Sequoia appoints Alfred Lin and Pat Grady as new co-hosts while Roelof Botha steps down

Just over three years after taking the reins as Sequoia Capital’s top leader, Roelof Botha is stepping down as chief overseer of the prestigious venture capital firm. Partners Alfred Lin and Pat Grady will succeed him as co-supervisors, the company announced Tuesday.

Lin joined the renowned firm in 2010, where he led significant investments in category-defining companies such as Airbnb, DoorDash, and Kalshi. Meanwhile, Pat Grady has been a partner for nearly 19 years and has led growth-stage investing at Sequoia since 2015, backing iconic companies like ServiceNow, OpenAI, and legal AI platform Harvey.

Since assuming leadership of Sequoia’s U.S. and European operations in 2017, Botha has overseen the distribution of $50 billion to the company’s limited partners. He took over the company’s top leadership role in mid-2022 and immediately oversaw a period of turmoil. He took the helm at a time when the economic downturn was devastating public markets, severely lowering the valuations of many companies across the Sequoia portfolio. The company also took a $200 million write-down when its investment in cryptocurrency exchange FTX blew up — a small loss in the bigger scheme of things for Sequoia but a financial hit nonetheless. Furthermore, in 2023, amid rising political tensions between the US and China and regulatory pressures on both sides, Sequoia separated its operations in India and China into separate independent companies.

This year, Sequoia became embroiled in controversy over partner Sean Maguire’s comments attacking New York City mayoral candidate Zahran Mamdani, calling the politician an “Islamist” who “comes from a culture that lies about everything.” Although Maguire later retracted some of these statements, they led to significant backlash and debate online. In August, Sequoia’s chief operating officer, Somaya Balbali, a practicing Muslim, resigned over the company’s decision not to discipline Maguire after his remarks, as first reported by the Financial Times and discussed last week during an on-stage meeting with Botha during TechCrunch Disrupt.

When asked about Balbale, Botha said that as a matter of routine, Sequoia does not comment on personnel matters and that he appreciates everything Balbale has contributed to the company. Asked about Maguire, Botha said: “Internally, we celebrate diversity of opinions, and we need prickly people inside Sequoia.”

“We have some or some of our partners who are very active in philanthropy,” Botha continued [other] Private dealings, and they’re not as loud as Sean might be on social media. We have always respected the right to freedom of expression of each of our retail partners.

During that same interview, Botha stressed that his role as senior steward is not one of absolute leadership, emphasizing that the other partners have roughly the same amount of authority to direct the direction of the company. “My title is host for a reason — it’s just a notch higher than ‘presenter’ in the dictionary,” he said. Then he added in a comment that caused laughter from the audience: “This is mostly due to the lack of a global supreme leader.”

When TechCrunch editor-in-chief Connie Loizos asked Botha who might succeed him as the company’s leader given its historical focus on ensuring smooth delivery — Botha himself was promoted several times on his way to the top of the company — Botha responded that Lin; Grady. Luciana Lexandro, who leads Sequoia’s European investments; and Andrew Reed, a partner whose investments in Figma and Klarna went public this year, “have incredible depth and work as a team.”

Botha also noted that every Sequoia investor votes on investment decisions. He said: “We want the victory of ideas, not the victory of seniority.”

However, news of the move suggests the superintendent’s position carries real weight. While Sequoia has continued to achieve significant investment gains during Botha’s tenure, the leadership change comes as the company seeks to navigate a challenging period into its next phase.

In fact, Sequoia, one of the world’s leading venture capital firms, recently renovated its office, installing a wall where each investor hand-wrote this reminder: “We are only as good as our next investment.”

Last week, the company announced a $750 million early-stage fund targeting Series A startups, in addition to a $200 million seed fund.