the number of people they are am coin and what they're building. And weirdly, I think washington in some corners has moved away from that that story of creation.

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yes. So let's talk about what I think is probably now another huge megaton to come for the decades ahead, the exporting of silicon valley to the rest of the country and the rest of the world. You've been talking about IT.

You're there in my amy. You you don't hear in california more seattle or the west coast. How is your personal experience bit over the past two years with that?

This is a core part of the american dynamism theses. Maybe talking through a couple companies that explain this trend will make IT clear because I think now we've talked about kind of your a typical founder, someone who came from different industries is who felt like they were able to build a company. You know, that happened and a lot of those people felt like they were forced to move to a silent valley or or maybe, in some cases, network.

What I now seen and what we're seeing in our own portfolio is that those people can build from anywhere. And what that means for the country, IT, is an extraordinary thing that silicon valley could be exported to the rest of the country. I mean, that will be game changing.

When you think of just post war, how there was sort of this myth that if you were someone who was high achievement, someone who wanted to have a career, you had to go to certain universities, you had to leave your state, and then you had to go to one of a handful of cities. And the impact that has had on the country has been very detrimental, that there is brain rain from certain states that has benefit. Places like Evanses go in new york and were telling the story fifty years from now, we're looking back on what happened.

The thing that I will come out of cove IT is that people have now said, I do not need to be in separate us. go. I can be anywhere in the world and anywhere in the country, and I can be in my hometown building something.

And there's enough talent there to do IT where there's enough talent around the country that can do IT remotely. And so i'm incredibly bullish with that american dynamism will not only be companies that are built around the country, but there will also be just different types of problems because founders who wouldn't have gone to safran, csa are now building for their hometowns. I'll give a perfect example of this because I think this is one of my favorite examples in our portfolio.

So there's a company called flock safety that was A Y sy company built in the atlanta by second time. Founders get at langly extraordinary founder, and he had just built a small company before and said, I want to go after one of the biggest problems. What do I want to do? And he's like, why is IT so hard to eliminate crime like most crimes are done with a car? Rather, they we're talking about petty crimes.

Or if things like Amber alert trial cut up, like why is IT so hard in era of software and of cameras around the world? Halt, like, why is IT so hard to solve crime? And so he built a very small camera license plate readers, realizing that so many of the license great readers around the country were very expensive, built by legacy systems and in some way of public safety contractors, and started selling them to homeland's associations of selling them to neighbors.

Od saying, put up this camera will be able to track cars, not people, which was very important to him. And with the network of cameras, like, maybe we can solve crime. And what started happening around atlanta is they didn't do any press, but these cameras started actually solving very dangerous crime, things like child kidnappings.

And they were covered on the nightlife news, and then more homework associations would buy them. And then after a while, police chiefs across the country just started contacting them and bound, can you give us some of these cameras? And so now there are in thirty states, they've grown tremendously over the last few years.

But IT was something that was built so that they could solve one of the biggest problems that they solve in their community. And so that's where I think that they're a perfect example of an american dynamic company of a company that is solving civic needs, selling to government but didn't actually start out selling to government, but ultimately built for their community. And it's incredible, you know, this is in atlantis, the company which I think five years ago, people would have said, can you build and very large company in atlanta?

Oh my god, i'm thinking, as you're saying this, like I used to live this as a veta capital, I was the bad guy. On the other side of the equation of company in an interesting market gets traction in A X, Y, Z city. Had lana know whatever they're resting enough that you silicon valley venture capital writ large is interested probably the in the second meeting that you have with your B, C before the terms here they like.

So you're based in leana. Do you really want to build something big? You gotta move here.

yeah. And anything for a long time, that was the view. And what cover has changed is everyone realizes that's not the case. By the way, people want to move to places like atlanta. It's a great city.

The same thing with miami and Austin and provo, utah thought, like city, like there are so many places that people want to live, but didn't feel like they could do IT. Because the myth was, you have to be in silicon valley. You have to be a new york, if you are a serious person.

And I think that completely changed after covet. And so the number of new companies we are going to see sprout up in second and third ties across america. I don't even think IT has to be really big cities and they that can be smaller towns, the remote work movement, I think we will spur so many of these great companies and really just lead to a democratization of attack around the country.

