First Funders Shaherose Charania and Aamir Virani

What do you get when you mix U.S. national security, angel investing, and kids’ pajamas? Atlee Clark. Proud Canadian Atlee took a hard pivot from the public sector to the tech world, first through a nonprofit called the C100, which supports entrepreneurs, and later at Shopify, focusing on 0 - 1 initiatives. Similar to other angel collectives emerging at the time like Hashtag Angels and Operator Collective, Atlee tapped into her executive network at Shopify to connect with other female leaders who were looking to invest on the side. 

What began as informal conversations about investing and advising after the working day coalesced into Backbone Angels, a collection of executive tech women sourcing angel opportunities collectively and making investments individually. Backbone was started in 2021 and has amassed a portfolio of over 40 early-stage startups, including Bird&Be, 1Password, and Blume.

Atlee tells us what it’s like to balance functioning as a cohesive unit while making individual investment decisions. Plus, we get to hear about her journey as a small business owner and what motivates her to invest in what she wants to see in the world. 

Atlee writes angel checks of $10k to $20k, focusing on startups that address challenges for parents, small business owners, and Big Tech execs—three areas she intimately understands as the end user. Backbone Angels focuses on companies led by Black, Indigenous, and Women-led startups. 

Highlights:
Atlee hopped on a one-way plane to San Francisco and left her U.S. national security gig in Washington, D.C., behind to head up a nonprofit organization supporting Bay Area Canadian tech entrepreneurs (and she’d never even worked in tech!)She met early Shopify execs who convinced her to come work for the company doing developer relations and the app ecosystem. Casual conversations about investing and advising with her peers led to the creation of Backbone Angels.Atlee prefers to follow her own intuition with early-stage investing, but she does have a tried-and-true framework for determining if a deal is right for her. She shares her tips for working as a collective and the reason she believes you should never overthink a “no.”Angel investing is a side hustle for Atlee (Remember, she’s also a Shopify exec, small business owner, and mom), and she prefers it because it fulfills her in a way that going full-time wouldn’t.   Resource:Want to Angel invest with other operators and learn from the team at Hustle Fund? Check out Angel Squad and resources created by Brian Nichols

(00:00) - Atlee Clark, Angel: Canadians breaking into tech and now investing with intuition and purpose
(01:33) - Building an ecosystem for Canadian tech founders: the story of becoming the first CEO of the C100
(06:38) - Meeting Tobi Luke and joining Shopify: a new adventure pre IPO
(09:34) - Founding Backbone Angels: a collective of senior leaders at Shopify coming together to write checks
(15:27) - First Investment: The power of patience and a developing a personal investment thesis
(23:21) - Worst Investment: Trust your gut and staying patient
(29:20) - The art of feeling a "no"
(30:54) - Best Investment: Highlighting Top Performers Calico and MIrza
(32:59) - Resilience in Founders: Overcoming Challenges
(34:15) - Current Investment Strategy: Today's Focus
(38:21) - Sourcing Deals: Networking and Connections
(44:46) - Lightning Round ⚡

Join Shaherose & Aamir as we reflect on our conversation with Charles Hudson of Precursor Ventures. 
Highlights: 
Don’t forget the macro: Government regulations can lead to massive opportunities or failures. We discuss case studies of companies like Samsara, Movtive (fka KeepTrucking), Republic, and Zum, showing how regulatory shifts led to category-creating opportunities. Charles’ worst investment was wiped out due to changes in government regulation. Team vs market: We discussed the interplay between having the right team, idea, and timing for startup success. Charles evaluates opportunities 70% team and 30% idea. Both Aamir and I take a more balanced approach than Charles does.Fund size vs. outcomes: Reflecting on the past learning, "Your fund size is your strategy." We wonder what role that played in Charles’ decision to invest in the Athletic, later acquired by the NY Times for $550M.Links:
Follow Charles Hudson on Twitter: @chudsonRead Charles’ blog on SubstackLearn more about Precursor Ventures: Precursor VenturesConnect with Charles Hudson on LinkedIn: Charles HudsonConnect with Us:
Follow the First Funders PodcastNewsletter with behind-the-scenes access and key takeawaysTwitter/X: @shaherose | @aviraniEmail us with feedback and suggestions on topics and guestsDisclaimer: This is for information purposes only. This is not investment advice.

