socialmedian: Greylock’s Guide to Fundraising

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Greylock’s Guide to Fundraising

Source: Wall Street Journal

Nov 03, 2009

Summary

Fundraising in venture-capital land has been tough this year, but Greylock Partners announced Monday that it had closed a new $575 million fund that was above its $500 million target. In addition, Greylock brought in LinkedIn co-founder and executive chairman Reid Hoffman as a new partner. In a conversation with this blog, Greylock partner David Sze discussed raising a new venture fund in a difficult market environment:

WSJ: How long did you think it would take to raise a new fund?

Sze: We didn’t really know. Our funds have had most of the same investors for decades — some for as long as 40 years — so generally we can do fundraising fairly quickly. But in times like this, you just never know.

One fund we raised in the depths of 2000 (during the tech bust) took three weeks and we were stunned. This ended up taking four to six weeks and we were pleasantly surprised.

WSJ: Did you take any precautions, such as allotting more time to raise money?

Sze: We started the process earlier than we would normally — usually we start at the end of the year, so we planned that t

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