Andreessen Horowitz's David Ulevitch outlines the strategy behind the firm's $1.776 billion American Dynamism fund

I got to sit down with David Ulevitch (@davidu) for E31 of We The Builders (@WeThe_Builders). He is a General Partner at @a16z where he cofounded the $1.776 billion American Dynamism practice with @KTmBoyle about 4 years ago. Since then, it has taken over the timeline and become the language many use to describe frontier, deep or hard tech. Friend of the show @lochhead calls this Category Design, where you don’t necessarily have to be the first to become a category leader, you need to frame the problem and do it better than everyone else.

We talk about investing strategy, founding story of American Dynamism and what made it a sticky brand, what he has learnt about how the world works from his anthropology background, surveillance concerns with public safety technologies, his best mentor who is not @pmarca and more.

American Dynamism focuses on investing in areas such as public safety, aerospace, logistics, national security, defense, manufacturing, industrialization, logistics. Some of the companies in their portfolio include @anduriltech , Amca, @AppliedInt , Apex Space, @AstroMechanica , @Astranis , @basepowerco , @CAForever , @Castelion , @HadrianInc , @NorthwoodSpace , @RadiantNuclear and of course @SpaceX. Founders of many of these will be featured in upcoming episodes or are friends of the show.

David was previously the founder and CEO of OpenDNS, a cloud-delivered security service that was acquired by Cisco in 2015 for $635 million. While at @Cisco , David was Senior Vice President and General Manager of Cisco Security — a $2.4 billion annual revenue business with more than 5,000 team members — where he oversaw the company’s global cybersecurity strategy, product portfolio, and business (via A16Z).

Timestamps:

00:00 - Introduction 01:57 - Defining American Dynamism 05:43 - Project Maven and Rebuilding the Arsenal of Democracy 07:24 - Competing with General Catalyst for Anduril 08:49 - Category creation and defining the market 10:57 - The marketing engine of “The American Dream” 15:20 - Replicating Silicon Valley 18:22 - Robot Dogs and General Catalyst 19:47 - 1776 Million: Building the American Dynamism Practice 20:59 - Why Hardware Outperforms Software Over Time 22:38 - Coupling Defense, Energy, and Space 26:28 - Investing in Public Safety 33:01 - Investment Committees are “stupid” 35:39 - Long-term partners over short-term bets 39:23 - Policy, Regulations, and navigating relationships in DC 43:11 - How regulations are slowing us down 46:54 - The Industrial Supply Chain Divergence 51:29 - Global Maritime Dominance and Expanding TAM 53:39 - Venture-Backable Bets in Critical Industrial Infrastructure 1:00:24 - Applying Anthropology: Study of People, Culture, and Political Power 1:04:08 - What Drives Innovation Across Nations? 1:11:49 - Regional Talent and State Incentives 1:15:48 - Moving from Benevolent Dictator to Minority Investor 1:20:42 - Life is Checkers, Not Chess: Agency and Knowing When to Sell 1:26:57 - OpenDNS and the Pivot to Enterprise: Letting Markets Dictate Your Revenue 1:30:13 - The High Bar for Talent: Grittiness, Grind, and Magnetic Leadership 1:33:09 - Attracting Capital via Narrative: Storytelling vs. Lying 1:35:07 - Toastmasters and Single-Topic Debates: Sharpening Communication 1:37:20 - Modern Credentials: Domain Expertise and Sourcing True Signals 1:44:23 - Government Sales 101: Enterprise Sales on Steroids 1:46:34 - Closing