Perhaps some near-fraudulent collusion between SVB, VCs and the executives of the banked startups then ...
Less so the executives, who probably did largely as their investors advise. Their individual business probably isn't that important on its own.
It's the VC partner who sees to it that 10 portfolio companies a year drop their capital raise into cheap deposits who really mattered.
the issue is that startup founders might have a lot of implied wealth based on the equity they hold and money raised but a "mainstream" bank is going to look at that equity, assess it as non-liquid and highly speculative and reject any loan applications
svb was more likely to extend personal loans to startup founders because -- in theory at least -- they better understood startup finance and they were incentivized to provide good service to prospective customers of their more business focused activities
But notice that it's not in the bank's interest to provide them or push them if they do. They would rather you trust them and provide them the cheap float.