The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
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20VC: Why This Time Will Be Worse Than The Great Financial Crisis, Why Down-Rounds, Firesales and Shutdowns Will Happen & The Ultimate Startup Survival Guide; 7 Steps to Ensure Your Company Survives The Storm
13 februari 2023 · 46 min
Tom Loverro is a Partner @ IVP where he has led or was actively involved in investments in Amplitude, Coinbase, Hashicorp and Datadog to name a few. As a result of his investing success, Tom was named to Forbes Midas List in 2021. Prior to joining IVP, Tom was a Principal at RRE Ventures. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Tom Loverro We Discuss:
1.) The Entry into Venture:
How did Tom make his way into venture first with RRE? How did the role with IVP come about?
Does Tom believe we will see many venture investors move firms with much of their existing expected carry cut in half with the changing landscape?
What is Tom's biggest advice to someone looking to make their way into the venture world?
2.) The Calm Before the Storm:
Why does Tom believe now is the calm before the storm?
Why does Tom urge founders to go out and raise now before the storm hits?
Is Tom already seeing pricing coming down for both early and late-stage companies?
3.) When The Storm Hits:
When does Tom believe the storm will hit?
Why does Tom believe when it does hit, it will be worse than The Great Financial Crisis?
How will VCs respond when the storm hits? How will it impact their investing cadence?
How will LPs respond when the storm hits? Will they cut back their manager commitments?
Does Tom have hope that their will be a new class of LPs in this new economic cycle?
4.) The Rounds That Happen When The Storm Hits:
Does Tom believe we will see a wave of down rounds when the storm hits? Why are they less common than people think?
In the eye of the storm, will we see further layoffs? Will we see firesales? Will we see a tidal wave of shutdowns?
Will large multi-stage funds with huge amounts of dry powder change their deployment pace?
The Survival Guide for the Storm:
1.) Raise Now:
Why does Tom believe that startups should raise now, not later? What amount of runway should they raise for in this environment?
2.) Cut, Cut and Cut Some More:
What amount of runway should startups be …
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20VC: Boston Celtics' Steve Pagliuca on The Future of Sports Team Ownership; What Happened with the Chelsea Acquisition | Why More Money is Pouring Into Sport Than Ever & Do These Assets Keep Increasing in Value
10 februari 2023 · 45 min
Steve Pagliuca is a Senior Advisor at Bain Capital, the firm he joined in 1982 and as a Managing Director of Bain Capital, he has helped build the firm into one of the world's leading investment companies with over $160 billion in assets under management. Steve is also a Managing Partner and Co-Owner of the World Championship Boston Celtics Basketball franchise. Steve is also co-owner and co-chairman of the Serie A professional football club, Atalanta Bergamasca Calcio. If that was not enough, Steve currently, serves on the Board of Directors of Burger King, Gartner Group, HCA, Warner Chilcott, and FCI. Huge thanks to Moshe @ Shrug Capital for making the intro. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Steve Pagliuca We Discuss:
1.) From Duffel Bags at Duke to Buying Sports Teams:
How Steve went from having a single duffel bag arriving at Duke University to entering the world of private equity with the founding of Bain's PE funds?
Did Steve always know he would be successful? What does Steve think about the importance between luck and timing?
How did Steve's mother impact how he approaches parenting and self-belief with his children?
2.) Buying Sports Teams: Not So Different to Companies:
When buying and running a sports team, what is the same, and what is different from buying and running a company?
What is Steve's biggest advice to new owners of sports teams?
What are the single biggest mistakes sports team owners make when they buy a team?
What happened with the Chelsea bid? Why did Steve lose? How did debt change the deal?
3.) The Future of Sports Ownership:
Why does Steve believe we have seen a massive rise in American and private equity buyers of both global sports teams but also European sports teams?
How has "new media" changed the inherent value that can be placed on a team? Why does it change the value? Which forms of "new media" are most important?
How much further can the value of these sports teams increase?
Does this massive increase in the price and ass…
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20VC: Why Salesforce, SAP and Concur Will Die | Scaling 3x and Raising at a $9.2BN Valuation in COVID | How OpenAI is Changing the Travel Industry Forever | Never Before Revealed Margins on Travel and Expense Management with Ariel Cohen, Co-Founder & CEO
8 februari 2023 · 44 min
Ariel Cohen is the Co-Founder and CEO @ Navan (formerly TripActions), the #1 travel management super-app used by over 8,000 companies. Ariel has raised over $2BN for Navan from some of the best including a16z, Zeev Ventures, Lightspeed, Greenoaks, and Elad Gil. Prior to TripActions, Ariel co-founded streamOnce, a business multimedia integration platform that was successfully acquired by Jive Software, where Ariel had previously served in a senior position following his time at Hewlett-Packard. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Ariel Cohen We Discuss:
1.) Why Education is Outdated and Wisdom to People Entering the Working World:
Why did Ariel not really attend many classes when he was a student?
