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Austin Moss
Co-founder, Black Bay Venture Capital Fund
In this conversation, Ahmad Ashrafi interviews Austin Moss, who shares his journey from a farm in Kansas to becoming a successful entrepreneur and venture capitalist.
He skipped college at 17 — already making ~$80K a year. Between a Sprint job and his own business, Austin Moss saw that most wildly successful people he knew never went to college, bought a house at 19, and built a 300-person team by 22.
Back the founder, not the industry. Black Bay is industry-agnostic and founder-first: five operator-partners with 15+ exits evaluate the person's core, coachability, and ego before the market size — because the person, not the thesis, carries you to the exit.
Derisk through questions nobody asks. His team analyzed call sentiment seven years before AI made it standard and scores lending deals on KPIs like real website traffic — creativity in deal structuring is how you make risk look smaller than it seems.
One habit for 30 days beats fifteen resolutions. The system behind his 70-pound weight loss and upcoming book: change one small thing a month, guard sleep, journal, keep a therapist and mastermind peers — entrepreneurship is lonely without them.
