We started SXSW off with a bang 💥
Last Friday we had the honor of co-hosting MATCH HOUSE Founder x Investor Day at Pershing Hall alongside Jonny Boyarsky, Mahesh Narayanan, and Shawheen A.! 🙌
The lineup was stacked: Bill Gurley (Benchmark), Kleida Martiro (Glasswing Ventures), Arzu Tekir (Treeo VC), Tyler Denk 🐝 (beehiiv), Martin Tobias (Incisive Ventures), and more. The kind of day that makes you wish SXSW was every week.
A few moments I'm still thinking about:
→ Bill Gurley shared that a colleague told him he no longer wants to make 10-year VC bets - "I don't know what will exist in 10 weeks." Bill's take: predicting the future has always been the job. It's just never been this hard.
→ Tyler Denk on why radical transparency is his entire content strategy: "If I write about newsletters, 20K people care. If I write about building a company — every founder does." His newsletter now does $500K/year. As a side project.
→ The question that stopped the room: "What do you know for certain will still exist in three years?" The silence was the answer.
And a personal highlight: I got a brief moment to tell Bill about what we're building at SimpleClosure, helping founders wind down their companies cleanly and compliantly. His reaction made my whole weekend. Turns out even the best VCs know that not every company makes it, and that the off-ramp matters just as much as the runway.
Massive shoutout to my colleague Emily Adams for helping hold down the fort, and for making sure every VC in the room left with SimpleClosure socks and chargers. I kept spotting them in use all weekend. Best feeling. 🧦⚡
Thank you to every founder, investor, and operator who showed up. Austin, you delivered 🤠