Do you feel that now that like you personally, a sixteen z generally the year geography is the internet at this point leg, you know, versus anything else?

I think kova made that inevitable. All of us were keeping our relationships online. It's so funny. A couple years before covet, people would mock people who spends ing much time on twitter.

They would mock people who were in their signal chats, like why rents you going to cocktail parties, like how you really meet people's building relationships and person. And I very much disagree with that view. I mean, when you think i've sort of like the early internet, people were hanging out in chat rooms, they were all weird avatars.

That was all so to anonymous, and you see that more in the cypher to world now, but it's like covet LED to this sort of rebirth of, actually, you could build relationships online actually. Gz, like that's how they build their relationships, that they make friends, not with their neighbors or not with the kids that are in their class, like they're all over the country. And like that's a great thing, is that people can find community online.

And so the idea that investors aren't trying to find community online or or founders aren't going to find their next higher online like the internet is not this thing that's not part of our lives. And then i'd say in some ways, like the physical world is definitely downstream of the internet and culture is downstream of the internet, but we clearly need both. And of course, I invested in the physical world, but it's like what we're doing right now is through the enabled of the virtual.

So what's the path now breek of IT, the path for a company that was you in the of the calibrated Andrews and horse could lead at series air, series b. The path for that company was book a one way ticket to S, F, O. And stay on the financial as long as you need driving up and down sand hill, meeting with ferb zo until you get a turkey.

What's the path? Now, as an example, like how did you meet them? How did they present? How does the relationship happen? Well, how to board meetings happen?

What does that look like? I'll sure the story of how I met hAdrian, which was my first investment since being an din horwich, and sort of how that relationship loss because that's another los Angeles based company, typically not a place where VC spent much time. But of course, with the emergence of the just extraordinary new space movement, there's a lot of people spending a lot more time for different reasons in los Angeles.

And I know my partners are certainly spending time there and games and other areas too, but hydra S A company where IT was our first formal investment out of the american dynamism practice. And it's a company that is building automated machine shops for ero space and defense manufacturing. So talk about a sector that technology just did not go to.

We just mention the private equity world. And it's like private equity had been buy a machine for a long time, seeing that is a great place to do roll ups and to cut people. But in terms of have like building jobs and creating new machine shops to actually service needs of these large ero space companies, that was not something that silicon value was interested in or that technology was really interested.

And the origin story of that company, the founder, Chris power, is this extraordinary founder who moved from australia few years ago, was very devoted to this idea that he wanted to do something in manufacturing, and I wanted to build something new, but actually started out with, hey, maybe the only way is to raise a small private equity funds. So he raise a small private equity fun and talk to a bunch of different shops, machine shops, where people are retiring. I mean, the nature of this field is that a lot of the machine shops are owned by people who are baby bombers.

They're trying to get out and their kids don't have the the pity that either leave the shops or want to. And he realized he's like this is a nightmare of what is about to happen, like this is an impending nightmare. Because even if you are to try to bring software into these existing shops as almost impossible from a technical perspective, like there's not much that can be done unless you build something from scratch.

So we actually return capital to his investors and said, this is not. From a private equity standpoint with existing shops. And we have to build new machine shops with automation. And then we have to up skill american workers so that they can do this type of work like we need to bring in a new generation machines who are technically competent, but but can also where IT doesn't require some sort of special artisan knowledge.

And so he built his first factories now onto a second and is serving a lot of large area space and defense company in a lot of the new space sector. And it's one of these things where you talk about how we met. We met through a number of people in the ecosystem.

It's like it's one of these things. And I always joke about any time you hear this about a founder like you should always like pick your head up. It's like every third call I was having about ero space, about like what's happening, defense, his name would come up. This company would come up.

As this is one of these things where if IT doesn't succeed, like we will be in a bind, like we will be in to bind, if we can't get hearts delivered as a hardwork company, or if we have to fly out to a random machine shop in middle the country and like find out why things are delayed and so was one of these things were yeah lic you hear people talking about IT on the internet, but you also hear IT just in your entire network that everyone is rooting for a founder to succeed. And that's also it's just like what's so cool about a lot of these companies. They don't have real competition.

