by Ali Yahya

Conceptually, DAOs are simple, but their implications are profound. The team at Syndicate is building the protocols and tools that will enable DAOs to reach their full potential. That’s why today we’re announcing that we’re leading Syndicate’s Series A.

From the moment that we got to know Will and Ian, we’ve been inspired by their crystal-clear vision of a future in which the majority of all economic coordination between humans happens through DAOs, rather than through the archaic legal machinery that we use today. It’s a vision that is very aligned with our view of crypto’s potential and with the kind of positive impact that we believe it will have on the world.

First, for the uninitiated, what is a DAO? A DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) is a mechanism that enables online communities to form and coordinate economically. It is a new kind of digital and economic entity that runs as code and is owned and controlled by its members. It makes it possible for an online group with members from anywhere in the world to pool capital and hard-code rules — entirely in software — for how that capital will be managed and deployed. Those rules are then enforced by the underlying blockchain.

It’s easy to forget that there was a time when the very idea of a corporation was controversial. Before their invention, all we had were informal partnerships that were loosely held together by ad-hoc agreements. The widespread adoption of legal protocols that formalized corporations like LLCs (and other kinds of structures that followed) dramatically increased the scale at which humans were able to cooperate — as well as the amount of capital that they can collectively raise, manage, and deploy.

But the legal machinery behind corporations today is slow, inflexible, and expensive. For example, creating an LLC in the U.S. today can easily take weeks and cost thousands of dollars. In the age of software and the internet, that kind of inefficiency is embarrassing. DAOs are a better, digitally native mechanism for human coordination. They have similar properties as corporations, but they’re 10,000 times faster/cheaper to set up and operate because so much of how they work is expressed in code (rather than legalese) and is fully automated.

Because they are so much more efficient, they have the potential to unlock yet another dramatic increase to the scale at which we humans and capital can come together and cooperate with one another. But, it would be a mistake to think that all DAOs will do is make corporations 10,000x more efficient. An improvement of this magnitude to any technology tends to bring along with it fundamentally new use cases and capabilities.

For example, there is a sense in which the core protocols of the internet were nothing more than a 10,000-fold improvement over the postal mail service. After all, both of them really just do one essential thing — they transport messages from point A to point B. But could you imagine Google Search or Amazon ever being built on top of the postal service? The kinds of things that can be built on top of a 10,000x better messaging system like the internet are fundamentally different.

So, in the same way that the internet unlocked all sorts of new fundamental value by improving messaging, DAOs have the potential to do the same by improving our social mechanisms of coordinating humans and capital on the internet. We’re at the very start of the evolution of DAOs as a technology. For them to reach their potential, we have to build the right standards/protocols, developer tools, user interfaces, and legal frameworks. Syndicate is leading the way.

We’re excited to be partnering with the Syndicate team and the community that they’ve brought together to help build the infrastructure that will drive DAOs to widespread adoption.

The views expressed here are those of the individual AH Capital Management, L.L.C. (“a16z”) personnel quoted and are not the views of a16z or its affiliates. Certain information contained in here has been obtained from third-party sources, including from portfolio companies of funds managed by a16z. While taken from sources believed to be reliable, a16z has not independently verified such information and makes no representations about the enduring accuracy of the information or its appropriateness for a given situation. In addition, this content may include third-party advertisements; a16z has not reviewed such advertisements and does not endorse any advertising content contained therein.

This content is provided for informational purposes only, and should not be relied upon as legal, business, investment, or tax advice. You should consult your own advisers as to those matters. References to any securities or digital assets are for illustrative purposes only, and do not constitute an investment recommendation or offer to provide investment advisory services. Furthermore, this content is not directed at nor intended for use by any investors or prospective investors, and may not under any circumstances be relied upon when making a decision to invest in any fund managed by a16z. (An offering to invest in an a16z fund will be made only by the private placement memorandum, subscription agreement, and other relevant documentation of any such fund and should be read in their entirety.) Any investments or portfolio companies mentioned, referred to, or described are not representative of all investments in vehicles managed by a16z, and there can be no assurance that the investments will be profitable or that other investments made in the future will have similar characteristics or results. A list of investments made by funds managed by Andreessen Horowitz (excluding investments for which the issuer has not provided permission for a16z to disclose publicly as well as unannounced investments in publicly traded digital assets) is available at https://a16z.com/investments/.

Charts and graphs provided within are for informational purposes solely and should not be relied upon when making any investment decision. Past performance is not indicative of future results. The content speaks only as of the date indicated. Any projections, estimates, forecasts, targets, prospects, and/or opinions expressed in these materials are subject to change without notice and may differ or be contrary to opinions expressed by others. Please see https://a16z.com/disclosures for additional important information.

by Ali Yahya

Conceptually, DAOs are simple, but their implications are profound. The team at Syndicate is building the protocols and tools that will enable DAOs to reach their full potential. That’s why today we’re announcing that we’re leading Syndicate’s Series A.

