The Secrets to Working with VC Associates, Scouts, Syndicates....& the True Gate Keepers to Venture

Please welcome coleus capital managing partner zach colias and ggv capital investor tiffany luck.

Hey, everybody, thanks for coming. It's much better than if there was no one here, then actually we could quit and start drinking. So maybe if you all leave then we can just bail and then we'll be good to go. Anyway, thanks for coming. My name is Zach.

I'm Tiffany.

And we're here to talk about raising capital. In particular, we're here to discuss the often under discussed but incredibly important topic of working with people who are not the managing partners at VC firms. And so if you spend any time raising money and I imagine a bunch of you have, you've had to deal with these folks and we're going to kind of walk you through a bunch of strategies and ideas and thoughts and feelings and all the stuff that we've dealt with both from being on the capital raising side and also on the check writing side. I'm a early stage investor, invest in early stage B2B software companies. So two people in an idea all the way up through, you know, they can get pretty big, but. And I write checks anywhere from 500,000 to 5 million. Tiffany is much more fancy than I am, so I'll let her introduce myself herself. But yeah, we're excited to have you all here.

Yes, thank you guys all for coming and really no introduction needed after that. So thank you. I'm Tiffany. I'm with GGV Capital. We are a global VC firm. Have been around since 2000, manage a little over $9 billion, invest all around the world at all stages across technology. And super excited to be here today. Thank you guys all for coming. And as Zach said, yeah, we'll chat through some of the different players in the ecosystem and talk a little bit about RA Capital.

I love that she can say with the straight face that they manage $9 billion of capital. I mean literally, like if you stack that money up, it would probably go to the moon. Like it's just a huge. Congratulations.

Thank you.

Yeah, yeah. They also have a really good podcast, by the way. What's the podcast called again?

There's several podcasts. Okay, yes.

What's the one Hans does?

There's. There are next billion.

Okay, that's a good one.

Is very good.

Yeah.

We also have founder real talk to talk about with a lot of founders talk about the act grit of building a company. I also host a podcast called the future of where I talk about all things the future holds. Especially talk a lot about executive coaching, which I'm a big fan of yeah.

I highly recommend it. That $9 billion pays for a lot of high quality production. So it's actually like a really good set of podcasts, so I highly recommend them. I don't have a podcast. Not that cool. So, anyway, today we're going to talk about four things and then we'll throw in some other stuff just for fun. First, we're going to discuss working with VC associates and we'll kind of explain who they are and what they are and what they do and really a lot of ideas around working with them. They've got both pluses and minuses. Working with associates can be challenging if you know what you're doing, it can be easy. So it's all about going into it, the right strategies when you work with associates. Then we're going to talk about scouts relatively quickly. Scouts are a relatively new thing, but there's lots and lots of them out there now and they run around throwing around the name of the VC firm that there's a scout for. And you really need to understand where they fit in the ecosystem. Then we'll quickly talk about Venture partners, which is a whole nother brand of VC that's not really a vc and you can kind of understand how they work. And then the last thing we're going to discuss is syndicates, angels and other folks who sort of orbit around the VC firms. I started my career running an angellist syndicate. I still do. I have 4,000 people who invest with me on Angellist. And so I've spent the last eight years doing that. And so it's something that's near and dear to my heart. And yeah, if you guys have questions, we look forward to hearing them. And yeah, hopefully this doesn't suck too much.

Okay, perfect. I think we can. This is. Doesn't need to be said, but, you know, there are many players in the VC ecosystem and so your entry point to fundraising might be with any one of these players. And so I think, you know, we're right now just trying to give some advice around how to think about maybe your first meeting or first couple touch points when you're raising capital. So VC associates. And I think this actually really goes to any first touch point at a VC firm because oftentimes investment teams can be quite large and, you know, you're talking with one person first who's then going back and relaying that information, you know, back to their team. And, and so what you really want to do is think, how can I package my story up? How can I give good highlight reels? How can I share why I'm excited with this one person or one or two people I'm chatting with who are then going to go back to their firm, back to their broader team, who may or may not be experts in your sector, and actually convey that same level of excitement. So, VC associates, one thing important to say, deeply trusted internally and can be really, really good at really good, helpful people for you, really good allies, really good resources. You know, if they're excited about your company like they can, they can help you get across the finish line.