What would be his biggest advice to young people leaving school today? Where would he focus?
Why does Ariel believe that traditional education is more outdated now than ever before?
2.) Why SAP and Salesforce Will Die:
Why does Ariel believe that SAP and Salesforce have not innovated for a decade?
Why does Ariel believe that Slack is a disaster inside of Salesforce?
What are the single biggest advantages that startups have over these large incumbents?
What can startups do to retain innovation and speed as they scale into becoming an incumbent?
Why are the best founders willing to kill their own projects?
3.) Growing a Business 3x and Raising at a $9.2BN Valuation in COVID:
How did Ariel grow the business 3x with all travel being banned?
What were the tactics to blitz scaling during COVID?
How did Ariel approach his investors for a new round in the middle of COVID? How did he get such a high price in the midst of a global pandemic?
What is the bull case for how Navan can be a $40BN company?
4.) Margins Matter: Gaining Leverage Through Additional Margin:
With Navan's 80% margin, they have 30% higher margins than other competitors, how do they have such high margins?
With the additional 30%, how does Ariel plan to scale Navan's reach and use the margin to do so?
How d…
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20VC: Thoma Bravo's Orlando Bravo on Why Now is The New Normal, Why Every Company in the World is Worth its Future Cashflows, The Three Core Elements Thoma Bravo Need to See in Any Potential Deal & Orlando's Relationship to Risk, Wealth and Parenting
6 februari 2023 · 54 min
Orlando Bravo is a Founder and Managing Partner of Thoma Bravo. He led Thoma Bravo's early entry into software buyouts and built the firm into one of the top private equity firms in the world. Today, Orlando directs the firm's strategy and investment decisions. Orlando has overseen over 420 software acquisitions conducted by the firm, representing more than $235 billion in transaction value. Forbes named him "Wall Street's best dealmaker" in 2019, and he was dubbed "Private equity's king of SaaS" by the Financial Times in 2021. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Orlando Bravo We Discuss:
1.) From Puerto Rico Roots to Wall Street's Best Dealmaker:
How did Orlando come to co-found Thoma Bravo? What was that a-ha moment for him?
Orlando mentioned 2 mentors that shaped how he thinks, who were they? What are his single biggest lessons from those mentors?
What does Orlando know now that he wishes he had known when he started his career?
Why does Orlando disagree with setting timelines in life? Why does it not help?
2.) The Secret to Success in Value Investing:
What is good value investing today? What is it not?
What three things does Orlando look for when doing a deal and acquiring a company?
Why is every company in the world worth its future cash flows?
How important is price today? How does Orlando reflect on his own price sensitivity?
Many suggest Coupa and Anaplan were extremely expensive. How does Orlando respond and defend the prices he paid for companies in 2020-2022?
3.) WTF is Happening In Markets Today:
How does Orlando reflect on where the market is today?
Is this the new normal? How does Orlando expect the market to change over the next 12 months?
Why does Orlando believe that the best companies win in the worst times?
Is this the result of quantitative easing on behalf of central banks? Who is to blame?
How does Orlando balance the mindset of his team between risk on and taking advantage of lower prices in market but also not catching a falling knife?…
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20Product: When to Hire a CPO, The Three Different Types of CPO, How To Know What You Need, How To Structure the Hiring Process, What Are the Must-Ask Questions, What Tests and Case Studies Should Be Used, How Should Their Compensation Package Be Structur
3 februari 2023 · 54 min
Annie Pearl is the CPO @ Calendly, the company that makes scheduling meetings simple and painless. Before Calendly, Annie led Glassdoor's product vision and user experience, managing a 70-person product and design org. Lees meer
Shreyas Doshi is an investor, advisor, and all-around product OG. Most recently Shreyas spent over 5 years at Stripe where he was Stripe's first PM Manager and helped grow the PM function (from ~5 to more than 50 people). Before Stripe, Shreyas was a Director of Product Management @ Twitter.
David Lieb is one of the product OGs of the last decade. As the founder of Bump David pioneered how over 150M users shared data, contacts and more before the company was acquired by Google. At Google, David took this one step further by creating Google Photos.
Marty Cagan is one of the OGs of Product and Product Management as the Founder of Silicon Valley Product Group. Before founding SVPG, Marty served as an executive responsible for defining and building products for Hewlett-Packard, Netscape Communications, and eBay.
Aparna Chennapragada is the former CPO @ Robinhood, revolutionizing consumer finance with commission-free investing. Prior to Robinhood, she spent an incredible 12 years at Google, most recently as VP and GM for Consumer Shopping and also as the lead AR and Visual Search products.
