THE VENTURE CAPITAL UNBUNDLING

Summary from the TLDR Founders newsletter

Top venture capital investors are launching their own boutique funds in record numbers, moving away from mega-funds' focus on managing ever-larger pools of capital. While established firms like a16z and General Catalyst raise increasingly massive funds, former partners like Mark Goldberg (Index), Kristina Shen (a16z), and Ethan Kurzweil (Bessemer) have started Chemistry Ventures with a clear mission to "out-hustle legacy firms distracted by scale." The industry's pursuit of "2% of the biggest number" has transformed venture capital from hands-on company building to pure asset management, creating an opening for investors who want to return to the early days of working closely with founders.