Founders and investors, like Cloudflare founder Matthew Prince (left) and legendary venture capitalist Vinod Khosla (right), faced off online over the weekend.
Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile via Getty Images; Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images
Over the past few days, some Silicon Valley tech founders have taken to the internet to publicly roast the venture capitalists they once pitched.The kefuffle began last week when Greg Isenberg, the host of "The Startup Ideas Podcast," posted to X about his experience raising a $15 million Series A."12 people in the meeting. One of the GPs fully fell asleep. Out cold for 30+ minutes. Nobody acknowledged it. Everyone just kept going," Isenberg wrote, referring to an unnamed general partner.Isenberg said he continued his presentation, sharing slides with an investor he called an "unconscious man in a Herman Miller chair.""That's venture capital," he wrote.Venture capital is the financial engine of the tech industry. Founders with an idea rely on them to kick-start or turbocharge their fledgling companies. Typically, this is not a loan, but an equity exchange. The earlier a VC invests, the riskier the investment. When a company succeeds, however, the returns can be astronomical.Uber founder Travis Kalanick, responding to Isenberg, said that the venture world has changed over the years. Investors, he said, once took a more casual approach to pitch meetings.
