Weekly Roundup: Bye Bye Birdie 🕊️

Happy Friday, DVC! It was reported this week that Nicolas Puech, the billionaire descendent of the founder of luxury designer Hermès, plans to adopt his 51-year-old gardener and leave him half of a $13 billion fortune.

As wild as this story is, it proves the age-old career advice that you should always “be nice to your boss… they might adopt you someday”.

On a totally unrelated note, if any of you are multibillionaire fashion moguls looking for an heir, just an FYI that I planted a moderately successful veggie garden last summer, so… 👀 

Club Admin & Holiday Schedule:

As we head into the holidays, we wanted to give a few quick admin notes!

1st - Welcome to DVC! 👋
A very warm welcome to the 20 members who’ve joined us this month! We’re thrilled to have you in the DVC community!

2nd - DVC Schedule Update 📆
With the holidays upon us, our DVC Deal Reviews will take a brief pause until 2024. You’ll still get our Weekly Roundup newsletter in your inbox on Fridays, but our next Deal Review will drop on Tuesday, January 9th!

3rd - Feedback Request 📣
We have huge plans for DVC in 2024, but want to get your feedback on where we are right now. We would be eternally grateful if you’d take a moment to fill out the 10-minute survey below (if you haven’t already):

Startup News & Weekly Poll:

We all love a good old fashioned startup exit. But, sadly you might have seen a Tale of Two Failures unfolding recently with high profile startups… They’re each important in their own ways, so we’ll dive into the breakdown below!

Failure #1 - Adobe X Figma Merger:

“Failure” is a little dramatic (both companies are alive and well), but this week design giants Adobe and Figma announced they will abandon their proposed $20 billion merger. While the landmark deal was announced over a year ago and would likely be approved in the US, both companies stated they no longer see a path to approval in Europe due to increased antitrust concerns from EU and UK regulators.

On the one hand, Big Regulation Superfans argue that an Adobe X Figma megacorp would hold a powerful monopoly over the digital design market - potentially leading to stifled innovation and higher prices over time.

Critics of the decision, however, suggest that Adobe and Figma are not competitors and make different tools for different customers (i.e. Adobe is for graphic designers, Figma is for web developers). In other words, European regulators are just assuming the companies might become a monopoly at some point in the future.

My Take?

Part of me thinks it’s a shame. Figma built an incredible business after bootstrapping for 6+ years with no revenue. Obviously they’ll continue on, but it would have been nice to see the team secure a lucrative exit.

Selfishly, however, I have an unrelated personal vendetta with Adobe given that last week they finally kicked me off my free Adobe Creative Cloud student account 5+ years after graduation… With no more access to Photoshop, Illustrator, or Acrobat, I NEED Figma to compete with and destroy Adobe if I ever want to edit a PDF again. So, I’m team #FigmaForever 💗 

Failure #2 - Bird Goes Bankrupt:

In what’s probably a surprise to no one, infamous e-scooter startup Bird just filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protections. Founded in 2017, Bird reached a record $1 billion valuation in less than a year, went public via SPAC in 2021 at a $2 billion valuation, and was delisted from the New York Stock Exchange this September after falling below a $70 million market cap.

The company will now use the bankruptcy process to sell off its remaining US assets - although its unclear what millions of abandoned e-scooters will fetch at auction…

My Take:

Bird was a glimmering/beautiful/verifiably insane moment in venture capital. I can still remember the cool Spring morning in 2018 when a flock of wild Birds landed in my city, prompting questions like:

1. “What are all these things littering the sidewalks?” 🛴 

2. “Why is that sketchy guy loading them into his cargo van at 10pm?” 🥷 

3. “If I can charge 25 scooters per night, how much cash will Bird give me before my landlord sees the electricity bill?” ⚡️ 

Investors like Jason Calacanis point out that Bird’s venture-backed model thrived in locations where schools & municipalities could subsidize it. Aka “places where profits don’t matter”.

For everywhere else, it’s a reminder that (say it with me) Unit 👏 Economics 👏 Are👏 Important 👏

Join us this holiday season in reviewing basic accounting formulas and pouring out an Egg Nog in memory of Bird…

Time for a poll… Choose an answer below and see how you stack up next week!

Last Week's Results:

Last week we shared a deep dive on Wefunder’s new VIP Membership and asked if you would sign up… After tallying the results, 66% of you said you would not…

While we applaud Wefunder for the new product drop, unsurprisingly the VIP Membership only makes clear financial sense for investors deploying large sums of capital. For the rest of us, the benefits are complicated by factors like the SEC’s $2,500/year RegCF limit and having multiple RegCF platforms to choose from (e.g. Wefunder, StartEngine, Republic, etc.)

Here’s what some of our fellow DVC members had to say about it:

Vote for New Deals:

Help select DVC's future deals! Please view the options, upvote your favorites, and suggest your own!

New companies suggested this week:

• It’s Skinny

Deal Review #72 Summary:

We’re happy to say that our Deal Review for Advancing Eco Agriculture (AEA) was a success! Between the DVC Venture Pool and direct investments on Wefunder, DVC members invested a total of $687 in AEA’s Community Round.

DVC has committed the Club's Venture Pool investment on Wefunder (see DVC Portfolio Manifest) and issued individual confirmations to the "My Portfolio" section of your DVC accounts.

Overall, DVC Members strongly resonated with AEA’s mission to advance regenerative agriculture education and farming practices. We generally agreed that a scalable, natural way to improve soil health and crop yields seems like a win/win for the world! Plus, it never hurts that the company is consistently profitable and a thought leader in the space…

However, members still have some outstanding questions about the deal. Most notably:

1. AEA says its model is globally scalable, but we still have very little insight into its sales flow, capital requirements, or unit economics

2. While we can assume that a successful, profitable business will have long-term exit opportunities, AEA has few (if any) stated plans to return funds to investors in the future

In fairness, these are nuanced topics that are hard to answer in a simple Q&A. So, for now we wish them good luck and bountiful harvests! Go AEA!

Bonus Links for this Deal:

DVC Portfolio Updates:

Read on for recent updates from past DVC Deals!

Overplay (Deal #65) - The Gift of Games!
Just in time for the holidays, make-your-own-game startup Overplay shared that it has officially concluded its 2023 fundraising campaign with $3M+ raised from Wefunder and VCs! To celebrate, they’ve shared two new games just released on their platform. See full update.

Volektra (Deal #45) - Live on Indiegogo!
Electric mobility startup Volektra has officially pre-launched its next generation e-bike conversion kit, Vollkit, on Indiegogo! See full update for links & product discount.

Thanks for reading & participating! We wish you the best for a safe, healthy, and happy holiday with friends and family. Talk to you next week! ❄️ 

Sincerely,

Team DVC