Harry Stebbings hosts Tim Chang, the fitness-focused, musically-inclined, and body-hacking managing director at Mayfield Fund, on his venture capital-focused podcast. Chang, a successful investor with triumphs like Ad China and Playdom, previously worked at General Motors and Norwest Venture Partners and has been recognized on Forbes' Midas List. They discuss Chang's accidental venture into venture capital, the importance of seeing industry cycles, and the current investment climate with a focus on AI and machine learning startups. Chang emphasizes the significance of proprietary data and top-tier AI talent in distinguishing genuine AI ventures from the crowd. They also explore the challenges of establishing business models for AI startups and delve into body hacking, with Chang sharing his strategies for optimal health through diet and intermittent fasting. Stebbings also promotes sleep and productivity tools, Simba Sleep and Cirrus Insight, as personal enhancements for the new year.
"So I'm delighted to welcome today's guest, Tim Chang, managing director at Mayfield Fund, to the show."
The quote is Harry Stebbings introducing the guest, Tim Chang, setting the stage for the discussion about Tim's background and his contributions to the venture capital industry.
"I fell into venture capital when I was at Stanford Business School and I didn't know about the industry before I got there."
Tim Chang explains how he discovered and entered the venture capital industry, highlighting his lack of prior knowledge and the allure of the challenge it presented.
"Well, I entered at the fall of 2001, so my second week at work was 9/11."
The quote denotes the challenging timing of Tim's entry into venture capital, which influenced his initial perspective on the industry.
"I believe to be a good venture capitalist, you probably need to see a couple of cycles both up and down, so you know the full spectrum of possibilities."
This quote conveys the importance of experiencing multiple market cycles to gain a balanced understanding of the venture capital industry.
"You know, the consensus is that right now might be the closest thing to a new normal."
Tim Chang provides his perspective on the venture capital industry's state at the time of the conversation, suggesting a stabilization in the market.## Valuation Sensitivity and Investment Timing
"People are much more sensitive to unit economics, LTVs, payback ratios on CAC, all these sorts of sensible ways to value a business and because of that, I actually think it's a pretty good time to invest."
This quote highlights the shift in investment valuation towards fundamental financial metrics, suggesting a more rational market that could be opportune for investors.
"My best deals were actually in the post 2008 downturn."
This quote reflects the speaker's experience with successful investments during economic downturns, emphasizing the potential for high returns when investing during such periods.
"Let's call a spade a spade and there is no real seed two or seed three. That is basically a bridge, right?"
This quote suggests that additional seed rounds are effectively bridge rounds, indicating that companies have not yet achieved the necessary product-market fit for a proper series A.
"Are your acquisition channels for paid users? Is it scalable or does it start topping out after this amount of Facebook ads?"
The speaker is emphasizing the importance of sustainable and scalable user acquisition strategies for startups seeking series B funding.
"It is the best way to look at a deal, because really your risk is yes, ultimately, does it succeed or not?"
This quote underlines the importance for investors to understand the benchmarks that startups need to hit in order to secure the next round of funding and reduce investment risk.
"The way you can suss that out is look at the PhD caliber backgrounds of the teams on their machine learning or AI staff."
This quote provides a practical approach to differentiating genuine machine learning startups from those that might be misrepresenting their capabilities.## AI Talent and Recruiting
"For true world class AI machine learning startups, they're going to need name brand AI rockstars."
This quote emphasizes the importance of having leading experts in AI for startups to succeed in the competitive tech industry.
"Proprietary data pools and AI talent are the new natural limited resources."
Here, the speaker likens the value and scarcity of AI talent and proprietary data to traditional valuable resources like oil and gold, highlighting their significance in the current era.
"That's what my biggest fear is, that if startups can't train on massive proprietary data sets, then they'll never get that advantage on their algorithms."
The speaker expresses concern that startups need access to large data sets to enhance their AI algorithms, which is a significant challenge in the industry.
"We've seen a wide variety of AI startups focusing on the assistance and AI assistance."
