Greylock

We - Greylock - have a long history of partnering with founders starting at day one through IPO. We are excited to share new steps in that effort: 1/ Fund 17, our newest $1B early-stage fund focused on Pre-Seed, Seed, and Series A founders in enterprise & consumer software - specifically AI-first companies across Cyber, Infra, SaaS, Consumer, Marketplaces & Commerce, and Fintech & Crypto. 2/ Edge, a bespoke program to help founders initiate new companies by harnessing the full potential of Greylock’s resources & expertise. Our team works directly with founders to brainstorm & iterate foundational decisions with fully flexible financing options. (visit greylock.com/edge for more info) We are privileged to be early partners to Airbnb, AppDynamics, LinkedIn, Meta, Palo Alto Networks, Okta, Workday and more recently, Abnormal Security, Cato Networks, Discord, Figma, Lyra Health and Rubrik. We can't wait to help the next gen of founders go from idea to iconic.

In today’s newsletter, CEO and Co-Founder of Notable, Pranay Kapadia, shares how the company leverages #AI to automate all the mundane, day-to-day administrative tasks that suck time and money out of the #healthcare system. “Imagine not having to make a phone call ever again in the healthcare system, not for scheduling appointments, verifying insurance, making referrals, or collecting payments. That’s what we’re working on,” says Kapadia. Plus, Greylock partner Saam Motamedi talks to Mario Gabriele about why founders deserve a VC partner who understands what they are doing really deeply.

Design is more important than ever. In a world where AI will be able to output fully-functioning interfaces from a simple prompt, craft will differentiate great products from obvious solutions. I hope that the features launching today at #Config2024 will support that end-to-end process and unblock creativity so teams can go from idea to product. Let’s go through some of our launches: - New product: Figma Slides! You’ve been asking for speaker notes so we are giving you that and more. We’re gradually rolling this out so please try it and let us know what you think. - Figma AI: Our approach to bringing AI to the Figma editor is to address real pain points that stand in the way of your craft. Today, you’ll see a lot of AI features that do monotonous tasks for you and help you stay in the flow (Rename Layers and Make Prototype). Some are still MVP, but others are immediately useful. For example, Make Design helps you get to your first idea faster with a first draft and Visual Search finds similar designs already existing in your team. - UI3: We don’t take UI changes lightly. We put a lot of thought into making UI3 in Figma feel familiar while also reducing bloat and making it easier to use. We know that it may take some time to adjust to these changes, so we’re slowly rolling them out to users, starting today. You are welcome to turn this redesign off as we improve UI3 with your feedback. Eventually we will migrate all users to UI3. - Dev Mode: Since the launch, teams have marked over 4 million designs as ready for dev! We’re now introducing Ready for Dev View, Focus View, and new statuses. - Also available today, Code Connect is out of beta with new improvements like surfacing connected code snippets in the component playground, a new tool to streamline setup, and support for React, React Native, iOS, Android (with more to come!). Thank you to everyone who showed up for Config IRL and virtually! Lots more on what we’ve built and what we’re building here: https://lnkd.in/eRavMsr4

Students: Start Up Your Career Here! Greylock has a long history of supporting university students through various programs and events to connect with our investors and portfolio companies. ➡️ Find an #internship at Greylock startup! We’ve developed an application-based channel for students seeking internships and full-time opportunities at startups. Through the application process, we will learn about your motivations, skills and interests to connect you with relevant startups.  Register at the link below. ⭐ Welcome Jessica Waterman, (She/Her) to the Greylock team!  Jessica will be leading Greylock’s University Talent programs that connect students with startups. CC: Glen Evans #internships #startupcareer #recentgrads

Onehouse is on a mission to make data open. Today, the team announced their Series B, and two new products: 1/ LakeView, a free lakehouse observability tool for the OSS community, and 2/ Table Optimizer, which automates data lakehouse optimizations. Congrats, Vinoth Chandar and team on these milestones. We - at Greylock - are proud to be your partners since the seed. P.S. - Onehouse is hiring! Below are a few open opportunities. All jobs can be found: https://lnkd.in/gZAAkxhs - Data Platform Engineer (India) - https://bit.ly/4bmGfu4 - Engineering Manager, Product Development (India) - https://bit.ly/45JnfEQ - Staff Software Engineer, Open Source (US) - https://bit.ly/4cCg9UX CC Jerry Chen

