26 rising Fintech VCs still excited about the sector

Croom Beatty, Menlo Ventures

How did you get started with venture capital?

I started my career in technology investing straight out of undergrad. I worked at Susquehanna Growth Equity, where I started focusing on capital markets, technology, and then payments and banking infrastructure. I worked on special projects around bank structure and then worked on expansion into different countries and worked with small and medium-sized companies.

Then I went to Payoneer. It was a great experience, but I really wanted to get back to venture. The one complaint about being in venture is that you’re, like, an inch deep and a mile wide – sometimes when you’re operating, you’re an inch wide and a mile deep. So I really missed somewhere in between; this is what I was looking for, where you can talk to entrepreneurs solving different problems.

What areas do you usually focus on?

I do everything in fintech, but if you look at my investments, I’d say it’s more on the corporate side. I naturally gravitate more towards B2B companies. But when you really look closely, many of these companies end up looking a little more consumer-facing. Some companies provide software for solopreneurs or retailers, contractors and the like, so they look a lot like consumer solutions.

Do you still see some strength in the fintech sector?

I think some of the pullback was expected, because a lot of the companies were valued as software companies when they weren’t software companies. If you look at insurance and lending companies, they were treated as very expensive software-as-a-service businesses. It’s also the case with Robinhood and Coinbase where they experience feedback loops, so when asset prices rise and more people are interested in the assets traded on their platforms, they make more on each trade – but prices fall, so they make less.

Ultimately, though, where I’m bullish about fintech is in areas that know there are so many people who don’t have access to best-in-class tools. Cash, checks and transfers are still dominant. There are these really old legacy systems that are still in place and so much of their functionality is past its time. It’s amazing when you look at B2B trade networks like distributors, manufacturers and all that where invoices are still pen and paper. There are still many areas that are changing, so I am very positive about that.