When I started Ascend in 2019, I realized even though I was o-l-d OLD, I had more in common with the folks in town who were earlier in their professional investing journeys than the venerable VC’s I’d pitched as a founder. I admire and respect the new wave of Seattle/Pacific Northwest venture capitalists, and thought it would be fun to profile some of our region’s up and coming VC talents in these pages. —KW
Austin Guyette sweats the details. He thinks like an operator and brings real talent to bear when he digs into a startup, even if he doesn’t invest. Austin is one of the rare VCs that actually makes founder think differently about their opportunity.
What made you decide to be a professional investor?
There wasn’t a single “ah-ha” moment. The decision was something that evolved over years.
I didn’t start down this path intending to become an investor. I had worked at a startup, knew I eventually wanted to start a company, and thought it would be useful to understand how investors worked. I dove in, learned everything I could, and discovered that being an investor was how I wanted to spend my career. For someone who is naturally curious about technology, enjoys investing, and likes working with people as much as analyzing a market it’s an extremely interesting job.
What keeps me loving what I do is the pursuit of mastery in this craft, a sense of purpose to serve our founders and LPs, and the autonomy in how we spend our time to make that happen. We’re constantly learning and evolving to do a better job.
What did you do before becoming an investor and how does that benefit your founders?
I was technology consultant for large enterprises (think big financial institutions and insurers) and helped build the first set of products at a healthcare analytics startup. The first job where anyone paid me was cleaning bathrooms and renting paddleboats at a county park.
I didn’t start as an insider to the venture industry. I’d like to think this hodgepodge of experiences manifests in my relationship with founders as:
Empathy for the early-stage journey having been a part of the 0-1 process in a previous life.
Zero-ego, no-nonsense, and intense loyalty in my relationships with our founders.
A blue-collar “in service to others” mindset to my work. I want our founders to be successful and will do everything within my power to make that happen.
Thinking like a product manager – I assemble resources, gather information, and collaborate with founders to make the best possible decisions together with humility. It’s an influencing without authority mindset that some of the most effective product managers have.
What are your most successful investments so far?
The two Voyager companies that have really broken out over the last few years are SheerID and Zipwhip though I was not with Voyager when those investments were originally made. “Up next” in the Voyager family is Syndio. They help ensure fair pay within the workplace and might have the most important mission of any company we’ve invested in.
Why should founders want you on their cap table?
We take leadership development seriously. The job of founders is so different at a company of 3, 30, and 300 people – it’s incredibly challenging to make these transitions. To help, we have folks on the Voyager team who specialize in CEO coaching, leadership development, and organizational change. (We also dogfood this tenant via coaching ourselves.)
How many new pitches (actual calls/zooms) do you take per month?
We’re probably in the ballpark of 30-50 new pitches across the team every month.
How many new investments do you make per year?
We’ll generally make 2-5 core investments each year.
What's your sweet spot(s) in terms of check size, valuation, and vertical?
We’re exclusively a B2B investor but vertical agnostic. It’s tough to put names on things since the definition of a Seed and a Series A has changed over the years but I would say that Voyager invests across most of the Seed and Series A spectrum.
Our core investments are lead checks of $1M-$5M in rounds totaling $2M-$10M in size. Generally, companies at this stage have a repeatable value proposition to customers and are working towards a repeatable go-to-market motion. We also write seed checks of $100k-$500k in rounds of $1M-2M.
What one portfolio company do you want to hype for us here?
I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about our joint portfolio company Candidate! They help employers hire through the power of personal referrals. If you think about a job posting on the internet today, it really only reaches those who are actively looking for a position. Candidate exposes employers to an entirely new, networked universe of people actively thinking “who do I know that would be the perfect fit for this job” and uses that as a lens to recommend people for a role. They’re just getting started but feedback from their early customers has been incredible.
What do you think the next ten years looks like for Seattle/Pacific Northwest startups?
We’re going to see the sous-chefs in our region develop into the next generation of legendary founders in the Pacific Northwest.
Let me explain that metaphor. In a kitchen, the sous-chef is second in command, ranking just under the executive chef. They hold an incredible amount of responsibility to operate the kitchen and make sure the food is of the highest quality. In the best kitchens in the world, sous-chefs work their way up to become experts in their craft. Those with enough creativity and ambition leave the nest and start their own restaurants with a unique style and flavor based on what they’ve learned.
Sous-chefs in the startup context are the early employees of a company that finds product market fit and goes into hypergrowth. They’re usually a director or VP level but are probably not founders themselves and can be, but are usually not, on the executive team. They learn how to level up their skills quickly. They operate with the passion, speed, charisma, and focus necessary for a startup to be successful. Almost always, they develop a unique insight on a set of new problems they learned about during their experience. Sometimes, they leave the nest and start their own companies to fix those problems. They are the founders of tomorrow.
We all know the standard “The Seattle/PNW startup ecosystem is poised to explode” pitch. Iconic companies! (AMZN, MSFT) World class education! (UW grad here) Critical mass of technical talent! (checkout the map of engineering centers) More venture dollars! More incubators and studios! All of these are good points, but they miss a critical ingredient that’s rapidly changing before our eyes. The quantity and quality of sous-chefs.
Since 1994, Seattle has had 37 companies reach the billion-dollar mark, an average of 1-2 per year. Over the last three years the rate these companies are being minted has increased to 4-5 per year. The data is similar for companies valued in the 9-digit realm. We’re TRIPLING the number of sous-chefs in our region and no one is talking about the second order effects of that growth.
Our region’s next legendary founders will come from Auth0, Convoy, Outreach, Remitly, Rover, and Zulily. Mona, Patrick, Maria, Shane, Tomasz, and Ryan are CEOs doing incredible things and more like them are on the way.
PNW sous-chefs are having their coming out party and I can’t wait to see what they’re cooking.
What song is currently getting the most run on your Spotify/Apple Music?
The Foo Fighters and Eric Church get the most airtime on my Spotify. “Sinners Like Me” holds a special place in my heart and “Kill A Word” is a song I love that’s gotten more runs recently.
Favorite shoes?
Hands down my ski touring boots.
Favorite cooking ingredient?
The dried porcini mushrooms that go into a White Bolognese recipe that our dad made for my brother and I as kids. The smell brings back memories and the dish is delicious.
Anything else to say?
I’m truly grateful to be able to do this for a living. My incredible colleagues at Voyager and the founders we partner with make this job special. It’s an honor to work with them and I feel lucky to be in this position.
If you’re a sous-chef opening a new restaurant, don’t hesitate to get in touch ;)