The Power Law and the Dragon

Brad, I don't think I've ever been quite so well prepared for a show as I am for this one.

Brad,我想我从没有为哪一期节目做过像这次这么充分的准备。

You introduced me to some incredible people.

你给我引荐了一些了不起的人。

Ravi Gupta, one of my favorites.

Ravi Gupta,我最喜欢的人之一。

I met Bob Pittman, wonderful.

我见到了 Bob Pittman,太棒了。

I managed to have him coming on the show.

我还成功邀请到他来上节目。

You didn't know that.

这你还不知道吧。

We hit it off and so he's coming on.

我们一见如故,所以他要来了。

Rich Barton, many more.

Rich Barton,还有很多人。

But thank you so much for joining me today, Brad.

总之,非常感谢你今天来做客,Brad。

I mean, Harry, thanks for having me.

Harry,谢谢你请我来。

You, as you know, I'm a huge fan.

你知道的,我是你的铁杆粉丝。

And I have to say it's an incredible honor to be podcast number 3,300.

我得说,能成为第 3,300 期播客的嘉宾,是莫大的荣幸。

I mean, I didn't make the first 3,000, but you know, 3,300's not bad.

我是没赶上前 3,000 期,但你懂的,3,300 也不赖。

Well, you know, now you know how, uh, Andres — I left Harry speechless to start.

你看,现在你知道了吧……我一开场就把 Harry 说得哑口无言。

Yeah, yeah, thank you for that.

是啊,是啊,谢谢你啊。

That really makes me feel brilliant.

这可真让我觉得自己特别机智。

The truth is I wanted to build up to it.

说实话,我是想慢慢铺垫到那个高潮。

I didn't feel ready for you yet, Brad.

我还没准备好面对你呢,Brad。

That's the truth.

这是真心话。

Well, good on your feet.

嗯,反应真快。

The fact that I had Gurley on three times already.

毕竟我已经请 Gurley 上过三次节目了。

Unbelievable.

难以置信。

Uh, listen, I want to start with some context.

听着,我想先从一些背景聊起。

So, talk to me.

跟我说说。

We see Altimeter's today, the incredible institution you've built.

我们看到今天的 Altimeter,你一手打造的这家了不起的机构。

But just in terms of some context, what was the founding aha for you with Altimeter?

但先说说背景,当初创立 Altimeter 时,让你顿悟的那个契机(aha)是什么?

And how did that come to be in the first place?

这一切最初又是怎么发生的?

The question is how far in the wayback machine do we want to go?

问题是,我们想把时光机开回多远?

Um, because I really think my thinking on this, in terms of why I wanted to be an investor, started in childhood.

因为我真的觉得,关于我为什么想成为一名投资人,这个念头得从童年说起。

I mean, I grew up in Indiana.

我在印第安纳州长大。

I was a poor kid.

我是个穷孩子。

My dad was an engineer.

我爸是个工程师。

Um, kind of got forced into entrepreneurship.

算是被逼着走上了创业这条路。

He was running a factory in Indiana and um an acquirer came along.

他当时在印第安纳经营一家工厂,后来来了一个收购方。

He promised the men they wouldn't get laid off.

对方向工人们承诺,不会裁员。

Of course, the acquirer in 1978 lays everybody off.

结果呢,这个收购方在 1978 年把所有人都裁了。

So, my dad heroically tries to hire all these men and compete and, um, mortgages the house.

于是我爸英雄般地把这些工人全招过来,想跟对方竞争,还抵押了自己的房子。

Ends up going bankrupt, never declares bankruptcy.

最后破产了,但他从没申报破产。

Refuses to — works his whole life to pay all that money back to the banks who had loaned him the money.

他拒绝赖账,用一辈子的时间,把钱一分一分还给当初借钱给他的银行。

And you know, I was coming of age.

而你知道吗,那正是我逐渐懂事、长大的年纪。

This was third grade through probably sixth or seventh grade.

大概是从三年级到六、七年级那段时间。

Um, and it was really — it was tragic.

这真的……真的很悲惨。

It was devastating in our family, you know, times were tough.

对我们家是毁灭性的打击,那段日子很艰难。

Um, we had hostages in Iran.

当时美国还有人质被扣在伊朗。

Um, we had double-digit interest rates and inflation.

利率和通胀都是两位数。

And so, that was my childhood, like seeing us kind of lose the house.

这就是我的童年——眼看着我们差不多要失去房子。

And this guy who was a real hero to me, seeing him struggle.

而这个在我心里是真英雄的人,却在苦苦挣扎。

And so —

于是——

Can I just dive in there?

我能插一句吗?

I'm so sorry to interrupt you, but um you know, I actually saw that with my own family, too, in terms of like losing the house, losing family money.

非常抱歉打断你,但你知道吗,我自己家里也经历过类似的事——失去房子,家里的钱也没了。

And it really instilled this like downside protection in me and risk aversion, where I'm very scared even now of losing everything.

这在我心里深深种下了一种对下行风险的防范和风险厌恶,以至于我到现在都非常害怕失去一切。

And that still very much pervades my mind.

这种感觉至今仍萦绕在我脑海里。

How did seeing that and seeing, you know, your father lose the majority of his money —

眼看着这一切,眼看着你父亲失去他大部分的财产——

How did that impact your mindset, do you think?

你觉得,这对你的心态产生了怎样的影响?

Well, I mean, my dad didn't lose the majority of his money because that presupposes he had money to begin with.

嗯,我爸并没有失去他"大部分的钱",因为这个说法的前提是他一开始得有钱。

Um, you know, as my grandfather used to say, he said, "We don't have money problems, we have lack of money problems."

我外公有句常挂嘴边的话:"我们家不存在'钱的问题',我们只有'没钱的问题'。"

Um, you know, that was the environment in my family.

这就是我家当时的境况。

So, he had borrowed everything from these banks.

所以,他是从这些银行把一切都借来的。

And, um, I would say for me, my grandfather made the grandkids promise that we would not be entrepreneurs.

而对我来说,我外公让我们这些孙辈发誓,将来绝不做创业者。

Huh.

嗯。

That we would be professionals.

而要成为专业人士(医生、律师这一类)。

And the reason I went to law school is because I had to choose between law school and medical school.

我之所以去读法学院,是因为我得在法学院和医学院之间做选择。

And I wanted to be a doctor, but really couldn't stand the sight of blood.

我本来想当医生,可我实在受不了见血。

So, I decided to go to law school as an insurance policy, really to honor my grandfather and the commitment I made to him.

所以我决定去读法学院,当作一份"保险",其实是为了不辜负我外公,以及我对他许下的承诺。

And once I got the insurance policy, then I felt like I checked a box, and then I could go be an entrepreneur.

一旦拿到了这份"保险",我就觉得算是完成了一项任务,然后就可以去创业了。

Which is, in some ways, wanting to finish my dad's journey, I guess.

某种程度上,这大概是想替我爸走完那段未竟的路吧。

Um, but yeah, profoundly impacts you as a kid.

总之,这些经历在你小时候会深深地塑造你。

I think there are a lot of people in Silicon Valley, uh, and elsewhere as entrepreneurs that grew up, whether they're first generation, whether immigrant, whether they grew up poor.

我觉得,硅谷以及其他地方有很多创业者,他们的成长背景——要么是移民第一代,要么是移民,要么从小家里穷。

That chip on the shoulder uh puts chips in pockets, as they say, you know.

正如那句话说的:肩上背着那股不服输的劲儿(chip on the shoulder),最终能把筹码(chips)装进口袋。

I totally agree and get you.

我完全同意,也懂你的意思。

I think the other thing it does is it forces you to grow up faster.

我觉得它还带来另一个影响,就是逼着你更快地长大。

Um, can I ask, you know, when you look at that and then your father's passing, also, did you feel like you had to grow up much faster?

我能问一下吗,当你回看这一切,再加上你父亲的离世,你有没有觉得自己必须更快地成熟起来?

My mother's got MS and since I was like 11, I felt like I'm 25.

我妈妈有多发性硬化症(MS),从我大概 11 岁起,我就觉得自己像 25 岁了。

And now I'm 50, then.

那照这么算,我现在都 50 了。

Um, did you feel the need to grow up faster and look after your family because of that acceleration?

因为这种被迫的加速,你有没有觉得必须更快长大、去照顾家人?

Yeah, no doubt.

是的,毫无疑问。

Um, no doubt.

毫无疑问。

I, you know, I had a very trying period in middle school, in high school.

我在初中、高中经历过一段非常煎熬的日子。

I lived with my sister.

我跟我姐姐住过。

I lived by myself.

也一个人住过。

Um, I had a loving family.

我有一个充满爱的家庭。

My mother, 86, beautiful, still alive, incredible.

我妈妈现在 86 岁,依然美丽,还健在,了不起。

You know, sadly, she feels guilty about my childhood, but she was working two jobs trying to hold things together for four kids.

遗憾的是,她一直为我的童年感到愧疚,可她当时同时打两份工,拼命为四个孩子撑起这个家。

And so, I mean, she was extraordinary as a mother.

所以说,作为母亲,她真的非凡。

And the one thing our family always had — my dad had this tradition, my grandfather had this tradition.

而我们家始终拥有一样东西——我爸有这个传统,我外公也有这个传统。

They would always say whenever they signed off, "Love you and like you."

每次道别时,他们总会说:"爱你,也喜欢你。"

Right?

对吧?

There was this idea that I have to love you because we're family, but I also choose to like you.

背后的意思是:因为我们是一家人,所以我必须爱你;但我也主动选择喜欢你。

And we had, you know, I'm super close to my siblings today, couldn't be closer to my mother.

我跟我的兄弟姐妹如今关系特别亲,跟我妈也亲得不能再亲。

And so, there was never a question about love.

所以,爱从来不是问题。

Right?

对吧?

It was really just financial security.

真正的问题只是经济上的安全感。

Um, and I think that held the ship together when the times were toughest.

我觉得,正是这份爱,在最艰难的时候把整条船稳住了。

Yeah.

是啊。

Can I ask, how did your childhood impact your approach to fatherhood today?

我能问问吗,你的童年是如何影响你今天为人父的方式的?

I know obviously your boys mean the world to you and how much of a role they play in your life.

我知道,你的儿子们显然就是你的全世界,他们在你生命中占据着极重的分量。

How much did your childhood impact your approach to fatherhood?

你的童年,对你如何做父亲,影响到底有多大?

Um, well, you know, my kids mean everything.

嗯,我的孩子就是我的一切。

Um, my dad was on the road a lot.

我爸当年经常在外奔波。

I didn't see him a lot during these periods of time.

那些年我不太能见到他。

Um, and so, I really try to balance my life, integrate my life in a way that I'm really there for my kids.

所以,我真的努力去平衡自己的生活、把生活整合好,让自己能真正地陪伴孩子。

Um, and so, you know, I would say that more than anything else, just try to be a great dad, a great role model, a great leader for them.

所以我想说,比什么都重要的,就是努力做一个好爸爸、好榜样、好的引路人。

Um, but they keep you so humble.

但孩子们总能让你保持谦卑。

They keep you so humble.

他们真的让你无比谦卑。

So, we have this um—

所以,我们有这么一个……

medic who's scared of blood turned lawyer.

一个怕血的医学生,后来转行当了律师。

Um how does that lead to bossing the financial world and founding Altimeter, Brad?

Brad,这怎么就一路走到执掌金融世界、创立 Altimeter 了呢?

Yeah, I know.

是啊,我知道。

I never connected the dots.

我自己都没把这些点串起来过。

Well, I mean, so I'm in rural Indiana.

这么说吧,我在印第安纳州的乡下。

I'm growing up.

我在那儿长大。

My dad's going broke.

我爸正一步步破产。

So, I start reading a bunch of biographies um to try to understand the world, really.

于是我开始读一大堆人物传记,真的就是想搞懂这个世界是怎么运转的。

Um I come across Buffett Munger.

我就这样读到了 Buffett 和 Munger。

This is probably um middle school, early high school.

那大概是初中、高中刚开始的时候。

Um now, I don't want to give this impression that I didn't have fun.

不过我可不想让你觉得我那时候不玩。

I mean, I was partying.

我照样去派对。

I was playing sports.

我打各种运动。

I was doing all these things.

这些事我一样没落下。

But I would show up at school early.

但我会早早地到学校。

Um and I started, you know, on graph paper, like charting stocks.

然后我开始在方格纸上手画股票走势图。

Because I was absolutely enthralled with this idea that people who kind of look like me, Buffett was in Omaha, right?

因为我彻底被这个念头迷住了:有些人其实跟我差不多,Buffett 不就在 Omaha 吗?

And seemed to live a kind of normal life like the life I lived, I would really want to understand these markets and these things called stocks and how companies work.

他过的似乎也是一种很普通的生活,跟我过的差不多,而我特别想搞懂这些市场、这些叫"股票"的东西,以及公司到底是怎么运转的。

Perhaps in a way to help explain to me why it didn't work for my dad.

也许某种程度上,是想替我自己解释清楚:为什么我爸就没能成。

Um and so, I you know, like fast forward, right?

好,那我们快进一下。

Go to law school because I said to you know, I had to get that insurance policy.

我去读了法学院,因为我跟自己说,我得给自己上一份保险。

Um I actually did a stint in politics, thought I was going to run for office.

我其实还在政界干过一阵,一度以为自己要去竞选公职。

That's a whole 'nother vector of of trying to live a life of purpose and have impact on the world.

那完全是另一个方向的尝试——想过一种有意义、能对世界产生影响的人生。

But I realized I was poor.

但我意识到自己太穷了。

Went back to business school.

于是又回去读了商学院。

Um in law school in 1995, right?

回到法学院时期,1995 年。

I had gathered all of my friends around this computer, like one or two computers in the law school library.

我把我所有的朋友都叫到一台电脑前——法学院图书馆里也就一两台电脑。

I had just seen the Netscape browser.

我当时刚见到 Netscape 浏览器。

And you know, I gathered these my friends around.

我就把这些朋友都围拢过来。

I said, "This is going to change everything."

我说:"这东西会改变一切。"

And I was convinced that not all you know, I understood markets a little bit.

我当时深信不疑——我对市场多少懂一点。

I understood, you know, stocks.

我也懂一点股票。

And I was convinced that there's going to be incredible value creation in technology.

而我坚信,科技领域将会创造出惊人的价值。

Um and you know, so I set about trying to get to Silicon Valley.

所以我就开始想方设法要去硅谷。

In fact, I hopped on a plane when I was in law school and I flew out to Silicon Valley having no idea what this place was about.

事实上,还在读法学院时,我就跳上飞机飞去了硅谷,压根不知道这地方是干什么的。

And just started knocking on doors, including the old Venture Law Group, trying to get a job here.

然后就开始一家家敲门,包括当年的 Venture Law Group,想在这儿找份工作。

Um but I went back to business school.

但后来我还是回去读了商学院。

In business school, um 1999-2000, internet is going crazy.

读商学院的时候,大概 1999 到 2000 年,互联网正疯狂。

I feel like I've missed it.

我觉得自己错过了。

I'm too late.

我来得太晚了。

Um but I was hell-bent on getting to Silicon Valley.

但我铁了心一定要去硅谷。

Um but my classmate who became my wife decided that we're going to stay in Boston.

可是我那位同学——后来成了我太太——决定我们要留在波士顿。

And I had met these two crazy folks, uh one crazier than the other, David Fialkow and Joel Cutler, uh who were investing their own money at the time, entrepreneurial, interesting, thinking about starting a venture capital firm.

而我当时认识了两个疯子——一个比一个疯——David Fialkow 和 Joel Cutler,那会儿他们在用自己的钱做投资,有创业精神,很有意思,正琢磨着要办一家风投公司。

Um and that was really my launch into investing was starting with David and Joel, um helping them, you know, do their first deal, helping them think through General Catalyst.

我真正踏入投资这行,就是从 David 和 Joel 开始的——帮他们做成第一笔交易,帮他们把 General Catalyst 这盘棋想清楚。

And then ultimately, um you know, I can finish the story.

最后嘛,故事我可以讲完。

But that got me into the investing universe.

但正是这一步,把我带进了投资的世界。

I became co-CEO uh of one of their first investment out of General Catalyst.

我成了 General Catalyst 头几笔投资中某家公司的联席 CEO。

I mean, well, all great stories start with and then I met David Fialkow and we did things together.

这么说吧,所有精彩的故事开头都是"然后我遇到了 David Fialkow,我们就一起干起来了"。

I mean, this is the start of one great night out in Vegas, am I right?

这简直就是一个拉斯维加斯狂欢之夜的开场,对吧?

Um but uh—

嗯,不过——

I do want to start on something you said before cuz it's leading into your investing career.

我确实想从你之前说过的一句话讲起,因为它会自然引到你的投资生涯。

And as you mentioned the importance of the power law.

你当时提到了幂律 (power law) 的重要性。

And as I said, you said this was the single most important thing and so you kind of have to start there.

就像我说的,你说这是最重要的一件事,所以我们差不多得从这里开始。

So, what is the power law and why is it the single most important thing, Brad?

那么 Brad,幂律到底是什么,为什么它是最重要的那一件事?

Well, I mean, we all know that in investing returns don't follow a normal distribution, right?

