Father of Silicon Valley Venture Capital Tim Draper: Betting on Bitcoin and the Pioneers of the Future Era

The success of the trendy toy brand Pop Mart has once again made its early investor Mai Gang the focus of the market. Mai Gang's investment insight partly stems from his "enlightener" during his studies in the United States—Silicon Valley's famous venture capitalist Tim Draper. In 1998, Mai Gang entered the Chinese venture capital scene and later studied in the U.S. While studying at UCLA, he won first place in a startup competition, which led to his connection with the Silicon Valley venture capital giant Tim Draper, entering the Silicon Valley venture capital industry. In 2005, the two jointly founded the startup incubator VenturesLab.

Tim Draper is known as the "father of venture capital," and the projects he has invested in have driven some of the most innovative advancements in today's market, including Skype, Baidu, Hotmail, Tesla, and more. At the same time, Draper is also an early and staunch supporter of Bitcoin.

Family Heritage and Silicon Valley Genes: The Continuation of the Third Generation of Investors

Draper comes from a family with a background in venture capital and politics, being the third generation of the family. His father founded Draper & Johnson Investment Company and served as the chairman and president of the Export-Import Bank of the United States. In 1994, Draper's father returned to the investment scene and co-founded Draper International, the first U.S. VC fund focused on investing in Indian companies.

Draper's grandfather William Henry Draper Jr. founded the venture capital firm Draper, Gaither and Anderson in 1958, establishing the basic rules of modern VC, including management fees and project distribution after the invested company's exit. Draper's grandfather also served as the first U.S. ambassador to NATO.

In a family with both financial and political backgrounds, Draper demonstrated a unique perspective early on. He attended Phillips Academy Andover, Stanford University, and Harvard Business School, where he earned a Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering and an MBA.

In 1985, Tim Draper founded Draper Fisher Jurvetson (DFJ), and later expanded into multiple entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial education platforms such as Draper Venture Network and Draper University.

Tim Draper's most well-known investment projects include Baidu, Hotmail, Skype, Tesla, SpaceX, AngelList, Twitter, Coinbase, Robinhood, Twitch, and others.

In the early 2000s, when most foreign capital withdrew from China, Draper chose to stay and eventually successfully invested in Baidu through DFJ. He is one of the earliest Silicon Valley figures to enter the Chinese venture capital industry. In 2005, he co-founded "VenturesLab" with Mai Gang and others, becoming an important participant in China's entrepreneurial ecosystem, and in the crypto field, VenturesLab also became an angel investor in a certain trading platform.

In 2018, Draper University founded by Tim Draper established a base in Zhongguancun, Beijing, through a training camp called dCamp to cultivate blockchain talent, attracting many senior professionals from the crypto field.

Draper has also invested in several early cryptocurrency projects, such as Ethereum, a trading platform, Ledger, Bancor, Arkham, Ark, Merzo, Propy, and others.

Connecting with Bitcoin: From 40,000 Bitcoins "disappearing" to steadfast believers

Tim Draper's interest in Bitcoin began in 2011, two years after Bitcoin was born. He met CoinLab founder Peter Vincennes through investor Joel Yarmon. CoinLab later became an innovative company focused on Bitcoin and miners, and also a partner of the largest exchange in the United States at that time. Draper became intrigued by the concept and made a small investment in CoinLab. Subsequently, he asked Peter to help him purchase $250,000 worth of Bitcoin, when the price of Bitcoin was around $6 each.

However, due to delays in the delivery of mining machine chips and thefts at exchanges, about 40,000 Bitcoins that were supposed to be obtained have "disappeared". Yet, this loss not only did not undermine Draper's confidence but instead sparked his respect for the resilience of the Bitcoin system.

In 2014, the U.S. Marshals Service auctioned off Bitcoin seized from Silk Road. Draper participated in the bidding and won all nine blocks at a price of $632, which was above market price, totaling approximately 36,000 Bitcoins.

Draper quickly realized that he could do something meaningful with these Bitcoins - such as promoting the adoption of Bitcoin in developing countries. In these countries, people generally lack confidence in their national currencies, and Bitcoin could be a solution for around 3 billion "unbanked" individuals.

Predicting that Bitcoin will rise to $250,000 by 2025, "Bitcoin will replace the US dollar"

In Tim Draper's view, the advantages of Bitcoin are very clear: it is a universally accepted currency that does not require government intervention; it is a way to retain value without the need to store precious metals or artworks; it is a frictionless currency that can circulate automatically based on contracts, without the need for lawyers or accountants to explain or intervene.

He believes that Bitcoin and its underlying technology, blockchain, are the engines driving human progress. The United States wisely refrained from imposing regulations on the internet, allowing a large number of internet entrepreneurs to establish themselves in the country, ultimately leading to the prosperity of the internet economy. Today, if a similar "light-touch" approach can be adopted for Bitcoin regulation, it will continue to attract innovators to stay in the U.S.

In May of this year, Tim Draper repeatedly stated that the US dollar is rapidly depreciating and strongly advocated for Bitcoin as an alternative. He predicts that within 10 years, Bitcoin will replace the US dollar as the global reserve currency. In the short term, he forecasts that Bitcoin will reach a price of $250,000 by 2025.

One reason Draper is becoming increasingly pessimistic about the US dollar is that the Dollar Index (DXY) has performed poorly this year, reflecting a decline in market confidence in the dollar. He pointed out that the weakness of the Dollar Index is related to global concerns about President Trump's trade policies.

Investment Philosophy: Set cycles for 5 to 10 years, passion takes precedence over data.

As a venture capitalist, Draper summarized six core investment principles:

1. Do not invest too much money in a single company in the early stages.

2. The investment period is set to 5 to 10 years.

3. Do not project your own entrepreneurial experience onto others.

4. Focus on the mission, not the money.

5. Investment should look at "enthusiasm", not "data".

6. Invest for the mission, not to make money.

Conclusion

While Bitcoin is still being questioned as a "bubble," Tim Draper has fully committed; while mainstream capital is still cautiously observing Web3, he is already cultivating talent, building infrastructure, and investing in visionaries for the next era. He does not see himself as a speculator but as a driver of change.

Perhaps in the eyes of Pop Mart investor Mai Gang, Draper is not only an enlightener but also a person who "still ignites a spark in the cold winter of capital."

His actions continue to ferment. Whether Bitcoin will truly replace the US dollar is uncertain, but what is certain is that Tim Draper has bet all of his investments on that possible world.