It’s been a while since I last published anything in the newsletter. I’m here to explain the radio silence from F2F, the new vision for the newsletter, and how I plan to execute going forward to take us there.
Where Has Soda (Me!) & F2F Been?
My absence from F2F can be explained in the following three bullet points:
Reaching My Goal of 200 Forbes Articles: I was writing at a frequent pace for Forbes (I’m usually in high demand), dropping 46 stories over the past six months. I saw I was in striking distance of #200 and decided to go for it. I’m so glad I got to hit the milestone on my four-year anniversary of publishing my very first story on Forbes, but now F2F is my only writing priority going forward.
Starting As A New VC Associate At UP.Partners: While I was working on reaching 200 Forbes articles, I got an opportunity to chat with some folks on the team at UP.Partners, an early-stage Santa Monica VC fund investing in multi-dimensional mobility that just launched publicly with a $230M debut fund. You all know how things go - a couple of conversations here and there, and somehow, I end up getting an offer on my birthday to join the firm (best birthday present ever!) as an Associate. I always knew I wanted to be in LA in the near term investing in deep tech (I have an aerospace academic and professional background), so it was no brainer to take the job!
Moving To Los Angeles: Which brings me here to LA! It’s taken me a lot longer to get settled personally and professionally in the city, and I’m still going through my adjustment period. That being said, I’ve loved catching up with old friends/founders and making new acquiantances/colleagues so far.
My only regret is that I didn’t share all this with you all, my readers, in advance before moving to LA.
I sincerely apologize for the radio silence and I ask for your forgiveness.
I promise that from here on out, I will overcommunicate in well in advance if there is going to be any prolonged absences from me. What’s done is done however - for those who have decided to stick with me, thank you. I can’t look back on things, only forward towards realizing the vision for F2F.
Where Is F2F Going? (The Vision!)
After working on this newsletter for two years, it’s finally become clear to me what the vision for Founder to Founder should be.
I’ve realized that the #1 thing I can do for early-stage foundersis connect them to one another. It’s even more important than, in my opinion, raising VC funding. A founder’s network in the early-stages can be the difference between success and failure. Thus, with given my overarching goal of helping more founders be successful, connecting early-stage founders together is the greatest value-add this newsletter can bring to the table.
To put it simply:
My vision for Founder to Founder that it becomes a content-driven community to connect founders together both online and offline.
Founder to Founder is where you come for the content and stay for the community.
Why now? Well, I’m finally in a position (both literally and figuratively) where I can meet the founders I write on face-to-face! It’s a new era for Founder to Founder given that I am working a day job where I am PAID to meet founders! A lot of things had to go right for me to be in this position, and now I can fully capitalize on it.
How Will We Get There?
Now that I’m in LA and can meet with founders in person, the game completely changes for F2F. Like I said above, I can now build relationships with founders both offline and online. Here’s how I will realize my vision for F2F:
In the short-term:
I will be publishing two Startup Spotlights this week (one today, and one of Wednesday before Thanksgiving) and one Case Study. F2F will then be on a short break and will resume on December 6th.
I will be spending Thanksgiving Break catching up on my massive backlog of content and reconnecting with founders. The goal here is to have enough prepared content to see out 2021 and potentially cover a portion of Q1 2022.
Once that content has been prepared and scheduled to be published, I will be reworking the onboarding process for F2F when working with new founders for the first time. Specifically, I will be explicit in asking founders who they want to connect with in my network of founders that I’ve already covered in F2F. The goal here is simple: if I can provide new founders being covered on F2F with one meaningful connection to founders who have previously been featured on the newsletter, then that is a major success in my book.
In the long-term:
I’ll be meeting founders covered F2F in person over coffee, lunch, and/or dinner! Other than having a wonderful time over a meal, the hope is I can expand these to regular group-based or one-on-one gathering over time.
I’ve also had interest from founders who want to create video content with me about how they are going about building their future multi-billion dollar startups. I can’t speak too much on this now, but there’s plans in the works to start producing videos on LinkedIn/YouTube come 2022. Stay tuned!
That’s all I have to share now.
Again, from the bottom of my heart, I deeply apologize for the long radio silence. Thank you to everyone who has decided to stick with me and F2F - I can’t wait to change the founder ecosystem for the better!
