The article is phrased as VCs wanting founders who take risks, but actually it's just another framing of the fact that VCs are looking to reduce their risks as much as possible.
No matter which new market the founders are working on proving, if and once the founders find PMF, first mover advantage provides a very narrow window of opportunity before second-mover advantage competitors enter the market, many of them either incumbent players with large GTM operations or simply foreigners (e.g. Chinese) willing to steal IP and undercut on cost. Exploiting the new market sufficiently quickly to develop into a major player that is capable of providing VC-acceptable returns requires the founders to have, shall we say, a certain kind of cut-throat character.
It has never been more feasible to avoid VC funding. Initial server costs are cheap. Social media makes it free (even profitable) to develop a following to sell to. Why waste your time chasing VC funds?
If you don’t take VC funds someone who will is going to copy your business, expand much much faster than you with all their free money, undercut you and any other competitors for years driving you out of business, before ultimately dominating the market and squeezing customers for more money than you while providing a product that is worse in every way and a fraction of what you had envisioned for your own product.
No matter which new market the founders are working on proving, if and once the founders find PMF, first mover advantage provides a very narrow window of opportunity before second-mover advantage competitors enter the market, many of them either incumbent players with large GTM operations or simply foreigners (e.g. Chinese) willing to steal IP and undercut on cost. Exploiting the new market sufficiently quickly to develop into a major player that is capable of providing VC-acceptable returns requires the founders to have, shall we say, a certain kind of cut-throat character.
It has never been more feasible to avoid VC funding. Initial server costs are cheap. Social media makes it free (even profitable) to develop a following to sell to. Why waste your time chasing VC funds?