Ben Horowitz on Raising a New Fund and How Venture Firms Scale

You know, when we started the firm, like, a big idea that we had was that venture capital was disappointing as a product for an entrepreneur. We always said, wow. A much better product would be, give me, like, the network to be confident in the advice I need to run this fucking thing. Today, we're sharing a few drops from uncapped to Jack Altman, featuring a 16 cofounder Ben Horowitz. In this conversation, Ben reflects on one of the core ideas behind a 16, that venture capital as a product for founders often wasn't good enough, and that a better model would be a firm built around a real network, real operating experience, and real support for entrepreneurs building through the hard parts. Jack and Ben also get into Ben's thirty year relationship with Mark and Friesen, how the relationship works in practice, how they make decisions, and how you scale a venture firm without losing the edge that actually helps founders. Ben, I'm really happy to be back here doing this. I got to be in the same room with Mark earlier in the year, and I'm I'm really happy that you're doing this with me. Alright. No. I'm glad to be here. It should be some fun. Can we start with your relationship with Mark? Because I think it's, like, a super unique thing where you guys obviously work together, you know, running companies. You built this firm together. You have a really unique relationship. I can't think of that many examples where I feel like I've seen it in that sort of equal way for so so long? Can you talk about it a little bit? We've been working together thirty years, and, I I would say we're we're both different and complement and and the same, and so not too complimentary, so that helps. He's kinda like we're a little more like relatives than than anything else at this point, you know, working together thirty years and so forth. So, like, are you friends outside of the work context, or, like, what's, like, on a on, like, a non work situation? Like, what is the interaction like? Yeah. We're we're friends, but not, like, drinking buddies or something like that. Right? Like, we both work so much. We mostly talk about work anyway, and then, like, because we're working together, we're talking about work. But it's kind of like the the way I would describe it, and I I wanna say this without sounding I'm not making the, like, level comparison. Like, I'm so I'm just saying the relationship comparison that I think is most similar that I've know about is kind of the Michael Jackson, Quincy Jones relationship, if you think about that. And that, yeah, Mark's more Michael Jackson. Like, he's a a star of talents that nobody else has. Yeah. Like, nobody else has maybe, like, ever had. Right? Like, you've talked to Mark, to the point where, like, as a firm, …