Benchmark GP Sarah Tavel on What She Learned at Bessemer, Greylock, Pinterest and Benchmark, Being an Operator vs. an Investor, and How to Create an AI Moat

On this episode of Invested, Michael hosts Sarah Tavel. Sarah is a General Partner at Benchmark, where she invests in network effect businesses and applications leveraging AI. Sarah currently sits on the boards of Agentio, Chainalysis, Hipcamp, Rekki, Glide, Cambly, Medely, and 11x. She is also a founding member of All Raise, the nonprofit organization working to accelerate the success of women in the venture capital and VC-backed startup ecosystem. Prior to Benchmark, Sarah was a General Partner at Greylock Partners, where she led their investment in Sonder ($SOND) and Gixo (acquired by Openfit), and represented Greylock on the board of both companies. Sarah joined Pinterest in 2012 after co-leading the Series A investment while at Bessemer Venture Partners. There she was the product lead for search, recommendations, machine vision, and pin quality at Pinterest. As one of the first 35 employees, her first order of business was to launch Pinterest internationally and close the Series C financing. She also led three acquisitions as she helped the company scale through a period of hyper-growth. Sarah graduated from Harvard College with a degree in Philosophy.

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KEY TOPICS 

• [00:00:00] Intro
• [00:04:45] Differences Between Bessemer and Benchmark 
• [00:09:11] Silicon Valley: Upside Mentality vs. Downside Protection
• [00:11:55] Underestimating Market Potential
• [00:14:53] Using AI to Reduce Friction and Unlock Market Size
• [00:18:02] Operator vs. Investor Mindset
• [00:21:05] Lessons from Building Pinterest
• [00:24:04] Transitioning from Operator to Investor
• [00:26:50] Female Partners and Their Perspective in VC
• [00:29:58] Equal Partnership Culture at Benchmark
• [00:37:00] Every Company is an AI Company 
• [00:41:59] AI’s Economic Value and Market Shifts
• [00:51:00] What Sarah Wants to See an AI Company Build 
• [00:55:04] Competing and Winning in Crowded Markets
• [01:01:12] Branding’s Role in Venture Capital
• [01:09:10] Identity, Growth, and Personal Reflections

RESOURCES

Follow Sarah on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarahtavel/ 

Follow Sarah on X - https://x.com/sarahtavel

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CREDITS

Executive Producer: Erica Marom 

Producer: Yoni Mayer

Video and Editing: Ron Baranov

Music and Creative Direction: Uri Ar 

Content and Editorial: Kira Goldring

Design: Rony Karadi