Hi there 👋 I'm Elizabeth co-founder and General Partner at Hustle Fund. AMA

@imarkphillips Building out Hustle Fund! Hustle Fund is fundamentally a company. We started with our VC firm, but we now have many other business lines run by other GMs. Our mission for the company is democratize wealth via startups by impacting capital, knowledge, and networks. We have 20 people now working on programs like Angel Squad (our angel program), Hustle Fund Scale (our late stage angel program), Redwood School (our growth school) 3 crypto initiatives, and more to come. It's fun!

@edgar1 I would take a step back and think about: 1) Are you still excited about doing a startup? 2) If so, are there other problems (with the world wide open) that you are excited about solving? 3) if so, perhaps do customer development in those other areas Sometimes people need to take a break, make some money, and then get back at it. Finding product market fit is hard (and a lot of luck IMO), and sometimes you just need to reset a bit.

@elizabeth_yin1 Thanks for your answer! I will definitely get to thinking this weekend. Definitely still excited about doing a startup just need to think about everything

@ivandothetrick We do not hold Nationality from anywhere against a founder. We cannot invest in Russian incorporated companies.

Hi @ivandothetrick 👋 I am Moiz, founder of https://grandeur.dev. Barging in the conversation because I have been there (almost, originally based out of Pakistan). In my experience, nationality doesn't really matter (we raised from multiple US VCs). But the location of core team matters. For starters, incorporate in USA. It will open so many doors for you (particularly, if you are a global company, like targeting US users). But if you are solving a local problem (e.g. Uber of Russia), then it is actually much better to raise from local VCs. Because local VCs will help you solve a lot of regulatory problems in long run.

@elizabeth_yin1 I meant Russian founders in the US obv. Not investing in Russia-based enterprises. But I guess I got the answer. Hope to see more talents from post-soviet space in your portfolio then ✊

@moizhusnain We are the venture studio based in New York scouting at post-soviet space and trust me I've seen it all. My question here is based on experience of hundreds of founders I met in person. Post-soviet founders is highly underrepresented cohort not even recognized here as one and now it's getting even worse. I think @elizabeth_yin1 told the truth, at least the one she believes in. But I will truly believe in it when I see these talented founders among The Hustle funds deals. So far the % of founders coming from post-soviet countries getting here pre-seed funding is catastrophically low.

@aleksi_halsas1 Incorporation still matters a lot for funding. Less where you are based but more where the company is based, because regulation + compliance is a pain. IMO, a US incorporated company will give you more optionality with US investors. (That may turn away local investors though, so you have to make a decision on where you want to raise.) More here: https://mobile.twitter.com/dunkh...

@stelian_dobrescu1 Great q and so many! If I had to pick one, as a small fund, I'd choose low competition. More thoughts here: https://twitter.com/dunkhippo33/...

@elizabeth_yin1 Thanks, that's extremely insightful.

@stefani_kovachevska this is probably the most unusual pitch I've received as an investor: https://twitter.com/dunkhippo33/...

@elizabeth_yin1 Awesome, they really did their homework and connected the dots creatively :) Thanks for sharing!

@devlorenzo1 Reposting from above: Founding team and more importantly market pull. In 3-6 months, you can learn a lot about the founding team. Do they execute with speed? Can they hire well / attract talent / do ppl want to work for them? Can they learn new skills? Are they focused on 1-2 things? etc. But you can't always learn about whether the idea has market pull. It may require a lot more learnings and pivots along the way which could even take years. Market pull is a combination of understanding why customers buy? If the problem is really dire / urgent to warrant this solution? And if there is a seemingly repeatable channel to get more of that customer.

@evgeniyantoshkin Thank you Evgeniy! That's really nice of you!

@andygcook Ooof -- so many tough lessons! Probably the big one is around people management -- esp when you're pivoting or experimenting with a number of things. Employees feel whiplashed around, and no one likes their work thrown out, when you're pivoting or are not sure what the right direction is. Spending a lot of time communicating this framing is really important when you're pivoting for team morale sake.

@paulkorver This is a great question! Yes, we invest pre-revenue. But not solely in ideas. We send out automated responses, so I suspect you checked the box that you have not built anything yet. But, if you have built something, please check that box. Thanks!

@elizabeth_yin1 No... we didn't select the box that said we haven't built anything yet because we ARE actively building. The three options in your Typeform question 4a "What is the status of your product?" were (A) Nothing built (B) Currently building MVP and (C) MVP built (or beyond). We checked option B and which triggered the auto-rejection. So I stand uncorrected :) It doesn't seem like Hustle Fund comes in as early as advertised. Wouldn't it be more straightforward to simply say "hit us up once you've built MVP! That's when we may want to invest"?