Yeah. One thing that I always like to tell my companies that I work with is that the associate can't necessarily get the deal done themselves. They're your advocate, but they can absolutely kill it. So if you don't make friends with your associate or whatever associate is working on the deal, and there's always going to be one involved doing research, if you don't make friends with them and you don't make them your ally, they can absolutely make sure that deal does not get done. And so it's super important that even though they're not the final check writer and they don't have the final say, you really, really need to make friends, if you can.

Yes. Okay. A few other things. Broadly, how do you think about associates? And maybe I think it's helpful sometimes to say, how do associates spend time? A lot of times they're actually doing very deep research in your sector. They're spending time with a lot of companies in your sector, you know, probably a few sectors, but they're doing deep research, they're finding companies, they're sourcing, they're doing diligence, they're benchmarking. And so they actually have a really good set of knowledge around you. Your company, you know, oftentimes have a lot of perspective and again, have met others in this space as well. Most likely, you know, they. They do tend to take first meetings, may or may not be joined by others on the team. They then analyze your metrics. Again, back to the benchmarking. So they're kind of looking for specific things. How are you relating to top decile of companies in your space? And so we'll talk through, like, how to think about presenting your metrics and making sure that you're actually talking about the metrics that matter, you know, broadly. Like, they're kind of quickly assessing the opportunity. Is this interesting? Is this something my firm's interested in? And, you know, do I take it back to the team and try to move this forward? And so to that point, they Package and present. And I always say, like, I think this is good with anyone, not just associates, but anyone you're chatting with. What is the highlight reel you're going to leave them with so that they know like, oh, this is the company, right? This is that company I really loved and here's why. So give them that ammo and let them take that back to their team and just relay that message. So I think a few kind of excitement points I like to call them.

I think one of the other good things to think about when you work with associates is they can inform you about what they're seeing in the market in really powerful ways. So they spend a lot of time focused on your sector, your competitors, your ecosystem generally. And they often get to meet with many of your competitors. They know a lot about what's happening that you may or may not have access to as a result of your day to day job. And so one of the things that you can do in that meeting is after you kind of share what you do, you can start asking a lot of questions. You can be like, hey, what are you seeing? What's working, what's not working, who's winning, who's losing? And they can be this like this source of really, really deep intelligence that is incredibly powerful. And so I think it's another reason why being friendly and building that relationship is really to your best interest is because they can bring a lot of value back even beyond just helping get the deal done. So I think we covered a lot of this, so we don't really have to go too deep into this. But the one thing that you really want to remember in this process is, is they often come in with kind of like a checklist and they're going to be thinking about you relative to that ecosystem and relative to the metrics as Tiffany was talking about. She's going to walk you through some of those in a second. But like asking them what that checklist is and asking them what sort of like those benchmarks look like is going to really help you. When you think about how fast you need to grow, how profitable do you need to be? What sort of retention numbers are really critical for getting that deal done?

Yeah, and I think actually one theme you'll see throughout the this is always ask. I think that's a good, a great point. Like it is a two way street. And so, you know, asking, what are you guys seeing for metrics? How do you think about this space? What's interesting to you? What do you, what do you focus on? You know, when you make investments in this space, which will just give you again, give you more ammo for next meetings as well. Okay, my favorite slide, the metrics that matter slide. And by, you know, clearly this is not a comprehensive list of metrics that matter because to some extent a lot of metrics matter. You know, I'd say broadly, we kind of bucketed them, of course, you know, people want to know what's, what's the high level, what's your top line, what's your error at? How has that been growing and then roughly how efficiently is it growing? And I think, you know, this is, this has really always been the case, but especially in today's environment, you know, people are spending a lot more time focused on efficiency and growth and how you're thinking about that growth, you know, will it be sustainable over time? So one of my favorite metrics, I'm sure one of your favorite metrics as well is just retention generally. And not only, you know, a lot of people focus on net dollar retention. I think that's super important. You know, you want to prove that land and expand is working, you know, that your existing customers will grow with you. But I think gross retention is also equally important, you know, and making sure that you've really got a product that people love and, you know, you're selling into that right customer. And so it's a balance between those two, but making sure that, making sure that you're touching on those, you know, margins in general, gross margin, how, and you know, possibly it's something that's expanding over time and if so, like telling the story around that, right, where are margins today? Where do you expect margins to be? What are the levers that are going to drive that expansion? Sales efficiency. It's a big one. Kind of also goes to, you know, how you're thinking about go to market, how do you have go to market set up? How are you reporting on it? And I think even more than, you know, just the actual numbers really the logic around right now, where are you in the go to market journey and how do you assess where you are? So what are the metrics that you measure? How is your sales team set up or go to market team more broadly? And again, how do you expect that to change over time? Team size. Now, more than just the quantitative part of this, there's certainly how large is the team? But another thing you'll get a lot is just what are the key hires you have to make still? Where are you expanding? And then to the last point, what's cash balance what's your fundraising history been? And I think again, a lot of people right now are also focused on burn and burn ratio. And I like to always say, you know, it's not just about burn ratio today, but again, how do you expect that to change over time? And so your burn ratio, you know, you might be at 2 to 1 today, but you think that ends up going down to one and a half next year. And so I think it's constantly about where you are, but, you know, painting where you're heading. What will you add, Zach, on metrics?