我们都知道,投资的回报并不服从正态分布,对吧?

We know it's 80/20, 90/10, you know,

我们知道它是 80/20、90/10 这种格局,

and so that's a tiny number of firms in a tiny number of deals that represent the vast majority of the gross profits that get generated in the industry.

也就是说,极少数的公司、极少数的交易,贡献了整个行业绝大部分的毛利润。

And the fact of the matter is, I mean, if you look back 10, 20 years average VC returns are not that compelling.

而事实是,如果你回看过去 10 年、20 年,VC 的平均回报其实并不亮眼。

In fact, they're worse than the indexes.

实际上,它们还跑输了指数。

Okay, so to me, while we all know this very few people actually organize their day, their life, their firm around this concept.

所以在我看来,尽管这个道理人人都懂,真正围绕这个理念去安排自己的一天、自己的人生、自己整家公司的人却寥寥无几。

So, it's one of these things that lots of people know, but they don't necessarily know what to do about it.

所以这是那种很多人都知道、却未必知道该拿它怎么办的事情。

And so for us, thinking about how we spend each minute of our time, thinking about where we're focused, who are the founders we're talking to.

所以对我们来说,关键就在于思考每一分钟的时间怎么花,思考我们把精力聚焦在哪里,我们在和哪些创始人交谈。

There's this idea in venture that, you know, two people and an idea walk in your front door and you get lucky and you invest in that company and it hits it big.

风险投资里有这么一种想象:两个人带着一个点子走进你的门,你运气好,投了那家公司,然后它一飞冲天。

Nothing could be further from the truth in terms of like how we prosecute our strategy at Altimeter.

但就 Altimeter 执行策略的方式而言,没有比这更离谱的误解了。

And I started learning that, I would say my first decade of venture, I made a ton of mistakes.

而我是慢慢才学到这一点的,可以说我做风投的头十年犯了一大堆错。

2000 to 2010, I spent a tremendous amount of time on ideas that, even if everything was true were going to be small outcomes.

从 2000 到 2010 年,我花了大量时间在那些哪怕一切设想都成真、结果也只是小成果的点子上。

And the truth of the matter is it probably takes as much effort, emotional and intellectual, to start a restaurant as it does to start Google.

而真相是,开一家餐馆所耗费的心力和脑力,大概和创办 Google 是一样多的。

So, you really need to focus on what is the, you know, what is the biggest trend in the world, what are the markets that you're trying to invest against

所以你真正需要聚焦的,是世界上最大的趋势是什么,你想切入的市场是哪些,

and then prosecuting a strategy that allows you to take advantage of the power law instead of being on the tail where you spend an equal amount of time, but don't see the returns.

然后去执行一套能让你吃到幂律红利的策略,而不是待在长尾那一端——你花了同样多的时间,却看不到回报。

So, I'm totally with you here,

我完全同意你说的这些,

but I'm on in terms of the market sizing.

但在市场规模的判断上,我是认同你的。

What worries me though is that I will disregard new markets or small but growing markets because I'm focused on big.

但我担心的是,因为我一门心思盯着大市场,反而会忽略掉新兴市场,或者那些当下很小、却在成长的市场。

We can look at data storage, we can look at data analysis, we can look at I don't know, enterprise compliance, again, massive freaking markets.

我们可以看数据存储,可以看数据分析,也可以看企业合规之类的——这些都是大得吓人的市场。

But actually completely category creation markets and massive expansionary markets.

但它们其实完全是靠新品类创造出来的市场,是那种爆发式扩张的市场。

You know, so many of these examples from your Airbnbs and your Ubers to your Twilios of the world in enterprise they weren't big markets at the time.

你看,从 Airbnb、Uber 到企业软件里的 Twilio,这么多例子,它们在当时都算不上大市场。

How do you factor in market creation and massive market expansion into that it needs to be big enough?

那你怎么把"市场创造"和"市场的巨大扩张"这两点,纳入到"市场必须足够大"这个标准里去?

I think you have to be careful of commingling markets and what I describe as super cycles.

我觉得,你得小心别把"市场"和我所说的"超级周期 (super cycle)"混为一谈。

Okay, so in my investing career, there've been three what I would describe as super cycles.

在我的投资生涯里,一共出现过三个我会称之为超级周期的东西。

The first was the internet.

第一个是互联网。

Right? Everybody coming online.

对吧?所有人都开始上网。

It was very clear even by 2000 that we were going to have hundreds of millions or billions of people online.

早在 2000 年就已经很清楚,将来会有数亿甚至数十亿人上网。

So, the question was who were going to be the biggest beneficiaries of that?

所以真正的问题是:谁会成为这波浪潮最大的受益者?

And so I would describe that period of time for me investing or me founding companies I concluded that search making sense out of all this chaos and e-commerce, which was really search for products were going to be the two biggest areas of category creation.

那段时间,无论是做投资还是自己创业,我得出的结论是:搜索——也就是从这一片混沌里理出头绪——以及电商——本质上就是对商品的搜索——会是品类创造中最大的两个方向。

So, seen through that lens, Airbnb which was making sense out of all the world's long-tail inventory right?

所以从这个视角看,Airbnb 做的其实就是把全世界的长尾房源理出秩序,对吧?

In the way that Craigslist had done for all properties that were not on booking.com.

就像 Craigslist 当年对所有不在 booking.com 上的房源所做的那样。

Like it actually fit it wasn't a new market at all.

它其实是契合这个逻辑的,它根本不是一个新市场。

That was a business prosecuting a strategy in a massive super cycle with massive tailwinds, okay?

它是一家在巨大的超级周期、巨大的顺风里执行某个战略的公司。

I would say the second super cycle in my career was the move from search and e-commerce to mobile and applications that sit on top of mobile.

我认为,我职业生涯里的第二个超级周期,是从搜索和电商,转向移动端,以及跑在移动端之上的各种应用。

And so, what led us to Facebook in 2012 or what led us to ByteDance early was this idea that this device was going to be the principal and replacement mechanism for entertainment, for communication, for interaction.

所以,让我们在 2012 年投中 Facebook、或者很早就投中 ByteDance 的,正是这样一个判断:手机这个设备,会成为娱乐、通讯、互动的主要载体,并取代原有的方式。

Right? And that wasn't a market.

对吧?而这并不是一个"市场"。

It wasn't, you know, when I met with Yiming, I don't know, it was 2016 in our offices it wasn't that I was looking to invest in a newsfeed called Toutiao in China.

当我见到一鸣的时候——大概是 2016 年,在我们办公室——我并不是冲着"要投一个叫今日头条 (Toutiao) 的中国新闻信息流"去的。

Right? There was no TikTok.

对吧?那时候还没有 TikTok。

There was no idea about is there a big market for news in China?

也根本没有"中国的新闻资讯是不是一个大市场"这种念头。

The question was are there big tailwinds for a continuous feed in China where there was no feed?

真正的问题是:在一个原本没有信息流的中国,一个持续不断的信息流,是不是有巨大的顺风?

And then I would say finally I think probably maybe the biggest super cycle yet for us.

然后是最后一个,我觉得它很可能是迄今为止对我们来说最大的一个超级周期。

What led us to Twilio, what led us to Snowflake.

就是那个把我们引向 Twilio、引向 Snowflake 的周期。

It wasn't that we had a strong conviction on the data warehouse market.

我们靠的并不是对数据仓库这个市场有多强的信念。

What we had conviction in was that all the world's storage and compute was going to move into the cloud.

我们真正笃信的是:全世界的存储和算力,都会迁移到云上。

That it would be more performant, that it would be lower cost than every company doing it for themselves.

相比每家公司自己去搞,云会性能更强、成本更低。

And so, I think there's a lot of talk about TAM or markets, we focus on super cycles and power law.

所以,很多人在谈 TAM、谈市场,而我们关注的是超级周期和幂律 (power law)。

So, I love that.

我太喜欢这个说法了。

I but my next question is, okay, we identify the super cycle, which as you mentioned that kind of being the movement of data and everything that kind of comes with that into the enterprise.

但我下一个问题是:好,我们识别出了这个超级周期——就像你说的,数据以及随之而来的一切,向企业侧迁移。

You then have to pick and it like just cuz you know the cycle, it doesn't mean you get into the great companies.

可你接下来还得选公司啊——光是看懂了周期,并不代表你就能投进那些伟大的公司。

And someone said to me the other day, one of the best VCs actually, they said, "Harry, the outcomes are so much bigger than we could ever have anticipated in the winners.

前几天有人跟我说——其实是最顶尖的 VC 之一——他说:"Harry,那些赢家最后的回报,比我们当初能想象的要大太多了。

The only thing that matters is that you're in them.

唯一重要的事,就是你有没有投进去。

So, spray away, baby. Like be in everything cuz you can't pick."

所以尽管撒网吧,兄弟。什么都投,因为你根本挑不准。"

And I thought, huh.

我当时想,嗯,有点意思。

So, I should be in 100 companies cuz all that matters is I'm in Stripe or I'm in Notion or I'm in Figma.

照这说法,我应该投 100 家公司,因为唯一要紧的是我投中了 Stripe、或者 Notion、或者 Figma。

And just if I'm in it, [expletive] it.

只要我投进去了,那就万事大吉。

Amazing.

太棒了。

I mean, but you know, that listen, I couldn't disagree more.

但你知道吗,听着,我完全不能同意。

I honestly couldn't disagree more with that strategy.

老实说,对这套策略,我再不认同不过了。

First, there are not hundreds of big outcomes, okay?

第一,根本不存在成百上千个大赢家。

And so, if you have a diversified portfolio across hundreds of investments, you will have an index-like return, which as we started off by saying it's not very compelling in this category.

所以,如果你的投资组合分散在几百个项目里,你拿到的会是接近指数的回报——而正如我们一开始就说的,这种回报在这个行当里并没有多大吸引力。

Secondly, what I would say is if you look at the difference between the Sequoia round in Figma or the Durable round in Figma, right?

第二,我想说的是,你去看 Figma 里 Sequoia 领投的那一轮,和 Durable 那一轮之间的差别,对吧?

It's the difference between having a 100 plus X outcome and a 2X outcome.

那就是拿到 100 多倍回报和只拿到 2X 回报之间的差别。

A 2X outcome is nice is nice but you know, that doesn't you know, those are not venture returns in the scheme of things.

2X 回报是不错,是挺好,但说到底,那算不上真正的风险投资回报。

And so, for us I look for pattern recognition around companies that become the market leaders in super cycles.

所以对我们来说,我要寻找的是一种模式识别——找出那些会在超级周期里成为市场领导者的公司。

It was clear to me that Yiming could build the largest entertainment and newsfeed in China, right?

对我来说,一鸣能在中国做出最大的娱乐和新闻信息流,这一点是清清楚楚的,对吧?

Like that was a bet and it was a deliberate bet against a super cycle.

那是一次下注,而且是一次刻意押注在超级周期上的下注。

Right? It was clear to us that booking.com, in fact, I teach a class on this at Columbia Business School the old Graham and Dodd Securities Analysis class

对吧?我们当时很清楚 booking.com——其实我在哥伦比亚商学院还专门开了一门课讲这个,就是那门经典的 Graham 和 Dodd《证券分析》课——

it was clear that they had less than 1% penetration of what was going to be a massive market, which was buying hotel rooms online.

很清楚的是,在"在线预订酒店"这个未来的巨大市场里,它当时的渗透率还不到 1%。

And that that would compound for a very long period of time.

而这件事会在很长很长一段时间里持续复利增长。

And so, that's the other closely related item here, Harry, which is I think if you sit back, if you're leaning back and saying or if you're talking to all your buddies and they're like, "This is the winner. This is the winner."

所以这里还有另一件密切相关的事,Harry:我觉得,如果你往后一靠、四平八稳地坐着,或者跟你那帮哥们儿聊天,他们都说"就是这家了,就是这家了"——

To me, that represents a lot of momentum trend following.

在我看来,那不过是一大堆追涨、跟风。

And the history of that in venture is not particularly great.

而这种打法在风险投资里的历史战绩,并不怎么样。

The history in venture has really ignored to the benefit of first principle thinkers who frankly, rather than waiting for the founder to show up in their office they identify what they want to invest in and they go find them.

风投的历史其实一直偏向那些第一性原理思考者:坦白讲,他们不是坐等创始人自己找上门来,而是先想清楚自己要投什么,然后主动去把这些公司找出来。

And frankly, for us why was our mind fertile and prepared when I took a walk in a park with Mike Speiser and we talked for 70 minutes about a number of things and I had known Mike since business school.

说实话,对我们来说,为什么当我和 Mike Speiser 在公园里散步、花 70 分钟聊了一堆事情时,我的脑子是肥沃而有准备的?——要知道,我从商学院时期就认识 Mike 了。

And in fact, the main idea that we were talking about the entire walk was Pure Storage.

而事实上,我们那一整趟散步聊的主要话题,是 Pure Storage。

Right? And at the very end of the walk I said, "Mike, what's the new thing you're working on?"

对吧?一直到散步快结束时,我才问:"Mike,你最近在鼓捣什么新东西?"

And he said, "Ah, something, but it's too early for you.

他说:"哦,有个东西,不过对你来说还太早了。

I'm the CEO of it.

我现在自己是它的 CEO。

Thinking about you know, we're starting to recruit for a CEO but you know, Benoit and Thierry, these engineers out of Oracle have a whole new concept for a data architecture in the cloud."

我们正开始物色 CEO——不过呢,Benoit 和 Thierry 这两位从 Oracle 出来的工程师,对云上的数据架构有一套全新的构想。"

And it'll start with maybe a data warehouse, but eventually it's about rewriting the world's most important databases native for the cloud.

它可能会从数据仓库起步,但最终要做的,是把全世界最重要的数据库,以云原生的方式重写一遍。

And I said, "That's what we want to do."

我说:"这正是我们想做的事。"

That's what we want to do.

这正是我们想做的事。

But I couldn't have said that had we not spent 1,000 hours thinking about it as public market investors and venture investors as to why we thought all data was going to move to the cloud.

但要不是我们作为二级市场投资人和风险投资人,已经花了 1,000 个小时去思考"为什么我们认为所有数据都会迁移上云",我根本说不出这句话。

Do you worry about confirmation bias?

你会担心确认偏误吗?

I think I've had this before where I developed theses in my mind about how I see markets playing out in certain ways or you know, super cycles developing in different ways.

我自己就有过这种情况:我在脑子里形成了一套论点,认定市场会以某种方式演化,或者说某些超级周期会以不同的方式展开。

And then I find the company that aligns to my thesis and I jump on it.

然后我就找到一家契合我这套论点的公司,一头扎进去。

And actually, my thesis just could be wrong.

可实际上,我那套论点本身就可能是错的。

I worry that it just falls very much victim to confirmation bias.

我担心这整件事其实深深落入了确认偏误的陷阱。

How do you think about that as a potential flaw?

你是怎么看待这个潜在缺陷的?

I, you know, I think as you know, we often say around here we're anthropologists who just happen to be investors.

我想,你也知道,我们在这儿常说一句话:我们是恰好在做投资的人类学家。

So, we really have a culture and we spend our days challenging each other, thinking, inviting people in to opine on the subject that we might have um you know, around for example the modern data stack, you know, that we've obviously written a lot about uh you know, on Twitter and Substack etc. Discord.

所以我们真的有这样一种文化:我们整天都在互相质疑、思考,把外面的人请进来,就我们关注的话题发表看法——比如现代数据栈(modern data stack),我们显然在 Twitter、Substack、Discord 等地方写了很多。

Um but every day we're pulling together the most interesting founders, engineers, and others and studying.

但我们每天都在把最有意思的创始人、工程师和其他人聚到一起,一起研究。

Right?

对吧?

Like drinking the Kool-Aid is a recipe for disaster.

你要是自我陶醉、盲信自己那一套,那就是灾难的配方。

But if you really have a culture of continuous learning, right?

但如果你真的有一种持续学习的文化,对吧?

Because there are plenty of things that we invested in where the facts change or where we were just wrong.

因为我们投过的很多东西,事实后来变了,或者干脆就是我们判断错了。

And throwing good money after bad when you were wrong is a really bad idea.

而当你已经错了,还继续拿好钱去填坏账,那是非常糟糕的做法。

Um and so for us it's you know, it's that constant study.

所以对我们来说,靠的就是这种不间断的研究。

Um I think being a public market investor is really a value-add in terms of that type of culture when you're investing in venture.

我觉得,身兼公开市场投资人这个身份,对于在风险投资里建立这种文化,真的是一种加分。

How do you know when you're wrong versus a blip?

你怎么分辨自己是真的错了,还是只是遇到一个短暂的小波折?

And how do you communicate that to the founders?

以及你又是怎么把这一点跟创始人沟通的?

Is something I'm still very weak on.

这是我到现在还很不擅长的地方。

Can't necessarily use all the specific names, but I would say this.

具体的名字我不一定都能说,但我可以这么讲。

The reality is we made this pre-revenue investment in Snowflake.

事情是这样的,我们在 Snowflake 还没有任何收入的时候就投了它。

And I remember Mike called me maybe 6 months after we made the investment.

