Nivi · February 7th, 2013
“He cares deeply about… the advancement of humankind, and putting the right tools in their hands.”
Startups aren’t here to change the world, they’re here to save the world—by bringing us innovation that advances humankind.
Our universities, labs and garages create enormous amounts of innovation—and there’s more coming every day. Today’s challenge is delivering it to customers in ways that advance humankind.
Super companies
Apple, Google, Facebook and Amazon all deliver innovation at scale: they reliably bring it to the whole world at once. I call them super companies. (And there are many more in information technology, hardware, healthcare and energy.)
It might seem impossibly difficult, but super companies can be built. And the only way they get built is by starting a startup.
Our duty
If super companies are saving the world, and every company started as a startup, then it is our moral duty to remove the frictions along the startup’s way.
That’s our duty at AngelList: to serve the startups that are saving the world. By eliminating the frictions along their way, in the most meaningful way possible.
It is also the duty of every service provider in the startup ecosystem: investors, incubators, advisors, lawyers, recruiters, etc.
Entrepreneurs
If the service provider’s duty is to eliminate the frictions in the startup’s journey, then it is the entrepreneur’s duty to only start companies that can make a meaningful contribution to the advancement of humankind. That means saying no to businesses that are the Internet equivalent of McDonald’s.
And it is our duty as entrepreneurs to never sell, shut down or give up until we’re delivering innovation at scale.
Topics Philosophy