Everyone is excited about their success because if they don't create this world of abundance and a lot of these categories will all suffer and particularly thinc airspace and defense will suffer. So that's one of the companies that point to because one is an immigrant founder solving one of america's biggest problems. It's been built in los Angeles at the heart of our defense and era space industry.

It's right next to the customer. It's be able to interface with the customer every day. And that IT also has this really, really important mission that I think is people see IT as secondary what's actually happening. But IT will be the legacy of this company, which is that you are up skilling in a generation of people who were told that working with their hands was embarrassing, who were told that they had to go to college and they had to recount.

You're describing .

David college experience.

probably mine too. Yeah, right. We can joke about IT.

But like we were told, if you have an interest and doing something that your value comes from going to college, your value comes from having one of these jobs .

and we were told, you know, don't worry, IT all work out. Oh yeah, we've been lucky. IT has for us, but for so many people, IT hasn't. For a lot of .

people who graduated right at the great recession, IT was like OK. The myth in the lie has been exposed. And so we need companies that are saying, actually, you can be part of this start up revolution.

You can work hand in hand with the people who are era space engineers as a machines, and we're going to solve these problems together. And that looks a lot more like what silicon valley looked like in the forties and the fifties. This is what the innovation with the department of defense ve looked like.

And as so the can bali was coming up in the sixties and the seventies, and IT was a very different type of community of people. And so i'm excited for that because I do think that like we are going to see that renaissance people working together. And it's just it's great that hydra an is sort of emblematic of sort of the innovation we think is going to happen with the practice.

You mentioned them sub stack earlier. You are thinking about like, I think one of the greatest problems facing america, western society broadly right now is just like all these people that meet jobs that little red content or didn't, but like, you know what to do, how to like, how are people going to make money in this new society? And you know, how was middle class gna thrive? You've talked about, lots of people have talked about.

You know, the survey is now that, like, for the first time in generations, most americans believe their kids are going be worse. Often they are, and filled that they're worse off than their parents at the same time as all this, you know, we're talking about these companies at sixteen z funds that our power law DNA ics with these huge, huge outcomes. At the same time, there is this new middle ass on the internet. We're kind of like doing IT right now in this conversation, you know in lots of subsectors. Are two, is that part of the american dynamism?

This is too we're a little bit more tailored in terms of like a lot of the companies that we are invested in now have a physical component. They don't necessarily need to. And I do think they touch government, but I do think you're pointing out a trend that is so important that I think a lot of people are missing, which is that these companies are leading to a revolution for people who want to be individual creators like the creator or economy.

Thing is, you know, people have their theories on eat. Its like you do see people are building new types of businesses through this enabling technology. And IT is a small business revolution.

The thing that I get upset with when washington talks about tech is that it's this monolithic thing. Everyone points to big tech and everything falls into big tech. But small tech is actually the thing that gets me excited.

It's the fact that I invest in early stage companies. I invest in companies from the napkin stage, and those are small companies. Those are small businesses.

Of course, they aim to become large businesses because the incentive structure of venture capital and the incentive structure means that we want to see things grow, and that's good. We should not be afraid of that. But these are like wonderful small businesses.

And now people across the country can use the tools that have been built to enable these businesses. And so whether you're talking about, like, as you said, substate or shop ify, where people are building incredible businesses on the platform or whether it's hey, like there's a lot of capital available. And now i'm a founder in miami and I want to build a company here and I want to employ people in miami and it's fantastic.

But were talking about small businesses, that's what's really exciting is like we can talk about companies that are too big or things that get the focus of washington and get people riled up on both sides of IT. It's like the only thing washington can actually agree on as a bahai c but like not that of creation is giving a small tech. And like where I am focused in american dynamic.

And these are small tech companies that are trying to solve the country's big problems. And so we should support that. That's exciting. And it's also like this method of company building that I don't think people have realized.

I think our generation has I don't think older generations that are outside technology have realized that yet that this is the new way of company building. Whether you're in middle amErica or whether you're in silicon valley, like this is how companies are going to be built in perpetuity. And so we need to be excited about that like nothing is not attack business anymore.

