Firms & Funds

Twitter reaction to three VCs retiring in one week

A trio of well-known investors in the span of a week said they are calling it quits, for now. The Twitterverse wonders what they will do next and what it all means.

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Venture capital goes through regular generational changes, with managing partners coming and going.

And many then come back again. Just ask Dick Kramlich, co-founder of New Enterprise Associates, who began to scale back his activities a decade ago and now, in his mid-80s, remains active in VC again with the new firm he co-founded, Green Bay Ventures.

But it’s a bit unusual to see in one week three brand-name venture capitalists announce their plans to retire: Bijan Sabet at Spark Capital, Jeremy Liew at Lightspeed Venture Partners and Roger Ehrenberg at IA Ventures.

All three are in their 50s, and their reasons for retiring are different. Ehrenberg mentioned the difficulty of the past 18 months, especially with elderly parents.

Sabet said he and his wife Lauren would focus on philanthropy on economic inequality and education. Sabet also said he and his wife would invest in seed and Series A deals in companies tackling climate change. Sabet’s plan is reminiscent of Chris and Crystal Sacca, who after Lowercase Capital have come out of retirement to launch Lowercarbon Capital with their own money to invest in climate tech.

People on Twitter, of course, had a lot to say about three VCs retiring in one week. Here’s a sample.

Lightspeed started this trend a week ago when it announced Liew:

Ehrenberg also tweeted:

Others on Twitter mused what this all means. Is it a changing of the guard?