Yeah, so one thing I would like to add to this slide that's not actually here is we are an incredibly different capital ecosystem than we were even six months ago. And the information is starting to get out, but I can share a story with you if you guys are interested in that. So one of my companies, SaaS Company, just like everyone else here, 27 million ARR. 90% gross margin. They'll probably end the year at about 6, 60 million. So growing incredibly rapidly. 1.6 million developers. So big good company a year ago that would easily have been a unicorn. A few months ago we went through a fundraising process. We went out to all the BC firms, hedge funds, the usual late stage check writers, and a hedge fund came in, they're going to put in $50 million at a $400 million post. So that a year ago would have been an incredibly cheap price. But nine months ago or nine weeks ago, that was the market. And a couple weeks ago we're supposed to close. So we sign the term sheet, we go all the way through the fundraising process, we got all the docs finished. It's supposed to close on a Friday. On Thursday, the hedge fund's like, nah, fuck it, we're not going to do it. We want to do 50 on a 250 pre. Companies actually beat their plan during those eight weeks in between signing the term sheet and closing the deal. But because the public markets have come down so much, so rapidly, the multiples that were the comps for this company had just collapsed. And so the hedge fund is like, we're not going to do it, we're not going to do that deal. And so now the term sheet is from another fund. It's going to be coming in for $25 million instead of $50 million at a significantly lower price than where we were eight weeks ago. And so I want to tell you that story because as the venture market is changing rapidly as a result of these multiple contractions in the public market, what we're going to see is these metrics are really going to matter. So, like, when you go in and you're like, this is my business, they're just going to look at you relative to the public market metrics that they build their models off of, and they're going to just be like, one to one, what is it? What's like, what's ARR. Where are you in retention? Bing, bing, bing, bing, bing. And then like, and that model is going to really inform where your fundraise happens. And 12 months ago, you could have gotten a term sheet a week after you got. You walked in that door. Now it's going to be a much longer, much harder, much more arduous fundraising process, more similar to what we saw two or three years ago, certainly what we saw in 2008, 2000. And then, like, after the last financial crisis, like, the fundraising market is getting harder. And so, like, being more buttoned up with your metrics and knowing them and owning them is going to be really helpful in that process.

Yeah. Yes. And the one thing I will say is, no doubt we are in a different market environment today than we were, you know, six months ago. Not everyone is behaving that way. So, you know, I would not expect that, you know, you're still having investors, are still investing, and obviously it matters, you know, your company and the metrics and all of that good stuff. But I would. That is not, you know, not everyone is acting in that way. So GGB doesn't do that. So the wise. Yes, it's true.

You just mark up all my companies, like, I'll just hand them to you and you mark them up and we'll just keep doing it. And this would be really easy.

Show us some more companies. Exactly. The other thing I would say, I guess, you know, not to go on a complete tangent on the fundraising environment, but I would say, yes, we've, we've been talking about metrics and, you know, it's certainly true that people are comparing metrics right now and thinking more about public market multiples. I would also say there's a lot of, like, strategic conversations going on just in terms of how you're thinking about managing the business through these times. You know, how are you thinking about playing offense versus defense? When do you, when do you think about accelerating again? Right? Like, when will, you know, what are the trigger points for you to put your foot back on the gas? And so I think, like, having good answers to those questions or even just thinking through, like yourself, you know, how am I going to Manage and, you know, when am I going to maybe be a little more aggressive, you know, versus, you know, versus be a little more cautious. So I think those conversations are happening as well. All right.

