Ben Horowitz Quotes

I have seen entrepreneurs ask for hundreds of millions of dollars on a concept and try to sell because of 'their passion' for an idea. If the idea is that good, why wouldn't I cut you out and hire someone who is just as passionate for much, much less?

If your business had no risk, you could go get a bank loan and call it a day. VCs like risks - without them, venture capital wouldn't exist. But they need to be risks that VCs are good at assessing and managing.

In order to access private capital, you have to provide competitive return on investment. In order to give competitive returns to investors, you've got to operate on a profitable basis and be thinking of yourself as a business.

Investors like to invest based on traction, so it's always better to raise money when you've got more traction than less.

Investing is pure.

The point of an accelerator is to teach you about companies and business, not about technology.

If you want to invest in early-stage technologies, putting a timeframe on it does behold you to Silicon Valley economics. You've got a certain time period where you have to make the money. And you have to invest that money whether you find good companies or not.

Airbnb is undervalued.

Picking winners among the many young companies seeking money is a tough business, even for the most sophisticated investors. Indeed, most professionally run venture funds lose money. For individuals, it's pure folly. Buy a lottery ticket instead. Your chance of winning is likely to be higher.

By definition startups usually do not turn a profit.

Business, that's easily defined - it's other people's money.

One hundred percent of our earnings are reinvested in the company, and a great deal of that goes to research.

A good default, like Portugal or Greece, would be very good for the private equity business.

In any business opportunity, you'd be looking, probably, primarily at the risk and return. Some business can be very risky with a low return; what you want is the lowest risk with the biggest return.

I have invested in the stock market since I was very young.

I think this is also a great time to invest in private equity, helping companies grow from the ground up.

I am not criticizing investing in the stock market; I am an investor.

The venture industry is both quite vibrant and quite competitive.

There would really be no reason to get up in the morning if Founders Fund was not willing to invest in companies that were doing important things, great businesses that very few people believe in.

Finance is critical. If sufficient investment is made in infrastructure and venture capital is made available, there will be a big improvement in the situation.

We have a tax code that favors debt over equity.

Venture capital is a dynamic and people-driven business.

The thing to do is to buy and sell.

You, as an entrepreneur, must make sure the postmoney valuation is a number you can obtain. You don't want too high of a valuation.

You have venture capitalists. We view them as experts who also help finance your company and give directions and also some pretty candid discussions about what you have to do better.