Josh Kopelman on innovation
From Episode 032: Imagine If with Josh Kopelman · · Alliance for Decision Education
“I think actually the two most powerful words in humankind's history is imagine if. No great movement, no great concept, whether you're a social movement, a form of government, whether you're a company, whether it's imagine if we could have a reusable rocket, imagine if you could push a button and a car turns up or imagine if all mankind is created equal; like every great concept starts with someone thinking about how it could be different.”
On , Josh Kopelman, Founder of First Round Capital at First Round Capital, spoke about innovation during Episode 032: Imagine If with Josh Kopelman on Alliance for Decision Education.
About Josh Kopelman
Josh Kopelman, co-founder and managing partner of First Round Capital, has been discussing the firm's approach to early-stage investing and decision-making. In a September 2025 podcast, he described the firm's focus on partnering with founders at the "imagine if" stage, helping them move from concept to execution. He emphasized that First Round Capital uses a rubric to evaluate founders, collecting data over nearly 20 years to "stress test" their thinking and improve decision quality, rather than outsourcing decisions to an algorithm. Kopelman also spoke about the importance of making implicit assumptions explicit and tracking decisions to learn from them over time. In a May 2025 interview, Kopelman discussed the venture capital industry's dynamics, noting that most venture firms are "poorly run" and that First Round Capital operates like a company with products and experiments. He argued that the "bull case" for large funds is about scale, not alpha, and that the average venture firm returns negative performance. Kopelman also commented on the AI cycle, stating it will drive scientific improvements in healthcare, energy, and education, but cautioned that many companies will simply improve productivity in existing jobs. He reiterated the firm's focus on investing in people and problems rather than specific solutions at the seed stage.