> They can also literally kill your company. VCs have a very specific strategy: they give some money to 1000 companies knowing that 990 of them will return 0% in the hopes that of the remaining ten, 9 of them return %X000 and one returns %X0000.
+1 to this.
There are definitely different models for VCs, but in general, the big "brand name" VCs are in the unicorn business. This tweet [1] does a succinct job of explaining why.
The result of this is that as a founder, if you own 49% of your company and big-VC investors own 51% of your company and someone comes along offering to buy your company for $100m, your investors are likely to turn it down. For you, that would likely be a life-changing amount of money. For a big-name VC, it doesn't move the needle. In most cases, they'd rather roll the dice and end up with $0 then get their share of a $100m exit.
[1] https://twitter.com/jasonlk/status/1670021902612549632?ref_s...