Lenny Rachitsky is one of the OGs of product, having spent over 7 years at Airbnb as a product lead he left to start his newsletter, find it here. This has scaled to thousands upon thousands of readers and one of the most popular newsletters on Substack.
For the last 7 years, Kayvon Beykpour has been at Twitter where he led all of the teams across Product, Engineering, Design, Research, and Customer Service & Operations. Kayvon came to Twitter through Periscope, the live broadcasting app he founded that was acquired by Twitter in 2015.
Scott Belsky is an entrepreneur, author, investor, and currently serves as Adobe's Chief Product Officer. Scott oversees all of p…
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20VC: From $57M in ARR to $297M in Just 12 Months; Why Speed of Execution is the Most Important Factor to Success, Hiring 2,000 People in 3 Years Remotely & Secondaries; Why, When and How Much To Take Out with Alex Bouaziz, Co-Founder & CEO @ Deel
1 februari 2023 · 45 min
Alex Bouaziz is the Co-Founder and CEO @ Deel, the all-in-one platform made to simplify all things HR, built for global teams near and far. In the last year alone, Alex has scaled Deel from $57M in ARR to $295M, EBITDA positive since Sept 2022, 85%+ gross margins, and over $5BN paid out to 250,000 people. Alex has raised over $679M with Deel, pricing the company at the last round at $12.1BN. Investors in the company include a16z, Spark Capital, Coatue, and many more. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Alex Bouaziz We Discuss:
1.) From Student in London to Decacorn Founder:
How Alex made his way into the world of startups and how he came up with the idea for Deel?
Did Alex always know he would be successful when he was growing up?
What does Alex know now that he wishes he had known when he was starting?
2.) The Importance of Execution:
How important does Alex think speed of execution is for startups?
What can startups do to deliberately increase their speed of execution?
How does Alex think about the dilemma of losing quality with speed?
What does Alex think you do need to go slow on to ensure it is perfect?
How does Alex think about focus and prioritisation today with Deel?
3.) Scaling to $295M in ARR in 3 Years:
When did Alex know he had true product-market fit with Deel?
How did Alex use a 50-person Whatsapp group to both determine product market fit and to navigate product direction for the company?
What was the key to Deel's blitz scaling strategy? What worked? What did not work?
How did Alex hire 2,000 people in such a short space of time?
What broke first in the organisation? How could they have prevented it?
4.) Secondaries, Angel Investing and Wealth Management:
How much did Alex take out in secondaries in the last round of funding?
How did Alex determine how much cash to allocate to angel investing?
Why does Alex believe most founders make poor angel investments when they have cash?
What have been Alex's biggest lessons from investing? How has i…
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20VC: Homebrew's Hunter Walk and Satya Patel on Why $100M is Not Enough To Execute a Seed Strategy Today | Why They Decided not to Raise New External Funds | Where Are We in the Cycle & What is Truly F***** | Why Founders Should Take Secondaries Earlier
30 januari 2023 · 1 uur 2 min
Hunter Walk and Satya Patel are Co-Founders and Partners @ Homebrew, one of the leading seed funds of the last decade. Following 10 years of stellar returns with investments in the likes of Chime, Plaid, Gusto and many others, they decided to not accept any further LP capital and to only invest their own money moving forward through Homebrew Forever. Lees meer
In Today's Discussion on Homebrew We Breakdown:
1. ) The Foundings of a Great Partnership:
What was the moment when Hunter and Satya decided they were going to go out and raise their first fund with Homebrew I?
What are the core principles that all founding partners need to align on before they start a firm together? What questions should they ask of each other?
Why does being independently wealthy coming into a partnership make the partnership easier and more efficient to operate? What changes when the partners have money already?
2.) What Changes When Moving From LP Dollars to Personal Capital:
Why did Hunter and Satya decide to not raise any further capital from external LPs?
Asset allocation-wise, how did they determine how much is the right amount to set aside for the first 2 years of investing? How many investments do they want to make with that cash?
How does investing their personal capital change their deployment pace and cadence?
How does it change their approach to reserves management and follow-on financing?
How does it change their approach to pricing? How price sensitive are they today?
3.) Analyzing the Seed Landscape Today:
Why do Hunter and Satya not think that a $100M seed fund is enough to properly execute a world-class seed strategy today?
Who is their competition with the new strategy? How does it change their relationship with large multi-stage funds? How does it change their relationship with seed funds?
Do they agree that the last generation of sub $20M micro-funds will not raise another fund in this cycle? How did their entrance impact the seed landscape over the last few years?
