Initialized Capital’s recent layoffs are part of a much larger (and longer) cycle

A man in a button down t-shirt sits on stage (Credit: Carlos Osorio/Sportsfile for Collision via Getty Images)

When Initialized Capital announced layoffs last week, social media hummed with retweets of the TechCrunch story, along with scattered commentary about the changes afoot at the firm. 

The changes at Initialized are undoubtedly substantial—along with an undisclosed number of employees, managing partner Jen Wolf and partner and Rent the Runway cofounder Jenny Fleiss will be leaving the firm. In the announcement, Initialized managing partner Brett Gibson wrote out publicly what I usually hear privately—that this just isn’t the marketplace they planned for, and that it’s time to adjust or falter.