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A Short Update On F2F
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Hello Founders,
It’s been a while since I last published anything in the newsletter. I’m here to explain the radio silence from F2F, the new vision for the newsletter, and how I plan to execute going forward to take us there.
Where Has Soda (Me!) & F2F Been?
My absence from F2F can be explained in the following three bullet points:
Reaching My Goal of 200 Forbes Articles: I was writing at a frequent pace for Forbes (I’m usually in high demand), dropping 46 stories over the past six months. I saw I was in striking distance of #200 and decided to go for it. I’m so glad I got to hit the milestone on my four-year anniversary of publishing my very first story on Forbes, but now F2F is my only writing priority going forward.
Starting As A New VC Associate At UP.Partners: While I was working on reaching 200 Forbes articles, I got an opportunity to chat with some folks on the team at UP.Partners, an early-stage Santa Monica VC fund investing in multi-dimensional mobility that just launched publicly with a $230M debut fund. You all know how things go - a couple of conversations here and there, and somehow, I end up getting an offer on my birthday to join the firm (best birthday present ever!) as an Associate. I always knew I wanted to be in LA in the near term investing in deep tech (I have an aerospace academic and professional background), so it was no brainer to take the job!
Moving To Los Angeles: Which brings me here to LA! It’s taken me a lot longer to get settled personally and professionally in the city, and I’m still going through my adjustment period. That being said, I’ve loved catching up with old friends/founders and making new acquiantances/colleagues so far.
My only regret is that I didn’t share all this with you all, my readers, in advance before moving to LA.
I sincerely apologize for the radio silence and I ask for your forgiveness.
I promise that from here on out, I will overcommunicate in well in advance if there is going to be any prolonged absences from me. What’s done is done however - for those who have decided to stick with me, thank you. I can’t look back on things, only forward towards realizing the vision for F2F.
Where Is F2F Going? (The Vision!)
After working on this newsletter for two years, it’s finally become clear to me what the vision for Founder to Founder should be.
I’ve realized that the #1 thing I can do for early-stage founders is connect them to one another. It’s even more important than, in my opinion, raising VC funding. A founder’s network in the early-stages can be the difference between success and failure. Thus, with given my overarching goal of helping more founders be successful, connecting early-stage founders together is the greatest value-add this newsletter can bring to the table.
To put it simply:
Why now? Well, I’m finally in a position (both literally and figuratively) where I can meet the founders I write on face-to-face! It’s a new era for Founder to Founder given that I am working a day job where I am PAID to meet founders! A lot of things had to go right for me to be in this position, and now I can fully capitalize on it.
How Will We Get There?
Now that I’m in LA and can meet with founders in person, the game completely changes for F2F. Like I said above, I can now build relationships with founders both offline and online. Here’s how I will realize my vision for F2F:
In the short-term:
I will be publishing two Startup Spotlights this week (one today, and one of Wednesday before Thanksgiving) and one Case Study. F2F will then be on a short break and will resume on December 6th.
I will be spending Thanksgiving Break catching up on my massive backlog of content and reconnecting with founders. The goal here is to have enough prepared content to see out 2021 and potentially cover a portion of Q1 2022.
Once that content has been prepared and scheduled to be published, I will be reworking the onboarding process for F2F when working with new founders for the first time. Specifically, I will be explicit in asking founders who they want to connect with in my network of founders that I’ve already covered in F2F. The goal here is simple: if I can provide new founders being covered on F2F with one meaningful connection to founders who have previously been featured on the newsletter, then that is a major success in my book.
In the long-term:
I’ll be meeting founders covered F2F in person over coffee, lunch, and/or dinner! Other than having a wonderful time over a meal, the hope is I can expand these to regular group-based or one-on-one gathering over time.
I’ve also had interest from founders who want to create video content with me about how they are going about building their future multi-billion dollar startups. I can’t speak too much on this now, but there’s plans in the works to start producing videos on LinkedIn/YouTube come 2022. Stay tuned!
That’s all I have to share now.
Again, from the bottom of my heart, I deeply apologize for the long radio silence. Thank you to everyone who has decided to stick with me and F2F - I can’t wait to change the founder ecosystem for the better!
All the best,
Soda