Market Selection in Vertical Integration

If you were to ask what sunk Convoy, it ultimately boils down to an over-dependence on the digital freight matching software they pioneered with a corresponding inattention to the operational parts of the brokerage that were really low margin. Technology isn’t a panacea for operational excellence. Every vert... See more

laughter

I’ve been doing improv comedy for the last twelve years. Over that time I’ve realized there are at least two types of laughter you hear from the audience. One is a response to something clever or smart, like ‘ha ha I see what you did there, very nice.’ It’s a shallow sort of laugh and one that comes mainly from the mind. 

The other - my favo... See more

Last week, Brad Gerstner and Bill Gurley discussed how Tech has grown from 5% to 15% of global GDP over the last 15 years, largely owing to faster growth rates.

As software companies get fitter and stack new S-curves of growth, later stage companies become highly effective capital allocators - which is why we’ve seen Tech outstrip the rest of the ec... See more

Average loss ratio. Some sectors are higher risk than others. For the past couple of decades, for example, social media has been particularly challenging, with Meta acquiring or suffocating insurgents. If the sector you operate in has a high loss ratio, you may want greater diversification.

“The best way to think is to write.”

Many people pretend they do. Often they don’t because their ego and fear of failing get in the way. There is a close inverse correlation between ego and self-confidence. The latter is also an excellent indicator of resilience. Last week, a new study on the characteristics of unicorn founders found unlimited self-belief to be one of the three domina... See more

He thought about space the way he thought about mathematics or analytic philosophy or the Torah or Mozart’s twentieth piano concerto, which he sometimes played at night when my sister and I were going to bed. It was beautiful and complex and infinite, and how could you not want to explore that, know where it came from, know where we came from?