我记得投完大概 6 个月后,Mike 给我打了个电话。

And he said, "Hey, we're not hitting the milestones we need to hit to get the next round of investing."

他说:"嘿,我们没能达到拿下一轮融资所需要达到的里程碑。"

Okay?

明白吧?

But we need, so let's just put in a little bit more money, kind of an interim round.

但我们需要资金,所以我们就再多投一点钱吧,算是一轮过渡性的中期融资。

And you know, because we'll get there and we talked through the reasons why etc.

因为我们相信最终能做成,我们把背后的种种原因都聊透了。

It was very clear to us that what was going on in the business focused on recruiting, dealing with a bunch of customers etc. had no outcome on the big bet.

我们非常清楚,业务里当时发生的那些事——招人、应付一堆客户之类——对我们下的那个大赌注不构成任何实质影响。

So, that was a very easy decision.

所以那是一个非常容易做的决定。

I mean that conversation lasted a minute.

那次对话前后也就一分钟。

Yes, we'll put more money in the business.

好,我们再往这家公司里投钱。

You know, let's go.

就这么干吧。

I would say you know, we're an investor right now.

再说个例子,我们现在就是某家公司的投资人。

Listen, there's been a massive dislocation in the world.

你看,这个世界经历了一场巨大的错位。

And there's a bunch of really bad stuff that occurred last year.

去年发生了一堆非常糟糕的事情。

Right?

对吧?

And a bunch of valuations that are totally not supportable.

还有一大批估值,是完全撑不住的。

Uh we have a software company, you know, where people misplanned by 70%.

我们有一家软件公司,团队的规划整整偏差了 70%。

Right?

对吧?

An incredible group of investors around the table.

董事会桌边坐着一群极其出色的投资人。

But this particular group, right?

但就这一群人而言,对吧?

The lack of truth-telling about what's really going on, confronting the truth.

在到底发生了什么这件事上,缺的正是说真话、直面真相的勇气。

Right?

对吧?

I mean, I think that's so important in having the courage.

我是说,拥有这种勇气,真的太重要了。

I'm not being a good friend to the founder if I'm blowing smoke up their ass in the boardroom and then the second they walk out of the boardroom, all the investors have a different conversation.

如果我在董事会上对创始人一味吹捧、灌迷魂汤,等他前脚一走出会议室,所有投资人后脚就换一套说法,那我根本算不上创始人的好朋友。

Right?

对吧?

So, I think that being willing to tell the truth as I would have wanted as a founder.

所以我认为,愿意讲真话——就像我当年身为创始人时希望别人对我做的那样。

Fialkow when he was on my board, trust me, in 2000 when the world was coming undone, he talked truth.

Fialkow 当年在我的董事会上,相信我,2000 年整个世界分崩离析的时候,他讲的是真话。

Or on September 11th when planes ran into buildings, right?

又或者 9 月 11 日飞机撞进大楼的那天,对吧?

Rich Barton and I and David Fialkow, we talked truth.

Rich Barton、我,还有 David Fialkow,我们讲的都是真话。

And so, you know, to me I treated founders the way I'd want to be treated.

所以对我来说,我用自己希望被对待的方式去对待创始人。

I tell them exactly the same thing in front of them that I'd tell them when they're not in the room.

当着他们的面我说的,跟他们不在场时我说的,一字不差。

That's the culture we have as a firm.

这就是我们作为一家机构所秉持的文化。

Um and so but I think you know, the question of knowing when it's just a blip and when it's different, the facts in this particular software company radically changed.

回到怎么判断到底是短暂波折还是情况真的变了这个问题——就这家软件公司而言,事实发生了根本性的变化。

Right?

对吧?

The facts in the world radically changed.

整个世界的事实发生了根本性的变化。

Their product's relevance in the world changed.

他们的产品在这个世界里的相关性变了。

Their performance changed.

他们的业绩表现变了。

And so you have to accept that market feedback, that customer feedback, and then you have a different question.

所以你必须接受那样的市场反馈、那样的客户反馈,接下来你面对的就是另一个问题了。

Will you support me in the pivot of this business or not?

你到底会不会支持我把这家公司转型?

But that's a totally new underwriting.

但那是一次全新的研判。

That's a different question.

那是另一个完全不同的问题了。

That's also another underwriting, which is my biggest mistakes, which is are you willing to pay the new price, especially on reserves management.

这其实也是另一种研判,也是我犯过的最大的错误——你是否愿意支付新的价格,尤其是在弹药管理(追加投资额度)上。

My biggest mistakes have not been not doing companies, and I don't mean that arrogantly cuz I've missed many great companies.

我最大的错误并不是没投某些公司——我这么说不是自负,因为我确实错过了很多伟大的公司。

But it's been they came to me with the new price for the new round and I went, "Oh my god, no, no way. I'm not doubling down in this price."

而是当他们带着新一轮的新价格来找我时,我心想:"天哪,不,绝对不行,我不会在这个价格上加码。"

How do you think about price sensitivity on reserves management and capital conservation?

在弹药管理和资本保全上,你是怎么看待价格敏感度的?

Let me ask you why.

我想问问你原因。

Why did you deem the prices not to be fair or too high?

你为什么会判定那些价格不合理、或者太高了?

They would treble 3 months after the last round, with varied—

它们会在上一轮之后三个月里翻到三倍,而且各不相同——

Sorry, I'm interrupting you, but okay.

抱歉,我打断你一下,不过好。

So, they're 3x what they were 3 months prior.

所以它们是三个月前的 3 倍。

What were they relative to your target price at exit?

那相对于你设定的退出目标价,它们又是什么水平?

They were above.

高于目标价。

They were still high.

还是偏高。

Okay, so listen, if somebody comes to me and they want me to invest in a company that is at a price higher than I in my own underwriting and all my research, right?

好,听着,如果有人来找我,想让我投一家公司,而它的价格高于我自己研判和全部研究得出的水平——

Assuming that things go well, I can't get to that price, then I'm not investing.

也就是说,即便一切顺利,我也达不到那个价格,那我就不投。

Okay?

明白吗?

That is just momentum.

那纯粹是追涨(动量)。

You are a steward and fiduciary to your LPs.

你是 LP 的资产管家和受托人。

We invest in companies if we believe in subsequent rounds that there is still a venture underwriting, that we can earn venture-like returns in the subsequent round, right?

只有当我们相信在后续轮次里仍然存在风投级别的研判、能在后续轮次赚到风投级别的回报时,我们才会投。

Sometimes you know, we'll have to pass on our pro rata in those rounds because we think that the price, like we did many times last year, the price has just gotten too far ahead of itself.

有时候我们不得不放弃那些轮次里的 pro rata 跟投——就像去年我们很多次做的那样——因为我们觉得价格已经严重透支了。

Yeah, right?

对吧?

And so, you have to be optimistic.

所以你必须保持乐观。

You have to have the imagination to believe that these companies can be big.

你得有想象力,去相信这些公司能做大。

But listen, what has happened over the last 24 months has been a great disservice to founders, right?

但听着,过去 24 个月里发生的一切,其实是对创始人的巨大伤害。

And is the worst example, I think, of lack of discipline.

我认为,这是缺乏纪律最糟糕的例子。

And listen, we get caught up in it, too.

而且说实话,我们自己也会被卷进去。

I'm not trying to say—there is an entire body of work in behavioral economics around the lemming effect, group think etc.

我不是想说我们能置身事外——行为经济学里有一整套研究,专门讲旅鼠效应、群体思维之类的现象。

And boy, was this industry caught up in it over the course of the last 12 to 18 months.

而这个行业在过去 12 到 18 个月里,真是彻底陷了进去。

Well, listen, I spoke to Gurley before the show.

好,听着,我在节目开始前跟 Gurley 聊过。

Obviously, you know, a mutual friend and a very close friend of yours.

显然,他是我们共同的朋友,也是你非常亲密的朋友。

And he said, "I want to hear Brad talk about value reshuffling."

他说:"我想听 Brad 聊聊价值重排。"

So, obviously we've seen, you know, enterprise value of companies completely change and this has largely been blown through public markets and kind of multiple expectations.

显然,我们已经看到很多公司的企业价值彻底改变,这在很大程度上是被公开市场以及那些估值倍数预期冲击出来的。

How does Brad think about value reshuffling with that in mind?

带着这些背景,Brad 是怎么看待价值重排的?

Was Bill's question.

这是 Bill 的问题。

When you say value reshuffling, I generally—whenever Bill asks me a question, I always have to ask a clarifying question because it's usually smarter than I'm able to grok in the first instance.

当你说价值重排时,我一般——每次 Bill 问我问题,我都得先反问一个澄清性的问题,因为他的问题往往比我第一时间能领会(grok)的要高明。

But when you say value reshuffling, what do you mean by that?

所以当你说价值重排时,你具体指的是什么?

I think he means, essentially, we were willing to pay 30x revenues.

我想他的意思大致是,我们过去愿意按 30x 营收去付钱。

And now we're looking at, you know, Twilio is a four and a half x revenue, I think it was when I last looked at it.

而现在再看——比如 Twilio 只有 4.5x 营收,我上次看的时候大概是这个数。

I mean, as Bill well knows and as our group chats often included in them, right?

我是说,正如 Bill 很清楚的,也正如我们群聊里常常聊到的——

Interest rates are to valuations, you know, what gravity is to the apple.

利率之于估值,就像地心引力之于那颗苹果。

You know, like we can all say we don't do macro, we ignore the backdrop, but we can only say that because most investors have only been investing during a period of really low rates.

我们都可以说自己不做宏观、无视大环境,但我们之所以敢这么说,只是因为大多数投资人从业以来一直处在利率极低的时期。

So, when you have low and stable rates, right?

所以当利率又低又稳的时候,

You've never had to think about it.

你根本不需要去想它。

But trust me, if you were investing in 1978 or 1982, you thought a lot about it, right?

但相信我,如果你是在 1978 年或 1982 年做投资,你会没少琢磨这件事。

And in particular, the rate of change of rates is super impactful, particularly when we're talking about long duration, high growth assets.

尤其是,利率的变化速度影响极大,特别是对于长久期、高成长的资产而言。

And so to me, you have to accept that.

所以在我看来,你必须接受这一点。

You should have had a margin of safety baked into the cake when you made the original investment.

在你做出最初那笔投资时,就应该把安全边际预先算进去。

If you made the mistake and you didn't, you have to be sober today.

如果你当初犯了错、没有留出安全边际,那今天你就必须清醒起来。

What is the multiple that's going to get paid at exit?

退出时市场会给出多少倍的估值?

Everybody on my team, for example, knows that we're applying a 20% discount to the pre-COVID 10-year average, right?

比如我团队里的每个人都知道,我们会在疫情前那十年的平均倍数上再打 20% 的折扣。

So, that is the exit multiple that we use.

这就是我们采用的退出倍数。

So, now we have to say, "Let's assume everything goes right."

于是现在我们得说:"假设一切都顺利。"

Let's give the entrepreneur the benefit of the doubt.

我们不妨对创业者往好里想。

This is a super cycle, a company we love.

这是一个超级周期,一家我们钟爱的公司。

We want to be investors.

我们很想成为它的投资人。

So, let's assume all of that.

好,这些我们全都假设成立。

But apply a rational multiple to that.

但要给它套上一个理性的估值倍数。

Do we get a target return, right?

这样我们还能拿到目标回报吗?

That's worth us writing the check.

值不值得我们开出这张支票?

And oftentimes, listen, these $1 billion, $2 billion, $3 billion software rounds that are done with very little revenue, you have to assume a tremendous amount goes right.

而很多时候,听着,那些营收还很少却融到 $1 billion、$2 billion、$3 billion 的软件轮次,你必须假设有极多的事情都会顺利兑现。

And then you probably have to assume an absurd multiple.

然后你大概还得假设一个荒谬的估值倍数。

And everybody's counting on the greater fool, right?

而所有人都在指望着博傻(找到更大的傻瓜来接盘)。

And you just like there's going to be a lot of money that gets lost in all of those rounds.

在所有这些轮次里,注定会有大量的钱打水漂。

And so I don't particularly care if it's full of all the great investors or anything else.

所以我并不特别在意里面是不是挤满了各路顶尖投资人,或者别的什么。

Like, we do our own work.

我们做的是我们自己的功课。

I don't carry the bags for anybody.

我不替任何人接盘扛货。

We do our own work and we're going to force ourselves through that screen around valuation.

我们做自己的功课,并且会强迫自己通过估值这一道筛子。

There's a couple of points I have to pick up on.

有几个点我得接着追问一下。

You said about the rate of change there of interest rates being so important.

你刚才说利率的变化速度非常重要。

To me, how does the rate of change of interest rates impact our job so profoundly?

在我看来,利率的变化速度到底是怎么如此深刻地影响我们这份工作的?

So, if you think about it in 2000, 2001, 2002, rates were at 6% and there was a tremendous amount of value creation between 2000 and 2005, right?

你想想看,2000、2001、2002 那几年,利率在 6%,而 2000 到 2005 年间创造了海量的价值,对吧?

Because we had this massive secular tailwind in the internet.

因为当时互联网带来了一股巨大的长期顺风。

But the rate was fairly stable during this period of time and was moving, the market believed, directionally lower.

但这段时间里利率相当稳定,而且市场相信,它的方向是往下走的。

Okay?

明白吗?

When you have a period where we just went through something that is a major standard deviation event, which is going from basically 50 basis points to 400 basis points on the ten-year.

而当你经历一段像我们刚刚经历的、堪称重大标准差事件的时期——十年期国债的利率基本上从 50 个基点飙到了 400 个基点。

It leads to a state of paralysis.

它会导致一种瘫痪状态。

Because our job is to predict the future, we got to forecast the future for the company, but we also have to forecast what is the multiple the world's going to be willing to pay at a point in time in the future.

因为我们的工作就是预测未来,我们得为公司预测未来,但我们还得预测在未来某个时点,整个市场愿意给出的估值倍数是多少。

And so I think when people see a huge rate of change, now we have Larry Summers saying we may go to 6% or 7%.

所以我觉得,当人们看到如此剧烈的变化速度——现在还有 Larry Summers 出来说我们可能会涨到 6% 或 7%。

Well, your cost of capital is going up.

那么,你的资本成本就在上升。

You need to have some predictability about that cost of capital.

你需要对这个资本成本有一定的可预测性。

Let me take it to its logical extreme, Harry.

让我把它推到逻辑的极端,Harry。

Let me tell you that you could earn 20% a year in a risk-free investment.

假设我告诉你,你能在一笔无风险投资上每年赚 20%。

Okay?

好吗?

How many fewer investments would you make?

你会少做多少笔投资?

Many.

很多。

You would make 90% fewer investments.

你会少做 90% 的投资。

Okay?

对吧?

Because the hurdle rate to that capital now gets so profoundly different.

因为这笔资本的门槛回报率现在变得截然不同了。

This is why interest rates do have the impact they do.

这就是为什么利率会产生它们那样的影响。

It really matters, right?

它真的很重要,对吧?

And so once you go to logical extreme, it becomes very obvious.

所以一旦你推到逻辑极端,一切就变得非常显而易见。

We would all just go surf and ski and hang out and do the fun things we do because you would double your money every 4 years.

我们都会去冲浪、滑雪、闲逛,做那些好玩的事,因为你每 4 年就能让钱翻一倍。

You wouldn't do this at all.

你根本不会去干这行。

That's a higher rate of return than the 70th percentile in venture.

那可比风投里第 70 百分位的回报率还高。

And it's risk-free.

而且是无风险的。

So, you know, obviously that matters.

所以,显然这很重要。

We spend a lot of time thinking about it, but we don't try to out-forecast the best macro people in the world.

我们花很多时间思考这件事,但我们不会试图在预测上胜过全世界最顶尖的宏观分析师。

What we effectively do is we look at the future strip.

我们实际上做的,是去看利率期货曲线 (future strip)。

And we say, what is the market telling us that future rates are going to be?

然后我们问,市场在告诉我们未来利率会是多少?

So right now, the market's saying Fed funds rate will peak out in March of next year, something like 4, 4.5%.

就现在而言,市场说联邦基金利率会在明年 3 月见顶,大概在 4% 到 4.5% 左右。

You know, we don't try to outsmart the market.

我们不会试图比市场更聪明。

We just say, okay, let's use that as kind of a rule of thumb.

我们只是说,好,就把它当作一个大致的经验法则来用。

There was one period of time, October of last year, where I went on CNBC and I said I think that the market could very well be getting it wrong.

有那么一段时间,去年 10 月,我上了 CNBC,我说我觉得市场很可能判断错了。

And if once COVID normalizes, I expect us to go back to January 2020 levels on interest rates.

而一旦 COVID 恢复常态,我预计利率会回到 2020 年 1 月的水平。

And if we do that, then multiples on the Nasdaq will be down 20 to 30%, which means the Nasdaq will be down 20 to 30%.

如果真是那样,那么 Nasdaq 的估值倍数会下跌 20% 到 30%,也就意味着 Nasdaq 会下跌 20% 到 30%。

Now, I wish I had followed that wisdom as well as I articulated it.

说实话,我真希望自己当初能像说得那么漂亮一样,把那份智慧执行到位。

But the reality is nobody should be surprised.

