article thumbnail

IRR is a vanity metric

VC Adventure

I’m observing that IRR is a metric that is becoming an increasing focus in venture, replacing fund return multiple as the key metric of success. I understand the draw of IRR, and – as a fund draws to a close – there’s no question it’s an important metric. Recycling hurts IRR.

IRR 116
article thumbnail

What Does the Post Crash VC Market Look Like?

Both Sides of the Table

IRRs work really well in a 12-year bull market but VCs have to make money in good markets and bad. But it will be patiently deployed, waiting for a cohort of founders who aren’t artificially clinging to 2021 valuation metrics. It’s just math.

Insiders

Sign Up for our Newsletter

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

article thumbnail

How is the VC Asset Class Doing?

View from Seed

At the time, I spent most of my time describing the metrics themselves and how VCs and their LPs evaluate performance based on these measurements. If you aren’t familiar with these metrics, I recommend reading the original post to get a sense of the numbers that I’ll be reviewing here. So, is this good or bad?

LP 256
article thumbnail

ESADE Business School Commencement Speech

Steve Blank

Metrics like Return on Net Assets, Return on Capital and Internal Rate of Return are the guiding stars of the board and CEO. As Harvard professor Clayton Christensen noted, these efficiency metrics provided wise guidance for times when capital was scarce and raising money was hard. Ultimately this is not just another staff function.

article thumbnail

Flexible VC, a New Model for Companies Targeting Profitability

David Teten

This structure allows for alignment on the front end, and real-time flexibility for performance metrics,” says Samira Salman , a family office investor and advisor. . Flexible VCs have created structures based on other company performance metrics than revenues, such as profits or founder salaries. Flexible VC 102: Variations.

article thumbnail

Why Companies are Not Startups

Steve Blank

They measure their success on metrics that reflect success in execution, and they reward execution. These metrics stack the deck against a company that wants to invest in long-term innovation.). Our Investment Readiness Level is just one of those metrics.) Innovation metrics need to be predictive for the future.

IRR 335
article thumbnail

As a VC or angel investor, how has your approach to investing changed over time?

Gust

Having now invested in over 85 startups, and finding that my personal metrics are very similar to aggregated industry ones, it is clear that (a) there is little to no correlation between my home runs and my personal favorites, and (b) angel investing done correctly really *can* produce a consistent IRR in the 25%-30% range.