The goal of a private company is, first, zero to one. Get past the product market fit, figure out whether people actually care about what you're trying to build and someone will pay you money for that. That's the zero to one problem. So scaling, one through N, is figuring out can you do that at scale and how big is the scale. And when people pay you more than what it costs for you to make it, does that equation end up leaving you with money left over, i.e. profits.

It's OK, by the way, that it takes 10 years for you to make "money." Since when was it that being in your mid-30s to make a few hundred thousand dollars or a million dollars was like egregiously unfair? I think we have to have a sense of perspective here. We're all going to live into our 80s or 90s. So what is everybody in such a rush for?

The entrepreneurial struggle is the same at basically every stage in the sense that there's maybe slightly less risk but strategic issues are generally always the same. Now there's so much existential risk from another company either being able to compete or to disrupt you in the same way you're disrupting somebody else, an entrepreneur needs a real steady partner who has the ability to start working with them in the Seed or the A and be credible and value-add with strategic advice, and just be backstopped by so much capital that you can do any growth round or even a public round.

The goal of a private company is, first, zero to one. Get past the product market fit, figure out whether people actually care about what you're trying to build and someone will pay you money for that. That's the zero to one problem. So scaling, one through N, is figuring out can you do that at scale and how big is the scale. And when people pay you more than what it costs for you to make it, does that equation end up leaving you with money left over, i.e. profits.

As you start the company, you start spending spending spending ahead of revenue but then you come out of it and very quickly you should become a company that spends less than it makes. And what I mean by very quickly, is that window of time should be in that 6 to 8 year time frame. And the reason is because if you build your business model correctly it's almost unavoidable.

What you should be in a rush for isn't necessarily the immediate monetary return, but it's to know that this equation existing between an employee and a company is being honored. What's the equation? I'm going to give you my most precious thing that I have - my time and my reputation. That's what the employee says. And the company says I'm going to take your time and your reputation and direct it at things that we believe collectively have a huge impact opportunity to do something extremely positive. And that positivity will get measured in impact and also economic upside.

If the investors themselves are not sophisticated, if they themselves are not putting a lot of their own money to work, if they themselves don't understand the continuum of capital and how different parts of the capital structures react differently, then they're basically worthless. They're not going to give great advice to these entrepreneurs who then need it. So that is unfortunately the cycle we're in and we have to break the cycle.