It's not unusual to see venture investors touting their portfolio companies – no matter what dog
s they might be holding. But the other way around? That's unusual.
So I was surprised the other day to see Spencer Rascoff, the CFO of real estate website Zillow.com, defending the honor of his venture backer in the comment section of New York Times columnist Joe Nocera's blog. Nocera had recently teed off on Bill Miller, the legendary manager of the Legg Mason Value Trust mutual fund; after a 15 year streak of beating the S&P 500, Miller the last few years has been unable to top the market, leading to mass redemptions.
But besides just returning cash to angry investors, the firm has also been doing some dot-com investing, including leading Zillow's $30 million series C round. And so Spencer went on the offense:
Was Zillow afraid that tarnishing Bill would lead to Zillow getting smeared? I emailed him to see if Bill Miller or any of his Legg colleagues asked Spencer to come to their aid. He said he did it on his own:
Companies have trouble raising venture cash might want to think about this strategy. Promise a few down-on-their-luck private equity pros that if they invest you'll do their PR in your spare time. There are worse ways to get funding.