This Week In Startups is made possible by:
CLA - www.claconnect.com/withyou
Northwest Registered Agent - www.northwestregisteredagent.com/twist
Today’s show:
Forget the triple-triple-double-double-double; the new bar for startups hoping to raise venture capital has reached the stratosphere, though our venture panel is worried that startups are focusing too much on today’s problems that may not become companies tomorrow. During a lively VC roundtable, Cowboy’s Aileen Lee, Floodgate’s Mike Maples, and Lerer Hippeau’s Ben Lerer joined Alex to dig into exiting pre-AI startups, rising valuations, token spend, why they are keeping their funds small, and whether the government just tripped OpenAI and Anthropic!
Guest Links:
Aileen Lee https://x.com/aileenlee
Cowboy VC https://cowboy.vc
Mike Maples https://x.com/m2jr
Floodgate https://www.floodgate.com
Bene Lerer https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjlerer
Lere Hippeau https://www.lererhippeau.com
Timestamps:
Aileen Lee, Mike Maples, and Ben Lerer join the show
Venture liquidity returns: what SpaceX/Stripe distributions mean for LPs
Bending Spoons prices IPO at $29/share, roughly $18.4B valuation
Agree.com - Stop chasing invoices and automate your entire contract-to-cash stack. Go to https://agree.com and tell them Jason sent you to get 50% off for life!
"Companies get bought, not sold" — Ben on taking first offers seriously
Plaud: If your work depends on conversations — interviews, meetings, calls — you need a Plaud NotePin. You can check it out at https://Plaud.ai/twist and use code TWIST for 10% off!
Mutiny's burn-the-boats AI pivot with Jaleh Rezaei
Northwest Registered Agent - Get more when you start your business with Northwest. In 10 clicks and 10 minutes, you can form your company and walk away with a real business identity — Learn more at https://www.northwestregisteredagent.com/twist
Mike's KeepSafe story: the "rule of 70" and profit-first companies
The new growth bar: 5x, 4x replaces triple-triple-double-double
Fund size is your strategy: why Floodgate and Lerer Hippeau stay small
CLA - Innovation takes balance. CLA's CPAs, consultants, and wealth advisors can help you get from startup to where you want to end up. Get started now at https://www.claconnect.com/withyou
The $100M Series A: Starcloud, General Intuition, Scale Cognition, Scout AI
King-making rounds and why mega-seeds destroy optionality
Open-weight models: the GLM-5.2 moment and going model-agnostic
Why fine-tuning open models is a treadmill, with Cursor/Kimi as an example
Grading the Trump administration on Mythos and Fable
Rising anti-AI sentiment, the wealth gap, and lessons from social media
Raising kids in the post-intelligence era
Where to find the panel and what each firm is investing in
Subscribe to the TWiST500 newsletter: https://ticker.thisweekinstartups.com
Check out the TWIST500: https://www.twist500.com
Subscribe to This Week in Startups on Apple: https://rb.gy/v19fcp
Follow Lon:
Follow Alex:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexwilhelm
Follow Jason:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasoncalacanis
Check out all our partner offers: https://partners.launch.co/
Great TWIST interviews: Will Guidara, Eoghan McCabe, Steve Huffman, Brian Chesky, Bob Moesta, Aaron Levie, Sophia Amoruso, Reid Hoffman, Frank Slootman, Billy McFarland
Check out Jason’s suite of newsletters: https://substack.com/@calacanis
Follow TWiST:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TWiStartups
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/thisweekin
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thisweekinstartups
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@thisweekinstartups
Substack: https://twistartups.substack.com
