⏮️July's Highlights Across Startups, VC, Data & AI
Your Summer Reading List :)
👋 Hi, I’m Andre and welcome to my newsletter Data-Driven VC which is all about becoming a better investor with Data & AI. Join 34,710 thought leaders from VCs like a16z, Accel, Index, Sequoia, and more to understand how startup investing becomes more data-driven, why it matters, and what it means for you.
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Hear from experts at BlackRock, OpenAI, and Affinity as they explore how AI is reshaping workflows, unlocking new insights, and redefining what’s possible for deal teams.
This session is built for investors looking to understand where AI can drive real value and how to assess readiness across their portfolio and the broader ecosystem.
Welcome to our monthly wrap-up episode where we cover July’s most relevant content at the intersection of startups, VC, data & AI.
Said differently: We curated a summer reading list for you👇
MULTIPLES SNAPSHOT📸
88% of you want me to continue with the Multiples Snapshot - so I trust the data & repeat ;) Below is a snapshot from July’s state of the market. Full episode with all tables and deep dives here.
INTERESTING RESEARCH & REPORTS📈
SaaS CAC Payback Periods Hit Troubling Highs
Kyle Poyar spotlights new data showing just how inefficient SaaS go-to-market teams have become. He shares numbers from Jamin Ball’s Clouded Judgement, indicating that sales and marketing costs now take years to recover, even for top performers.
Q1 2024 Average: Gross margin-adjusted CAC payback hit 57 months. That means even strong public SaaS companies need nearly five years to break even on new customer acquisition costs.
Best vs. Worst Performers: Zero public companies had CAC payback under 12 months. Only five were under 24 months, while 24 firms reported payback above 100 months or negative net-new ARR.
12-Quarter Trend: The average CAC payback over the past 12 quarters sits at 41 months, showing this is a persistent problem not explained away by one bad quarter or macro factors.
✈️ KEY TAKEAWAYS
Public SaaS companies face severe GTM inefficiency, with CAC payback periods stretching multiple years. This may force a reckoning as companies can’t rely on legacy customer subsidies forever.
Seed Round Liquidation Preferences Stay Standard
Peter Walker’s LinkedIn post analyzes current norms in early-stage venture deals, showing that seed and Series A rounds overwhelmingly use 1× non-participating liquidation preferences. He notes this consistency as evidence that founders shouldn’t fear hidden investor-unfriendly terms at these stages.
1× Non-Participating Remains Standard: Seed and Series A deals almost universally feature 1× non-participating liquidation preferences, with no cumulative dividends, keeping founder and investor interests aligned.
Bridge Rounds Often Have Tougher Terms: Bridge or extension rounds can include higher liquidation preferences, reflecting the higher risk for investors when companies raise unplanned interim capital.
Later-Stage Rounds Diverge: More mature rounds often include investor-friendly terms such as participating preferences or higher multiples, but these are not standard at seed.
✈️ KEY TAKEAWAYS
Early-stage funding rounds maintain simple, founder-aligned terms. Seed deals with preferences above 1× non-participating should be seen as warning signs.
INSPIRING TECH IN VC CONTENT💡
How RA Capital’s Legal Team Uses AI to Scale Their Operations: Tools & Case Studies
RA Capital’s General Councel Sarah Reed shares here how their legal team handles a massive workload by treating AI as a “junior associate.” They use sandboxed versions of Claude and ChatGPT to draft contracts, research laws, and even produce first drafts of fund documents—faster and cheaper than junior lawyers. AI isn’t replacing humans but augmenting them, offering extra precedent examples, surfacing new insights, and speeding up repetitive tasks while lawyers focus on high-value work.
They also pair AI with tools like Glean, which helps interns instantly answer questions and ramp up quickly, and Smartsheet, which streamlines contract intake and tracking. Even though many AI tools are still “wrappers around ChatGPT,” RA Capital is training them now, betting on compounding gains. By blending AI-driven drafting, automation, and standardization, they’ve built a legal “factory” that keeps pace with one of the busiest investment firms in biotech.
A New VC Operating Model Is Emerging
A recent feature from Invezz reveals how AI is reshaping VC from sourcing to portfolio management, raising the question about the erosion of traditional mentorship models and relationship‑based vetting. The article argues that firms must intentionally decide whether to become AI-native or preserve human-led instincts—or both.
AI is making venture capital faster, leaner, and more automated. But it’s also hollowing out the structures that gave the industry its staying power.
Fewer junior hires means fewer apprentices. Founders are exiting earlier. Deals are being picked by models, not relationships.
That’s efficient, but it’s also brittle. The venture business was built on long-term trust, shared experiences, and human judgment.
Those things don’t show up in training data.
The industry now faces a choice. Some firms will become AI-native, treating venture like a throughput machine.
Others will double down on the human edge, like deep relationships, conviction calls, and hands-on support.
Most will try to do both. But the ones who succeed will be those who choose their model deliberately. Not just as a thesis, but as a way of working.
How AI Is Transforming VC in 2025
This deep dive from Capitaly.vc looks at how AI technologies—like ML, NLP and big data—are fundamentally changing how VCs identify and evaluate startups. AI tools automate pattern recognition across global deal flow and surface emerging trends in real time. The article illuminates use cases including automated sourcing platforms, enhanced analytics during diligence, and the broad implications for deal velocity and competitive differentiation.
EVENTS📆
Data Driven VC Investor Summit in Munich
Super excited to double down on the big success of our inaugural edition with 1k+ participants last year and co-host our physical Investor Summit 2025 again with our friends at Bit & Pretzels on 29th September 2025 in Munich🔥🥨🍻
We aim to make this the premier event for 1,500+ GPs and 300+ LPs to meet in Europe, alongside Bits & Pretzels festival and the one and only Oktoberfest. First confirmed speakers:
Many more to be announced soon. Stay tuned and make sure to get your ticket early & book an unforgettable trip to Munich. See you around!
Data Driven VC Community Get-Together in Munich
One day after our Investor Summit in Munich, we’ll host our next DDVC Community breakfast on 30th September 2025 8.30am. We have limited seats available and you can join us here
“TECH IN VC” JOBS👩💻
We just filled our VP Engineering position at Earlybird - YAAAY! If you’re recruiting tech in VC jobs too, just hit reply with the URL to your job posting and we’ll include it in our next monthly wrap-up episode + share via VCSTACK.COM
Open positions:
Tech Lead @All Iron Ventures in Bilbao here
Analytics Engineer @Dawn Capital in London here
Data Engineer @Dawn Capital in London here
Fullstack Software Eng @Equation Cap in Munich here
Senior Data Engineer @Growth Equity Firm in the Bay Area here
Principal Software Engineer @SignalFire in SF here
THIS MONTH’S DATA DRIVEN VC EPISODES⏮️
Essays
Insights (from the data)
Time to Unicorn, Liq Prefs at Seed, PLG vs. Sales-Led, AI Pricing Experiments & More
Startup Survival Rates, State of Seed Rounds, Peak Unicorn Funding, Sizing Finance Teams & More
Resources
Stay driven,
Andre
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