Scouts. So some people don't know about scouts, some people do. But just to give you a brief sort of synopsis, a scout is an individual who has some sort of contractual relationship with a venture fund where the venture fund will provide them with capital. I've seen them as small as 2 or $300,000. I've seen them as large as a few million dollars. And effectively the venture funds like here, here's a bunch of money, go invest it. And hopefully it works. So they'll go to Small Angels, former CEOs from their portfolio, friends of the firm generally. And what they're hoping is that that scout is out in the ecosystem, finding early stage companies, putting in a check to sort of get access to information, get on the cap table, and then they're hoping that those scouts feed those deals back into the VC when the VC firm leads or potentially would lead the next round. The problem that you're going to run into is that there is a pretty significant signaling risk when you have a scout involved in your company. So I'll give you an example. Let's say the person is a scout for Sequoia and they invest in your company. Now, every other venture firm that looks at this deal is going to say, oh, Sequoia is already in this deal. Sequoia's already been looking at this deal for the last six months, eight months. However long it's been, Sequoia knows more than we do. We need to basically be really, really sure of where we are if we're going to basically like put in a competitive term sheet into this round. Or the worst question is, why is Sequoia not offering to invest in this company? And so you can often run into trouble when you have a scout on your cap table that's known to be a scout for the firm. And so this is where it's really important to talk to the scout very early on and ask them about what is the relationship with the firm, how does that work? And how do you basically like, help us in that relationship process? Because if I had to choose between taking scout money versus taking unaffiliated money, I would always take the unaffiliated money rather than taking the unnecessary signaling risk when you work with one of these firms, but without having them deeply involved. But the plus side of it is that those scouts can get you in and really deeply Introduce you into the right people at the right time and work you through that fundraise process. And as we move into a more challenging fundraising environment, or I think we are, we certainly are right now, that can be really powerful because those relationships really can help you get a deal done that wouldn't be done otherwise. So there are pluses and minuses, discounts. But just beware. It's not perfect, but it also can be, you know, can be great.

Yeah. And I would say this is one too, where it, it really does vary, you know, so scouts work very differently across funds. And, you know, I think it's just good to develop a relationship with the firm, you know, for, for capital in the future. All right, what's next? Venture partners. Same idea, you know, varies a lot by firm. And, you know, I think the biggest thing here again is just like, ask how this person is working with their firm. And, you know, I'd say like, relationship and how long they've been or how long they will be there varies. The great thing about venture partners is they often come with very deep industry experience. And so are, you know, whether they're, they're possibly functional experts, have built out, have been very successful operators or very deep in a particular industry. And so this is one where, you know, to Zack's point earlier around, like, ask, I think, like ask, ask, ask their pov, what are they seeing in the space? I mean, they may even be able to introduce you to customers, some people in their network. And so this is one where you can really, again, if you, if you develop the right relationship, like, this person can be a huge. Both ally for you in terms of fundraising, but ally for you in terms of company building. And I'd say, at least from what I've seen, like, venture partners tend to get quite involved. And so it can really help you not only at the time of check writing, but even throughout as you, as you continue building the company. The other thing is, yes, sometimes they can be an actual, like, they might be the first person you chat with. You get an introduce to the venture partner and they actually kind of kick off your fundraising process or you may not meet that person until you're already kind of, you know, through the, into the due diligence process. But regardless, I'd say, like, venture partners are hugely helpful and you should think of them that way for you in company building.

Yeah, the best example I've seen of a venture partner really doing a great job is one of my companies, I guess I could name it, it's a company called Zeotap, it's based in Berlin and it's a data company. And so when they went through their last fundraise process, they were talking to a number of VC firms and the conversation that ended up leading to the term sheet that they took resulted from a venture partner who had a very, very, very long history in the space. He knew everyone he understood over a decade long experience about how to run a data business. And so when the time came to choose between the competitive term sheets that were on the table, his was by far the most compelling because not only did they get a board member who was smart and you know, well adapted and knew what they were doing, but they got a board member who had deep relationships that lasted, you know, over that, that decade. And that became really, really compelling and valuable for them when they went through that fundraise, when they, when they chose to basically accept that term sheet. And so whenever I think about a venture partner it's all about the expertise. If they have a deep expertise, super powerful, awesome. But if they don't, I wouldn't waste your time. They just, it's going to be very challenging. Challenging for them to get a deal through a deal partnership unless they can claim that they are truly an expert.

Yeah, the one thing on the expert too, that's a great story. And I think especially if you're in the earliest stages, you know, sometimes you want to chat with someone before it's a customer. And so you know, for example, the ex COO of a potential customer may be a venture partner and they could give you a really good perspective of one, how to sell into that customer, what that customer cares about, roadblocks in the market. And so actually kind of having those conversations before you actually go to that customer and use that bullet there I think is really helpful.

