What Aydin Senkut Can Teach You About Angel Investing

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Last Updated: February 2, 2011

First Posted: April 21, 2009 by Joey Lo

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aydinsenkut What Aydin Senkut Can Teach You about Angel Investing There’s no denying it — becoming an angel investor may have a significant impact on your financial future. You sure want to get it right from the start. And here’s the good news: you’re not the first person to start from scratch. Why not learn from someone who’s been there, done that?

Aydin Senkut’s Investing Wisdom

I recently came across an interview of Aydin Senkut. Senkut was a senior manager at Google when it went public; no doubt he came out of that process with some coins in his pocket. Money was obviously no longer an issue, so he decided to move on to new ventures — venture capital, that is.

Aydin Senkut launched his own VC firm, Felicis Ventures, without previous experience in venture capital. He explained it all in a conversation with Connie Loizos for PEHub.com. [1] There are some key takeaways for angels, paraphrased here:

Know the people you’re partnering with, both the startup and your fellow angels. Senkut was careful to work with good and smart people, folks he knew and trusted. He also had appropriate legal representation to help him review his deals.
Talk to experts who are already succeeding as angel investors. Senkut did just that, and he drops a couple of names in his interview (e.g., to wit Mike Moritz, Ron Conway, Rajeev Motwani). Of course, it’s much easier for a former Google-ite to open those doors; still, you may be pleasantly surprised if you try.
Consider spreading your investments around. Senkut points out that he puts a bit here, a bit there. And he tries to arrange a portion of his deals to include co-investors to share risk and wisdom.
Take time and learn everything you possibly can. There are lessons in every deal you make. As Senkut says, mistakes make a big impression, and everyone makes mistakes. Evaluate every deal for positive and negative aspects.

* For series, references are published in the last installment of the series.

Angel Investing, Becoming an Angel Investor

tongyun

The difference between a smart person and someone who is doomed to failure? The willingness to listen to those who have gone before you and to learn from their successes as well as their failures. He also makes sure that he knows the people he works with because trust is such a huge factor when you want to partner with someone. Finally, instead of putting all of his eggs in one basket, he diversifies just to be on the safe side. Seems like he has done his homework. Not to say that there won't be bumps in the road, but it'll be just a little less bumpy.
cirereyes

That’s the way to do it, if you want to learn new things about something you should consult those who already had an experience on it. He’s also doing the right thing with his investments, hedging was probably considered that’s why he divided his investments and I’d do the same thing to minimize the risks involved in investing.
Kejatz

A little wisdom and patience go a long way, I am sure. It is better to know your business friends and enemies before you even consider making a deal with them. I specifically like the idea of spreading the investments a bit here and a bit there, which really increases the odds of avoiding devastating mistake of loosing all your invested money.
http://venturehype.com The Hyper Team @ Venture Hype

Successful people are lifetime students. No matter how high a status one’s achieved, he’d stop earning if he stopped learning. Like you said, willingness to listen and learn from others might not guarantee you a shiny road, but it’ll at least give you a “less bumpy” ride.
http://venturehype.com The Hyper Team @ Venture Hype

Yes, “don’t put all your eggs in one basket” applies to all forms of investing.
http://venturehype.com The Hyper Team @ Venture Hype

cirereyes, Kejatz – Yes, “don’t put all your eggs in one basket” applies to all forms of investing.
http://venturehype.com/picking-winners-with-sequoia%e2%80%99s-michael-moritz-cheap-is-chic/ Picking Winners with Sequoia’s Michael Moritz: Cheap Is Chic | Venture Hype

[...] subscribe to the RSS feed for updates on this topic. Font Size: + | – Last time, I highlighted some key takeaways from PEHub’s interview with ex-Googler Aydin Senkut, who went on to launched his own VC firm without previous experience in venture capital. This time, [...]