但现实是,没人应该感到意外。

In fact, in some ways we should be celebrating.

事实上,某种程度上我们该庆祝才对。

You know what rates mean today?

你知道今天的利率意味着什么吗?

It means that humanity beat a global pandemic that in March of 2020 we thought might wipe out 20% of the world's population.

它意味着人类战胜了一场全球大流行病——在 2020 年 3 月,我们曾以为它可能抹掉全世界 20% 的人口。

That's what this means.

这就是它的意义所在。

Right?

对吧?

So, I suspect that the new normal is going to look a lot like the old normal,

所以,我猜想新常态会和旧常态非常相似,

but we have to get through this period of massive uncertainty and volatility so that you and I can underwrite to a predictable cost of capital.

但我们必须熬过这段充满巨大不确定性和波动的时期,这样你和我才能基于一个可预测的资本成本去做投资研判。

I think it was Chamath on the panel that you and Gurley and Jason Calacanis did together who said, you would never be investing in this period of uncertainty with valuations being so transient and fluid,

我记得是在你和 Gurley、还有 Jason Calacanis 一起做的那期节目上,Chamath 说,在这种估值如此善变、如此飘忽的不确定时期,他绝不会出手去投,

because it's almost irresponsible to invest in a time when no one knows where valuations are going to rest.

因为在没人知道估值最终会落在哪里的时候还去投资,几乎是不负责任的。

And then I'm like, you know, listen to Gurley and Gurley says, no, the best investors invest continuously and you're always investing and you're always in market.

然后我又去听 Gurley 怎么说,Gurley 说,不对,最好的投资人是持续不断地投,你要一直在投、一直在场。

And I'm going, I'm a student of venture, Brad.

于是我就想,Brad,我是个研究风险投资的学生。

Which one of these incredibly smart people do I believe?

这两个绝顶聪明的人,我到底该信谁?

I mean, well, come on.

我是说,拜托。

If it's Gurley versus Chamath, you know which way you got to go.

如果是 Gurley 对 Chamath,你心里清楚该站哪边。

Well, that's bloody true.

嗯,这话太对了。

I mean, just put it out there.

我是说,把话摆到明面上讲。

Now, they're both brilliant, and here's what I would say on that.

他们俩都很出色,而我对这件事的看法是这样的。

Our strategy has always been, we're not going to say all or none.

我们的策略一直是,不搞非黑即白、要么全上要么全不上。

As a firm, we say less or more.

作为一家机构,我们讲的是投得少一点还是多一点。

Okay?

对吧?

So your aperture should be expanding and contracting based upon what you see going on in the world.

所以你的光圈 (aperture,投资节奏的收放) 应该随着你对世界形势的判断而放大或收缩。

So if multiples are at an all-time high like they were last October, and I went on All-In and CNBC, we showed the charts, etc.

所以如果估值倍数处在历史高点——就像去年十月那样,当时我上了 All-In 和 CNBC,我们摆出图表,诸如此类。

We talked about the things we were concerned about.

我们谈了那些让我们担忧的东西。

If multiples are at an all-time high, your aperture should be contracting.

如果估值倍数处在历史高点,你的光圈就应该收缩。

It doesn't mean you shouldn't do any deals,

这并不是说你就一个项目都不该做,

but you should be really clear that you're only doing the best deals because only the best deals will clear those valuation hurdles.

而是你得非常清楚,你只做最好的那几个项目,因为只有最好的项目才能越过那些估值门槛。

At the same time, when the world's panicked, when there's blood in the streets as Buffett says, I agree with Gurley, your aperture should be expanding.

反过来,当市场陷入恐慌、用 Buffett 的话说满街是血的时候,我同意 Gurley——你的光圈就该放大。

But let's be clear about where we are today.

但我们得看清楚今天身处什么位置。

Okay?

好吧?

This is not a blood in the streets moment.

现在并不是满街是血的时刻。

It feels catastrophic because we have growth names that are down 40, 50, 60, 70% in the public markets.

感觉像是灾难,因为公开市场上那些成长股跌了 40%、50%、60%、70%。

But look at where they are compared to where we were in January of 2020.

但你把它们现在的位置,跟 2020 年 1 月时的位置比一比。

For most of these companies, it's just getting back to the normal or slightly below normal or average valuations.

对其中大多数公司来说,这只不过是回到了正常、或略低于正常、或平均水平的估值而已。

That's how far in left field we were in terms of valuations.

这就说明我们之前的估值离谱到了什么地步。

Right?

对吧?

So don't anchor yourself to the stupidity of the last 18 months.

所以别把自己锚定在过去 18 个月那种愚蠢上。

Do a de novo underwriting based upon the facts as they exist today.

要基于今天真实存在的事实,从零重新做一次研判。

So for Altimeter, listen, we just signed a Series A deal, we have a Series B term sheet out.

所以对 Altimeter 来说,你听我说,我们刚刚签了一笔 A 轮,还有一份 B 轮的投资条款清单在外面。

I still think that but we were following a process.

我依然是这么想的,不过我们当时是在遵循一套既定流程。

But I will tell you, most of that distribution, right?

但我告诉你,那笔分配 (向 LP 的返还) 的大头,对吧?

Not all, but most of that distribution was Snowflake.

不是全部,但那笔分配的大部分都是 Snowflake。

And the truth of the matter is I think Snowflake will be worth a lot more in the future than it is today and even more in the future than it was then.

而事实是,我认为 Snowflake 未来会比今天值钱得多,而未来的它也会比当时值钱得多。

So they're never easy decisions.

所以这些从来都不是容易的决定。

But the way I feel like about Snowflake, I felt about less than five companies over the entire course of my career.

但我对 Snowflake 的这种感觉,在我整个职业生涯里,加起来对不到五家公司有过。

And so that's what made that one as difficult as it was.

正因如此,那个决定才会那么艰难。

You spoke about the deal with your LPs there.

你刚才提到了和你的 LP 之间的那笔交易。

I think

我觉得

the biggest problem that I see from speaking to LPs is managers aren't marking down their books either fast enough or aggressively enough and it's causing this misalignment between publics and privates within LPs' books,

我跟 LP 聊下来,看到的最大问题是:基金管理人给自己的账面估值减记,要么不够快、要么不够狠,这就导致 LP 账上公开市场资产和私募资产之间出现错位。

which is meaning they're going, "Whoa, whoa, I'm not allocating anything to venture for a while because it's so out of kilter."

结果他们就说:"打住打住,这段时间我一分钱都不往风险投资里配了,因为它太失衡了。"

And it's because managers aren't either doing it at all or doing it aggressively enough.

而根源就在于管理人要么根本没减记,要么减记得不够狠。

How do you think about the right way for managers to think about marking down books?

你觉得管理人应该用什么样的正确方式来看待账面减记?

How would you advise me on it?

你会怎么建议我?

I'd love your genuine thoughts.

我特别想听你真实的想法。

Well, so we have a you know, I think our policy is pretty standard with with most managers, which is we don't spend a lot of time marking up our books when the Nasdaq's going up and we don't spend a lot of time marking down our books when the Nasdaq's going down.

我们的做法,我觉得跟大多数管理人差不多,挺标准的:Nasdaq 上涨时,我们不会花很多精力去调高账面估值;Nasdaq 下跌时,我们也不会花很多精力去调低账面估值。

When the facts change or new rounds intervene or down rounds occur, obviously we will make changes to the portfolio.

当事实发生变化,或者有新一轮融资进来,或者出现下折(down round)时,我们当然会对投资组合做调整。

But again, what's so important is I have that very clear expectation with my LPs.

但我再强调一次,关键在于我和我的 LP 之间早就把这个预期讲得很清楚。

So I was having a conversation with the CIO of Harvard and he asked me early this year, what do you How do you think we ought to think about valuations?

今年年初我和哈佛的首席投资官(CIO)聊天,他问我:你觉得我们应该怎么看待估值?

And I said, I would take everything in your portfolio that received a valuation over the last two years, over $500 million, and I'd mark it down by 50%.

我说:我会把你组合里过去两年拿到过估值、且估值超过 $500 million 的所有资产,统统减记 50%。

And what do you mean?

他说,此话怎讲?

And I said, well, if I look at the average growth stock in the NASDAQ, it's down 50%.

我说,你看 Nasdaq 上平均的成长股,已经跌了 50%。

So, like, I think every LP needs to assess for themselves how they carry it.

所以我觉得,每个 LP 都得自己去评估,该怎么在账上计量这些资产。

Right?

对吧?

So, I don't think it's just a GP issue.

所以我不认为这只是 GP 一方的问题。

Right?

对吧?

Ultimately, I have different LPs.

说到底,我的 LP 各不相同。

Some are longer duration, some are shorter duration, some have the denominator problem that you described because they're running an endowment model, some don't because they're families and they want to double down.

有的期限更长,有的期限更短;有的存在你说的那个分母问题,因为他们跑的是捐赠基金模式;有的则没有这个问题,因为他们是家族资本,还想加倍下注。

And so, I think it's just important to talk clearly with your LPs about what your approach is.

所以我觉得,关键就是把你的做法跟你的 LP 讲清楚。

And then if you get the question like I got, like I think a useful heuristic, if you want to mark up and down with the NASDAQ, then just put all your exposure in a book, right?

然后,如果你遇到我碰到的那种问题,我觉得有个好用的思路:如果你非要跟着 Nasdaq 上上下下地调估值,那干脆把你所有的敞口都摊到一个账本上,对吧?

Hell, you can mark it every day.

见鬼,你甚至可以每天都重新标一次价。

What's the NASDAQ up today?

Nasdaq 今天涨了多少?

What's the NASDAQ down today?

Nasdaq 今天跌了多少?

And mark your book accordingly, have a score sheet, put it up on the wall.

然后照着调你的账本,搞一张记分表,贴到墙上。

Um, you know, we don't need to do that.

但我们没必要那么干。

We don't do it, but it's not hard to do.

我们不这么做,但真要做也不难。

Can I ask on that deal with your LPs, you know, we've kind of touched on before, but in terms of LP alignment, you have this slight tension between fee gathering and AUM collecting, which we've seen a lot of people do over the last years.

我能不能就你跟 LP 之间的这套安排再问一下,虽然我们之前多少聊到过——就 LP 利益一致性而言,你会面临一种微妙的张力:一边是靠攒管理费、一边是靠堆 AUM,而过去这些年我们看到很多人正是这么干的。

And Brad, me and you both know the dirty truth, which is it is a [expletive] lucrative game if you want to do it and do it right.

而且 Brad,你我都心知肚明那个不太体面的真相:只要你想干、又干得漂亮,这就是一门利润高得离谱的生意。

And some people have absolutely, but you will I think obviously see a dim damage to compare like multiples.

有些人确实就是这么干的,但我觉得,一旦拿回报倍数(multiple)去比,你显然会看到它对业绩的伤害。

So, how do you think about this misalignment between fee collection and maximizing multiples on smaller pools of capital?

所以,对于"收管理费"和"在更小的资金池上把回报倍数做到最大"这两者之间的错位,你是怎么看的?

Again, it you know, you're right.

还是那句话,你说得对。

It's structural.

这是结构性的。

Um, one of the ways, like if I'm an LP and I'm allocating to somebody, I need to think about their economic alignment.

其中一个角度是:假如我是 LP,我要把钱配给某个人,我就得去想他的经济利益是否跟我一致。

Okay?

对吧?

So, I think at Altimeter, I'm 20% of the capital in Altimeter.

拿 Altimeter 来说,我自己就占了 Altimeter 20% 的资本。

Okay?

对吧?

So, the return to me of an incremental turn on the multiple is a lot more important and dramatically more important on an after-tax basis than return to me from fee, from management fee.

所以,回报倍数每多做出一倍,给我带来的收益,按税后口径算,要比我从管理费里拿到的收益重要得多、重要得不是一星半点。

Okay?

对吧?

And so, I'm very well aligned with my partners that I'm going to size our funds in a way that I think balances maximizing return and building the firm.

所以,我和我的合伙人利益高度一致:我会以一种我认为能在"把回报做到最大"和"把公司做起来"之间取得平衡的方式,来决定基金的规模。

Um, and so, like, for example, our fund started off at a hundred million, our first VC fund.

举个例子,我们的基金一开始是一亿美元,那是我们的第一支 VC 基金。

VC 6 was closer to a billion and a half.

到了 VC6,规模接近十五亿美元。

We could have raised a lot more than a billion and a half.

我们本可以募得远不止十五亿。

Why did we choose billion and a half?

那我们为什么偏偏选十五亿?

I think where the space we occupy at Altimeter, which is sitting in between the best seed and A investors in the world and the public markets, and really helping invest in those companies like Snowflake, like Modern Treasury, like DBT pre-revenue and growing with them all the way to public markets, we need scale to do that.

因为 Altimeter 所处的位置,是夹在全世界最好的种子轮、A 轮投资人和公开市场之间——去投那些像 Snowflake、Modern Treasury、DBT 这样的公司,在它们还没有收入的时候就进去,一路陪着它们成长直到上市——要做这件事,我们需要一定的规模。

Right?

对吧?

And so, how much is enough scale but not so much as it becomes hugely dilutive or even meaningfully dilutive to our returns?

于是问题就成了:多大规模才算够,但又不至于大到严重摊薄、甚至只是有意义地摊薄我们的回报?

Deploying a 10 billion dollar fund or God forbid a 50 billion or a hundred billion dollar fund like Masa tried to do, right?

去部署一支一百亿美元的基金,或者天理不容地,像 Masa 想干的那样去搞一支五百亿、一千亿美元的基金,对吧?

You already know you will not generate alpha in that.

你心里早就清楚,那种规模是做不出 alpha 的。

You are getting the beta of the global tech industry when you're investing those dollars at best.

你把那么多钱投出去,顶多也就是拿到全球科技行业的 beta。

And most likely there'll be adverse selection because the best founders in the world don't want to be part of that portfolio.

而且很可能还会遭遇逆向选择(adverse selection),因为全世界最好的创始人根本不想成为那个组合的一部分。

The best founders in the world want to be with the best brands and the best brands in the world aren't raising that size of fund.

全世界最好的创始人想跟最好的品牌绑在一起,而全世界最好的品牌根本不会去募那种规模的基金。

And so, for us, you know, like we're perfectly happy and content.

所以对我们来说,我们非常满足、非常知足。

If I get a call over the weekend an investor in a company that we love needs a hundred million dollars, we can write them that check.

如果周末我接到电话,说我们特别看好的一家公司需要一亿美元,我们能直接开出那张支票。

Um, at the same time, I can write a 10 million dollar check like I'm doing uh today in a series A investment that has enough impact on that fund to really matter.

与此同时,我也可以像今天这样,在一笔 A 轮投资里开出一张一千万美元的支票,而这笔钱对这支基金的影响,依然大到真正有分量。

I totally get you.

我完全懂你的意思。

I think what worries me honestly, Brad, is that I speak to many LPs and I say, why why would you do that you know, investment into this three billion dollar fund when you could have done it into these great managers with a 250 million dollar fund?

说实话,Brad,真正让我担心的是:我跟很多 LP 聊,我问他们,你为什么要把钱投进这支三十亿美元的基金,明明你本可以投给那些管着两亿五千万美元基金的优秀管理人?

The opportunity cost of your dollars and the multiples that are associated with each uh I mean it starkly obvious.

你这些钱的机会成本,以及两边各自对应的回报倍数——我是说,差距明摆着、一目了然。

And they go, ah yeah, I I I agree, Harry, but like, you know, I'm this I don't picking a brand name, Andreessen.

然后他们会说,啊对,我同意,Harry,但是你知道吗——随便点个名吧,比如 Andreessen。

Um, as Andreessen, like, you know, I'm I I've got no incentive.

就拿 Andreessen 来说,我个人是没有什么激励的。

I get paid a salary and I get paid a bonus.

我拿的是工资,加上一笔奖金。

Very few LPs obviously have upside.

显然,只有极少数 LP 才真正分享到业绩上行的好处。

And so, [expletive] it.

所以,管它呢。

Like, why would I risk it on these two people when I could do Andreessen?

我干嘛要拿职业风险押在这两个人身上,明明我可以选 Andreessen?

I think there's like

我觉得这里面有一种——

You just answered your own question.

你刚刚已经自己回答了自己的问题。

I mean, so

我是说,所以——

Do you see the structural like problem with LPs yourself?

那你自己也看到 LP 身上这种结构性的问题了吗?

Of course.

当然看到了。

I mean, but I I I won't describe it as a problem.

不过我不会把它叫作"问题"。

I'll describe it as just a reality in the world.

我会把它形容成这个世界的一种现实。

So, for example, when I got started in this business with David and Joel, sovereign wealth funds were not allocating to venture.

举个例子,当年我和 David、Joel 一起入行的时候,主权财富基金根本不往风险投资里配钱。

Pension funds weren't allocating in any real way to venture.

养老金基金也没有真正实质性地往风险投资里配钱。

Right?

对吧?

I mean, s- Swensen and Yale were in the vanguard of allocating to venture.

当时,Swensen 和耶鲁算是率先大举配置风险投资的先锋。

Right?

对吧?

So, it's important for GPs to understand the world has structurally changed.

