Gerstner warns his team that being too early on investments is as dangerous as being too late.
“When we think about the future we're always paying attention you know one thing that I would say is I remind my team it's just as dangerous to be too early as it is to be too late.”
Gerstner warns his team that being too early on a trend is as dangerous as being too late.
“And I was talking of I was worried about the future of search and the future of vertical search starting in 2010,”
Gerstner calls access to top tech companies the most asymmetric bet in investing history.
“The the the most asymmetric bet maybe in the history of all of investing is having a golden ticket to have access to the best technology companies in the world today.”
Gerstner reveals Altimeter has passed on 75 AI investment opportunities in the last twelve months.
“Today to me, you know, we've passed on 75 AI businesses over the course of the last twelve months that we've looked at, not because we don't think those are good founders or maybe even good business models,”
“I think there's plenty of time. If this is going to be as big and as transformational as humanity as we all think it will be, remember, you didn't have to invest in search until Google's IPO in 2004 to capture 95% of all ever generated by Internet search.”
Gerstner proposes three investment categories instead of two: venture under $100M revenue, quasi-public over $1B, and public markets.
“One thing that we have done and I've encouraged LPs like endowments to think about is we used to have these two buckets. Right? Venture and public when I talk to technology investors.”
Gerstner contrasts buying NVIDIA in fall 2022 based purely on tech fundamentals versus today's layered policy risks.
“What do I do as an investor? You know, what did I do in the fall of twenty two that led me into NVIDIA in the first place?”
Gerstner expresses interest in owning a company but questions whether current timing is right for purchase.
“I would want to own this company but I’m not sure today is the day I would buy the company.”
Gerstner claims modest investments given time to compound can change someone's life trajectory.
“During that time, I also witnessed firsthand how even a modest investment, given time to compound, could alter the trajectory of a person’s life.”