Ashley Brasier is Moving at Lightspeed in the Startup Venture Capital World

After graduating with an MBA from Stanford University, Ashley Brasier achieved success in the consulting world. She then took the next step in her career, joined Lightspeed Venture Partners in November 2018, and positively impacted the firm’s business in a short time.

Ashley strived to take advantage of her excellent educational pedigree and prior experience as a consultant and a Category Manager at the San Francisco-based startup called Thumbtack.

With those successful experiences under her belt, she is now making significant contributions to Lightspeed Venture Partners’ success as a Partner in the firm.

But she also aims to serve as a positive role model for other talented women to come and join her at Lightspeed Venture Partners. So far, so good as the number of women at Lightspeed is starting to grow to very respectable levels.

Ashley Brasier works in the exciting and fast-paced world of venture capital (VC) and deals daily with startups as part of the team that advises startup portfolio companies. She knows the importance of doing proper due diligence on the business proposals and plans offered by startups seeking new and continued investment funding.

Therefore, she must be adept at helping her firm make the right call about whether to invest new money or additional money in a startup or to take a pass. The wrong decision can cost the firm a lot of money, and the right one can make it a lot of money.

Of course, the startups she advises count on her to give the best guidance possible to help them succeed. Thus the stakes are very high for Ashley Brasier and her colleagues at Lightspeed Venture Partners as she carries out her essential duties as a Partner in the firm.

NOTE:

“Venture capital (VC) is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth potential or which have demonstrated high growth (in terms of the number of employees, annual revenue, the scale of operations, etc). Venture capital firms or funds invest in these early-stage companies in exchange for equity, or an ownership stake. Venture capitalists take on the risk of financing risky start-ups in the hopes that some of the firms they support will become successful. Because startups face high uncertainty, VC investments have high rates of failure. The start-ups are usually based on an innovative technology or business model and they are usually from the high technology industries, such as information technology (IT), clean technology, or biotechnology.

The financing diagram above illustrates how start-up companies are typically financed. First, the new firm seeks out “seed capital” and funding from “angel investors” and accelerators. Then, if the firm can survive through the “valley of death”–the period where the firm is trying to develop on a “shoestring” budget–the firm can seek venture capital financing.

The typical venture capital investment occurs after an initial “seed funding” round. The first round of institutional venture capital to fund growth is called the Series A round. Venture capitalists provide this financing in the interest of generating a return through an eventual “exit” event, such as the company selling shares to the public for the first time in an initial public offering (IPO), or disposal of shares happening via a merger, via a sale to another entity such as a financial buyer in the private equity secondary market or via a sale to a trading company such as a competitor.” — Wikipedia

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