Notable Capital’s Hans Tung on the state of VC and the upside to down rounds

To some investors, “down round” is a dirty phrase, but not to Notable Capital’s Hans Tung. Hans is a managing partner at Notable Capital, formerly GGV Capital, a venture firm focusing on investments in the U.S., Latin America, Israel, and Europe.

Hans, whose portfolio includes the likes of Airbnb, StockX and Slack, sat down with TechCrunch’s Equity podcast to discuss the overall state of venture and why he still believes down rounds can make a lot of sense. Per Hans, “An IPO is actually just a milestone, not the end game. An IPO is the beginning of public investors being along for the ride. So when you think in longer-term valuations, up or down temporarily doesn’t matter as much as generating a big outcome at the end.” It’s worth noting that by September 2023, nearly 11% of the year’s VC deals were down rounds, according to PitchBook data.

Hans also let us know why he’s still bullish on fintech, and what sectors in the fintech space have him especially psyched.

Of course, we dug into recent changes at his own firm, which evolved from 24-year-old cross-border firm GGV Capital and rebranded its U.S. and Asia operations to Notable Capital and Granite Asia, respectively. GGV’s transformation is the latest in a string of changes we’ve seen in the world of venture capital, including personnel changes at Founders Fund, Benchmark and Thrive Capital.

Hit play to hear what Hans has to say on these topics and more! Equity will be back on Monday. See you then!

Equity is TechCrunch’s flagship podcast and posts every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. You can subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts.

You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.

For the full interview transcript, for those who prefer reading over listening, check out our full archive of episodes over at Simplecast.