Winning a Gold medal is a lot like being a VC, according to Olympic champion Kristen Faulkner

winning-a-gold-medal-is-a-lot-like-being-a-vc,-according-to-olympic-champion-kristen-faulkner
Winning a Gold medal is a lot like being a VC, according to Olympic champion Kristen Faulkner

Kristen Faulkner’s astonishing Olympic success of two gold medals stems from lessons learned from her former career as a venture capitalist.

Faulkner was an associate investor at Threshold Ventures, and at Bessemer Venture Partners before that, leaving the VC world in 2021 to pursuing cycling. She wasn’t initially scheduled to ride in the 158-kilometer (98-mile) road cycling race but took her teammate Taylor Knibb’s spot at the last minute. Faulkner passed the favorites to win gold that day. She won a second medal as part of the gold-winning US women’s velodrome track cycling team.

“As a VC, you sit down with entrepreneurs every single day who are going to do something they’re passionate about. They have these big ideas. They’re taking risks,” she told Fortune, add that such thinking helps her win races. “If a VC thinks there’s a 50% chance the company is going to be successful, that doesn’t mean they go 50% all-in for the company. When you invest, assess the risk and make your decision, but then you go all-in. You don’t look back. You have to commit. I think that’s something that shaped me.”

Google launched Gemini Live during its Made By Google event in Mountain View, California, on Tuesday. The feature allows you to have a semi-natural spoken conversation, not typed out, with…

Texas filed a lawsuit Tuesday against GM over years of alleged abuse of customers’ data and trust. New car owners were presented with a “confusing and highly misleading” process that…

Chinese autonomous vehicle company WeRide has received the green light to test its driverless vehicles with passengers in California.  The step comes as WeRide begins the process to go public…

Kristen Faulkner astonishing Olympic success of two gold medals stems from lessons learned from her former career as a venture capitalist, she says.

Image Credits: Flavio Coelho / Getty Images

SB 1047 has drawn the ire of Silicon Valley players large and small, including venture capitalists, big tech trade groups, researchers and startup founders.

For many companies, this also means that now is the time to start implementing these algorithms.

The United Auto Workers union said Tuesday that it filed federal labor charges against Donald Trump and Elon Musk. The union alleges that Trump and Musk attempted to “threaten and…

With the introduction of the Pixel Watch 3 smartwatches, which now come in two sizes, Google is also introducing a new, potentially life-saving feature: loss of pulse detection. At the…

Made You Look will be available on the Pixel 9 Pro Fold when it launches next month.

Made by Google 2024 kicks off at 10 a.m. PT on August 13. Get ready for a slew of new hardware, including the Pixel 9 and a new foldable.

With the new app, users “won’t have to scroll through a bunch of numbers to get a sense of the day’s weather,” according to Google.

Let’s dive right into what the Google Pixel 9 lineup looks like, how Google’s Gemini AI will be incorporated in the devices, and more.

Meta has been spotted working on a new feature that would allow a post — as well as all its replies — to disappear in 24 hours.

In line with Elon Musk’s increasing rhetoric on X of going back to the good old days, Tesla looks like it’s finally getting ready to open its 1950s-style diner.  Tesla…

Google is adding features for photo editing, plus new apps for storing and searching through screenshots on-device and an AI-powered studio for image generation.

The $229 Pixel Buds Pro 2 start shipping September 26.

At Made by Google 2024, the company announced that the new Pixel 9 phones are the first devices to ship with Gemini as the assistant by default.

In addition to the Pixel Watch 3’s 41mm model, the smartwatch will also be available in 45mm.

Gemini Live lets users have “in-depth” voice chats with Gemini, Google’s generative AI-powered chatbot, on their smartphones.

The Pixel 9 starts at $799, the Pixel Pro at $999 and Pixel 9 Pro XL at $1,099. Preorders open Tuesday.

Time will tell whether the new “Pro” bit in Pixel 9 Fold presages the arrival of a lower-cost foldable, or if it’s simply a nod to the high-end pricing.

The U.S. Appeals Court for the Fifth Circuit said geofence search warrants are “categorically prohibited” under the Fourth Amendment.

Welcome to TechCrunch Fintech! This week, we’re looking at Payoneer’s $61 million acquisition of Skuad, Robinhood and Dave’s second-quarter results, X’s progress on its payments and more. To get a…

Labeling and annotation platforms might not get the attention flashy new generative AI models do. But they’re essential. The data on which many models train must be labeled, or the…

The Asia Pacific region has long been an important market for wealth management firms with the plethora of developing economies and a burgeoning retail investment market. But there’s still a…

After launching photo and text stories last year, Twitch is now introducing video stories. Streamers can now film 60-second videos in the Twitch mobile app or upload a video from…

With the update, any Flipboard user can follow user profiles from any other federated service.

ArborXR, a startup that helps companies remotely manage AR and VR devices, believed that enterprise customers would be the primary targets for AR and VR devices. Now, that bet is…

Music streaming service SoundCloud has launched a merch marketplace called SoundCloud Store. The store will sell SoundCloud-themed items, but will also act as a service for artists to put out…

Search engine optimization (SEO) has been top of mind for brands for more than a decade to ensure their websites and products capture as many eyeballs as possible by ranking…