(00:00) - Introduction and Format Change
(00:39) - The macro matters
(03:40) - Learning from past investments while staying open minded, what about bias?
(04:12) - Team vs. Market
(10:36) - Fund size vs outcomes
(16:17) - Investors don't know it all

Hailing from Michigan, Charles developed an early obsession with the public markets in high school. Charles Hudson is now the Managing Partner at Precursor Ventures, a pre-seed venture fund that has defined and has become synonymous with “pre-seed”. Charles is known for his ability to identify and mentor early-stage companies that have the potential to disrupt their industries - first and early - including companies like the Athletic (acquired by the NY Times for $550M), Bobbie (recently raised a $70M Series C), Carrot Fertility (recently raised $75M Series C) and Pair Eyewear (recently raised $75M Series C).
Charles writes checks of $250k - $500k at Pre-seed and Seed. He is a Generalist with a focus on digital health, media, and software.
Highlights:
The boomerang back to VC: Charles shares his unique path from Michigan to Silicon Valley, starting in VC, then moving to Google and various startups before returning to VC.Founding Precursor Ventures: Charles spotted an opportunity to invest in non-obvious founders pre-product and pre-revenue while other firms moved upstream in 2015. This made him one of the first in a second wave of pre-seed firms to launch, and 10 years later, he’s become the go-to first funder.Evaluating Founders vs. Ideas: Charles is a founder-first investor (founder 70%, idea 30%). He shares his criteria for assessing talent and reveals indicators of success that have generated alpha in his portfolio.Investment Strategy over Trends: Even in the face of trends like crypto, AI, and the economic downturn, Charles stays steady and focused on people and his definition of pre-seed, not morphing with industry shifts.
Links:Follow Charles Hudson on Twitter: @chudsonRead Charles’ blog on SubstackLearn more about Precursor Ventures: Precursor VenturesConnect with Charles Hudson on LinkedIn: Charles Hudson
Connect with Us:Follow the First Funders PodcastNewsletter with behind-the-scenes access and key takeawaysTwitter/X: @shaherose | @aviraniEmail us with feedback and suggestions on topics and guests
Disclaimer: This is for information purposes only. This is not investment advice.

(00:00) - Intro
(00:52) - Early Days and Building Community
(03:09) - Interning at Smith Barney to the CIA's Venture firm
(08:59) - Embracing Risk and Independent Thinking defines a solo GP
(11:05) - Operating Experience As Product Manager, then Business Development at Google and a Return to VC
(16:50) - Charles' first role as an advisor surprisingly had a $300M acquisition by Paypal
(19:55) - Joining Softech (now Uncorked) in 2010 when Seed investors were known as Super Angels
(21:10) - Launching Precursor to fill the gap created by Super Angel Funds going upstream and defining a new category - "pre-seed"
(23:50) - First Investments: the role of macro tailwinds and headwinds
(27:57) - Evaluating Founders 70% and Ideas 30%
(31:03) - The Role of Business Model Innovation in Generating Alpha
(33:25) - Learning from Challenging Investments: If you don't know its ok, but say something
(38:01) - Staying True to Your Investment Strategy
(40:44) - Charles' best investment: The Athletic, acquired by the New York Times for $525M
(45:55) - How he Decides: Evaluating Founders and Their Potential, Weird Patterns, Product Velocity, Remote Teams
(51:38) - Current Investment Strategies, Focus Areas and Check Sizes
(53:25) - Following High-Potential Talent vs. Investing Theses: People vs. Market vs. Product Evaluations
(57:00) - Speed Round

