Each January we write to the people whose money we invest. This is the public half of that letter. The private half has the valuations in it; this half has everything else.

The year in numbers

We backed eleven new companies, nine of them from the first cheque. The portfolio now stands at 86 companies. Fund IV, our $420M fund, is 46 % deployed, which is where we planned to be.

Three companies left the portfolio the way we hope they will. Two were acquired, and Tidewater listed in 2025. We wrote Tidewater's first cheque and its six-page memo is still on file. Its fifth page lists the ways we could have been wrong. One of them nearly happened.

Where the companies came from

Sixty-one per cent of the portfolio came to us cold, through an e-mail or the pitch form, with no introduction. We keep saying this because founders keep not believing it. A partner reads every message within two working days.

What we got wrong

We passed on two companies last year because the market looked small. Both markets turned out to be larger than our memo allowed. In each case the fourth page measured the market as it was, and not the one the product would create.

We have changed how that page is written. It now has to answer two questions and keep them apart:

• How large is the market today, in numbers we checked ourselves?
• What would have to change for it to be several times larger, and is this company the one changing it?

A small market is a reason to ask a second question, not a reason to stop.

What stays the same

• One partner, start to finish, for every company
• A six-page memo before every cheque, shared with the founder afterwards
• A decision in fourteen days at seed, ten at pre-seed and twenty-one at Series A
• No board seat at pre-seed or seed

The year ahead

We will keep writing first cheques at the pace we have kept so far, and we will keep reserves for the companies we already back. If the plan changes, you will read it here first.

Thank you for your trust, and for your patience with the two we missed.