Hussein Kanji, Founder @Hoxton Ventures: Why AI Means London Can Compete with the US | E1248

There is a correlation between how much money goes in to a company and what the probability of success is. The average is about, like, 300 million to get to a unicorn status. And your best path to scale, from a financing perspective, is America. The rounds are bigger. Do not do a fundraise for a size of the fund. Do a fundraise for time of the fund. Give yourself 90 days. Whatever you get, go start investing.

... are saying, "Dude, we did this nine years ago. It was a webcam on Skype," which is aging both of us. Thank you so much for joining me today.

Yeah. I think I remember. I was like, I had my laptop on a pillow in my bedroom, staring up, and was like, "Who's this Harry kid, like, interviewing me?"

(laughs) I think everyone was thinking, "Who the fuck is this Harry kid? Why won't he leave us alone?" Um, listen, I want to dive right in. I remember Keith Rabois telling me in a show, "Every fund needs, like, a right to exist." When we think about Hoxton, how do you think about your answer for what our right to exist is?

Yeah, it's a good question. Um, I mean, when we, when we first... By the way, I think the venture world does not need yet another fund. Like, we have a lot of them, right? They're coming down in numbers, but the, the world, we have a lot of V- like, a lot of people playing VCs. 11, 13 years ago when we first started, we were 11 years old, but we started fundraising a little bit before then. The world did not have that many VCs in Europe. Had a lot of them in the US, had a lot of them in China, had a lot of them in India, but nobody was here in Europe. In fact, the seed funds of record here, you won't even remember the names. There were Eden and Pond. They're like a bygone, right? The people raised money in the dot-com boom, mismanaged their capital all the way through the collapse, and kinda left. And so the world really needed a venture player in Europe. And that was the thesis of Hoxton. And then if you look at where we are today, the world now has quite a bit of venture funds i- in Europe. But there are not that many old-fashioned venture funds left in this industry. I think most of us become momentum investors in this industry. We write the check largely to get the next markup, not to build the long-term, durable, big company of tomorrow. And I don't think there are that many people in Europe who do those kinds of things.

Why do you think that is? Why have we shifted to this heavy momentum?

Well, we went into a market where money was effectively free. And the way you get promoted inside of most firms... Remember, we are, we're, we're, we're exceptions to the rule, right? 'Cause we own our own firms. Like, these are our businesses. So we think like business owners, not like employees. If you're the general employee, you optimize for getting to the next career ladder. And how do you show that you can get to the next career ladder? You do a deal, and then General Catalyst or Index or Kleiner or Sequoia or, or Andreessen, I mean, there are so many of these great firms, mark it up at a significant premium. And then someone else, Tiger, et cetera, marks it up after that. And all of a sudden, doesn't make a difference if you've not made any money. You look like you've picked a hot company.