Eric Ries has invested in over 100+ early-stage startups. He is best known as the author of The Lean Startup, a must-read for entrepreneurs worldwide. He also founded the Long-Term Stock Exchange (LTSE), a new stock exchange designed to support companies with long-term goals. He recently launched a new podcast discussing ways to re-think corporate governance to be mission-first.
In Part 1 of our interview, he shared insights from angel investing. In Part 2, Eric shares his new ethos for startups rooted in long-term thinking, putting a company’s mission at the center of everything and aligning all stakeholders. This mission-first approach challenges the traditional capitalist, and data shows it leads to better company performance.
Eric writes checks of $10K or less as an Angel at the earliest stages. He is interested in mission-driven founders, education, fintech, AI, and more.
Highlights:
Eric Angel invests for reasons beyond financial outcomes. He focuses on giving back to people in his network, learning about startup approaches and various industries, and doubling down in areas he is passionate about. Any time he has strayed from his investing criteria, it hasn’t worked out. Advising then investing: Eric prefers to work with a startup as a friend or advisor before investing. He keeps his check size to $10K to support his goal of high-velocity learning. He can write more checks with smaller checks, which means more learning.Investing as a spiritual journey: Eric practices introspection to support continuous learning and to avoid overgeneralizing when things don’t work out. When he invests, he applies Lean Startup thinking by asking, “Is this outcome falsifiable”? Invest -> Measure -> Learn. We guess this makes him is a "Lean Investor"Eric’s second act after Lean Startup is supporting mission-first startups: He advocates for a new ethos that he believes will lead to better performance in the long term.Eric shares tools for mission-first founders, including the Public Benefit Corporation, the LTSPV, employee voting trust, and more.
(00:00) - Introduction to First Funders
(00:54) - Meeting Eric Ries: a journey down memory lane
(02:45) - The Impact of Lean Startup
(07:15) - Eric's Angel investing journey starts with being an advisor and a mindset of giving back
(09:55) - What is Eric's investing criteria
(14:04) - Eric prefers to advise startups first before investing
(17:47) - Eric's second act: from Lean Startup to nurturing mission-driven founders who will also realize massive profits
(25:14) - Writing small $10K checks into a high volume of early-stage startups enables high velocity learning
(27:24) -
(28:28) - Eric decouples investing from outcomes to stay focused on giving back and learning
(30:44) - How to be a useful startup advisor: stand for something that creates competitive advantage for startups
(34:31) - A challenging investment: lessons from high-stakes and high-stress moments and can the startup journey be a force for healing trauma?
(43:04) - The Long-Term Stock Exchange vision: a new ethos and governance approach for the startup community
(45:01) - How mission-driven founders and investors need to be brave to challenge the capitalist status quo
(47:33) - How tech startup can leverage the Public Benefit Corp and how the B-Corp certification won't work for software companies
(51:24) - LTSPV: An SPV Angels can leverage to align their check with long-term thinking
(54:08) - The spiritual journey of investing: what did you really learn vs what do you think happened?
(57:07) - Speed Round and Final Thoughts
(59:24) - Takeaways
Connect with Us:Follow the First Funders PodcastNewsletter with behind-the-scenes access and key takeawaysTwitter/X: @shaherose | @aviraniEmail us with feedback and suggestions on topics and guestsDisclaimer: This is for information purposes only. This is not investment advice.

Rajiv Bala, GP of Clutch VC, a pre-seed and seed-stage fund exclusively investing in Texas. Rajiv is committed and bullish on the region with a hands-on approach to investing, working with founders on product feedback, team building, and more to see initial customer validation before investing. Rajiv also embraces sub $500 million outcomes to drive fund multiples rather than relying on Unicorn outcomes only. This episode pushed our thinking on what we know and practice here in Silicon Valley, reminding us that there is more than one way to achieve Alpha.
Highlights from our discussion:
Starting startups, Texas style: Is it about 24/7 work-life or work-life balance? We discussed a Texas vs. Silicon Valley approach to company building. Can it work and drive outsized venture outcomes?Beyond chasing unicorns: Can you be successful with sub $500M outcomes in VC? We dug into how portfolio construction starts with fund size and what scale of outcomes matters to you.Does previous founder or operator experience make you a better investor? Rajiv believes it builds founder empathy, skills, and experiences that make you more effective in challenging moments.Selective incubation as a strategy: Rajiv will sometimes work with a team for 6 to 12 months before investing to gain information asymmetry, build conviction (or incertitude), and establish a genuine relationship ahead of the check. Topics