所以,GP 一定要明白,这个世界已经发生了结构性的改变。

I'm getting cold called from Middle East sovereigns who want to invest.

现在会有中东的主权基金主动打电话来找我,说想投钱进来。

Okay?

对吧?

This is going to mean that we have a permanent increase in the amount of capital that exists in venture capital.

这意味着,风险投资里的资金总量会出现一次永久性的增加。

A permanent increase.

是永久性的增加。

And pension funds want in.

而且养老金基金也想进来。

And by the way, their hurdle rate, what they need to make on that money, is much lower than what MIT expected to make.

顺便说一句,他们的门槛回报率(hurdle rate)——也就是这笔钱他们需要赚到的最低回报——要比 MIT 期望赚到的低得多。

And so, you know, now if you're if you're Yale or MIT, you might say these guys are ruining the party.

所以,如果你现在是耶鲁或者 MIT,你可能会说,这帮人把这场好局给搅了。

And to some extent, they are.

某种程度上,他们确实是。

The industry is going from highly fragmented to much more industrial scale.

这个行业正从高度分散,走向更接近工业化的大规模。

Returns are going to compress.

回报会被压缩。

But you want to the reason I still remain so optimistic, w- where we started.

但是,我之所以依然如此乐观——回到我们一开始聊的那个点。

It's a power law industry.

这是一个幂律(power law)主导的行业。

It doesn't matter that you're in 200 deals.

你投了 200 个项目,这本身并不重要。

Hell, you don't want to be in 200 deals.

见鬼,你根本就不该去投 200 个项目。

The question is, is the best founder, right?

真正的问题是:那个最好的创始人在哪儿,对吧?

Is Mike Speiser and, you know, and Bob Muglia going to do that deal with Altimeter?

Mike Speiser、还有 Bob Muglia,他们那笔交易会不会选择和 Altimeter 一起做?

Are they going to do it with a hundred billion dollar fund um or a 10 billion dollar fund that can't have the impact that doesn't stand in our shoes?

还是说他们会去找一支一千亿美元的基金、或者一支一百亿美元的基金——那种既起不到我们这样的作用、也站不到我们这个位置上的基金?

I think the best founders in the world want to be with the best partners in the world who proven themselves to be much more than just a commodity when it comes to money.

我认为,全世界最好的创始人,想要的是全世界最好的合伙人——那些已经用事实证明,自己远不只是"一笔可以随处买到的钱"的合伙人。

I have to ask you about the portfolio construction side.

我得问问你投资组合构建这块。

We've talked about it and touched on it a little bit.

我们之前聊过、也稍微带到过一点。

You spoke before about being sufficiently concentrated.

你之前提到要"足够集中"。

What does that look like in your mind in terms of the optimal concentration cuz I think I struggle more with it.

在你脑子里,最优的集中度到底长什么样?因为我自己在这件事上其实挺纠结的。

I don't think people are that good pickers and I think diversification is more needed, and you, I think, think concentration is needed.

我不觉得人真有那么会选,我倾向于认为更需要分散;而你,我理解,是认为需要集中。

So, help me understand why sufficiently concentrated is better.

所以,帮我理解一下,为什么"足够集中"更好。

Yeah, I mean, when I think about concentration, you got to know, I come out of this Buffett school.

是这样,我一想到集中持仓,你得知道,我是从 Buffett 那一派出来的。

And I think, as Buffett has said, you know, diversification is a great way to preserve wealth but a terrible way to create it.

而我认为,正如 Buffett 说过的,分散是保住财富的好办法,却是创造财富的糟糕办法。

Right?

对吧?

And so, I think diversification in many ways is the greatest myth perpetrated on the investing public.

所以在我看来,分散在很多层面上,是强加给投资大众的最大迷思。

The idea that risk mitigation is the equivalent of diversification —

那种把"降低风险"等同于"分散"的想法——

anybody who lived through 2008 knows that all asset and all pricing was correlated.

任何经历过 2008 年的人都知道,所有资产、所有定价都是相关的。

Hell, look at a chart on any technology company over the course of the last nine months.

你就看看过去九个月里任何一家科技公司的走势图。

How much did diversification help you?

分散到底帮了你多少?

Right?

对吧?

And so, what I want to do and what people should pay me for, or choose not to pay me for, right?

所以,我真正想做的、也是别人该为之付钱、或者选择不为之付钱的东西,对吧?

Like, they either believe or they don't believe, is: can you — are you in a position intellectually, network, conviction, etc. to generate alpha?

就是说,他们要么信、要么不信——那就是:你有没有能力、你是不是在认知上、人脉上、信念上等等,处在一个能创造 alpha 的位置上?

And if you are, right?

如果你确实处在那个位置,对吧?

If I find a company where I have a level of conviction like I did in Booking.com and Priceline 2004, Google in 2005, or Snowflake, you know, in 2014, if we find those opportunities and we re-underwrite them at every phase, mentally flexible, stay open to the idea that you're wrong —

如果我找到一家公司,我对它的信念强到就像我 2004 年对 Booking.com 和 Priceline、2005 年对 Google、或者 2014 年对 Snowflake 那样;如果我们找到那样的机会,并在每一个阶段都对它从头研判一遍,保持思维弹性,始终对"自己可能错了"这件事敞开——

but I want maximum dollars.

但我要投入最多的钱。

Again, it's my money.

再说一遍,那是我自己的钱。

I'm taking my partners along for the ride.

我是带着我的合伙人一起上这条船的。

I want maximum dollars behind our best ideas.

我要把最多的钱押在我们最好的想法上。

Why the hell would I put an incremental dollar in my tenth best idea or my fifteenth best idea when I can put more money in my best idea?

当我可以往最好的想法里加更多钱的时候,我干嘛要把每一块增量的钱扔进我第十好、第十五好的想法里?

And so, if, you know, at the end of the day, you got to live with the result.

所以说,归根结底,你得为结果买单。

Right?

对吧?

And the result is there's batting average and there's slugging percentage.

而这个结果,分两种:一个是打击率 (batting average),一个是长打率 (slugging percentage)。

Right?

对吧?

Altimeter needs to have a really high slugging percentage.

Altimeter 需要有一个非常高的长打率。

When we swing hard at the ball, runners are in scoring position.

当我们用力挥棒时,垒上是有跑者、处在得分位置的。

How often do we hit the ball?

我们挥棒击中的频率有多高?

Right?

对吧?

So, that to me is what makes the grade in this business.

所以对我来说,这才是这行里够格的标准。

I see a lot of venture capitalists and others.

我见过很多风险投资人,还有其他人。

They say, oh yeah, I was in that deal.

他们会说,对啊,那笔交易我也参与了。

I was in Snowflake.

Snowflake 我投了。

I was in this. I was in that.

这个我投了,那个我也投了。

I say, well, how much do you have in it?

我就问,那你投了多少?

Well, I, you know, I had one million dollars in a late stage round.

呃,我在一轮后期融资里投了一百万美元。

Right?

对吧?

It's like, who cares?

那种感觉就是,谁在乎啊?

Right?

对吧?

The gross profit dollars come from having conviction before the rest of the world does and putting sufficient money behind it.

真正的毛利润,来自你在全世界之前就有了信念,并在这个信念背后押上足够多的钱。

I mean, our first fund, VC 1, hell, I couldn't even raise it.

我们第一只基金,VC 1,说真的,我当时连都募不起来。

I was 20 or 25% of the fund.

我自己就占了这只基金的 20% 到 25%。

And we put over 30% of that fund in Snowflake at a point in time that the world thought we were crazy.

而我们把这只基金 30% 以上都投进了 Snowflake,在那个时点上,全世界都觉得我们疯了。

The world didn't, you know, think the cloud was — I mean, at the time I was pretty pessimistic about the cloud, to be honest.

当时全世界都不看好云——说实话,那会儿连我自己对云都相当悲观。

Brad, Brad, that is a bet the fund decision.

Brad,Brad,那可是一个"押上整只基金"的决定啊。

I just had this chat with Fialkow.

我刚跟 Fialkow 聊过这个。

He told me that in his second fund, he himself put 30% into one company.

他跟我说,在他的第二只基金里,他自己把 30% 都投进了一家公司。

And I said to him, that is a bet the fund decision.

我跟他说,那就是一个押上整只基金的决定。

Like, you're not who you are now.

你要知道,那时候的你还不是现在的你。

If you were to do that and it went wrong, that could have been the end of Altimeter.

如果你那么干、结果又出了岔子,那可能就是 Altimeter 的终点。

If you had lost the money, 30% to nothing, that's a tough thing.

如果你把那笔钱亏掉了,30% 变成零,那是很难扛的一件事。

I would say a couple things.

我想说几点。

Number one, I was talking yesterday to a great friend of mine, the Olympic skier Jonny Moseley.

第一,我昨天在跟我一个很好的朋友聊天,他是奥运滑雪选手 Jonny Moseley。

And he's giving a talk up at the YPO in San Francisco about whether or not sports, like big mountain skiing, which my sons do with his sons, whether or not that's good training for investing.

他要在旧金山的 YPO 做一场演讲,主题是:像大山滑雪 (big mountain skiing) 这样的运动——我儿子就跟他儿子一起玩这个——它到底算不算是投资的好训练。

So this idea, because a lot of people will see, you know, Johnny do a double back or, you know, I don't know, quadruple backflip and they'll say, "Oh my god, such a risk taker, totally crazy."

这个思路是这样的:很多人会看到 Johnny 做一个后空翻两周,或者,我也说不好,后空翻四周,然后就说,"我的天,真是个冒险家,简直疯了。"

But when you actually go out there, you look at the 10,000 hours they put in it, the research.

但当你真的走近去看,你会看到他们在这上面投入的一万个小时、做的那些功课。

He's taught our kids, you never go over a structure like a cliff without first inspecting the other side, right?

他教过我们的孩子,你绝不会在没先探查另一侧的情况下,就越过像悬崖那样的地形,对吧?

It's massively calculated.

这是经过极其周密测算的。

And then you prepare your mind for those moments, right?

然后你为那些关键时刻做好心理准备,对吧?

You know what you're going to feel like when the amygdala starts firing, when that frontal cortex says what you're doing is a mistake, right?

你清楚当杏仁核开始放电、当前额叶皮层告诉你"你在犯错"的那一刻,你会是什么感觉,对吧?

So unless you've done the work, unless you built the model, unless you have the conviction, you won't be able to do it.

所以除非你做足了功课、除非你建好了模型、除非你有那份信念,否则你根本做不到。

So what the outside world oftentimes perceives as tremendous amount of risk, to the person who's done the work, prepared themselves, right?

所以外部世界常常看作是巨大风险的东西,对那个已经做足功课、准备好自己的人来说,对吧?

Of course you can't eliminate risk, but often for the protagonist who's actually doing it, it feels much less risky than everybody who's perceiving it from the outside in.

当然你没法消除风险,但对那个真正下场去做的主角来说,它往往远没有那些从外往里看的人所感受到的那么危险。

Right?

对吧?

If somebody was adding — if Sequoia was adding money to Airbnb in the series B or series C, a bunch of people on the outside may have said, "Oh my god, that's so crazy."

如果有人在加码——如果 Sequoia 在 Airbnb 的 B 轮或 C 轮里继续加钱,外面一堆人可能会说,"我的天,这也太疯了。"

Look at the valuation. I can't believe they're doing that deal. It's so risky.

看看那估值。真不敢相信他们在做这笔交易。太冒险了。

I'm certain they didn't feel that way.

我敢肯定他们当时并不这么觉得。

I'm certain we did not feel that way in every subsequent round we co-led in Snowflake because we had done the work, prepared ourselves, had the information, had studied, we looked over the cliff, we understood what it meant for the fund.

我敢肯定,在我们联合领投 Snowflake 的每一个后续轮次里,我们都没那种感觉,因为我们做足了功课、准备好了自己、掌握了信息、做过研究,我们探查过悬崖的另一侧,我们清楚这对基金意味着什么。

But yes, I will conclude by saying this.

但没错,我最后用这句话来收尾。

My goal is not to build a highly diverse firm and, you know, raise 50 billion-dollar funds and never take any risk and, you know, that we get to have choices what we do with our days.

我的目标不是去建一家高度分散的机构,去募 500 亿美元的基金、从不冒任何风险,然后我们就能随心所欲地安排每一天。

I want to live a life that matters.

我想过一种有意义的人生。

I want to do [expletive] that matters, and that means that when you believe something, you actually do something about it.

我想做真正有分量的事,而这意味着,当你相信某件事的时候,你要真的为它去做点什么。

You actually stand with a little conviction behind it.

你要真的带着一点信念,站到它背后去。

If we're not doing that, then we're not the firm I want us to be.

如果我们没在这么做,那我们就不是我希望成为的那家机构。

Can I be blunt, Brad?

我能直说吗，Brad？

You spoke about kind of calculating risk there and you know, the skiing and jumping and everything in between is insurance and athletic sports.

你刚才聊到怎么去算风险，还有滑雪、跳跃，以及夹在保险和竞技体育之间的种种。

Um my question to you is I spoke to Sonali before the show and she asked a brilliant question.

我想问你的是——录节目之前我跟 Sonali 聊过，她提了一个特别精彩的问题。

She said, "Ask Brad with that element of like we bluntly took on a more risk forward mind over the last 18 months."

她说："去问问 Brad，就冲着这一点——过去 18 个月里我们明显抱着一种更冒进的心态。"

What are some of the biggest or most risky mistakes that you made over the last 18 months that you have learned from that maybe you haven't shared?

过去 18 个月里，你犯过哪些最大、或者说风险最高的错误，让你有所收获、而你可能还没对外讲过的？

Yeah, I mean listen, I think you know, so our cultural North Star at Altimeter is essentialism.

是的，我是说，听着，你知道，Altimeter 的文化北极星 (North Star) 就是本质主义 (essentialism)。

Right?

对吧？

It's kind of an operating road map for me in life.

它某种程度上就是我人生的一张操作路线图。

You know, think of what minimalism is to Jony Ive, right?

你想想，极简主义之于 Jony Ive 是什么，对吧？

Essentialism is to life design and business design for us.

本质主义之于我们的人生设计和事业设计，就是那个东西。

So the art of doing less better.

也就是——把更少的事做得更好的艺术。

And everybody in our firm would tell you that that's what our cultural North Star is.

我们公司里的每个人都会告诉你，这就是我们的文化北极星。

They'll tell you how we practice it both in terms of how we schedule meetings, how we spend our days, the investments that we make.

他们会告诉你我们是怎么践行它的——从怎么安排会议、怎么度过每一天，到我们做的每一笔投资。

And so for a firm that prides itself on that, there's no doubt over the course of the last 24 months where we're all working remotely, where there's a lot of FOMO, where the cost of capital is really low, we did more than we should have.

所以对于一家以此为傲的公司来说，毫无疑问，在过去 24 个月里——大家都远程办公、到处是 FOMO、资本成本又低得离谱——我们做的事情超出了应有的量。

Right?

对吧？

And I think most folks would raise their hand if they're being intellectually honest and say that that's the case.

而且我想，只要够坦诚，大多数人都会举手承认，事实就是这样。

To me, the practice of essentialism is kind of like my practice of yoga that I've been doing for over 20 years, right?

对我来说，践行本质主义有点像我练了 20 多年的瑜伽，对吧？

It is not just a statement you put on the top of your whiteboard.

它不只是你写在白板顶端的一句口号。

Right?

对吧？

But it's something that you aspire to every single day.

而是你每一天都要去追求的东西。

Right?

对吧？

Is this accretive to who we are as humans?

这件事，对我们作为人的成长有增益吗？

Is this accretive to who we are as a firm?

对我们作为一家公司的成长有增益吗？

Is this accretive to my intellectual understanding?

对我认知层面的理解有增益吗？

And if it's not, we shouldn't be doing it.

如果没有，那我们就不该去做。

Brad, how do you advise young people and young partners you have in your team, like your friends with, like me, who are looking at our books today going, "Fuck."

Brad，你会怎么建议年轻人、还有你团队里的年轻合伙人，比如你那些朋友、比如我——今天翻着自己的账本，心里想着"操"。

Am I any good at this?

我到底行不行啊？

The last year I thought I was great.

去年我还觉得自己特别牛。

My LPs thought I was great.

我的 LP 也觉得我特别牛。

Am I any good at this today?

可今天，我还行吗？

I don't know.

我不知道。

This is how a generation of junior partners feel and they cry to themselves and cry to each other on WhatsApp channels.

整整一代初级合伙人现在就是这种感受，他们自己偷偷崩溃，也在 WhatsApp 群里互相诉苦。

How do you advise our generation who's never been through this, got high on their own supply last year and now are going, "Shit. I don't know."

你会怎么建议我们这一代——从没经历过这种局面、去年还嗑着自己造的迷魂药飘飘然，如今却在念叨"糟了，我不知道该怎么办"的人？

I mean listen, I came into the business at exactly this time.

听着，我入行的时候，正好就是这样一个节点。

I mean I graduated from business school in May of 2000.

我是 2000 年 5 月从商学院毕业的。

David and Joel were starting GC and I was running our first investment.