The last one is by far my favorite because it's how I got my start. It's syndicates, angels and all the other folks who basically reside around a venture firm. So first I'll just talk a little bit about like what my experience has been. So when I got started 2015 I was a nobody in the business. I was just one more random ex CEO. I like to joke that I'm a washed up entrepreneur, but I washed up on the beach, that is venture. And I'm not leaving because this life is much easier than what you guys do for a living. I spent 20 years as a CEO and like shit's hard being a CEO, much easier doing this shit. But anyway, so I didn't know what I was doing I was very much a new player in the space. And I would meet these companies that were really cool and really interesting. And all of my capital at that point came from running my Angellist syndicate. And the thing about Angellist is that the investors there, they didn't know me either. And so they weren't necessarily investing in me. They didn't really care that it was Zach Kohlius doing the deal. What they cared about was who was the VC fund that was doing the deal. And so what I would do is I would find, find these relatively cool companies. I'd be like, oh my God, this is amazing. And then I call all my much cooler VC friends. I'd be like, hey, you should invest in this company. And I would help them with the deck, I'd help them with the pitch, I'd help them, I'd walk them into the room, I'd introduce them to a large number of my good friends in the venture community. And then if a term sheet came out, then hopefully I would be in the position to then invest alongside on the same terms. So I would say, okay, Sequoia is leading this round. Yay, I get to be in the deal because I brought the deal into Sequoia and I helped the company get access to that relationship. And so what you'll find is there's a large number of people like me out in the ecosystem. They're running around and they want to get access to the VC firm's deals, but the only way they can get access is if they basically bring in the company. And so they can be very much your friend and they can be very valuable. But the one thing I will warn you, and it's incredibly important, you've got to do your diligence because if you work with one of those folks and they have a bad reputation in the industry, they can absolutely sink your fundraise on the spot. Because there are people in the business who are not trustworthy, who run around with shitty deals, who generally don't really add any value. In fact, they can be detraction. And when the VC firms see them coming into the room, whatever company they bring into the company and whatever company they bring into the firm is dead on arrival. It's just not going to work. And so one thing I would say absolutely for that diligence is you can make sure to ask right away, what deals have you helped, which firms have you gone into? And then see if you can figure out how to do some back channel to figure out is this person legitimate ally in this process or Are they just trying to free ride on this fundraising process and are they going to try to take advantage of you? So be careful here. Super valuable, but it can have some downsides.

I think that brings up a good point, too. Just, you know, one thing is obviously, company building is a very long journey and fundraising is a very long journey. And it's, you know, just raising one round. You're. You're always raising more rounds generally. And I think, you know, you think about fundraising and closing out the current round, obviously most important. But ideally, you'd also kind of set yourself up for future rounds. And so always thinking through, like, how am I going to get my next round done as well, you know, and so you can use the cap table to your advantage in that sense, you know, and always thinking, like, again, if you, if you really protect that cap table and figure out, like, who am I going to let in and, you know, what am I going to use these valuable spots for? You know, always just thinking through, like, not just, not just step one today, but like, what are my next couple rounds and what could they look like? I think is always a good way to think about it.

So thank you for coming. We appreciate you guys being here. I know we're the only thing standing between you and drinks, so, you know, we'll get off stage.

So thank you.

Key takeaways here. Know your audience. Super duper, super duper important. Emphasize something that they can carry through. And so what I like to say and the way I would articulate this is imagine it's a game of telephone. So you go to the associate and you're like, this is what our company does. And you have one sentence and you describe it. Now imagine that associate is going to go tell the partner that, and they maybe are going to garble it and jumble it on the way. And then imagine that partner has to tell it to another partner and then they're going to garble it as well. So having a sound bite that easily carries through that Game of Thrones telephone is incredibly important to get into the end result you want, which is a firm getting excited about what the business does. Absolutely. Super duper important. What do you do in one sentence that can be repeated and repeated over and over and over again and everyone.

Is going to remember, yes, focus on the metrics that matter. We talked about this one. I think even more than just the metrics, like, it's, to Zach's point, it's really the storytelling in general. And, you know, having something that that person can relay and get excited about, right. And your excitement comes through. So if you're excited, which of course you are, because it's your company that you're building, you know, you just want to figure out like, how do I relay that excitement to the, to the person across from me. And also, you know, I think the two way street we've mentioned and it's definitely a theme, like it is a relationship building process. And to my point too, like, you know, a lot of firms are multi stage now and you know, maybe for, for whatever reason it doesn't work out in this particular round. But like always think about whoever you're chatting with as a great opportunity to build a relationship. And you never know if that person can help you with introductions or customer introductions, hires, you know, market feedback or potentially invest down the road. And so, you know, always just making sure you ask though, because I think that's the easiest way, like let us know how we can help you because often, you know, we want to and it is a long relationship. So. Okay, Greg. Yes. Let's get that mic.

