Paige Finn DohertyFounding Partner, Behind Genius · Founding Partner at Behind Genius Ventures

How has Blackbird Co-founder Niki Scevak's investment processes shifted over the years?

16 Apr 2023 · 1 min

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In this interview excerpt, the host asks Niki Scevak to describe his investment decision process and how it has evolved. Scevak explains that his approach is unified by ambition: while any success is unlikely, more ambitious ventures are comparatively more likely to succeed because ambition acts as a honeypot that draws top talent. This talent influx creates a positive network effect—progress attracts more talent, which fuels further progress and draws high‑quality investors willing to invest at strong valuations. Thus, his investment criteria have shifted toward prioritizing ambitious problems that can generate these self‑reinforcing cycles of talent and capital.

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I would love if you could expand a bit on what your investment decision process is and maybe how it shifted over the years.
So as I said, unified by ambition. I think people sort of think of highly ambitious things as highly unlikely. Like, first of all, succeeding is definitely highly unlikely. So any form of success is highly unlikely, but within the successfulness of things, being more ambitious is actually more likely than if you're less ambitious, you're actually less likely to succeed. I think because ambition is a honeypot or ambition has this network effect of attracting the best people to you. People want to work on an ambitious problem, which means that the solving of that ambitious problem becomes more likely because the best people are joining you. Once the best people join you and you make some progress, some more best people join and then you make some more progress and the best investors want to invest at the best valuation.