嗯嗯， it's funny. We even know for being and us being and so looking reality made up myself like when I transition to making acquired my foul time thing, I didn't know how to talk about IT even here to the capital of the silicon value.

Like the thing that I landed on after a couple months of trying to explain what the heck IT was I when we were doing that seemed to resonate the best, was as like, well, we're building a small business on the internet. And because of the internet can actually be a pretty big small business. But like but that's what we're doing yeah .

and we should celebrate that we are a country of small businesses. And the worst thing that can happen is when all of the talent goes to certain hubs and abandoned rest of the country. And so I do think the centralization that we saw in tech may be over the last, say, decade.

We're now experiencing this decentralized. And you know of the fact that I am investing from florida, of all places, which you know I grew up in florida. And like, did I ever think before of IT that I would be returning to florida in any point my life? No, I I don't think IT was possible.

Loved florida. But like, I certainly did not fake that. You know, the world would change to where everything can become centralized and people could associate where they live from where they work. But if we're all working online and if we're all online, this is actually a really good thing for the rest of the country. So I am hugely excited about that trend, and I think we'll look back and say, well, like the post war movement to new york city and to some persic, o didn't have to be the end alb all of the american experience.

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Can I have a question for you that is somewhere on the border of moral philosophy in politics? And I know that's a dangerous tee up, a good one, but in investing in american infrastructure projects, both to improve our footing domestically, but also to ensure continued prosperity in the international community defense projects, things like that, there's a implied assumption that the continuation and of the american way is a good thing. And I think there are a lots of good answers as to why.

That's a great assumption. But why is that to you when you are going to bed in and you're like, i'm funding this mission, what is IT about the american way where you're like? This is a very good thing that i'm investing in this. This question is so .

interesting because I used to get this question a lot more, say, five years ago. So i've worked with a company called t Andrew for a very long time actually since seed round. And this was one of them more contrarian. It's kind to say it's contrarian, but I can also say it's unpopular. When the investment first happened, I was excited about the mission of the company.

But I think I had because I came from washington, I kind of knew what would happen in a way that I think a lot of other people in IT, which was defense with something that was deeply unpopular in ago. And now when you talk to people about andal, all they can talk about is ukraine. It's like people are watching on a world stage, like what happens when a country invades another sovereign.

Like, we haven't seen a war like this since world war two. And people are now realizing actually like we need strong defence. IT is not something that anyone wants to be right about, honestly.

Like IT is painful and IT is horrible to watch. But what I think was so clear about that investment was like time would tell why we need new defense contractors, especially ones that are built with modern technology. And so going back to the journalist point, like i've always understood what conviction looks like and sort of like when other people see something as deeply unpopular.

You say I am totally find standing up and saying that history will serve us right or defending why I believe something is so important. But that was so clear to me. It's like one of the clearest investments I think i've ever made where IT was so clear that people were going to change their minds about the company. And I just extraordinary to see IT is grown tremendously over the last five years, multiple offices now working with australia, the U K. IT is a company that I think everyone is just so happy exists and realizes that, hey, we need modern defense contractors, not ones that we're built in the one thousand nine hundred.

And so what is IT about the american way that fires you up and says we should have a lot more of this for a lot longer time?

I think amErica is the greatest experiment in human history. The vast majority of americans come from somewhere else. My grandfather drove a truck and having an eighth great education. The fact i'm sitting here is a miracle, and the fact that I get to do this job is a miracle. And the thing that has always motivated me, and the thing that's very clear is that something like fifty percent of unique founders in this country are foreign orn, and they are sometimes the greatest test, I think, to what that means to live the american dream. It's the same thing of why i'm so excited to live in miami because of people are what this country stands for, about what you're able to achieve here, what you're able to build.

If you go to any other country as a venture capitalist, as a founder, and you talk to people, whether it's elected officials are, you talk to people who are also working on civic technology, the question you get is like, how do we become like you? Like, how do we do this? How do we create this unique thing?

I do think the founders experience in this country looks a lot like what the founders did in this country, where IT is just like a rejection of everything they have known to build something new. And usually it's these people who are misfits, contrarians, doing something that say like no one else can do. IT is an american experience and it's an american type of investigation.

