Chainfeeds Summary:
Dan Robinson saw it clearly. Chris Dixon was the first to spot the opportunity. Kyle Samani persevered to the end.
Article source:
https://x.com/hosseeb/status/2008562546853261497
Article Author:
Haseeb Qureshi
Opinion:
Haseeb Qureshi: Dan Robinson is the Mike Speiser of the crypto world. Time and again, Dan has been at the forefront of the founding stages of generational crypto companies. He was involved from the very beginning of Uniswap, and in fact, he was a co-author and core contributor to Uniswap V3, building the foundation for on-chain spot trading. He was a key contributor to Flashbots in its early days, giving rise to the modern MEV auction. He was also an early contributor to Plasma research, which led him to lead Optimism's seed round investment. Dan is a true polymath. He broke the stereotype of traditional VC: starting as a securities lawyer, becoming a self-taught protocol architect and mathematician, and now a self-taught investor. Perhaps Matthuang's greatest investment was hiring Dan. The most formidable investors are those who not only invest but also actively participate in making things happen. Dan's ability to foresee trends and personally drive them is what makes him one of the greatest figures in crypto VC history and allows him to reach the "Mount Rushmore" of crypto investing. Chris Dixon is the OG of OGs. He saw the opportunity earlier than anyone else. Before Chris, crypto VCs were a small league. He was the first to draw mainstream VC attention to crypto and publicly stake his career on it. He was the first to apply VC language and network investing methods to crypto. He was the first to popularize these concepts in Silicon Valley and its institutional LPs. Many of the concepts we discuss daily at IC are directly borrowed from Chris's methods. You could say that the path I'm following is the track Chris laid. I believe Chris Dixon's two most important investments are: 1) Coinbase: In 2013, Chris led Coinbase's Series B funding round when the industry was still in its infancy and nothing was obvious. This deal demonstrated Dixon's wisdom; he foresaw the trend and committed himself fully. 2) Uniswap: Almost everyone who saw Uniswap's Series A funding round gave up. At the time, the FDV was only $100 million, and the project was still insignificant. The capital efficiency and forkability of AMMs sparked heated debate. Paradigm gave up, we gave up, and as far as I know, no one else in the a16z IC was willing to participate. I often tease Kyle. He annoyed many people, including myself. But investing is like a competitive sport. Ultimately, you either score points or you don't. Kyle scored more points than anyone else. The returns from Solana's seed round alone, and the effort he put into that investment, are enough to write a book, and I probably frowned the whole time I read it. The best investors are often contrarians. Kyle is a true contrarian. A contrarian isn't someone who writes a popular comment and gets everyone to say you're smart; if everyone shares you, you're not a contrarian. A true contrarian is someone who can provoke others, make them think you're a fool, or even that you're burning money. Kyle is one of the few true contrarians in the crypto space. I disagree with him on almost everything, but his initial investment in Solana and his holding through the downturn following the FTX crash undeniably make him one of the greatest VCs in crypto history. Venture capital is a power-law game. Kyle's investment in Solana perfectly illustrates this. Sometimes, all it takes is a single deal.
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