Don Stalter on Backing Founders Who Have Something to Prove

The consensus in venture right now runs roughly as follows: the best founders have already found their way to Silicon Valley, and the biggest outcomes are built in one place. Don Stalter has built a fund on the conviction that both are wrong. He arrived at the Jefferies Private Growth Conference fresh off a flight from Tokyo, where he had just backed the grandson of Sony’s founder, exporting Japanese culture from a $700-a-month office near Ginza.