This seems like blatant linkbaiting from 37signals, and frankly I think it's childish.
They know quite well (or at least they should) that the reason some companies get a huge cash injection from investors is to grow fast and grab marketshare. This costs a lot of money. It's a risky strategy but if it works it pays off bigtime. The get fast big strategy is obviously not for 37signals, but I'm sure they are aware that there are people in the world that have had success with it. Amazon comes to mind as a classic example.
What Sequoia is saying now is that the get big fast strategy will have to be postponed if you want to survive. And they're right.
EBay got big slowly...they went almost 2 years between initial launch and VC funding. Also, they're one of the few companies that was profitable before the founder quit his day job.
It was used fairly successfully by both of the two most famous early Web cos, Netscape and Yahoo. In fact it was their example that made the idea popular.
Technically, Amazon made money but opted to grow faster. Youtube on the other hand didn't make money at all. They were losing money fast. They got lucky Google bought them.
They know quite well (or at least they should) that the reason some companies get a huge cash injection from investors is to grow fast and grab marketshare. This costs a lot of money. It's a risky strategy but if it works it pays off bigtime. The get fast big strategy is obviously not for 37signals, but I'm sure they are aware that there are people in the world that have had success with it. Amazon comes to mind as a classic example.
What Sequoia is saying now is that the get big fast strategy will have to be postponed if you want to survive. And they're right.