Perspectives from a Seed stage VC on trends and emerging themes in tech.

Areas of interest include SaaS, Digital Commerce (DTC across healthcare, financial services and retail), Marketplaces and PropTech.

Welcome to View from the Bottom by me, Ilana Stern. General Partner @ Peterson Ventures (https://www.petersonventures.com/). Faculty @ Stanford GSB. Former Founder+CEO @ Weddington Way (acq. NYSE: GPS).

In this newsletter, I’ll share my perspective on our latest investments at Peterson Ventures and emerging trends in tech from my perspective as a Seed stage VC, lecturer in entrepreneurship at Stanford GSB and as a former Founder and CEO.

The name for this newsletter came from one of my favorite student-run programs at Stanford GSB. For decades, the GSB has hosted a series called View from the Top that brings Fortune 500 CEOs, presidents and prime ministers to speak on campus; it’s an incredible speaking series. In response in the last decade, students started a corollary program called View from the Bottom that spotlights current MBA students sharing their on the ground experiences in careers ranging from Chief of Staff to a former U.S. President to startup founders; I love this program because it brings an unfiltered perspective from the trenches.

In Ilana Stern’s “View from the Bottom,” I’m not going to share the pre-IPO success stories. I’ll share what I’m seeing at the Seed stage: emerging trends that might take a decade+ to unfold, companies that have so much potential but might still fail and anything else I think is interesting.

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