From the moment that we got to know Will and Ian, we’ve been inspired by their crystal-clear vision of a future in which the majority of all economic coordination between humans happens through DAOs, rather than through the archaic legal machinery that we use today. It’s a vision that is very aligned with our view of crypto’s potential and with the kind of positive impact that we believe it will have on the world.

First, for the uninitiated, what is a DAO? A DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) is a mechanism that enables online communities to form and coordinate economically. It is a new kind of digital and economic entity that runs as code and is owned and controlled by its members. It makes it possible for an online group with members from anywhere in the world to pool capital and hard-code rules — entirely in software — for how that capital will be managed and deployed. Those rules are then enforced by the underlying blockchain.

It’s easy to forget that there was a time when the very idea of a corporation was controversial. Before their invention, all we had were informal partnerships that were loosely held together by ad-hoc agreements. The widespread adoption of legal protocols that formalized corporations like LLCs (and other kinds of structures that followed) dramatically increased the scale at which humans were able to cooperate — as well as the amount of capital that they can collectively raise, manage, and deploy.

But the legal machinery behind corporations today is slow, inflexible, and expensive. For example, creating an LLC in the U.S. today can easily take weeks and cost thousands of dollars. In the age of software and the internet, that kind of inefficiency is embarrassing. DAOs are a better, digitally native mechanism for human coordination. They have similar properties as corporations, but they’re 10,000 times faster/cheaper to set up and operate because so much of how they work is expressed in code (rather than legalese) and is fully automated.

Because they are so much more efficient, they have the potential to unlock yet another dramatic increase to the scale at which we humans and capital can come together and cooperate with one another. But, it would be a mistake to think that all DAOs will do is make corporations 10,000x more efficient. An improvement of this magnitude to any technology tends to bring along with it fundamentally new use cases and capabilities.

For example, there is a sense in which the core protocols of the internet were nothing more than a 10,000-fold improvement over the postal mail service. After all, both of them really just do one essential thing — they transport messages from point A to point B. But could you imagine Google Search or Amazon ever being built on top of the postal service? The kinds of things that can be built on top of a 10,000x better messaging system like the internet are fundamentally different.

So, in the same way that the internet unlocked all sorts of new fundamental value by improving messaging, DAOs have the potential to do the same by improving our social mechanisms of coordinating humans and capital on the internet. We’re at the very start of the evolution of DAOs as a technology. For them to reach their potential, we have to build the right standards/protocols, developer tools, user interfaces, and legal frameworks. Syndicate is leading the way.

We’re excited to be partnering with the Syndicate team and the community that they’ve brought together to help build the infrastructure that will drive DAOs to widespread adoption.

The views expressed here are those of the individual AH Capital Management, L.L.C. (“a16z”) personnel quoted and are not the views of a16z or its affiliates. Certain information contained in here has been obtained from third-party sources, including from portfolio companies of funds managed by a16z. While taken from sources believed to be reliable, a16z has not independently verified such information and makes no representations about the enduring accuracy of the information or its appropriateness for a given situation. In addition, this content may include third-party advertisements; a16z has not reviewed such advertisements and does not endorse any advertising content contained therein.

This content is provided for informational purposes only, and should not be relied upon as legal, business, investment, or tax advice. You should consult your own advisers as to those matters. References to any securities or digital assets are for illustrative purposes only, and do not constitute an investment recommendation or offer to provide investment advisory services. Furthermore, this content is not directed at nor intended for use by any investors or prospective investors, and may not under any circumstances be relied upon when making a decision to invest in any fund managed by a16z. (An offering to invest in an a16z fund will be made only by the private placement memorandum, subscription agreement, and other relevant documentation of any such fund and should be read in their entirety.) Any investments or portfolio companies mentioned, referred to, or described are not representative of all investments in vehicles managed by a16z, and there can be no assurance that the investments will be profitable or that other investments made in the future will have similar characteristics or results. A list of investments made by funds managed by Andreessen Horowitz (excluding investments for which the issuer has not provided permission for a16z to disclose publicly as well as unannounced investments in publicly traded digital assets) is available at https://a16z.com/investments/.

Charts and graphs provided within are for informational purposes solely and should not be relied upon when making any investment decision. Past performance is not indicative of future results. The content speaks only as of the date indicated. Any projections, estimates, forecasts, targets, prospects, and/or opinions expressed in these materials are subject to change without notice and may differ or be contrary to opinions expressed by others. Please see https://a16z.com/disclosures for additional important information.