In the career of any venture capitalist, one dreads the “oh shit moment”. For those unfamiliar with this most technical of terms — it is that moment of clarity when a VC, in the immediate aftermath of closing one’s latest investment (often at the first post investment Board meeting), is brought back down to earth with the realisation that the shiny new investment wasn’t quite so shiny after all.
Whilst it’s not the case for every investment of course (exceptions proving the rule and all that), it was still with slight trepidation that I set off for Mountain View, CA on Dec 4th, to attend H2O World and to connect with the Board — to see what customers, ecosystems partners and Board members really thought of the company — just weeks after the completion of H2O.ai’s $40m Series C, in which Crane participated as the sole European investor.
I suspect SriSatish Ambati, Founder & CEO, would probably have not asked me to pen my reflections of my first H2O World, had he known this — but you can relax Sri, I can genuinely say that H2O is one of those exceptions. What I experienced at H2O World surpassed my expectations.