当时 David 和 Joel 正在创办 GC（General Catalyst），而我在操盘我们的第一笔投资。

So I, you know, this pattern recognition comes from a painful exercise, I saw my dad go through it.

所以你知道，这种模式识别，是从一场痛苦的经历里来的——我亲眼看着我爸熬过那一关。

Right?

对吧？

And I started Altimeter, my first trade at Altimeter was November 1st, 2008.

而我创办 Altimeter——Altimeter 的第一笔交易是在 2008 年 11 月 1 日。

Literally into the teeth of that crisis.

简直就是一头扎进那场危机的风口浪尖。

And remember, November and December were wipeouts.

你要记得，那年 11 月和 12 月是全面崩盘。

The market bottomed in March of 2009.

市场是在 2009 年 3 月见底的。

And so the advice I give to them is if you don't have a stomach for it, find a different thing to do.

所以我给他们的建议是：如果你受不了这个，那就去干别的吧。

This was never meant to be a get-rich-quick scheme.

这行当从来就不是什么一夜暴富的门路。

The people who thrive in this business, Mike Moritz is great in this business because he has a incredible curiosity and passion for understanding the world around him and he expresses that finding in his investments.

那些在这行里如鱼得水的人——Mike Moritz 之所以厉害，是因为他对理解周遭世界有着惊人的好奇心和热情，而他把这份探究倾注在了他的投资里。

Same with Bill Gurley.

Bill Gurley 也一样。

Same with Brad Gerstner.

Brad Gerstner（我自己）也一样。

Same with Jim and Bala on my team.

我团队里的 Jim 和 Bala 也一样。

Same with, you know, Frieder or Rebecca on our team.

还有我们团队里的 Frieder、Rebecca，都一样。

Like, you know, when I look for recruiting, right?

你知道，当我招人的时候，对吧？

Paul Reeder, who's my mentor, an incredible investor.

Paul Reeder，我的导师，一位了不起的投资人。

He said to me early in my career, he said it's harder to pick people than it is to pick stocks.

在我职业生涯早期，他跟我说：挑人比挑股票更难。

And he's like, "I'm taking a chance on you because you have plausible alpha."

他说："我愿意在你身上赌一把，是因为你身上有那种说得通的 alpha。"

Said, "The road is littered with guys and gals who went to Harvard Business School who never made a nickel in this business."

他说："这条路上到处是从哈佛商学院出来、却在这行里一分钱都没赚到的男男女女。"

Right?

对吧？

But you're a lawyer, you've run three companies, you've got this network, you see it, you're contrarian, you see the world a little different, you were charting stocks when you're in high school.

但你是个律师，你经营过三家公司，你有这样的人脉网，你看得懂，你是个逆向思考者，你看世界的角度有点不一样，你上高中的时候就在画股票走势图了。

Like there's a chance you have a little alpha.

就是说，你有可能真带着一点 alpha。

The truth of the matter is most of the people you know, Harry, they're not great.

事实的真相是，你认识的大多数人，Harry，他们并不出色。

They don't have alpha.

他们没有 alpha。

Right?

对吧？

And like we're going to flush that out real quick.

而这种局面会很快把他们冲刷出局。

I've lived through two of these downturns and I've watched people get flushed out.

我亲历过两次这样的下行周期，也眼睁睁看着人被冲出局。

I've told you, I've watched you.

我跟你说过，我一直在观察你。

You have alpha.

你是有 alpha 的。

You came up with this hack, 20 VC.

你想出了 20VC 这么个妙招。

I'm going to figure out how to get Brad Gerstner and Mike Moritz and Bill Gurley and all their friends to talk to me and I'm going to build the most potent top of funnel in the world and I'm going to bolt on this great business model underneath it called venture capital.

"我要想办法让 Brad Gerstner、Mike Moritz、Bill Gurley 以及他们所有的朋友都来跟我聊，我要打造出全世界最强的漏斗顶端，然后在它底下嫁接上一个叫风险投资的绝佳商业模式。"

That's a hack.

这就是妙招。

That's alpha.

这就是 alpha。

Okay?

明白吗？

So if you were recruiting somebody, I would ask them the question.

所以如果你要招人，我会问他们这样一个问题。

I ask everybody that we're going to hire, I ask them this question.

凡是我们准备录用的人，我都会问他们这个问题。

Tell me how you've made money.

跟我讲讲，你是怎么赚到钱的。

You know the number of people went to Harvard Business School and worked at Goldman Sachs who can't answer that question?

你知道有多少上过哈佛商学院、在高盛干过的人，答不上来这个问题吗？

They've never had to make [expletive] money.

他们这辈子就没真正需要自己去挣钱。

I'll tell you you ask me that question, the first answer I'll give you is in the sixth grade, I had my mom drop me off at the gas station, I bought candy, I took it to my locker and I sold candy out of my locker at a 2x markup.

我告诉你，你要是这么问我，我给你的第一个答案是：六年级的时候，我让我妈把我放在加油站，我在那儿买糖，把糖拿到我的储物柜，然后从柜子里以 2 倍加价把糖卖出去。

That's how I first made money.

我人生第一次赚钱就是这么来的。

Right?

对吧？

So I've spent my life figuring out hacks on stuff like this.

所以我这辈子都在琢磨这类事情的窍门。

And if somebody doesn't have that grit, they can't answer that question, that's a disqualifier.

如果一个人没有那股韧劲、答不上来这个问题，那就是一票否决。

What's the best answer you've had to that question?

这个问题，你听到过的最好答案是什么？

I don't even really care about the answer to the question.

其实我根本不在乎这个问题的答案本身。

What I care about is they have an answer.

我在乎的是，他们能拿得出一个答案。

Right?

对吧？

You and I were talking about, how did Carl Eschenbach go from being a wrestler in Pennsylvania to an incredible venture capitalist at Sequoia?

你我刚才还在聊，Carl Eschenbach 是怎么从宾夕法尼亚的一个摔跤手，变成 Sequoia 一位了不起的风险投资人的？

That intrigues me.

这才让我着迷。

Having the curiosity, understanding those biographies, I think is important.

怀着那份好奇心、去读懂这些人的人生故事，我觉得这很重要。

Do you worry that hustle can get in the way of loyalty and discipline?

你会担心这种拼劲反而会妨碍忠诚和纪律吗?

Like if you're so intent on that you said that money making, that that hustle, that drive, then do they maintain the discipline when times are crazy?

就是说,如果一个人满脑子都是你说的那种赚钱欲、那股拼劲、那股冲劲,那当市场疯狂的时候,他们还守得住纪律吗?

Do they maintain the loyalty to you, Brad, and Altimeter when someone says, "Hey, there's a shiny new toy over here."

当有人跟他们说"嘿,这边有个闪亮的新玩具"的时候,他们还守得住对你 Brad、对 Altimeter 的忠诚吗?

Well, I would say a couple things.

我想说几点。

Number one, having figured out a way that you personally can build alpha is a condition required though not sufficient.

第一,一个人已经摸索出自己能创造 alpha 的方法,这是必要条件,但不是充分条件。

First. Right?

这是前提,对吧?

Like I know plenty of people have a good hustle, but they're actually not great thinkers.

我认识很多人很有拼劲,但其实并不是很会思考。

I know plenty of people have good hustle who don't have great discernment.

我也认识很多人很有拼劲,但缺乏出色的判断力。

So all I'm saying is when you're looking at recruiting somebody, is it plausible, right?

所以我想说的是,当你在考虑招一个人时,你要问:这靠谱吗?

That they have alpha that makes them different from everybody else in the world.

也就是,他们真的拥有那种让他们区别于世界上所有人的 alpha 吗?

Number two, what I would say is listen, my philosophy about people who work at Altimeter is that, you know, this place is not indentured servitude.

第二,听着,我对在 Altimeter 工作的人的理念是:这里不是卖身契。

You're all free agents.

你们都是自由人。

I say to everybody who comes to work here, you may work here a year you may work here the rest of your career.

我对每一个来这里工作的人都说:你可能在这里干一年,也可能在这里干一辈子。

The only thing I really care about is that it's an incredible experience for you and an incredible experience for us.

我真正在乎的只有一件事:这段经历对你来说很棒,对我们来说也很棒。

Right?

对吧?

I've had three analysts, including my first analyst Dennis Hong, who, you know, um Dennis, the day he agreed to come work for me, he said, "Listen, I want to work there 3 years."

我有三个分析师,包括我的第一个分析师 Dennis Hong——Dennis 答应来给我工作的那天就说:"听着,我想在这里干三年。"

I want you to help me get into Harvard Business School, and I want to learn everything I can so I can start my own fund."

"我想让你帮我进 Harvard Business School,我想学到我能学的一切,好让我以后能创办自己的基金。"

And I said, "Deal."

我说:"成交。"

And we kept that deal.

我们也守住了这个约定。

Went to Harvard Business School, he dropped out, and he started his own fund, and I'm an LP uh from day one in his own fund.

他进了 Harvard Business School,然后退了学,创办了自己的基金,而我从第一天起就是他基金的 LP。

And so, you know, like to me, and by the way, to have former employees who I feel that way about, you know, Ram, James, um who've all gone on to start their own funds, I don't view that as a breach of loyalty.

所以对我来说——顺带一提,能有这样一批我如此看重的前员工,比如 Ram、James,他们都去创办了自己的基金——我不把这看作背叛忠诚。

I view that as an example of the strength of the type of people that we attract.

我把它看作我们吸引到的这类人有多强的一个例证。

Can I ask, what have been the biggest hiring mistakes you've made?

我能问一下,你犯过的最大的招聘错误是什么吗?

I've made mistakes around logos.

我在"名头光环"上犯过错。

They worked at X firm before, they must be brilliant.

他们之前在某某大公司干过,那他们一定很聪明。

In terms of hiring mistakes over the years, are there any that stand out to you?

这些年来的招聘错误里,有哪些让你印象特别深刻吗?

Well, rather than focus on individual people, what I'll talk about is structure.

与其盯着具体某个人,我更想谈的是组织结构。

Um there are a lot of ways to make money in this business, there are a lot of ways to lose money in this business.

在这个行当里,赚钱的路子有很多,亏钱的路子也有很多。

I think you have to be very clear about what is your North Star, what who are you, what is your strategy, how do you differentiate, and then build an organization that reflects that strategy.

我认为你必须非常清楚:你的北极星是什么,你是谁,你的策略是什么,你如何做出差异化——然后再打造一个能体现这套策略的组织。

Right?

对吧?

So, for me, I want to be an analyst.

所以对我来说,我想当一名分析师。

I want to sit at the head of the table.

我想坐在桌子的主位。

I want to be chief thinker.

我想当首席思考者。

Um you know, I'm not some CEO who has MDs reporting to me, who have VPs reporting to them, who have associates, who have analysts reporting to them.

我不是那种下面有一堆 MD 向我汇报、MD 下面又有 VP、VP 下面又有 associate、再往下才是 analyst 的 CEO。

That structure to me is hell.

那种结构对我来说就是地狱。

I would want nothing to do with that.

我一点都不想跟它沾边。

I don't want to spend a day of my life working in that structure.

我这辈子一天都不想在那种结构里工作。

We have an incredibly flat organization.

我们的组织极其扁平。

We have, you know, 13 or 14 analysts.

我们有大概 13 或 14 个分析师。

We all call ourselves analysts.

我们所有人都管自己叫分析师。

Right? Where we study.

对吧?我们就是做研究的。

That's what we do.

这就是我们干的事。

We study, we think, we try to find things that are consistent with that thinking.

我们研究,我们思考,我们努力找到与这套思考相吻合的东西。

Um and so, I would say that during the period of COVID, we, because we were all virtual, we had a little bit more layering because it was just harder organizationally.

所以我得说,在 COVID 期间,因为大家全都远程,组织上更难协调,我们就多了一点层级。

And that was a huge liability for us.

而那对我们来说是个巨大的负担。

I didn't like it.

我不喜欢那样。

Um and we've since said everybody has to be back in the office.

从那以后我们就规定所有人都必须回办公室。

Um and we, you know, got rid of the layers because the layers don't work.

我们也把那些层级去掉了,因为层级根本行不通。

At the end of the day, the principal source of both maximum fund for us and maximum results for us is prosecuting a strategy that's very flat.

归根结底,对我们而言,无论是把基金做到最大、还是把业绩做到最好,最主要的来源都是去执行一套非常扁平的策略。

So, I would say most organizations that are growing, whose fund size increases, they feel like, "I got to have a certain number of partners cuz they do two or three deals a year, and I want to have this much money, so I have this many partners."

所以我想说,大多数正在成长、基金规模不断扩大的机构会觉得:"我得有一定数量的合伙人,因为每人一年做两三笔交易,而我想管这么多钱,那我就得有这么多合伙人。"

I would say the vast majority of organizations, okay, and I'm talking from Facebook and Twitter all the way down to uh GPs, they would be well served, right, to be much smaller, to be essentialists in the people that they have because it's very likely that your bottom 20 or 30 or 40% of your organization is dilutive, not accretive to your results.

我想说,绝大多数机构——从 Facebook、Twitter 一路到 GP——如果规模小得多、在用人上做本质主义者,反而会受益,因为很可能你组织里垫底的那 20%、30% 甚至 40% 的人,对你的业绩是稀释的,而不是增益的。

But it justifies AUM.

但这能为管理规模(AUM)撑门面。

Cuz LPs go, "But your team is so small."

因为 LP 会说:"可你们团队太小了。"

Listen, I hear from LPs every day.

听着,我每天都会收到 LP 的反馈。

The number one thing they worry about is how possibly can you guys do the stuff that you do with the size team that you have?

他们最担心的头号问题就是:就凭你们这么点规模的团队,你们到底怎么可能做到你们做的这些事?

Relative to all of our peers, we're way smaller.

跟所有同行相比,我们要小得多。

And I said, "Ultimately, you have to decide what you want."

我说:"归根结底,你得决定你到底想要什么。"

Right? We prosecute our strategy as SEAL Team Six.

对吧?我们执行策略的方式就像 SEAL Team Six(海豹突击队第六分队)。

Right? And when an entrepreneur, go talk to all the entrepreneurs we partnered with.

对吧?当一个创业者——你去问问所有跟我们合作过的创业者就知道了。

They don't It's not like I do a deal and then I throw you into a consulting group who may help you with your HR or may help you with your marketing.

情况不是这样的:不是我做完一笔交易,就把你甩给某个咨询团队,让他们帮你搞 HR、帮你搞市场营销。

Right? They get me.

对吧?他们得到的是我本人。

They get Jamon.

他们得到的是 Jamon。

They get Pauline.

他们得到的是 Pauline。

They get Gwen.

他们得到的是 Gwen。

They get this team.

他们得到的是这整个团队。

Right? We are one team.

对吧?我们是一个团队。

They get all of us, and we bust ass for them.

他们得到的是我们所有人,而我们会为他们拼命。

That is a huge differentiator, and you know, so I think that I don't think you have to have a large organization to justify increased AUM.

这是一个巨大的差异化优势,所以我认为,你并不需要靠一个庞大的组织来给不断增长的 AUM 撑门面。

I suppose if you want to go raise $100 billion, then fine, you know, do like SoftBank did and hire 50 people over a course of a year.

我想,如果你要去募 $100 billion,那好吧,那你就学 SoftBank 那样,一年里招 50 个人。

We saw how that turned out.

我们都看到那最后是什么结果了。

Um you know, but you know, for us, I have no no problem at all.

但对我们来说,我一点问题都没有。

We could manage twice as much money as we're managing today with the exact same team because this game is about picking the right ideas, making good decisions, thinking clearly, having conviction.

我们完全可以用现在这套一模一样的团队,去管理两倍于今天的钱,因为这个游戏比拼的是挑对想法、做好决策、想清楚、有信念。

It's not about your umpteenth analyst who's doing the umpteenth deal because their buddy over at XYZ firm is doing said deal.

而不是比拼你那第 N 个分析师去做第 N 笔交易,只因为他在某某公司的哥们儿也在做那笔交易。

That is a recipe to mediocrity.

那是一条通往平庸的配方。

I totally agree.

我完全同意。

What's the biggest challenge in fund building for you, then?

那对你来说,建立一支基金最大的挑战是什么?

I would say saying no.

我会说是学会说不。

Saying no to all of the, you know, I mentioned SPACs last year.

对所有那些东西说不——我去年提到过 SPAC。

Um saying no to a Middle East sovereign who calls me up and says, "Brad, you want to set up a structured convert fund? We'll sponsor it with a billion dollars because Coatue's doing one, and so-and-so's doing one, and you know, we're going to all these deals are going to be written down."

对一个中东主权基金说不——他们打电话给我说:"Brad,你想不想设一支结构化可转债基金?我们出十亿美元来做基石,因为 Coatue 在做一支,某某某也在做一支,而且这些交易都会被减记。"

We think you're really good at it."

"我们觉得你特别擅长这个。"

Like the opportunity for product proliferation, people proliferation, deal proliferation, I mean, it is incessant.

就是说,产品的膨胀、人员的膨胀、交易的膨胀,这类机会真的是没完没了。

Right?

对吧?

And so, for me, if I didn't have the conviction and the clarity that I do around essentialism, right, and practicing that every day, it would be a total distraction.

