20VC: The Memo: The State of the VC Market: Why Seed Funds Can't Invest in "Hot Startups" Anymore, Why Series A & B is Terrible, Why the IPO Market Will Explode in 2024 & Why VC DD is BS & Every VC Has More Fraud in their Portfolio with Jason Lemkin

Jason Lemkin is the Founder @ SaaStr one of the best-performing early-stage venture funds focused on SaaS. In the past, Jason has led investments in Algolia, Pipedrive, Salesloft, TalkDesk, and RevenueCat to name a few. Prior to SaaStr, Jason was an entrepreneur, selling EchoSign to Adobe for $100M where it is now a $250M ARR product.

In Today’s Episode with Jason Lemkin We Discuss:

1. WTF is Happening At Seed Right Now:

• Why does Jason believe seed is more active than ever?

• Is the pricing of seed rounds impacted since the downturn?

• Why does Jason believe it is not only not the end of party rounds but just the beginning of them?

• Why does Jason believe you cannot fail if you have $1M in ARR and an amazing founder?

• Why does Jason believe that seed investors cannot participate in “hot seed rounds” anymore?

2. Is Series A a Dead Zone:

• How does Jason analyze the Series A and B environment today?

• What has changed in what investors expect and want to see in potential Series A and B investments?

• What happens to the many companies who raised pre-emptive Series As and have 10 years of runway but no product-market fit?

• Why does Jason believe founders should offer to give the money back when it is not working?

• What happens to the Series A and B market in the next 18 months? When does it come back?

3. Growth: People are Too Negative!

• Why does Jason believe that growth is more active than many are giving credit for?

• What are the ARR benchmarks required to get a good growth round term sheet today?

• Why does Jason believe that VC DD is a load of BS?

• Why does Jason believe that every VC has fraud in their portfolio? Will they come out?

4. Ring That Bell: IPOs and M&A:

• Why does Jason believe 2024 will be an amazing year for IPOs?

• Why does much of the IPO market rely on Stripe and Databricks?

• What is needed for an amazing 2024 IPO market?

• How does Jason evaluate the M&A market in 2024? Will regulation get in the way?

5. Jason Lemkin: AMA:

• Why does Jason Lemkin believe this generation of workers will never work hard again?

• What is the only way for seed funds to make money investing in serial entrepreneurs?

• What does Jason know now that he wishes he had known when he started investing?