The Cerebras Systems IPO was a smash hit on Thursday, generating billions for itself, its founders, and its major investors.

Among the big winners is major shareholder Benchmark, which owns 9.5% of the company. One of the firm’s general partners, Eric Vishria, has been a Cerebras board member since 2016, the year the AI chip maker was founded, having co-led its $25 million Series A round.

But these billions only happened for Benchmark because Vishria met with the startup almost against his will, he told TechCrunch.

“It was five founders and a deck, and it was our first hardware investment in 10 years,” Vishria told TechCrunch about that first meeting.…