所以对我来说,如果我在本质主义上没有现在这份信念和清晰,并且每天去践行它,那这些东西就会彻底让我分心。

But it's the same as Johnny Ive or Steve Jobs, when somebody walked in and said, "Hey, I got a new product feature. You ought to add this, add that, add this button on the home screen, add this."

但这跟 Johnny Ive 或 Steve Jobs 是一回事:当有人走进来说"嘿,我有个新的产品功能。你该加这个、加那个、在主屏上加这个按钮、再加这个"的时候。

Like they got [expletive] every day.

他们每天都被这种东西轰炸。

And you need to build a culture where people are afraid to suggest new things unless they've actually thought about it.

你需要建立一种文化:除非真正想清楚了,否则人们不敢随便提新东西。

Right?

对吧?

If you are an analyst who walks into my office with an idea a day because, you know, Johnny Mac down the street did the deal, like you will be fired.

如果你是个分析师,每天都揣着一个想法冲进我办公室,只因为街那头的 Johnny Mac 做了那笔交易,那你会被开除。

Right?

对吧?

You better come in prepared, not with dribble, but you better have done your work because we're going to have a conversation.

你最好是有备而来,别拿些没营养的东西,你最好把功课做足,因为我们是要好好过一遍的。

Product additional products provide additional revenue, more money.

产品——额外的产品会带来额外的收入,更多的钱。

You have essentialism as a core strain of your mindset and life.

本质主义 (essentialism) 是你思维方式和人生里的一条核心主线。

You also have the childhood that you mentioned earlier.

你还有前面提到的那段童年。

How do you think about all of these combining to your relationship to money today?

你怎么看这些东西交织在一起,构成了你今天与金钱的关系?

What is your relationship to money today, do you think?

在你看来,你今天与金钱的关系到底是怎样的?

Uh this is this is deep.

这个问题很深。

And I've done a lot of reflection on if you would have told me I was going to have what I have, let's say when I was 20, and then you would have said, "Describe to me the house you're going to live in, the car you're going to drive, the life that you're going to live."

我为此反思过很多——假设在我 20 岁的时候,你告诉我将来会拥有我现在拥有的这一切,然后你说:“给我描述一下你将来会住的房子、会开的车、会过的生活。”

I would have described to you a life totally different than the life I'm living.

我当时描述给你的,会是一种和我如今所过完全不同的生活。

From as early as I can remember, 6th grade, I was like, "I have to make a million dollars by the time I'm 30."

从我记事起,大概六年级,我就想着:“我一定要在 30 岁之前赚到一百万美元。”

I mean, it was a dragon in my life because it destroyed our lives.

它是我人生里的一条恶龙,因为它毁掉了我们的生活。

Right?

对吧?

It was like when my dad went broke, destroyed his health, his marriage, like it was, you know, so when you grow up in that, like that is a real dragon.

就像我爸破产的时候,那把他的健康、他的婚姻都毁了——你在那样的环境里长大,那就是一条实实在在的恶龙。

That's a beast you have to slay.

那是一头你必须斩杀的猛兽。

Um and, you know, fortunately, because Fiacco and Cutler gave me a shot, I was able with N L G to slay that beast right at 30.

幸运的是,因为 Fialkow 和 Cutler 给了我一个机会,我靠着 NLG 在正好 30 岁的时候斩掉了那头猛兽。

Right?

对吧?

And um shortly thereafter, Bejul Somaiya and I, Bejul's now running Lightspeed, we co-founded my second company or our second company together called OpenList, and we sold that, and you know, another little base hit, double, and I'll tell you, when I had a few million bucks, I was like good to go.

紧接着,Bejul Somaiya 和我——Bejul 现在在掌管 Lightspeed——我们一起联合创办了我的第二家公司,叫 OpenList,后来把它卖掉了,又是一记漂亮的上垒、一支二垒安打;我跟你说,当我手上有了几百万美元,我就觉得可以了。

Like I had slayed the dragon.

我算是把那条恶龙斩了。

Um because I didn't come from a life of a cootchie mama.

因为我不是出身在那种养尊处优的生活里。

Remember, when I started Altimeter, I started with less than 5 million bucks.

你要知道,我创办 Altimeter 的时候,启动资金还不到 500 万美元。

I couldn't even convince my friends from HBS to contemplate being my partner in this thing.

我甚至说服不了我那些 HBS(哈佛商学院)的朋友,来考虑跟我合伙做这件事。

Right?

对吧?

They were like, "Dude, you're embarrassing yourself. Go back to par."

他们的反应是:“老兄,你这是在自取其辱,回去干正经的吧。”

And, you know, so to me, I slayed the dragon around money.

所以对我来说,我早就斩掉了那条关于金钱的恶龙。

My life and priorities totally shifted.

我的人生和优先级彻底变了。

Right?

对吧?

Now my priority is to raise two sons that have humility, understand the burden of having things, um and to know what it feels like to climb up the mountain rather than being dropped out of a helicopter on top of the mountain.

现在我的头等大事,是把两个儿子养成有谦卑之心的人,让他们理解拥有财富本身是一种负担,并且懂得亲手爬上山顶是什么滋味,而不是被直升机直接丢到山顶上。

Is it difficult giving them the perspective?

要把这种视角传给他们,难吗?

I mean this respectfully, given, you know, you do have a lot of money, and you've earned it, and it's very well earned, but they are brought up in a different life than you had.

我这么说没有冒犯的意思——毕竟你确实很有钱,而且这是你挣来的,挣得实至名归,但他们从小成长的生活和你当年完全不同。

Is it difficult providing that perspective to them as a parent?

作为父亲,要把那种视角给到他们,难吗?

It is the most difficult.

这是最难的一件事。

Yeah.

是的。

And I've discussed this with, you know, lots and lots of people on the topic.

这个话题我和非常非常多的人聊过。

Um and here's what I've concluded from wisdom from whether it's, you know, from Buffett to Reeder is it's not what you say to your kids.

从 Buffett 到 Reeder 这些人的智慧里,我得出的结论是:重点不在于你对孩子说什么。

Like you can say, "Oh, be humble."

你当然可以说:“哦,要谦卑。”

And then you go, you know, into your 18,000 square-foot home.

然后转身走进你那栋 18,000 平方英尺的豪宅。

Right?

对吧?

It's not what you say, it's what you do.

重点不是你说了什么,而是你做了什么。

It's the life you live.

是你过着怎样的生活。

It's how they see you treating others.

是他们看到你如何对待别人。

It's the choices that they see you making.

是他们看到你做出的那些选择。

And so, you know, I ended up saying that my life is different.

所以我最后的做法是,让我的生活本身与众不同。

I live in a small house.

我住在一栋小房子里。

In fact, I had a founder of a decacorn, you know, who had visited other investors' homes, and he came over to my house, and he was so floored by it, he said, "Can I take a video of this?"

事实上,有一位百亿美元独角兽 (decacorn) 的创始人,他去过其他投资人的家,后来来我家,结果被震惊得不行,说:“我能拍段视频吗?”

And I said, "Well, we're sitting around the fire in the back, you know, a fire pit in the backyard."

我说:“行啊,我们正围着后院的火堆坐着呢,后院一个火坑。”

He said, "I've got to show this to my wife. She won't believe that you live here."

他说:“我得给我老婆看看,她不会相信你住在这种地方。”

And um you know, and so for me, my children know that we could afford a much different home, but they know that we choose to live there.

所以对我而言,我的孩子们知道,我们完全负担得起一栋大不相同的房子,但他们也知道,是我们主动选择了住在这里。

And you know, and now my son says to me, "Dad, I love that we live here."

而现在我儿子会跟我说:“爸,我特别喜欢我们住在这儿。”

My 14-year-old son, Lincoln.

我 14 岁的儿子,Lincoln。

He's like, "Because I'm not embarrassed to bring any of my friends here. Like I love this house."

他说:“因为我带任何朋友来这儿都不会觉得难为情。我太喜欢这栋房子了。”

Right?

对吧?

So, you know, I think there's something that we're doing right.

所以我觉得,我们有些事情是做对了的。

Um but yeah, I think it's about how you live your life every day.

但归根结底,关键在于你每一天是怎么生活的。

Listen, I have plenty of friends who live in big homes and that's awesome, too.

听着,我有很多朋友住在大房子里,那也很棒。

Like we all have agency, we all have choice.

我们每个人都有主动权,都有选择的自由。

I'm not trying to say, you know, that I've denied myself all of life's privileges.

我并不是想说,我把人生所有的特权都拒之门外了。

I certainly have not.

我当然没有。

But I do think that um you know, there's a lot of wisdom in Buffett living in the home that he lives in.

但我确实觉得,Buffett 一直住在他那栋房子里,这里面藏着很大的智慧。

Uh and you know, living the life he does.

还有他过着的那种生活。

So, I would say um you know, I don't have as many cashmere sweaters as Chamath.

所以我得说,我可没有 Chamath 那么多的羊绒衫。

Um but I do enjoy having a good time.

不过我确实也享受痛快过日子。

Can I ask, I think ego often comes with money.

我能问一句吗——我觉得自负往往是随着金钱一起来的。

How do you think about your own ego and ego management?

你怎么看待自己的自负,又怎么管理它?

It's so easy, you know, you're top of the industry, everyone will praise you, everyone will tell you how brilliant you are.

这太容易膨胀了——你站在行业顶端,所有人都夸你,所有人都告诉你你有多聪明。

You have Saudi LPs wanting to give you a billion dollars.

你有沙特的 LP 想给你十亿美元。

You think you're freaking great, naturally.

你自然而然就觉得自己牛得不行。

Like it's a human response.

这是人之常情。

How do you think about ego management and how would you advise me on that?

你是怎么看待自负管理这件事的,又会怎么建议我?

First, um the number of people in life who surround themselves with sycophantic others, who are their yes-people, right?

首先,生活里有太多人,把自己包围在一群阿谀奉承的人当中,身边全是唯唯诺诺的应声虫,对吧?

Tell them what they want to hear, afraid of speaking truth to them.

这些人只说他们爱听的话,不敢对他们讲真话。

Um like it's almost everybody at a certain level, right?

到了某个层级,几乎人人都是这样,对吧?

Because you can afford to do that.

因为你有本钱这么干。

You can fire the people who say mean things to you and or disagreeable things to you and you can surround yourself with people who all agree with you.

你可以把那些对你说难听话、或者跟你唱反调的人炒掉,然后让自己身边全是附和你的人。

Listen, it starts with I have three siblings and an 86-year-old mother.

听着,这要从我有三个兄弟姐妹和一位 86 岁的母亲说起。

And we have a culture in our family of speaking truth.

我们家有一种讲真话的文化。

So, you know, my sister calls me fancy pants because I don't come back and visit her enough, right?

所以我姐会叫我“花架子先生”,因为我回去看她的次数不够多,对吧?

You know, so there's a lot of you know, siblings, dear friendships, right?

所以身边有很多这样的关系——兄弟姐妹、挚友,对吧?

And you know, you talk to some folks, you know, I know, Lexi Reese, Amazing.

再比如,和一些人相处,像我认识的 Lexi Reese,特别了不起。

who's a dear friend.

她是我的挚友。

I mean, I get out of line on something or I you know, I'm going to hear from Lexi.

我要是在某件事上越界了,肯定会收到 Lexi 的批评。

Right?

对吧?

Um and she's going to remind me of my priorities.

她会提醒我什么才是我真正该看重的。

And so having friends in your life who remind you of those priorities.

所以要在生活里有这样一些朋友,能提醒你那些优先级。

Um and then children, right?

然后还有孩子,对吧?

My kids, the things that you think are important, your kids probably won't.

在我孩子眼里,你自以为重要的那些东西,他们多半根本不在乎。

And you know, and I have kids now.

而我现在也当爸了。

Um I do we do a family service trip every year with GivePower, an incredible organization that uses solar microgrids to light up schools and health clinics around the world.

我们每年都会做一次家庭公益之旅,合作方是 GivePower——一个了不起的组织,他们用太阳能微电网 (solar microgrids) 为全世界的学校和诊所点亮电力。

Um and it was early in our kids, I don't know how old they were, probably four.

那还是我们孩子很小的时候,我记不清他们几岁了,大概四岁吧。

Our oldest was four.

我们家老大当时四岁。

Michelle and I were in Hawaii at the Four Seasons.

我和 Michelle 当时在夏威夷的四季酒店。

It was spring break.

那是春假。

We paid an absurd amount for this, you know, this room or whatever we were staying in.

我们为那间房、或者不管我们住的是什么,付了一笔离谱的钱。

And everything was perfectly curated.

一切都被安排得完美无缺。

It's perfectly fun.

完美地好玩。

And I said, "This can't be the end of our story."

然后我说:“这不可能是我们故事的终点。”

Like this can't be we didn't work this hard to have this be the life that our kids are going to live.

我们这么拼命,不是为了让这种日子成为孩子将来要过的生活。

Because it's like dropping them out of a helicopter on top of the mountain.

因为那就像把他们用直升机直接丢到山顶上一样。

And so I said, "We get three or four vacations a year, how about we as a family we take one of those vacations and we go to a service trip."

于是我说:“我们一年有三四次度假,不如我们全家把其中一次拿出来,去做一趟公益之旅。”

And fortunately, I found some incredible people um you know, around GivePower.

幸运的是,我在 GivePower 那边找到了一些很了不起的人。

We partnered with them.

我们和他们建立了合作。

We came up with this idea where we fund the capital projects, microgrids from Nepal to Tanzania and then our family goes and lives in the village for the final week or two weeks or three weeks of the project.

我们想出了这样一个办法:由我们出资承担那些基建项目——从尼泊尔到坦桑尼亚的微电网,然后在项目的最后一周、两周或三周里,我们全家去那个村子里住下来。

And um and I've been able to take a lot of friends on these trips with us.

而且我还能带上很多朋友一起参加这些旅程。

Um you know, and again, now my kids say it's one of their favorite things they do all year long.

而如今我的孩子们说,这是他们一整年里最喜欢做的事情之一。

And so, again, if you do this once, it's maybe kind of a gimmick.

所以还是那句话,如果你只做一次,那也许只是个噱头。

If you do it twice, it may be a curiosity, but if you really thread this stuff into your life, it becomes your values.

如果你做两次,那可能算个新鲜事;但如果你真的把这些东西织进你的生活里,它就变成了你的价值观。

And you know, we're doing another trip over Thanksgiving.

我们感恩节还要再去一趟。

And would I like to spend that with my family or friends or other things or in some fancy Yeah, there's part of me that wants to be on some fancy boat or doing something, but I know um how important this will be in the final reflection.

我是想和家人朋友一起度过、去做点别的、或者待在某个奢华的地方——是的,我内心确实有一部分想待在某艘豪华游艇上、或做点别的什么,但我知道,当最终回望人生时,这件事会有多重要。

Can I ask, final one cuz I've taken up a lot of your time, but I'm just too intrigued.

我能再问一个吗,最后一个——我占用了你很多时间,但我实在太好奇了。

Money does change the relationships you have with family and with friends.

金钱确实会改变你和家人、和朋友之间的关系。

The perception that they have of you changes, I find.

我发现,他们看待你的方式会变。

They want something from you now.

如今他们会想从你身上得到点什么。

There's always a reason why they want the dinner.

他们约你吃饭,背后总有个理由。

And it changes so many of your relationships.

这会改变你许许多多的人际关系。

Have you found that?

你有过这种感受吗?

And how do you think about retaining purity of relationship when you know that a lot of people actually now want something from you?

当你明知现在很多人其实都想从你身上得到点什么时,你怎么去保持关系的纯粹?

We're really getting into the therapist advice.

我们这真是聊到心理咨询师那一层去了。

I mean, what I would say is um you know, you mentioned a few people at the start of the show.

我想说的是,你在节目一开始提到过几个人。

Yeah.

对。

Um you know, Bob or Rich or others who've been, you know, Fialkow, like brothers for 20 years.

比如 Bob、Rich 这些人,还有 Fialkow,他们像兄弟一样陪了我 20 年。

I mean, I can't do anything for them.

我根本帮不上他们什么忙。

I can't give them anything.

我也没什么能给他们的。

Um you know, that they don't already have or have for themselves.

因为那些东西他们要么早就有了,要么自己就能搞定。

My buddies from high school will be the first to call me up and call me out on something.

我那些高中好哥们,永远是第一个打电话来当面数落我的人。

Hey, I saw you on CNBC, you look like an idiot.

“嘿,我在 CNBC 上看到你了,你看起来像个傻子。

Fix your hair, do this, do that.

把头发弄弄好,这样、那样。”

So, I think it's about the choice of the people that you surround yourself with.

所以我觉得,关键在于你选择让什么样的人围绕在自己身边。

I don't have a lot of people in life who I feel like are hangers-on, looking for something.

我生活里没有太多那种我觉得是攀附者、总想从我这儿捞点什么的人。

Perhaps because I just don't do that, right?

也许是因为我自己就不过那种生活,对吧?

I don't have the 400-ft yacht in Saint-Tropez.

我没有停在圣特罗佩的那种 400 英尺游艇。

So, maybe that you know, like hanging out with me is eating a cheeseburger at Box and sitting in our backyard around a fire.