Your career-defining role may be in a company you haven’t even heard of. When you join a startup in stealth, you have the opportunity to play an instrumental role in building what could become the next iconic tech company while also accelerating your career. At Greylock, we work with companies from day one. Before Workday, Palo Alto Networks, and Abnormal Security were household names, they were stealth companies at the whiteboard phase, starting up in the Greylock offices and looking for their foundational teams. The Greylock talent team works closely with exceptional people in #engineering, #design, #sales, #product and #operations to help them join the next big thing - before they have made a public debut. By joining a startup in stealth, you will have greater ownership of strategic projects and will expand your skill set beyond your core area of expertise. You’ll also directly collaborate with a wider variety of people and will be exposed to more ideas and ways of thinking than if you work inside a large incumbent. Joining a company in stealth is also a great way to prepare and gain experience for founding a company someday. But joining a stealth startup isn’t for everyone. It’s for courageous and exceptional people who are driven to make an impact in an environment that prioritizes speed, experimentation, and risk. People who thrive at this stage jump across functions and collaborate - all amid great uncertainty. When there is little to no available information about the company, product, mission, and team, where do you start? 1. Carefully assess the founders and the team, ensuring that you establish some level of connection and believe in the business. This includes scrutinizing the idea, assessing the TAM and competitive landscape of the targeted industry, and backchanneling the founders and any existing team members.  2. During conversations with the founders, investors, and other key stakeholders, be prepared to ask direct questions about the business and vision, role you are considering, career growth opportunities, working style, etc. The more transparent people are the better. It’s critical to be as informed as possible about the commitment you are making to an early stage team.  3. Work with a dedicated talent partner to significantly increase the likelihood that you find the right fit. While there are no shortcuts to the due diligence process you must run on your own when evaluating a role at a stealth company, a talent partner at Greylock can help you transparently navigate a process that can sometimes feel opaque.   Today, we have multiple stealth companies that are quietly building the next generation of category-defining tech. If you are interested in joining a stealth company now - or just want to connect proactively for the future - we would love to hear from you.

Glen Evans' post touches on common themes that are central to many conversations I have with engineers. It's worth a read and I've put some of my thoughts below too. I talk to countless people who have “rinse-and-repeated” their role at larger companies and find themselves leveling off, the rate of learning has significantly slowed and they want a new way to think about their career. Here's a framework that may help. Breadth versus Depth At established companies (post product market fit, over 1K employees, multiple business lines, etc) you can optimize for depth in your skillset. Your work will typically focus on one part of a platform, of one product line, of one division of the company. At smaller companies (pre product market fit, sub 50 people, one product line), you can optimize for breadth in your skillset. Your work will focus on the core product that is directly connected to the trajectory of the business and you'll work in lockstep with every function at the company. It's not an argument of what is "better" or more "valuable" in a persons skillset - it's about what you want for your career. It's about understanding the tradeoffs and making distinctive decisions that set you up to grow in a way that's fulfilling to you and where you perform at your best. Many candidates do not take the time for this self reflection of what they want in their career. They get lost in comparison or societal expectations of what looks “good” on a resume. Joining a stealth startup is an incredible way to hockey stick your impact and gain breadth in your skillset. Feel free to get in touch if you'd like to learn more or connect here as well. https://lnkd.in/e-FUGMxk

Congrats, Rockset on joining forces with OpenAI! Today's news is a testament to Rockset’s keen ability to recognize what businesses need to find the shortest path from data to apps no matter how quickly the technology is evolving. We are excited to see Rockset's engine power the next wave of applications built on the world’s leading LLM. It’s been a privilege to work with Venkat Venkataramani, Dhruba Borthakur, and team on their journey from very beginning when we led the seed round. We can't wait for Rockset’s technology to impact people at such a massive scale. More from Greylock partner Jerry Chen:  https://lnkd.in/gMdzkamg

🚀 Join Greylock’s New Cybersecurity Incubation as a Engineering Co-founder! 🚀 We are now working with a new team to build a cybersecurity company that has the potential to redefine one of the largest markets in the industry. We are recruiting a co-founder who will be an integral leader at this new company and responsible for building and leading a world-class engineering team. Greylock has a distinguished track record of partnering with ambitious engineers and product innovators to initiate and incubate companies in both large existing and emerging markets. Historical examples of companies incubated at Greylock include Palo Alto Networks, Workday, Sumo Logic, Abnormal Security, Inflection AI, and Neeva. If you’re interested in exploring this co-founder role, please reach out to: cofounder@greylock.com #Cybersecurity #Innovation #Startups #CoFounderOpportunity #DayOne

In today's newsletter, Greylock's Core Talent Partner Glen Evans shares why joining a stealth startup could be a great career move, and offers key advice for candidates considering a role at a company that has little to no public information. Additionally, Greylock partner Seth Rosenberg chats with Mustafa Suleyman for the Product-Led AI podcast, and we highlight some exciting portfolio news and updates.