Thank you.

This is super helpful.

By the way.

When you're, when you're working with multiple investors, how, and you're working with all these individual players across them, how important is it to you, from your perspective, to facilitate relationships, have them collaborate across each other, at least be comfortable working together. Important, not important?

Yeah, that's a great question. You know, oftentimes I think best companies do connect their cap tables. Reality is oftentimes the cap table is connected anyway. You know, it's a small world and a lot of investors know each other and you know, a lot of the players we talked about know each other. And so, you know, I think to the extent that they don't, connecting them is helpful. Right. Because you can also, so you're telling someone, the investor why you're excited, but another investor can also share how they were excited. Right. And how they're, how they're thinking about the opportunity. And you know, maybe they're deep sector experts and this is why they picked your company. And so I think again, just like the more reinforcement you have around, like the why really, really helps what you would add.

Yeah. One of the things that you'll often find between different participants in the ecosystem is that we have to play a long game with each other. So like we're going to be interacting around multiple deals for potentially decades. And so I actually can't lie to Tiffany. Tiffany can ask me, she can be like, hey, is this company doing well? And if it's doing poorly. I'm going to be like, no, it's actually doing pretty poorly. Because if I tell her that my company is doing great and it actually is doing poorly, she's going to lose trust in me. And that trust is incredibly valuable in this ecosystem because a lot of these deals are built on trust at the very core and things move very rapidly because everyone trusts each other. And so you'll often find that, like the back channel that happens behind the scenes where different investors and different angels and different participants in your cap table talk to the next round investors is just as important as what you say when you're at the front of the table talking to them about your company. And so you always need to be very careful about it. And then one thing that you can do is you can go to your angels and be like, hey, I'm getting ready to raise a round. When somebody calls you and they ask you how I'm doing, what are you going to say? And let's talk about that and let's make sure that we're all on the same page and that you understand kind of how that's all going to play out, because it can be very powerful in the process.

Yep. And one good way to do this is like incredible investor updates. Some people are amazing about sending out investor updates, especially if you have some so many people on your cap table, you're obviously not going to call all of them and give them an individual update every time. But a powerful investor update is really helpful arms whoever's chatting with the next person about what your company's doing, what you're up to. And again, it has all the highlights in there for the real.

Yeah, investor updates. Actually, there's this weird thing that I've seen is that my best companies always have the best investor updates and my worst companies always have the worst updates. I don't know what it is, but it always seems to work out to be true. I would definitely agree with that.

Yeah.

Any more questions?

Yeah.

Thanks. It's really good.

Do the associates also have a role after the deal is closed? Yes.

Because of that knowledge.

Yes, absolutely. And again, they can be great advocates for you, not only getting you through the deal process, but everything post as well. And again, it varies by firm. Right. And you know, some will actually meet with you weekly or monthly and. But again, it's kind of like ask them what you need, you know, do you need benchmarking? What are, what is the margin profile of other companies in your space? You know, what does go to market look like in Other characters. How do you think about hiring? What is the VP of people search looking like right now? Like, all of those questions would be great, you know, for anyone working on it, whether it's the associate, you know, might be others on the deal team as well. You know, for example, ggv, we have a platform services team that also comes in and helps you. And so really like, you know, to all of those people, ask how you need help because it'll just be easiest for them to direct their focus that way.

Yeah, one thing you'll often find is that the general partner is incredibly busy. So I mean, between sitting on boards and dealing with LPs and interacting with the other partners like they just can barely keep up with their day to day. Whereas the associates often have more bandwidth. And so for firm resources, introductions, potential customers, introduction to other portfolio companies, ways to utilize what the firm can do for you, the associate could often be your best resource. And so making friends with them, it's in your best interest. Like no, really, because they can spend their time however they want and they often aren't incentivized to like spend time on you, the company, any more than any other company. But like, you know, you send them a bottle of wine after the deal gets done, you take them out to dinner, you build a relationship, you, you, you show that you, you know, you, that you are a good friend to them. You're. You provide value to them. Maybe you introduce them to some other cool companies. Suddenly you'll find you can have this very powerful team member who can help you build your business anymore. Awesome. Thank you for coming. We appreciate it.

Yeah, great to. Sa.