Partner at Lightspeed, Lightspeed Venture Partners
Search every verified Jeremy Liew interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. Jeremy Liew, a general partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners and a nine-time member of the Forbes Midas List, has been discussing his investment philosophy and approach to venture capital in a series of recent appearances. Liew emphasized the importance of pattern recognition in deal sourcing, stating that to identify a "one in a thousand company," an investor must have met thousands of companies, as "there is no substitute" for direct experience. He described the process of winning competitive deals as understanding one's "home ground advantage," which he defined as a specific domain expertise, network, or geography that gives an investor a unique edge over competitors. Liew noted that for him, this advantage was initially a deep understanding of consumer internet, a specialization that was rare when he joined Lightspeed in 2006. Liew also spoke about the role of trust in investor-founder relationships, arguing that it is "built in difficult situations" rather than before an investment is made. He cited his experience with The Honest Company, where a prior failed investment with co-founder Brian Lee led to a strong reference because Lightspeed remained supportive even when the company was struggling. Liew advised entrepreneurs to conduct reference checks on potential investors by speaking with founders of companies that did not succeed, as "not everybody is supportive and helpful and kind when things don't go well." He added that he has made approximately 75 investments over his career, noting that while he was enthusiastic about all of them, more than half lost money, but that Snapchat and Affirm each returned over a billion dollars.
“Trust is earned and you shoot as old was not a good outcome for us as an investor and we were co-investors there with some other firms. Coming out of that, Brian said hey you know this is a tough situation we lost money to these guys but Lightspeed were a great team to work with even when the chips were down, even when...”
“Trust is built in difficult situations. Difficult situations tend to be like not always, sometimes you pull out of them but often they lead to bad outcomes. There's this old adage in venture capital that you build your returns from the success you the reputation between the companies that don't work out. That's the tru...”
“Every successful company will give a good reference for all of their investors because it's easy to be a supportive investor when the company's doing well. If you get good references from companies that aren't doing well, that I think is a real differentiator because not everybody is supportive and helpful and kind whe...”
“Entrepreneurs should always do reference checks on their potential investors and they shouldn't just do the references that were provided. They shouldn't just do the references for the successful companies that the investor initiated. They should do reference checks on the companies that don't work out as well because...”
“Jessica Alba had been so vocal as a new mom around the need for natural toxic chemical-free baby products and skincare products, so when she started the brand in that direction, it was a very understandable and natural extension of her advocacy work prior to that. Her audience understood it and embraced it immediately...”
“Brian Lee is a prolific serial entrepreneur who really understands how to work with influencers and celebrities to match their areas of expertise and passion with a brand and product. That authenticity and connection is necessary for influencer-led and celebrity-led brands; they need to believe in the product, be exper...”
“As a venture capitalist you have to realize that you actually don't have the ability to fix every problem in a company; the responsibility lies with the founder and CEO who are driving the bus, while you're just a passenger.”
“An investment can change the trajectory of a company by 30% versus 30 times for the founder, and internalizing that difference allows you to have singular peace as an investor.”
“You've got to figure out what's your way to win and it's not that you're going to win every single time; no one wins every single time but you've got to believe that you're going to win some of the time and you got to win some of the time against the best because if your taste is good then you are competing against oth...”
“You want to know what your home ground advantage is; it means that some of the time you will win there and maybe on the road you lose more. You want to play at home or on the road, but as long as you know what your home ground advantage is, you can make sure that you play more at home than you do on the road.”
“That advantage can be anything; it could be like Coinbase — people who work at Coinbase know you, they trust you, even if some amazing venture capitalist shows up with a great track record, they don't know them but they know you and they trust you, so you win.”
“For me, the home ground advantage was domain expertise; I could demonstrate that I understood consumer deals better than these generalists, and people wanted someone who really stands out on their board.”
“As mentors become more specialized, you have to become more specialized too. If you want to be a domain expert, it can't be on consumer broadly; it needs to be much more narrow at least to start off with, and over time you can grow it out.”
“It could be geography; you might really understand the dynamics of Latin America better than a generalist VC flying in from the US. It could be that you speak Spanish so you can speak to the entrepreneur in their native language, making communication easier.”
“There has to be something that would cause someone to say I would rather have you as my investor than all these other really impressive options that I have.”
In this episode, Lightspeed Partner Jeremy Liew shares the untold story behind The Honest Company—and how a failed ...
Jeremy Liew, GP at Lightspeed on his investment strategy.
9x Midas List Forbes Investor, Jeremy Liew Lightspeed General Partner, first investor in Snap chat.
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