Warm Intro: Laurie Owen

Laurie Owen is the founder of Refinery Media, a London agency that builds brands for venture capital and private equity funds. The firm works exclusively in that world, partnering with funds from first-time managers to those with $5B+ AUM, and has driven over 20 million impressions and, more importantly, real founder and LP connections.

The route there was unconventional. Owen played professional basketball in the Dutch and British leagues before spending five years founding VR software startups, raising capital and building products in 3D design. Along the way he co-founded an investor newsletter, grew another one for professional footballers, and consulted on projects now used in the NFL. Refinery Media is where all of it converged: the founder’s understanding of what it takes to build, and a media operator’s grasp of attention.

What are you working on currently?

Content, brand and positioning work for VC firms. Refinery Media only does venture.

Elsewhere, I’m closing a raise for a sports-media business, which I’d argue is part of the same job - if you’re advising investors on media, you should be able to show you can build it. Audience, product, revenue, the lot.

Dream collaborator?

Jack Butcher

What are your Red flags/green flags when evaluating a startup/founder?

Red Flags = status-seeking and evasiveness

Green Flags = that je ne sais quoi and commercial aptitude.

What do you want the future to look like?

More big families, more children, more Sunday lunch and more places where people know their neighbors.

Fewer people optimizing their whole lives around work they do not care about.

Overhyped/underhyped?

Overhyped: scale

Underhyped: permanence

What’s a belief you hold that most people in your industry would disagree with?

VC would be better if everyone had to show ownership, invested amount, returns, performance, who made what decision, what was passed on/why. The industry talks about judgment while revealing very little evidence of it.

What’s something you’ve changed your mind on in the last few years?

That modern football was ruined. VAR, state ownership, the lot - I was fully aboard the ‘game’s gone’ bus. Then I watched my boys fall in love with it from scratch, no nostalgia etc, and realized the game was never gone

Maybe generations confuses the decline of their own attention with the decline of ‘the thing’ itself. Applies to football, music, and roughly 90% of what gets called disruption.

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ignored?

Use VCs to get work with their portfolio companies. Completely correct advice, blissfully ignored.

What do you spend an unreasonable amount of time thinking about?

Which words are overvalued. ‘Conviction’ is trading at an all-time high right now, meaning it’s worthless. ‘Money’ is undervalued - the whole industry sells it and can’t bring itself to say it. It’s always ‘capital,’ always ‘deploying.’

Language is a market like any other… when everyone owns a word, sell. A lot of investors bought their entire vocabulary at the top.

Fav product?

Air conditioning

About ADIN

ADIN is a highly AI focused pursuit (bringing algorithmic venture with the full force of AI agents). ADIN is also just as much about the people. We’re building a network where early-stage funding happens faster, fairer, and with more incentives for the people on the bleeding edge. If you want to be part of that, apply here to be a scout or investor and follow ADIN as we keep opening doors.

You can follow Laurie Owen on X.