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20VC: Canva Co-Founder, Cliff Obrecht on The Journey From 100 VC Rejections to a $40BN Company, Why Good Enough is Not Good Enough, The Secret to Hiring Non-Obvious Talent and Relationships to Money and Why They Are Giving Away Billions
27 januari 2023 · 51 min
Cliff Obrecht is the Co-Founder & COO @ Canva, the free-to-use online graphic design tool that makes it easy for anyone to design anything from presentations to videos and social media. Cliff and Mel have scaled Canva to over 60 million monthly users, 2,000 employees, and 500,000 teams from companies like Intel and Zoom using Canva. During this incredible growth journey, they have raised over $580M with their last round valuing the company at over $40BN. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Cliff Obrecht
1.) From Teacher to Billionaire Tech Founder:
How did Keith make his way into the world of tech with his founding of FusionBooks? What did the process with FusionBooks teach him about how to run Canva?
How did the early fundraising days for Canva go? Why does Cliff think they got over 100 no's?
What are Cliff's biggest pieces of advice for founders today, not in Silicon Valley, looking to raise from Silicon Valley VCs?
2.) Scaling to $40BN: The Biggest Lessons:
What does Cliff mean when he says the secret to successful hiring is looking for "distance traveled"? How does he determine this in the interview process?
What have been some of the single biggest lessons in what it takes to acquire the best talent?
What are some of the biggest mistakes Cliff has made in talent acquisition? How has his process changed as a result?
What do Canva do to get the best operators as advisors in the company? How do they compensate these advisors? What does Cliff advise founders on how to do the same?
3.) The Art of Deal-Making:
How does Cliff think through what makes a "good deal"? How does he approach negotiation?
What are the biggest mistakes founders make when negotiating and doing deals?
What have been Cliff's biggest lessons on successful investor relations over the years?
How does Cliff and Canva approach acquisitions? What do they look for? What is their process? Why do most tech companies approach acquisitions the wrong way?
4.) Cliff Obrecht: Money, Fatherhood and Marria…
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20Sales: Why You Should Not Do PLG and Enterprise Sales at the Same Time | How To Move Into Enterprise Sales Gradually | How To Make a Comp Plan For Sales Teams | Why Discounting is Good and Can Be Used with Stevie Case, CRO @ Vanta
25 januari 2023 · 48 min
Stevie Case is the CRO @ Vanta where she oversees Vanta's go-to-market team to support the company's rapid growth. Prior to joining Vanta, Stevie was Vice President of Mid-Market Sales at Twilio, joining as one of their first account executives, Stevie helped to grow the sales team from a dozen to over 1,000 team members and played a pivotal role in establishing Twilio's enterprise business with key Fortune 500 customers, generating more than $400 million in annual recurring revenue. If that was not enough, Stevie is also a Founding Operator @ Coalition Network and a prominent angel investor. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Stevie Case We Discuss:
1. ) From World's First Pro Female Gamer to CRO:
How did Stevie make her way from pro gamer to CRO? How did her career in gaming make her a better CRO and sales leader?
In her early sales career, how did being a single mother with a child impact her approach to sales?
What can founders do to make workplaces more inclusive for parents today?
2.) Enterprise or PLG: Which One To Choose:
Why does Stevie believe it is not right to do both PLG and enterprise at the same time for startups?
How can startups and sales teams move into enterprise selling gradually through testing and without committing a significant budget to an enterprise sales team?
How do founders know when is the right time to move from PLG to enterprise? What are the signs?
3.) The Mythical Sales Playbook:
How does Stevie define the term "sales playbook" today? What is it not?
Should the founder be the person to create the sales playbook? If not them, then who?
When is the right time to make your first sales hire? When is the wrong time?
4.) Mastering the Hiring Process in Sales Recruits:
How should we structure the interview process for new sales reps?
What is the right profile for these first sales hires?
How do the best sales talent answer questions and perform in interview processes?
How can we really test for grit and curiosity in the interview p…
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20VC: USV's Albert Wenger on What Elon Musk Should Do with Twitter | The State of Crypto Today; The Impact of SBF and Why Now is the Best Time To Invest in Crypto | Are We Too Late to Save The Climate and Why Civil Disobedience is Required | Will TikTok b
23 januari 2023 · 46 min
Albert Wenger is a managing partner at Union Square Ventures, one of the most successful venture firms of the last decade with a portfolio including Coinbase, Twitter, Twilio, Etsy, and many more. Before joining USV, Albert was the president of del.icio.us through the company's sale to Yahoo and an angel investor (Etsy, Tumblr). He previously founded or co-founded several companies, including a management consulting firm and an early-hosted data analytics company. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Albert Wenger We Discuss:
1.) From Failed Startup Founder to Leading VC:
How Albert transitioned from being a failed entrepreneur to being one of the most respected venture investors with USV today?
What were the clear signs for Albert that he was not a good entrepreneur?
Why does Albert believe this downturn is different compared to the dot-com bubble? Why was there more hope and promise coming out of the dot-com bubble?
