Cerebras IPO makes billions for Benchmark but VC Eric Vishria almost didn’t take the meeting
The Cerebras Systems IPO was a smash hit on Thursday, generating billions for itself, its founders and its major investors.
Among the big winners is major shareholder Benchmark, which owns 9.5% of the company. One of the firm’s general partners, Eric Vishria, has been a Cerebras board member since 2016, the year the AI chip maker was founded, have co-led its $25 million Series A round.
But these billions only happened for Benchmark because Vishria met with the startup almost against his will, he told TechCrunch.
“It was five founders and a deck, and it was our first hardware investment in 10 years,” Vishria told TechCrunch about that first meeting. “I had been a venture capitalist for like, 18 months.” (Prior to being a VC, Vishria sold the social browser startup he co-founded, RockMelt, to Yahoo for a reported $60-$70 million in 2013.)
Benchmark is famously selective in the...
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