# Strong growth no longer guarantees a venture term sheet Markdown copy of https://realalpha.app/s/strong-growth-no-longer-guarantees-a-venture-term-sheet/ on Real Alpha, the best minutes from long interviews with the people building AI. Cite and link the page, not this copy. - Speaker: [Jason Lemkin](https://realalpha.app/people/jason-lemkin/) · Founder & managing director, SaaStr Fund · Founded SaaStr and runs SaaStr Fund, backing early SaaS winners like Algolia, Talkdesk and RevenueCat. - Host: [Harry Stebbings](https://realalpha.app/people/harry-stebbings/) · Founder, 20VC · Built a venture firm on his podcast; its third fund closed at $400M. - Show: 20VC - Episode: [The New VC Game | CoreWeave Sell-Off Creates Panic | Revenue Multiples Out of Control](https://realalpha.app/v/OJX2L21e4fA/), Oct 22, 2026 - Moment: 0:48 to 5:55 of the episode (5 min), playing on https://realalpha.app/s/strong-growth-no-longer-guarantees-a-venture-term-sheet/; the episode from there: https://realalpha.app/v/OJX2L21e4fA/?t=48 ## Quote > “You got to **meet every VC**. You got to meet 100. It is like the old days.” > — [Jason Lemkin](https://realalpha.app/people/jason-lemkin/) at [4:01](https://realalpha.app/v/OJX2L21e4fA/?t=241) · 20VC ## Takeaways 1. Capital is concentrating in a narrower set of categories. 2. Strong metrics may not fit current VC preferences. 3. Founders may need to meet 100 investors to find a match. ## About this segment Jason Lemkin describes a profitable company at $20M ARR growing 600–700% that struggles to attract VCs. He says founders outside favored categories may need to meet a far wider pool of investors. From “The New VC Game | CoreWeave Sell-Off Creates Panic | Revenue Multiples Out of Control”, Oct 22, 2026. [Watch the full episode](https://realalpha.app/v/OJX2L21e4fA/) ## Transcript Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there. [1:01](https://realalpha.app/v/OJX2L21e4fA/?t=61) boys i just tweeted something that has got a rather large response from a founder community i think venture is broken today in the way that i'm meeting more and more companies that fit this profile i just met a company today and i have a company that's 20 million in error growing incredibly fast six seven hundred percent profitable brilliant business with a great team crickets vcs do not want it is venture broken today well look i'm sure rory has a lot of thoughts i'll just add one one ahead of it which is we were talking about this company which will be nameless right i have invested in a in a vaguely similar company like doing similar things for similar size companies they raised about a three million dollar seed round and they're planning that's it even with this type of growth even with it all being agentic even with it all being [1:48](https://realalpha.app/v/OJX2L21e4fA/?t=108) all the things we're supposed to be excited about right ai and voice and resolution agents it does actually something that's pretty somewhat unique, but they're literally planning to never raise again because you get the 15% 18 a month venture update, but no one wants to meet. It's like, well, I'll put in a little more money, but it may have been some ways in the old days where early investors may need to carry you if you're anything that's not hyper growth and the right boxes to check, right? The three by chocolate. Your investors may have to carry you. It's like the old days. Jason, you're right. You said earlier, the kind of specificity box has really narrowed in terms of what is interesting to investors. And I'm seeing that more and more with this concentration of capital going to fewer and fewer names and everything else being wholly [2:31](https://realalpha.app/v/OJX2L21e4fA/?t=151) unfundable, which more so than I've seen ever in venture before, which is surprising for a sheep like market like venture. But what you're saying is, if you think about, if you think of the role of venture financing innovation, what you're saying, there are lots of companies that look on the surface to have very good numbers that can't raise money. That's what you mean, correct? Correct. And I think that's probably true. I mean, let me give you the contrast, though. [2:54](https://realalpha.app/v/OJX2L21e4fA/?t=174) At the same time, I don't think it's just going to 10 or 20 companies in total, because at the same time, there are a whole bunch of projects that probably in another era would not get funded at all that are getting venture money. Data centers in space, quantum computing. So we're very risk on for stuff that has ultra high upside. And I think the stuff that's struggling to get funded is, as you say, it's software for specific markets where there's some inarticulate fear that AI will make it all go away. Is that kind of a fair next level summary? Yeah, I think so. I think you're absolutely right. I think it's this like power law on steroids requirement where it's like, unless you can pay me the trillion dollar market cap, I'm not interested. To answer your question a little more, to be more tactical, Harry, I think you're right that you roll with a high powered [3:54](https://realalpha.app/v/OJX2L21e4fA/?t=234) crowd. I think if you want Sequoia and Benchmark and one of the better partners at Andreessen to fund you. The box is very specific, right? It's cursor better, right? Open routers, okay. But let's see what we can do better next time. I will say for companies like you described, still growing at numbers that approach the iconic outlier metrics, right? Here's where I think actually the world is today. You got to meet every VC. You got to meet 100. It is like the old days. And you will find someone that takes that bet. It will not be the seven benchmark partners and all the rest. But someone will take that bet at a reasonable but still elevated valuation because it's the best deal they've seen this quarter. Someone will take it. You just got, it's the old days where you got to beat a hundred. And there are growth investors whose names are not [4:36](https://realalpha.app/v/OJX2L21e4fA/?t=276) Index and Dreesen and Bessemer. And they will take that bet because it's a good bet. To Roy's point, it will lead to a Listen Labs or better in some cases. It's just, you better meet everyone on planet earth now if you just have top decile numbers. But top decile for a while was like an automatic of term sheet, right? For years, it was an automatic term sheet, right? You'd walk into Rory's office. [4:55](https://realalpha.app/v/OJX2L21e4fA/?t=295) Rory knew every deal since the dawn of time. He would know exactly if you're in the top decile, if he believed in you and trusted you, you'd walk out with a term sheet from scale, right? The world just doesn't work that way today. You might still walk out with a term sheet from scale. So what you're saying is there's a small number of extraordinary potential startups that the very best VCs are focused on almost to the detriment of anything else. [5:19](https://realalpha.app/v/OJX2L21e4fA/?t=319) That's your point, Harry, correct? No, I'm saying the whole venture landscape has realized that a certain few categories are the most interesting and exciting and everything else is uninteresting in a way that has not been before.