This quote points out the current trend and interest in AI startups that are concentrating on developing AI assistants and related services.
"Can you either generate more revenue for an existing line of business or save immense cost on a cost line?"
The speaker discusses the fundamental approach for AI startups to create value by increasing revenue or reducing costs in existing business lines.
"So early on I was exploring body hacking, and my big learning on it was it's actually 70 80% about what you eat, not even the exercise part."
The speaker shares their personal experience with body hacking, emphasizing that diet plays a more significant role than exercise in health and fitness.
"I'm intrigued, kind of. And this is just me asking for advice here. What does the food schedule like? How do you optimize the food schedule for health benefit?"
The speaker inquires about how to manage a healthy diet effectively amidst a busy schedule, seeking advice that could be applicable to others in the fast-paced startup environment.## Diet and Fitness Strategy
"The first is if you can switch your diet to more of a ketogenic or paleo like diet. So you're eating a lot of lean protein, a lot of high fiber, superfood type of vegetables like spinach or kale and broccoli, those sorts of things."
This quote outlines the dietary components of Tim's health regimen, focusing on protein and high-fiber vegetables.
"If you can do it, cut out all processed sugar, cut out carbs that are starchy and low quality carbs."
Tim advises eliminating processed sugars and starchy carbs to improve diet quality.
"Increase your healthy fat intake. These are coconut oils, avocado, et cetera."
Tim suggests incorporating healthy fats into the diet as part of his recommended nutritional strategy.
"And then if you can throw intermittent fasting into the schedule, you'll see immediate, wonderful results."
The quote highlights the incorporation of intermittent fasting into the diet plan for health benefits.
"If you then also add on top of that a high intensity 30 to 40 minutes weight training only schedule on, say, three, four days a week, you will pretty much achieve kind of the six pack Abercrombie fitch model look."
Tim describes the exercise component of his health strategy, emphasizing high-intensity weight training.
"Oh, that is one thing I should mention. If you're able to cut out alcohol or limit it severely, that'll do quite a bit."
The quote emphasizes the importance of reducing alcohol intake as part of a healthy lifestyle.
"So your favorite book and why Nexus by Ramesnam? I think it's the next successor to the matrix."
This quote reveals Tim's favorite book and hints at its thematic similarities to "The Matrix."
"My friend of all, ravikant, founder of Angelist, has influenced me quite a bit."
Tim credits Naval Ravikant as a significant influence and mentor in his life.
"But wait, but why is of course, my favorite blog? I know that's a common answer by now, but Tim Urban is such a great writer."
Tim expresses his preference for the "Wait But Why" blog, praising the writing quality of Tim Urban.
"Trying to keep a beginner's mind. Our human brains are basically shortcut and bias machines."
The quote addresses the cognitive challenge of overcoming ingrained patterns and biases in professional decision-making.
"But the first is treating processed sugar like a scheduled narcotic substance, because let's admit, that's really what it is."
Tim compares processed sugar to narcotics, suggesting it should be regulated due to its health impact.
"The second would be if you could limit people's freedom to eat what they want based on their BMI."
The quote presents a contentious idea of restricting dietary choices based on an individual's BMI to address obesity.
"So this is a company called Next Entertainment. They are taking the China live streaming phenomena and trying to see if that playbook will apply to the rest of the world."
Tim shares the rationale behind his investment in Next Entertainment, focusing on the company's business strategy.
"So much fun chatting with him and really was a highlight for me. Also, a huge hand to Rick Marini for making the intro, without which the episode would not have been possible."
Harry thanks Tim for the interview and Rick for facilitating it, acknowledging its significance.
"Mine is sleeping more, and that's where Simba hybrid comes in."
Harry shares his personal goal of more sleep and endorses Simba Hybrid mattresses as beneficial.
"Another target of mine for the new Year is also productivity, and there's no better for that than Cirrus Insight."
Harry promotes Cirrus Insight as a productivity tool, aligning with his new year's resolution.