“We had about 160 M&A exits, and not a single one of those companies was led by an expert. Not one. … If you're a specialist, you are so deep in subject matter that you're going to look at a batshit crazy way of doing things and you're going to say that can't be done. It's easier to say it won't work than say it will work, because you are so deep, you've been trained for 20 years.”
The Peel with Turner Novak · Startups & Venture · October 2026
Context
Senkut's case for generalist venture investing over specialist funds. He argues that founders who succeed in very different markets have more in common with each other than any one vertical does.
Transcript
I mean, we have the data to prove it. So I've made myself alone probably about 250 investments. We have, you know, well over 400 investments. We have 55 unicorns, which probably doesn't matter today. Nobody cares about a billion market anymore. But
you can start a company. We have
roughly 20 IPOs and more. So we have, we had some decent successes. We had about like 160 MA exits, and not a single one of those companies was led by an expert. Not one. Hundreds, dozens of companies, not a single one was led by a subject expert. So this argument of specialists saying, if you're not a specialist, you're not going to understand it. I think what ends up happening is if you're a specialist, you are so deep in subject matter that you're going to look at like a batshit, crazy way of doing things and you're going to say that can't be done. Now, there's also benefits where you're really smart and you can find companies. So there are multiple different arguments. One, sometimes when you're an expert and when there is like a crazy way of like outlier way of doing things, you're going to say, no, it can't be done. It's easier to say it won't work than say it will work because you are so deep, you've been trained for 20 years. Now somebody's saying all those 20 years and the experience you had and the thing that you learn is wrong. It can be done this way. It's very against human nature. Say yes to that. Versus if you're a generalist, you know what? Like…
There's kind of this like almost you, there's like an overlap of different specialties, like sector specialties that was in something like that, like Australian focused investor or design focus investor or like a cloud investor or something like that. And if you or and all those like different mega…
I mean, look, I think part of it comes down to in an outlier business. I think even if you look at like sports, for instance, if you look at like all the quarterbacks or whatever, like pick any sport, I don't know what your favorite sport is, but the very top echelon, those people are different…
Yeah. Right.
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