Game Over? (Summer 2022) - by Everett Randle

A little over a year ago, I wrote Playing Different Games1. The piece was my attempt at explaining the tsunami-like phenomenon that was Tiger Global in the scorching hot venture/growth2 market of 2020 & 2021. The TL;DR was that: Most people thought Tiger was crazy and/or stupid for its aggressive + high velocity investing approach There was, in fact, a method to Tiger’s madness which involved breaking many outdated/imaginary rules of how venture capital should be practiced Tiger’s strategy created the first structural, non-brand driven competitive advantage at scale in venture, which would enable it to generate more $ returns than competitors & capture increasing market share3 over time How is that thesis working out a year+ later? In meme parlance, let’s just say… How it started: How it’s going: Wellllllll, sh*t. As anyone with a pulse and access to the internet knows, it has been QUITE. A. YEAR. since Playing Different Games was published. We’ve just witnessed the worst crash in tech

A little over a year ago, I wrote Playing Different Games1. The piece was my attempt at explaining the tsunami-like phenomenon that was Tiger Global in the scorching hot venture/growth2 market of 2020 & 2021. The TL;DR was that: Most people thought Tiger was crazy and/or stupid for its aggressive + high velocity investing approach There was, in fact, a method to Tiger’s madness which involved breaking many outdated/imaginary rules of how venture capital should be practiced Tiger’s strategy created the first structural, non-brand driven competitive advantage at scale in venture, which would ena