所以跟我一起消磨时间,大概就是在 Box 吃个芝士汉堡、再围坐在我家后院的火堆旁。

And maybe the people who would be more inclined to hang out with, you know, hangers-on aren't as intrigued by that.

而那些更倾向于攀附别人的人,也许对这种事根本提不起兴趣。

But maybe I'll leave you with this because I do think it's related to it but not something you asked specifically.

不过也许我想用这一点作为收尾,因为我觉得它跟这个话题相关,只是你没有具体问到。

But a lot of my friends say, "Brad, you know, you kind of are living your life at warp speed."

我很多朋友会说:“Brad,你这日子过得简直是在飞速狂奔。”

Um you know, you're trying to pack all this in.

“你想把这一切都塞进人生里。”

Like what's this all about?

“这到底是为了什么?”

Um you know, and I mentioned I lost my dad when I was young.

我前面提过,我很年轻的时候就失去了父亲。

I lost my best friend when I was young.

我很年轻的时候就失去了我最好的朋友。

And I honestly, if a young person comes to me for advice or my own kids, like I think this is the most important thing, right?

说实话,如果有年轻人来向我求教,或者我自己的孩子来问我,我觉得这才是最重要的一件事,对吧?

That we are all just passing through.

那就是:我们都不过是这世上的过客。

Like this life is really, really short.

这一生真的、真的很短。

And as humans, we're programmed not to think about mortality.

而作为人类,我们天生被设定成不去思考死亡。

It's actually a survival instinct not to think about your mortality.

不去想自己终有一死,其实是一种生存本能。

Um but I think that that leads to really bad decision-making.

但我认为,这会导致非常糟糕的决策。

Because people tend to meander their way through life.

因为人往往就这么浑浑噩噩地晃过一生。

They don't have the intentionality.

他们没有那份笃定的用心。

And then, you know, lots of studies of people on their deathbed is all the regrets they have.

然后,有很多研究记录了临终之人的心声,全是他们的种种遗憾。

And so I would say that losing my dad early, losing my best friend early, like I made a commitment at their funerals.

所以我要说,早早失去父亲、早早失去挚友,让我在他们的葬礼上立下了一个誓言。

Like I'm not wasting it.

那就是:我绝不会虚度这一生。

I'm going to love big, I'm going to you know, I'm going to be intentional about how I spend each day.

我要热烈地去爱,我要用心对待自己度过的每一天。

And I was recently reminded about this, you know, Lorraine was talking on this panel with Jony Ive and she said, you know, she goes, "I'm not sure why Steve always had the sense, but he always had the sense that he had to get it done now because life was short."

最近有件事又让我想起这一点:Lorraine 在一场和 Jony Ive 同台的论坛上说:“我也说不清 Steve 为什么总有那种感觉,但他始终觉得,自己必须趁现在把事情做完,因为人生苦短。”

Right?

对吧?

Lin-Manuel talking about it in in Hamilton, you know, why did Hamilton write like he was running out of time, the Federalist Papers.

Lin-Manuel 在《Hamilton》里也讲到这一点——为什么 Hamilton 写起东西来就像时间快要耗尽一样,写下了《联邦党人文集》。

I mean, I think all younger people, particularly the ones you reference, would be well served by thinking about what is the eulogy values they want to live by.

我觉得所有年轻人,尤其是你提到的那些人,都会大大受益于去思考一件事:他们想依照怎样的悼词价值观 (eulogy values) 来生活。

Right?

对吧?

Like what do you want people to say about you when Harry Stebbings calls them?

也就是说,当 Harry Stebbings 打电话给他们的时候,你希望别人怎么评价你?

And I certainly don't want them to say, "Oh, he amassed the most money or he had the biggest firm or he has the most AUM."

我当然不希望他们说:“哦,他攒下了最多的钱,或者他有最大的公司,或者他管理着最多的 AUM(资产管理规模)。”

Right?

对吧?

I actually want to live a life of purpose that matters, of impact.

我真正想过的,是一种有意义、有价值、能带来影响的人生。

I want to show that to my kids.

我想把这活给我的孩子们看。

I want my kids to live that life.

我希望我的孩子们也过上那样的人生。

I think it's a recipe for happiness.

我认为这是通往幸福的秘方。

And I actually think it's a recipe for having a much more interesting life, a much more authentic and enriched network.

而且我确实认为,这也是让人生更有趣、让人际圈子更真实、更丰盈的秘方。

And I think it allows for great success in the business.

我还觉得,它同样能带来事业上的巨大成功。

I'm so pleased you answered that.

你能回答这个问题,我太高兴了。

That was Jam Man's question.

那是 Jam Man 提的问题。

I want to move into a quick fire.

接下来我想进入快问快答环节。

I say a short statement, you give me your thoughts.

我说一句简短的话，你告诉我你的想法。

Does that sound okay?

这样可以吗？

Whoa, is it— you're not going to use the list I posted on Twitter, are you?

哇，你该不会要用我发在 Twitter 上的那份清单吧？

Oh, no, no, no.

哦，不不不。

This is much better.

这份好多了。

Mine are better quick fire than yours.

我这套快问快答比你的强。

Do you know, Brad, I've done 3,000 of these.

你知道吗，Brad，这样的访谈我已经做了 3,000 期了。

So, I know.

所以我懂行。

You're rubbing it in.

你这是在得意地炫耀啊。

I'm guessing 3,301.

我猜是第 3,301 期吧。

But I love you the most.

但我最爱的还是你。

What's your favorite book and why, Brad?

你最喜欢的书是哪一本，为什么，Brad？

Yeah, no, it's a great question.

嗯，这个问题问得好。

I think for me, one of the most impactful books was Snowball about Buffett.

对我来说，影响最大的书之一是写 Buffett 的《Snowball》（《滚雪球》）。

And you know, just realizing that compounding is one of the greatest forces in the world.

它让我意识到，复利是这世上最强大的力量之一。

Start with a really small snowball on a really long hill.

在一道很长很长的坡上，从一个很小很小的雪球开始滚。

And I'm talking about compounding in love, compounding in impact, compounding in invention, compounding in investing.

我说的是爱里的复利、影响力上的复利、创造上的复利、投资上的复利。

Figure that out in life and just get started and compound your way along the way.

在人生里把这一点想明白，然后就动手开始，一路复利滚下去。

All SPACs done, how do you evaluate the next few years for SPACs?

SPAC 热潮已经过去了，你怎么评估接下来几年 SPAC 的走向？

Listen, I don't think SPACs need to exist in the world.

听我说，我并不认为 SPAC 这东西非存在不可。

They're a mechanism by which companies come public.

它们只是公司上市的一种机制。

They have forced more innovation in the traditional bank IPO.

它们倒逼了传统投行 IPO 模式的更多创新。

They have forced more innovation in the direct list market.

它们也倒逼了直接上市市场的更多创新。

And what I really care about, what I'm trying to solve for, is making sure that entrepreneurs and founders of iconic businesses have a fair and easy step into the public markets.

而我真正在意的、真正想解决的，是让那些标志性企业的创业者和创始人，能有一条公平、顺畅的通道走进公开市场。

It shouldn't be so Byzantine.

这个过程不该那么繁复曲折。

And we want to be partners to them because remember, some of the greatest venture returns in the history of venture capital occurred in the public markets.

我们想成为他们的伙伴，因为别忘了，风投史上一些最惊人的回报，恰恰发生在公开市场上。

Booking.com, Priceline from 1 billion to 100 billion.

Booking.com、Priceline，从 10 亿一路涨到 1000 亿。

Go through the list.

这样的例子你可以一个个数下去。

Those are venture returns in plain sight.

那些都是明摆着的风投级回报。

Best investment advice you've ever received?

你收到过的最好的投资建议是什么？

Buffett.

来自 Buffett。

Marry somebody you love.

娶一个你爱的人。

If you have a harem of 100, you don't get to know any of them very well.

如果你有一个上百人的后宫，你没法真正了解其中任何一个。

Apply that same logic to your portfolio.

把同样的逻辑用到你的投资组合上。

What is the most common investment mistake you see people make?

你看到人们最常犯的投资错误是什么？

I think the behavioral dynamics, the behavioral psychology around groupthink is super powerful.

我觉得围绕从众心理（groupthink）的那套行为动力学、行为心理，力量特别大。

People love to follow— take signal, follow others into deals because others did deals.

人们喜欢跟风——从别人身上找信号，因为别人投了某个项目，自己也跟着投。

It is very hard to resist.

这种冲动非常难以抵抗。

And I would say young analyst associates partners in Silicon Valley are filled with FOMO and follow too many others rather than doing their own work.

我得说，硅谷那些年轻的分析师、投资经理、合伙人，满脑子都是 FOMO（错失恐惧），太爱跟着别人跑，而不去做自己的功课。

What's the biggest investment mistake that you've made personally?

你个人犯过的最大投资错误是什么？

Not writing a bigger check into ByteDance.

没有给 ByteDance 开一张更大的支票。

What is so special about Burning Man for you, Brad?

Burning Man（火人节）对你来说特别在哪，Brad？

We could make a whole show on this.

这个话题我们能单独做一整期节目。

Maybe we should get Rich and Baba to do a whole show on—

也许该让 Rich 和 Baba 来专门做一整期——

No, listen.

不，听我说。

I think there's this view in the world that Burning Man is some hedonistic exercise of drugs and orgies and whatnot.

我知道外界有一种看法，觉得 Burning Man 就是一场纵欲狂欢，充斥着毒品、群交之类的东西。

And that's fine because it just means there's a lot of self-selection.

这也无所谓，因为这恰好带来了很强的自我筛选。

Not everybody's going to go and not everybody should go.

不是每个人都会去，也不是每个人都该去。

For me, its core value is no judgment.

对我而言，它的核心价值是不评判。

Like truly going to a place where you suspend judgment about what you see, the things going on around you, the people, etc.

就是真正走进一个地方，你对眼前所见、身边发生的一切、遇到的人等等，都暂停评判。

And you see the art of the possible.

然后你会看到，什么叫一切皆有可能。

It is a great open-source experiment in humanity.

它是一场了不起的、关于人性的开源实验。

It's an open-source festival of 75,000 people that could not possibly exist the way it does if it had a CEO or a head developer or architect who tried to micromanage what that event looked like.

这是一个 75,000 人的开源节日，如果它有一个 CEO、一个首席开发者或设计师去事无巨细地把控活动的样子，它绝不可能是现在这个样子。

And so, I think, not only do I see great friends, not only do I have fun, and I'm not saying crazy [expletive] doesn't happen.

所以我觉得，我不只是见到了好朋友、玩得开心——我也不是说那儿不会发生什么疯狂的事。

It does.

确实会发生。

Right?

对吧？

But for me, I think it embodies a real spirit that we could bring into our daily lives, which is suspend judgment about— or people are quick to get to judgment about people or the way they do things.

但对我来说，它承载着一种真实的精神，一种我们可以带进日常生活的精神——那就是暂缓评判；人们太容易急着去评判别人，或评判别人做事的方式。

You know, have an open mind and realize that that open design can lead to a lot of really incredible creativity.

保持开放的心态，你会发现，这种开放式的设计能催生出大量真正惊人的创造力。

Penultimate one.

倒数第二个问题。

What's your biggest insecurity today, Brad?

你如今最大的不安全感是什么，Brad？

That my kid— you know, I'd say two that I really have.

关于我孩子的——这么说吧，我真正在意的有两点。

Number one, I'm terrified that I will do a bad job as a dad and that my kids will grow up being entitled and not living to their full potential

第一，我很害怕自己没能当好一个父亲，害怕我的孩子长大后变得娇纵、没能活出他们全部的潜能，

and I will have deprived them of that really arduous but beautiful journey up the side of the mountain.

害怕是我剥夺了他们那段艰辛却美丽的、攀上山巅的旅程。

And I would say related to that is this idea that whenever I die, whether it's tomorrow or 40 years from now, that I'll have regrets.

第二点跟这个相关：不管我哪天死去，是明天还是四十年后，我怕自己会留有遗憾。

And you know, I really— if there's one thing that I feel great about is just the intentionality that I'm living in every day with.

而说真的，如果有一件事让我特别欣慰，那就是我每一天都活得如此有意图、有觉知。

I'm doing exactly what I want to do with the people that I want to be doing it with.

我正在做我真正想做的事，和我真正想共事的人一起做。

And that freedom, right?

还有那种自由，对吧？

The freedom that comes from the economic freedom, which is a total privilege and not a lot of people have,

那种源自经济自由的自由——它是一种莫大的特权，很多人并不拥有——

gives me the opportunity to have the impact, whether it's Board Challenger, Invest America, whether it's Give Power, all the things I dreamed of doing and having impact.

让我有机会去创造影响，无论是 Board Challenger、Invest America，还是 Give Power，都是我梦想去做、去产生影响的事。

And that's the challenge I put in front of myself, I put in front of our team, organizations, in front of my friends,

这也是我摆在自己面前、摆在我们团队和各个机构面前、摆在我朋友面前的挑战：

which is we live at one of the most privileged times in the history of humanity.

那就是，我们正生活在人类历史上最幸运、最优渥的时代之一。

I mean, capitalism is an incredible force for good, but it doesn't just happen.

资本主义是一股了不起的向善力量，但好事不会自动发生。

Like we've got to [expletive] show up.

我们必须真正到场、真正出力。

And we've got to leverage all of this goodness, the technology, the resources, etc.

我们必须善用这一切美好的东西——技术、资源等等。

And the system that we've been lucky enough to be a part of, and we've got to drive the goodness.

还有我们有幸身处其中的这套体系——我们必须去推动善的发生。

And so, my regret will be if I get to whatever the end point is and feel like I didn't use my voice, use my platform, use my network to achieve that.

所以，我的遗憾会是：如果走到终点那一刻，我觉得自己没有用好我的声音、我的平台、我的人脉去实现这些。

Final one.

最后一个问题。

This is episode 7,850.

这是第 7,850 期节目。

10 years time, Brad.

十年之后，Brad。

Okay?

好吗？

Me and you are sitting down again.

你和我再一次坐下来聊。

What does Altimeter look like then?

那时的 Altimeter 会是什么样子？

Where are we?

我们会走到哪一步？

Well, I think it's going to be a lot more of the same.

嗯，我觉得多半还是和现在很像。

You know, we may be five or 10 people bigger.

我们可能会多个五到十号人。

The incredible partners and young people around here will have even more responsibility doing all the things that we do today.

这里那些出色的合伙人和年轻人，会肩负更多责任，去做我们今天做的所有事情。

I mean, in the fullness of time, I want to see Altimeter have an incredible generational transfer.

随着时间推移，我希望看到 Altimeter 完成一次漂亮的代际传承。

They're going to end up owning most of the place.

最终，这家机构的大部分会归他们所有。

My money I'm going to ultimately give away.

我的钱，最终我会捐出去。

We've started, fast down that journey.

我们已经开始了，而且在这条路上走得很快。

But to me, I will have done my job if the Altimeter 10 years from now looks very recognizable culturally,

但对我来说，如果十年后的 Altimeter 在文化上依然清晰可辨，那我就算尽到了本分——

its values around impact, around radical candor, around intellectual honesty, thought leadership, partnership first.

它那些围绕影响力、彻底坦诚、思想上的诚实、思想领导力、伙伴优先的价值观。

If all of that is still pervasive here.

如果这一切在这里依然无处不在。

And I think if we were a 500-person organization and looked like the Blackstone of venture capital, I think we probably would have failed in that journey.

而我觉得，如果我们变成一个 500 人的机构，活成了"风投界的 Blackstone"，那我们大概就是在这条路上失败了。

That's not our North Star.

那不是我们的北极星（准则）。

It's not where we're headed.

那不是我们要去的方向。

Other people may do it.

别人也许会那么做。

They may make a lot more money than us.

他们也许会赚得比我们多得多。

They'll certainly end up on the covers of magazines and whatnot.

他们肯定会登上各种杂志封面之类的。

But knowing who we are and prosecuting that strategy and having a lot of fun along the way,

但认清我们是谁，坚定地执行那套战略，一路上还玩得尽兴——

if I don't do that, shame on me.

如果我做不到这些，那是我的失职，我该羞愧。

Brad, I've loved this.

Brad，我太喜欢这场对话了。

I can't thank you enough.

怎么感谢你都不为过。

This has been so much fun.

这真是太有意思了。

Shows like this is why I love doing what I do.

正是这样的节目，让我如此热爱我做的这件事。

So, thank you so much for joining me today, my friend.

所以，非常感谢你今天来做客，我的朋友。

Thank you for bringing to all of us what you do.

谢谢你把你所做的一切带给我们所有人。

I mean, you know, I started by saying I love biographies.

我一开始就说过，我热爱传记。

Right?

对吧？

You give us biographies every day.

而你每天都在给我们奉上一部部传记。

It helps everybody learn.

它帮助每一个人去学习。

And that in and of itself is an incredible cheat for young people to be able to listen to these things and maybe get up the learning curve a little bit faster.

光是能听到这些内容，对年轻人来说本身就是一个了不起的"捷径"，让他们能更快地爬上学习曲线。

Thanks for having me, Harry.

谢谢你请我来，Harry。