Adam Neumann continues to fail upwards as VCs throw even more money at the ex-WeWork CEO

Adam Neumann, standing on stage wearing a microphone and a white shirt that says "Made by We" repeatedly in rainbow colors, pointing at the audienceAdam Neumann (attribution)
In a just world, people would probably not be able to fail upwards quite to the extent of Adam Neumann, who engaged in all sorts of self-dealing and lost billions of dollars, among many other allegations, when he was CEO of WeWork until September 2019.

But Neumann has so far enjoyed a comeback thanks to the likes of Andreessen Horowitz, who led a $70 million funding round in May for Neumann's "Flowcarbon" startup, which aims to sell tokenized carbon credits — sorry, "Goddess Nature Tokens" — to companies trying to green up their image.

Andreessen Horowitz is now enabling another one of Neumann's new crypto schemes to the tune of $350 million — its largest investment to date. This one is just called "Flow", in which Neumann is returning to the real estate industry in a company that aims to help with the residential housing crisis... with blockchain, somehow.

God forbid the venture capitalists give money to deserving founders who haven't already been given, and squandered, a chance. Responding to the news that a16z had put $350 million into Neumann's new gambit — an amount larger than the money raised by all Black-founded startups in the US combined in Q2 — author and investor Kathryn Finney said it was a "slap in the face". "It sends a signal that you can really mess up as a white guy and still get second chances to win," she said.