427. Building a Billion Dollar Venture Capital Fund with Blackbird's Niki Scevak

Niki Scevak is co-founder of Startmate, and founder and partner at Blackbird VC, Australia’s largest venture capital fund, with its 5th fund having raised AUD$1B (US$640M). Blackbird was an early investor in Canva, SafetyCulture, CultureAmp, BugCrowd, RedBubble, and many more, and has to date generated a net internal rate of return of 56%.    Niki joined me today to discuss: His life before Blackbird Successfully raising his first fund back in 2012, without having a network or any startup successes of his own  Getting beyond the trough of disillusionment How Australian superannuation funds are opening their wallets to VC Scaling culture Generating deal flow Advice for founders and budding VCs on raising capital in a down market The AI investment landscape The battle between AI-powered indie hackers and venture-backed startups Whether sophisticated investor rules preventing retail investors from getting direct exposure to venture capital is just increasing the wealth gap  Diversity, quotas, and Startmate’s merit-based selection criteria And more.    Show Notes: Email Niki: niki@blackbird.vc  Web: www.blackbird.vc   Twitter: https://twitter.com/nikiscevak?lang=en Contact Steve on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/steveglaveski Email Steve: hello@steveglaveski.com