I’ve had the best seat in Silicon Valley for nearly two decades as a reporter covering tech startups and the teams building them. I recently decided to leave journalism to invest in and work alongside the best ones. I’ve joined MVP Ventures as Partner, Founder Narratives.
Reporters rarely leave newsrooms, but I did. Here’s why.
The right time. Quite simply, this is the most consequential tech cycle I’ve seen in my lifetime. AI is not a siloed sector; it’s an accelerant. And it’s helping founders more quickly disrupt everything from manufacturing and national defense to energy and healthcare. For years, I’ve been happy sitting on the sideline watching innovation play out. Not this cycle. There are just too many founders building meaningful startups attacking industries thirsty for change.
During my career, I’ve sat across from thousands of companies attempting to tell me their story. Some killed it. Some didn’t. Some started strong, but later struggled to deliver on what they were building or convince enough people to care before they ran out of money and shut down. They missed opportunities because they never developed a credible voice early enough. They let others define them while they were still busy figuring out who they were.
Startups able to articulate their story have the advantage. These founders describe a future in which what they’re building succeeds and convince others to join them. This means investors commit capital, top talent bet careers and the best companies hustle to find ways to partner. Having a story that withstands both scrutiny from the outside and inspires people on the inside is a superpower. All good startups have it.
A reporter weighs in when there’s enough evidence to justify a story. This means the most interesting decisions about what to share (and when) happened weeks earlier in a room I wasn’t in. Earlier this month I traded in my courtside seat for a MVP Ventures jersey because I want to be in the room. I want to help founders, especially whipsmart technical ones, develop their stories.
The right team. Venture capital is no longer a tiny club sport played only on Sand Hill Road. It has emerged as a global asset class famous for making the earliest bets on technologies now driving financial markets, shaping culture and influencing geopolitics. No wonder the number of firms has quadrupled since I started covering the beat. It’s now an industry standard for lead firms to support startups by helping them recruit, raise funds, go to market and communicate their ideas to the world. MVP has a different approach.
We are co-investors, meaning we don’t lead and we don’t take board seats. We help founders where and when it matters most. And when we do it well, they invite us back to invest again. That’s the model, and MVP has been quietly winning with it for a while.
The team believes that creating a durable narrative is core to every successful startup. History shows they’re right, and I’ve seen a steady stream of such attempts first hand. When done poorly, a startup’s story harms its ability to grow. When done well, it turbocharges every other aspect of company building. That’s why this job is not PR bolted onto the side of an investment firm.
The right role. Founder narrative isn’t spin. Spin is empty. It’s what you reach for when the thing itself isn’t good enough. This is the opposite. This is about helping founders discover the most important truths about what they’re building and then giving them the skills to communicate it. Startups with an authentic identity have something invaluable: a north star. This not only guides their team’s other efforts, but also allows them to enter conversations within their industry and the larger world. This means engaging proactively – not reactively - in shaping the ideas and having a voice in the conversations they’re already a part of, or should be.
I’ll still be spending time with founders and I’ll still be asking too many questions. Only this time, instead of watching the game, I’ll be playing it with the best team out there and helping founders win. Hope to see you on the court.