(00:00) - Introduction to First Funders
(00:58) - Meet Rajiv Bala: GP, Clutch VC
(01:34) - Rajiv's Journey into Venture Capital
(03:27) - The Texas Startup Ecosystem
(07:44) - Texas-style company building: work-life balance and outcomes
(11:06) - Rajiv's lessons on portfolio construction: diversification and fund size as key levers
(14:08) - Where and how Rajiv sources deals in Texas
(17:16) - Rajiv's "why" for investing: led to his hands-on investing approach
(21:01) - Lessons from Early Investment Furnace Software: an early DevOps leader bought by BMC
(30:03) - Rajiv's lessons from his worst investment came with an opportunity to build founder empathy on how hard the journey is
(35:38) - Rajiv's best investment: he Converse AI journey
(40:21) - A higher valuation isn't the end game, pick your investors for a long game
(42:10) - Selective incubation: Rajiv builds relationships with Founders before the check and wants to see the product reach initial traction
(48:48) - Clutch's Investment Strategy and Market Focus
(59:13) - Key Takeaways and Final Thoughts

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Meka Asonye, a Partner at First Round Capital, started angel investing in 2018 while working at Stripe and joined First Round in 2021. He has made dozens of Angel investments and 13 Venture investments, and he's just getting started! While he focuses on B2B SAAS, he has not shied away from investing in audacious founders, from modernizing 911 call centers to putting the biggest satellites in space. Meka shares his approach to finding true outliers, a practice he began while uncovering hidden talent for the Cleveland Guardians. 

Meka writes checks of $2M to $5M as the lead at pre-seed and seed.

Highlights from the discussion:
Meka's unconventional path to VC: from discovering high-potential baseball talent to leading sales at startups to VCMeka's first angel investment came from Craiglist!Exploring the frontiers: investing in Space and GovTechHow Meka supports founder friends, honestlyLeveling up in VC by learning from partners, retros, reviews, and reflection powered by process and data
This is for information purposes only. This is not investment advice.
Topics


(00:00) - Kicking Off the First Funders Podcast with Meka Asonye
(03:52) - First Round Capital's role in Meka and Shaherose's transition from Angel to VC
(05:53) - Meka's Unconventional Path to Venture Capital: from baseball talent to management consulting to startups to VC
(10:54) - Meka's purpose is rooted in being a part of the founder's village
(13:55) - The Art of Angel Investing: Meka's First Investment Story came from a person he met on Craiglist!
(18:37) - Thoughtful reflection: outliers can't be discovered via pattern matching
(20:15) - How Meka assesses for money smells and hustle in a founder
(23:16) - Missed deals like Anthropic keep Meka up at night.
(28:10) - How Meka supports founder friends
(33:42) - Outcomes and up rounds thus far: Rimeto, CODA, K2Space, Prepared
(36:16) - Exploring the Frontiers: Investing in Space and GovTech
(37:42) - Meka's betting on a pair of brother's putting big satellites in space
(39:04) - Unexpected VC bet: Integrating tech into every 911 emergency call
(43:31) - Meka is a generalist investor with a focus on B2B SAAS, Fintech and hard tech
(44:54) - Investing in YC companies and maintaining an orientation towards prioritizing ownership over valuation
(49:28) - First Round Capital's approach is rooted in consensus not conviction, they invest as team
(52:17) - Leveling up in VC by learning from partners, retros, reviews, reflection powered by a process and data
(01:07:47) - Outro

Connect with Us

Follow the First Funders Podcast
Newsletter with behind-the-scenes access and key takeaways
Twitter/X @shaherose
Twitter/X @avirani
Email us with feedback and suggestions on topics and guests