Emerging LA is a community of 12K+ founders, investors, & operators passionate about the next wave of emerging technologies. We have curated 50+ events bringing local leaders together on a mission of making Los Angeles a top startup hub in the world!

TLDR: Issue #039 Summary

• The Power of Coaching for Founders - Event Recap

  • Media, Tech, and AI leaders shared how coaching shaped their career

  • Candid conversation with impactful community partners MLT & Chief

• Upcoming Events

  • 1/30/25 - Space Tour at NASA JPL

• Graduating to Series A from Seed is hard!

  • 50% of startups go from Seed to Series A… lately it is closer to only 25%

  • What does this mean for VC funds? Click here to find out!

• Poll: Where in the world should we emerge next?

The Power of Coaching for Founders

On November 12th, we hosted a networking event and speaker panel in LA to openly talk about the role that coaching can play in starting a business, becoming a leader, and reaching success.

Our community partners for this theme were Management Leadership for Tomorrow (MLT) and Chief.

MLT is an organization with a mission to increase underserved groups (Black, Latinx, Native Americans) in business schools & leadership as a way to address the racial wealth gap in the U.S.

Chief is a private membership club built for powerful businesswomen, with clubhouses in NYC, Chicago, SF, LA, and DC.

We hosted our speakers & guests at Chief’s LA flagship clubhouse for this event!

The attendees had the opportunity to listen to leaders who shared their stories of how MLT and coaching impacted their trajectories and network with one another.

Our guest speakers:

• Azella Perryman, Film Executive, ex-Lyft

• Conchita Tucker, CEO, TTI

• John Frame, L&D Leader, Anduril ($14B tech startup in OC)

• Nonya Collier, Consultant, ex-Indeed

Members from our community came out to learn about how coaching can impact their careers, and they had the opportunity to network with like-minded, ambitious individuals.

We believe that having these candid conversations is the best way to build the next generation of leaders.

We ended the night by chatting for another 30 mins all together huddled in the cold outside the venue. A good sign that the beginning of many new connections formed!

1/30 Space Tour at NASA JPL (Pasadena)

Our most popular event is back! Join us and Steph Smith’s Internet Pipes Community for an exclusive tour of NASA’s JPL facility.

Space is limited & deadline is January 9th.

Note: If you are approved, you must show! (or else be excluded from future opportunities). We need 100% attendance on this one please.

Graduating to Series A from Seed is hard!!!

It was 50%, which is already low, but now is trending towards ~25%

In other words, it is 1/2 as likely that a Seed stage startup is able to go on to raise a Series A round within 4 years.

Look at Peter Walker’s (Head of Insights at Carta) insightful chart below.

You can see the ‘22/‘23 cohort of startups is trailing the prior cohorts’ graduation rates at the 1-year and 2-year marks.

Call it about half the rate it was before:

• 1-year was around 12%, now 6%

• 2-year was around 30%, now 15%

If we make a simple assumption at this rate, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see recent cohorts (startups with ‘22 or ‘23 inception) achieve a ~25% graduation rate to Series A.

What does this mean for VC investors & fund managers? Click here to find out

Did a friend forward you this? Make sure YOU can access future events by joining the member list here.

(Important) If this hit your “Promotions” tab, please drag to your priority inbox so you don’t miss updates!