Lightspeed’s Nicole Quinn on Cameo and Venture FOMO; Twitter Spaces Gets a Presidential Visit

When Nicole Quinn, a partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners, led the firm’s Series A round for Cameo in 2018, she said she got many weird looks from other investors who couldn’t understand the apparent appeal of the celebrity shout-out app. Then she watched some of those same investors try to pour money into the startup amid a broader rush into creator-economy companies. 

“It was a very out-of-consensus investment,” said Quinn, 36, of the deal, which valued Cameo at $60 million, according to PitchBook. The service gives fans a way to buy customized greetings from actors, sports figures and other celebrities. “People said this is not going to be long lived,” she said. “We had a very different view.”

Some of those skeptical investors came back to Cameo co-founder Steven Galanis during the company’s fundraising discussions for its Series B and C rounds, admitting “‘we’ve now realized the creator economy will be around for good,’” Quinn recounted. This March, Cameo said it had raised $100 million from Softbank Group’s Vision Fund 2, GV and others, tripling its valuation to more than $1 billion.