Madrona at 30: Soma Somasegar on What Early-Stage Founders Actually Need from a VC

In 1995, four co-founders made a bet that Seattle's technology ecosystem was going to be big. Thirty years later, Microsoft and Amazon alone represent more than $5 trillion in combined market cap. Managing Director Soma Somasegar talks with @GeekWire co-founder John Cook about what Madrona's hands-on investment philosophy looks like in practice, including the moment Snowflake's CEO Bob Muglia asked Soma to open doors at Microsoft and Amazon so Snowflake could expand beyond AWS. He also shares the story behind All In Seattle, the campaign Madrona helped organize during the pandemic to raise money for homelessness relief. Chapters: 00:00 – Madrona's original bet on Seattle and why it paid off 01:10 – $5 trillion in market cap: Microsoft, Amazon, and what comes next 01:54 – Investing from day one for the long run — what that actually means 02:15 – The Snowflake story: opening doors at Microsoft and Amazon for Bob Muglia 03:31 – Why the same playbook repeated when Frank Slootman took over as CEO 04:02 – Why early-stage investors have to be company builders, not just capital 05:23 – All In Seattle: how Madrona raised $25-30M for homelessness relief overnight