Up until about five years ago, Katie Haun’s career path wouldn’t lead you to believe she’d end up becoming one of the most prominent investors in the cryptocurrency industry.
After clerking for US Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy in the early 2000s, Haun worked as a federal prosecutor for more than a decade.It was Haun’s investigations into white collar crimes that eventually prompted her to dive deep into Bitcoin -related crimes—turns out, there are some nefarious use cases for emerging technologies.But when Haun left the federal government and joined the famed venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, a connection that was made through her board appointment at Coinbase, her conversion to crypto champion was complete.
Now Haun is branching out and launching her own fund, named Haun Ventures.It’s a big one: Haun and a team of eight others (so far) have raised $1.5 billion, one of the largest debut venture funds raised by a woman.Haun Ventures is focusing on Web3 companies, which will be underpinned by, of course, crypto.
A third of the fund raised will go towards early-stage companies, and the remaining $1 billion will be part of an acceleration fund.
Haun’s fund, like the broader Web3 world, is an amalgamation of recognizable names and utterly mystical ones.The investment team and board of advisors is comprised of executives from A16Z, Coinbase, AirBnB, Shopify, and Jigsaw; the actor and writer Mindy Kaling has joined as an advisor; and Haun has confirmed investments in Autograph, OpenSea, Aptos, and Moonwell.
If you’re not yet sure what those companies do, you’re not alone.Web3 is currently the catch-all term for what many technologists see as the next big phase of the internet.
One of the promises of this next interaction of the web is that it will be “decentralized,” shifting the power away from the Big Tech Firms of the past twenty years and back into the hands of the inventors and creators who want to build a better web.But how decentralized will this next web be if all of the same power players are involved? And what makes Haun Ventures different from other large crypto funds?
This conversation has been edited for clarity and length.
WIRED: So, you’re formally announcing Haun Ventures.What is the biggest differentiator between what you plan to do at Haun Ventures versus what you did at A16Z (Andreessen Horowitz), especially considering that you still have such a close working relationship with A16Z — they’re funding you, and there’s actually overlap in some of your investments?
Katie Haun: Yeah, that’s such a great question.Look, I think there will be some similarities and there will be some differences.I think Marc [Andreessen] and Ben [Horowitz] pioneered this “founders first” culture that we very much hope to live up to and emulate.And that’s especially important in crypto and Web3.
Because, to be candid, a lot of founders who are building right now in that space, who are building some of the most exciting products and services, don’t actually need capital.They have their choice of capital, really.And so the importance of the founders first culture that Marc and Ben really pioneered is important..