And it's like even the model for venture capital is something that is deeply part of the silk valley story. And so it's like there's just something so part of the history of this country, of what we're doing. And so I think when you look at other countries and other ecosystems that are merging using this model, which is exciting and extraordinary and that something I think we're all excited about, it's following a story that was created here.

I mean, we tell IT on acquired almost every episode, really like a negative and and in video, know where else could somebody come from air conditioner engineer and not in this country. Then Jenny ended going to reform school and now he's Jason. No.

yeah, yeah.

That is a pretty unique ly american story.

totally a country of miss fits where people come to escape and build something new. It's like, that is the silicon valley story. I mean, like I was escaping, my reality is about to be fired.

Journalist, that is like the kind of motivating factor if I had nothing to lose. And you all know this, you talk to so many founders and it's like they're coming from a place if we have nothing to lose, and that is such a motivating force. And then you add all of the incentive alignment of everyone trying to see that there's more innovation and ecosystem.

The thing that i'm most hopeful about, and I think if we do our jobs right over the next ten years, this will be the case. I want to see that instead of alignment across the country so that it's not just this unique thing that's in northern california and that a certain class people are privy to that. It's like IT is everywhere.

I love that. Well, Katherine, as we went to a close here, any parting thoughts or anything you want to leave listeners with going .

back to your original question of like as a venture firm, how do you create a new practice? I think if we do our jobs rate and we invest in the companies that we're intending to invest in and we tell the story, right, I think every venture capital firm, we have an and dynamism practice.

And while like selfishly as an investor, like I don't necessarily want that, but as an american, I want that I want every firm to say, actually this is the best place to be investing. Can't believe we weren't looking at IT and the just extraordinary opportunity. And it's not impact investing.

It's not sg. It's not just like a we're going to see incremental returns like IT is going to be the source of american innovation. And IT is a great place for the top venture firms to be investing.

And so I think if we do our jobs right, we will see this new category. And it'll be just like Price to be just like consumer. And i'm excited for that to happen, truly. And I think that sort of the story of the next ten, twenty years of silent valley.

well, it's cause you you can see IT starting like spaces. The first piece of this that I think I went from deeply unconcerned s in silicon value to now pretty consensus.

yeah. One of the things that I think is made this easier, like we see these companies in our portfolio before we had this practice, like me, they are sorry. So IT is not something where it's like over creating something completely new from nothing.

It's like there are a lot of success cases, but the idea that is just going to be this one off like, no, this is going to be a categories of innovation that becomes almost like you have to be investing actively in this category in the same way that no sas wasn't a thing. And then now it's like, who would say or we don't invest in sas, that is what I think is going to happen, but it's not just going to be this one off. So maybe we're an investor in this weird thing just to know this is a category of innovation that's going to be driving this country for the next ten, twenty, thirty years.

And IT wasn't the first thing that people attacked because I didn't have the higher growth margins the way that, you know these software, the service businesses did. But as technology permeates everything else in the world, IT turns out that you can build some really big businesses by attacking these broad swath of the american economy. And so I think we're going to continue see lots and lots of entrepreneurs do that, and we're all Better off for IT.

absolutely.

Will casting last thing before we rap up here, we've been talking this whole episode about all these trends. The internet, you can build companies anywhere. american.

We know U. N. And reason are the, you are the first ones. You are planting your flag officially. How can founders who are listening, who is like, totally resonates with our R, D, building companies that fit with the american dynamism? This is, how can get in touch with you.

N N on. yeah. yes. So you can find me any internet.

I'm shocked. I'm shocked on twitter.

I'm K, T, M. boil. I'm pretty responsive there, but we're pretty easy to get in touch with so definitely can find us .

and you've a great substate to the rain boler right?

Yeah, yeah. no. When I haven't been as active, I I need to get back into IT, but it's boiled at some stack dock off IT.

Catherine.

thank you so much.

Thank so much for having me this. This is an awesome.

all right listeners. Thank you for going on the journey with us. And Katherine, she's, I don't know, really dynamic. And I think what their dynamics, dynamism he did, did there accident like I like we do, there is an inspiring big swing that injuries in her, what's is taking, and it's very cool that he is on the forefront of IT. If you want to a join us in the slack, you should acquired dot F, M, slash, slack.

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