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- When entrepreneurs pitch me,

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I'm often looking for whether they're passionate

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about what they're doing, or obsessed

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about the business that they're trying to create.

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I'm interested in working with entrepreneurs

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who are obsessed about what they're doing,

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who were put on this planet to actually go after a problem

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with all of their energy for a long period of time.

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I'm Brad Feld, I'm a partner

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at a venture capital firm called Foundry Group.

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I'm also a co-founder of Techstars,

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which is a global network that helps entrepreneurs succeed,

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and I've been helping create and invest

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in companies for over 30 years.

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In the hundred of companies that I've been involved in,

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one of the things that I've learned over and over again is

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that the chance of success in building a very large business

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is directly linked to the amount of energy

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and thought you put into making sure you're going

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after the right opportunity, an opportunity

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that you're obsessed about and that you're willing

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to put a huge amount of your energy behind,

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and knowing how to then take that from this initial idea,

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which is nice but isn't really where the opportunity lives,

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into the product and into the market and into,

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with customers, where all the action happens.