2.) Income Inequality, The Rise of Depression & The Role of Politics:
Why is income and wealth inequality more concerning than ever? Why does Albert believe universal basic income is the right solution?
Why is mental health worse than ever? What can be done to improve this?
Why are our politicians failing us? What should our politicians be doing?
How does the rise of Trump show us what society is looking for in politicians?
3.) Climate Change: Misnomers, Developing Countries, Civil Disobedience:
What are the single biggest misnomers people have when it comes to climate change?
How can we shift spending on climate change solutions from 5% of GDP to 50%? Is that possible?
Why do developing nations have an advantage when implementing climate change solutions over more developed economies?
Why is civil disobedience the right course of action to ensure society is on a path to change our approach to climate change?
4.) Crypto and Central Banks: The Future of Finance:
Why does Albert believe that over the past few years, for many, crypto was a good hedge…
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20VC: Turning Canned Water into a $700M Media and Health Company, What Makes Truly Great Brands, How Founders Can Build Their Brand From Day 1 Today & How to Create Viral Content with Little to No Budget with Mike Cessario, Founder and CEO @ Liquid Death
20 januari 2023 · 47 min
Mike Cessario is the Founder and CEO @ Liquid Death, the man hacking the healthy beverage market with the first hilarious water brand. It is working, Liquid Death's latest valuation was over a staggering $700M and Mike has raised over $200M since founding the company from the likes of Science Inc. Away's Jen Rubio, Dollar Shave Club's Michael Dubin, Swedish House Mafia and Tony Hawk to name a few. Prior to founding Liquid Death, Mike was in the advertising industry at a number of dirrect firms including VaynerMedia. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Mike Cessario We Discuss:
1.) From Canned Water to $700M Business:
How did rockstars' hydration problems lead to the founding of Liquid Death?
How did growing up with guns and heroine needles around him at school, impact how Mike sees the world today? What is he running from? What is he running towards?
Everyone said, "canned water, that is a stupid idea". What does Mike tell to all entrepreneurs who are told their idea is stupid? How does Mike advise on picking your idea?
2.) How to Build a Truly Great Brand:
What does the term "brand" mean to Mike?
What does he mean when he says, "truly great brand transcends functional value"?
What are the single biggest mistakes Mike sees founders make today on branding?
Why does Mike believe people will always hate your brand, if it is good?
What are the biggest brand mistakes Mike has made with Liquid Death?
What brand does Mike most respect and admire? Why that brand?
3.) Marketing: The Secret to Reaching Millions of People with Little Budget:
How does the Liquid Death team come up with the ideas they have for content? Why does Mike believe the label "storytelling" is kinda BS?
Why does Mike believe people will always hate your marketing? What was Mike's biggest lesson from their Superbowl commercial with kids drinking Liquid Death, looking like beer?
How does Mike decide which channel to prioritise? How has the rise of TikTok and short form video changed their approach to …
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20Growth: When To Make Your First Growth Hire? How To Structure the Hiring Process for Growth? Five Core Things the Best Growth Hires Do in the First Week? What to Expect New Growth Hires to Achieve in the First 30 and 90 Days with Hila Qu, Growth Advisor
18 januari 2023 · 51 min
Hila Qu is one of the leading growth execs of the last decade. Hila helped scale Acorns from 1 million to 5 million users as their VP of growth. Hila then joined GitLab, where she launched their PLG motion (on top of an established sales motion), and built their first-ever growth team. Today Hila is an advisor to amazing companies like Replit and funds like Mucker Capital, Openview and First Round Capital. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Hila Qu We Discuss:
1.) From Biology and Explosions to Growth:
How Hila made her way into the world of growth with growthhackers.com?
What are 1-2 of the biggest takeaways from her time with Acorns and Gitlab?
How do B2B growth orgs compare to B2C growth orgs? What is different? What is the same?
2.) WTF is Growth? When? How & Why:
How does Hila define growth today? What is it not?
When is the right time for early-stage founders to hire their first growth hire?
Why does Hila always look for data analysts in this first growth hire?
From a data standpoint, what should founders have ready and accessible for their first growth hire to have access to and learn from? Is Google Analytics enough?
3.) Hiring Your First Growth Hire:
How should early-stage founders structure the hiring process for the first growth hire?
What do the best growth job descriptions include? What do they not include?
Once applications are in, how does Hila advise founders screen for the best candidates?
How should founders structure the interview process post-screening? What are the must-ask questions? Who is involved in the interview process? What are some red flags?
4.) The Master of Onboarding:
What should new growth hires want to achieve in the first week?
What should they want to complete in the first month?
In the first quarter, what do the best candidates have completed?
What can founders do to set their growth hires up for success in the best way at this time?
