Edition #9: 41 New Funds, A16Z's $15B Raise, Zombie VCs Rising, 2026 IPO Plays
Hey folks,
This is Pavel and welcome to the 9th edition (January, 2026) of Murph Capital newsletter.
This is my monthly brain-dump of the most useful stuff I’ve come across as an operator in the GP/LP world.
Follow me on X and LinkedIn for more frequent insights.
5 Best Tweets
“How a16z’s $15B mega-fund is rewriting the rules of Venture Capital”
By Pavel Prata from R136 Ventures
“The first VC contraction in a decade reveals 3,900 zombie firms”
By Beezer Clarkson from Sapphire Partners
“What I learned in my first 9 months as a solo GP”
By Aarthi Ramamurthy from Schema Ventures
“Residencies are the next evolution for top-tier pre-seed and seed-stage VC”
By Nick Linck from The Residency
5 Best Linkedin Posts
“SPV fees are moving past 2&20”
By Pavel Prata from R136 Ventures
“The emerging manager’s guide to reserves in Venture Capital”
By Dan G from Odin
“First Round's content lessons after building a million-reader platform”
By Laurie Owen from Refinery Media
“Why doesn't "top quartile" equal 3x anymore?”
By Peter Walker from Carta
“2025 endowment returns analysis”
By Julian Eison from Penultimate Capital
6 Best Reports / Stories
By Packy McCormick from Not Boring
“The Adolescence of Technology”
By Dario Amodei from Anthropic
“Where VCs and LPs Actually Come From”
By Pavel Prata / Art Garadecki from Murph Capital
“The Future of SaaS - a Fork in the Road”
By Jared Sleeper / Hunnah Bao from Avenir
By David George from a16z
By Emily Zheng / Kyle Stanford from Pitchbook
Iconic Funds Snapshot
How a debut boston Fund Turned Web 2.0 Bets into a $12B+ Multi‑Fund Franchise
Initialized Capital Fund I ($7M)
2012 seed fund that returned 50–60x to LPs and helped launch its GPs into leading roles at YC and 776.
Emerging Managers Interviews
Dr. Nadav Shimoni, co‑founder of A‑Squared Ventures, saw a gap in Seed‑stage digital health funding and closed a $40M Fund II to fill it. I asked Nadav 10 questions about how he did it 👇
Fund Chronicles
Fund Chronicles #8: Kleiner Perkins
How one thesis shaped 4 technology waves and built a $2 trillion venture portfolio.
41 New VC Funds
View all other funds by clicking the button below.
35 VC/LP Events
3 Best Podcasts
a16z (Apps) GP Alex Rampell and Harry Stebbings unpack why only large generalists and small specialists will win in venture, and how a16z plans to drive 5x‑type outcomes on a new $15B fund pool. Rampell argues the best founders are rare high‑agency people who materialize labor, capital, and customers, build products that create “hostages, not customers,” and are driven by a revenge‑or‑redemption fire strong enough to ignore early buyout offers.
Jack Altman hosts a rare conversation with Ben Horowitz on how Andreessen Horowitz scaled from a contrarian idea into a 600‑person venture “machine” serving founders like a product, not just a check. If you care about how top‑tier VC actually works behind the scenes - managing star GPs, resolving firm‑breaking conflicts, and deciding when scale beats concentration - this episode is packed with specific, hard‑earned playbook insights.
On The Data Minute, Peter Walker interviews Arian Ghashghai of Earthling VC about why real venture means backing “weird stuff early” instead of chasing crowded SaaS deals. He talks robotic oyster farms, VR, and why a small pirate‑ship fund and brutally transparent LP relationships can be a better way to do frontier tech.
Personal Notes
Official channels. We’ve launched Murph Capital’s official accounts on X and LinkedIn. Over the past 9 months, Murph grew primarily through my personal LinkedIn (from 1,800 to 10,000+ followers) and on X (almost 1,000). Now we’re taking the next step: building institutional-grade channels to publish proprietary research and curated industry signals. No spam. No noise. Only content that’s genuinely useful for emerging managers and LPs. Our goal is simple: become a real “new media” platform for VC/LP.
First sponsors. As we expand the team, launch the new website, and scale across platforms (IG, TikTok, YouTube), we’ve brought in our first sponsors.
I’m selective here. We only work with products and brands I genuinely believe in and personally use (no random ads). If you build something cool and would like to support Murph early and grow with us – reach out to me over email.
Guest authors & market maps. Substack is growing fast. Alongside monthly recaps, we’ve started publishing interviews with emerging managers and deeper analytical pieces. Next step: bring in top operators, investors, and thinkers from the industry to share contrarian ideas and practical insights. We already have 4 confirmed guest contributors (real rockstars!). Who would you like to see next? Let me know in the comments or on LinkedIn.
Life updates. January marked two milestones for me:
First – I turned 27. And honestly, I still feel like I haven’t done “enough” yet. But every time I get thoughtful feedback from strong GPs and allocators, it reinforces that I’m on the right path. It pushes me to stay focused on the one thing that truly drives me: building infrastructure for VC/LP and improving capital allocation between them.
Second – 500 days in Chicago. Funny enough, lately I’ve realized that my childhood in Belarus wasn’t as cold as I remembered. Still, the view of a frozen Lake Michigan outside my window doesn’t disappoint. We keep building!
Previous Editions
What would you like to see in the next episodes? I'd love to hear your ideas – just hit reply and let me know what would be most valuable to you.