[JCM9]

The article is a case study in playing with statistics to give the message you want. A different, and simpler, way of saying the same headline is that it’s much harder for ideas to get investment in the UK.

While the “unicorns per dollar invested” stat looks good the “good ideas killed off because someone didn’t invest” stat looks really bad.

The US market doesn’t pride itself purely on unicorns created, but on the fact that it’s a vibrant ecosystem that invests in ideas even if they might not become a unicorn. That fact seems lost on the meaning of the headline.

[Retric]

If you’re investing, this is a solid argument you should consider a UK VC over a US one.

Same data, different perspective and probably more the angle they were going for. Obviously ROI is ultimately what matters but risk tolerance is a thing.

[flir]

UK's financiers have always been risk averse.

[bmitc]

> but on the fact that it’s a vibrant ecosystem that invests in ideas even if they might not become a unicorn

Most venture capitalism in the U.S. is basically snake oil. Companies with tenous ideas at best get pumped and pumped until they're dumped and the VCs move on to the next grift. Most recently, it was self-driving cars, then blockchains and cryptocurrencies, and now AI. I'm sure they'll move onto something next soon.

[lotsofpulp]

There exist self driving cars being made by Alphabet and Amazon, publicly listed companies, not VCs.

The snake oil self driving cars are peddled by Tesla, not VC.

[Capricorn2481]

> The US market doesn’t pride itself purely on unicorns created, but on the fact that it’s a vibrant ecosystem that invests in ideas even if they might not become a unicorn. That fact seems lost on the meaning of the headline

That just seems like spin on what is essentially burning cash. I don't think it's a morally superior posture to invest in things that fail. I assure you VC's are turning down plenty of things because they don't seem like unicorns.

I mean Sequoia invested with SBF while he was playing league of legends in his pitch meeting. We're not dealing with geniuses here.