5.) Growth Models, North Stars, Activation and Onboarding and Key KPIs:
What really …
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20VC: a16z's Jeff Jordan on The Ultimate Guide to Investing in Marketplaces, Two Core Features to Look for in All Marketplace Investments, Why Fragmented Supply is so Important & Lessons from Airbnb, Pinterest and Instacart on What Makes the Best Cohorts
16 januari 2023 · 46 min
Jeff Jordan is a General Partner @ a16z where he serves on the boards of Airbnb, Incredible Health, Instacart, Lookout, and Pinterest, just to name a few. Before a16z, Jeff was CEO OpenTable, where he led the company during a period of hyper-growth and oversaw its IPO. Prior to OpenTable, Jeff was Senior VP and General Manager of eBay North America where he oversaw eBay's early growth into one of the Internet's leading commerce brands. In this role, he drove the successful acquisitions of PayPal and Half.com and went on to become President of PayPal, where he was responsible for establishing the company as the global standard for online payments. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Jeff Jordan We Discuss:
1.) From Taking Opentable Public to Being a GP @ a16z:
What led to Jeff making the jump from CEO @ Opentable to becoming a GP at a16z?
How does Jeff believe his operating career impacted how he thinks and acts as an investor today, both positively and negatively?
What is his 1 biggest learning from eBay and then Opentable that has really shaped his mindset today as an investor? How did those experiences impact what he looks for in companies?
2.) The Two Core Features To Look For in Marketplaces:
Fragmentation of supply side: Why does Jeff look for fragmented supply sides? Does this not take longer and is more expensive? How fragmented is fragmented enough?
What are the most common reasons founders fail to acquire a fragmented supply side?
Intelligent Lead Generation: What does Jeff really want to see in the way that new marketplaces acquire their customers? How does this change with the rise of TikTok and short-form video?
What are some other really core features or traits that excite Jeff when he sees them in an early marketplace? What are some massive red flags for Jeff when he sees them early?
3.) How to Acquire and Retain the Demand Side of a Marketplace:
Messaging and Brand: What are the biggest lessons Jeff has on how to craft the messaging of a marketplace …
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20VC: WTF is Going On in VC? Are VCs Still Investing? How Has What VCs Want in Investments Changed? Are LPs Investing in New Funds? Why VCs That Invest in Public Markets Are Losers? Dec 2023; Will It Be Better Or Worse with Jason Lemkin
13 januari 2023 · 49 min
The question is: "are VCs still investing?". Today we are joined by Jason Lemkin; one of the OGs of SaaS of the last decade. As the Founder of SaaStr, he has inspired more SaaS founders than one can imagine building "The World's Largest Community for Business Software." Jason also invests out of the $100M SaaStr Fund and in the past Jason has led rounds into TalkDesk, Pipedrive, Algolia, Gorgias, Salesloft, and many more incredible companies. Prior to founding SaaStr, Jason was the Co-Founder of Echosign, an early e-signature business, funded by Emergence Capital and that was acquired by Adobe for $100M. Lees meer
In Today's Episode on "Are VCs' Still Investing" We Discuss:
1. What Does it Take To Get Funded Today:
Early-Stage:
How has what VCs want in early-stage investments changed in this new environment?
Should startups prioritize growth? Profitability? Capital efficiency?
How long a runway is sufficient enough for founders to feel comfortable?
Why does Jason believe most founders are still deluded that they are fundable?
Growth Stage Companies:
Is the growth stage totally dead?
What will we see happen to all the companies that raised $50M+ at large valuations that have very little revenue?
Why does Jason believe that any operator who joined a $BN company in the past few years will not make any money on their equity? What should they do now?
Will we start to see down rounds and structured rounds at the growth stage? If so, when?
Public Markets:
Why does Jason believe this is a time unlike any he has seen before?
Are we in full recession now in Jason's mind? In Dec 2023, will this be better or worse?
Which are the most under-priced assets in the public markets today?
Why does Jason believe VCs investing in public markets are losers?
2. Micro Funds Will Be Decimated and LP Behaviour in 2023
Why does Jason believe that micro-funds in 2023 will be decimated and unable to raise new funds?
How will the majority of LPs approach new fund investments?
How wil…
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20VC: The Memo: How to Raise a Venture Capital Fund (Part I) | The Core Lessons from Raising $400M Over The Last Four Years| The Biggest Mistakes VCs Make When Fundraising | How To Find and Build Relationships with New LPs
11 januari 2023 · 28 min
How To Raise a Venture Capital Fund Lees meer
Over the last 4 years, I have raised around $400M across different vehicles from many different types of investors. Today I am going to break down the early stages of how to raise a venture capital fund and then stay tuned for a follow-up to this where we will break down a fundraising deck for a fund, what to do, what not to do etc. But to the first element.
