Bird’s Scooter SPAC Deal Boosts David Sacks’s Craft Ventures

When investor David Sacks first heard about an electric scooter startup founded by his former employee, Sacks told him “the idea was crazy,” he recalled in an interview the following year. “And then I tried the product.”

Getting over his skepticism paid off for Sacks, who knew Bird Chief Executive Officer Travis VanderZanden because of a company he had founded a decade earlier. Sacks led a $15 million funding round into Santa Monica, California-based Bird in late 2017 through his new VC firm, Craft Ventures, its first official check to a startup. At the time, Bird was worth about $45 million, according to PitchBook data. The ...