Your Fund Size is Your Strategy:
The most important decision you will make is the size of fund you raise. So much of your strategy and approach will change according to your fund size target (LP type, messaging, documentation, structure etc). Remember, your fund size is your strategy. If you are raising a $10M Fund, you are likely writing collaborative checks alongside a follower, if you are raising a $75M fund, you will likely be leading early-stage seed rounds. These are very different strategies and ways of investing.
MISTAKE: The single biggest mistake I see fund managers make is they go out to fundraise with too high a target fundraise. One of the most important elements in raising for a fund is creating the feeling of momentum in your raise. The more of the fund you have raised and the speed with which you have raised those funds dictate that momentum. So the smaller the fund, the easier it is to create that heat and momentum in your raise.
LESSON: Figure out your minimum viable fund size (MVFS). Do this by examining your portfolio construction. In other words, how many investments you want to make in the fund (the level of diversification) and then alongside that, the average check size you would like to invest in each company. Many people forget to discount the fees when doing this math and so the traditional fund will charge 2% fees per year and so across the life of the fund (usually 10 years), that is 20% of the fund allocated to fees.
Example:
We are raising a $10M Fund.
20% is allocated to fees for the manager and so we are left with $8M of investable cap…
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20VC: From a $5,000 College Fund to a $10BN+ Public Company, How to Beat People Who Are Smarter Than You, Why Happier Teams Outperform and How Software Buying Patterns are Changing in 2023 with Henry Schuck, CEO @ ZoomInfo
9 januari 2023 · 48 min
Henry Schuck is the Founder and CEO @ ZoomInfo. From ZoomInfo's founding moment, putting $25,000 on a credit card, Henry has led the company to today, with over $1BN in ARR, a market cap of over $10BN, and a team of over 3,600. This is one of the untold but truly great stories in software. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Henry Schuck We Discuss:
1. From a $5,000 College Fund to Founding a $10BN Company:
Why did Henry always believe early in life that he would be successful?
Along the way doubt sets in, what did Henry do to combat that doubt when he questioned his own ability and potential?
What does Henry believe he is running from? What is he running towards?
How did seeing the work ethic of his single mother impact his work ethic with ZoomInfo?
2. Henry Schuck: The Leader:
What does Henry believe is the difference between trust vs safety in team culture?
Why does Henry believe safety is built through performance? How does Henry manage and communicate underperformance? How long do you give an under-performer?
Why does Henry believe that happier teams outperform? What does Henry do deliberately and specifically to drive happiness in the business?
ZoomInfo is magnitudes larger than some competitors who receive a lot more attention, how does Henry think about this? How does he manage his own ego as a leader today?
3. Henry Schuck: A Leader in a Changing Market:
How does Henry maintain internal morale when employees see their stock options get smashed every day?
Does it suck to be a public company CEO in the current market? What element is the worst?
How are the buying patterns and behaviors of customers changing in 2023 vs 2021?
How does this impact the sales cycle, retention rates, upsell plans, and the structure of the customer success teams?
Dec 2023, will we be in a better or worse macroeconomic position?
4. Henry Schuck: Relationship to Money and Fatherhood:
How does henry evaluate his relationship with money today? How has it changed over time?
Why …
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20VC: Why Financial Planning and Goals Do Not Work, The Decision to Ban Politics in the Workplace and Losing 1/3 of the Team Overnight & The One Question That Will Drive All Decision-Making for Leaders with Jason Fried, CEO @ 37Signals
6 januari 2023 · 43 min
Jason Fried the Co-Founder and CEO at 37signals, makers of Basecamp and HEY. Over an incredible 21-year journey, Jason and his co-founder David have scaled Basecamp to become the communication tool trusted by millions. Jason is also the co-author of the widely acclaimed, ReWork and has also made several angel investments in the likes of Intercom, Gumroad and Hodinkee to name a few. Lees meer
In Todays Episode with Jason Fried We Discuss
1. From Web Design Agency to Founding Basecamp:
What was the a-ha moment for Jason when they had to make the pivot from a design agency to going full-time launching and running Basecamp as a SaaS company?
What is Jason running towards? What is he running from?
What is the single biggest fear that Jason is trying to avoid?
2. Jason Fried: The Leader:
Why does Jason believe he is running from his position as leader and CEO @ Basecamp?
Why does Jason not like or agree with goals or targets? Why are they not helpful?
How does Jason make decisions today as a leader and CEO? What one question does he ask that determines his decision-making process?
Why does Jason never compare himself to the competition? Why does he believe competition is for losers?
3. Jason Fried: The Politicisation of Leadership:
Why did Jason and David decide to not allow politics in the workplace?
How did they manage with 1/3 of their team leaving overnight? How was that experience for them personally? How did it impact the company? Is there anything they would do differently?
Does Jason believe we will see the continued politicization of leadership in the coming months?
How would Jason advise other CEOs when it comes to taking a stance on politics?
4. Jason Fried: Building the Best Team:
What is the one question that determines whether you made a good hire?
Why does Basecamp start with hiring all employees on a week-long project contract?
Why does Jason believe the best CEOs approach management as the art of the individual?
5. Jason Fried: The Partner, Fat…
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20VC Special: How To Fundraise Like a Pro: How to Size and Price a Round, How to Create FOMO and Urgency in a Fundraise, How to Structure Angel Allocations, The 7 Deadly Sins of Fundraising Decks, The 3 Signs a Potential Investor is Bad News
21 december 2022 · 27 min
20VC: Fundraising 101 Lees meer
Today we are going to walk through the process of raising a funding round for a hypothetical company. We will break it down by different stages in the fundraising process and at those stages I will talk about how each element differs according to the round being raised.
First, for 99% of fundraises it is a game of shots on goal. You need to have enough investors in the pipeline, it is a sheer numbers game. Miki Kuusi @ Wolt said on 20VC recently for his Series B he got 68 rejections before Laurel Bowden @83North said yes. Wolt sold in 2021 for $7BN to Doordash making a monster return for the company's investors. But 68 meetings before that yes, for the Series B. Also goes to show, you sometimes just need one true believer.
How to Create a Target List of Investors
Now we know we need enough shots on goal, we need to bring together a target list of investors, put these investors in three buckets:
Priority (5 names of people you really want.)
Tier 2 (15 names of people you would like)
Tier 3 (15 names of people you would take money from but would not invite to your birthday!)
So how do we choose who goes in what bucket? First, founder references speak volumes and lead to warm intros, so speak to your friends who are founders, ask which of their VCs have been the best, place even more weight on their recommendation if the company has not been a success. It is easy to be a VC champion when the company is flying, you often see the true colours of the VC when a company is really struggling or fails. Get a couple of names there and then analyse the VC landscape, you can do this on Twitter or the VCs website or blog and find the VCs that resonate best with your company. Look at the types of deals they have done before, are they interested in pre-seed fintech in Europe, do they do enterprise SaaS Series A in the Silicon Valley. You can see their portfolio, make sure it is a fit for them. I get about 200 inbounds per day across channel, about 150…
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20VC: Peloton CEO Barry McCarthy on Leadership Lessons Learned from Reed Hastings and Daniel Ek, What is Peloton's Competitive Advantage and Why Peloton is a Team and Not a Family
19 december 2022 · 46 min
Barry McCarthy is Peloton's CEO and President. McCarthy is a seasoned executive who served as CFO of Spotify from 2015 to January 2020, and CFO of Netflix from 1999 to 2010. Prior to Netflix, McCarthy held various leadership positions in management consulting, investment banking, and media and entertainment. McCarthy has served on the boards of directors of Spotify and Instacart since January 2020 and January 2021, respectively. In addition, McCarthy has served as a member of the boards of Chegg, Eventbrite, MSD Acquisition Corp, Pandora, and Rent the Runway. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Barry McCarthy We Discuss:
1. From Netflix to Spotify to Leading Peloton:
How did Barry make his way into the world of startups and come to work with Reed Hastings at Netflix? What are his single biggest takeaways from working with Reid?
Why did Barry decide to move to cold Stockholm to work with Daniel Ek and Spotify? What makes Daniel the special leader that he is?
Was Barry nervous about assuming the role of CEO @ Peloton? Are the elements he was most worried about the elements that are his biggest challenges today?
2. Barry McCarthy: The Leader
What does "high performance" in business mean to Barry?
Daniel Ek has described Barry as the "most strategic dealmaker in the world". What does Barry believe makes him so good at dealmaking? Where do so many go wrong?
Barry pioneered the model of the direct listing, why does he believe they are better? Why was it right as an approach for Spotify? Will we continue to see more?
What is Barry's framework for making tough decisions? How has it changed over time?
3. Barry McCarthy: The Master of Boards:
Barry has sat on some of the best boards from Netflix to Spotify to now Peloton and Instacart, what does Barry believe makes the best boards?
Where do many boards go wrong? Where do they become dysfunctional? What can and should be done to stop that?
How does Barry advise other board members on the right way to deliver tough news cons…
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20VC: Leadership Lessons from Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer, The Early Days of TheFacebook Advising Mark Zuckerberg and Why Now is Not the Right Time For Startups to Stockpile Cash with Hadi Partovi, CEO @ Code.org
16 december 2022 · 50 min
Hadi Partovi is a tech entrepreneur and investor, and CEO of the education nonprofit Code.org. Before founding Code.org, Hadi founded two prior startups: Tellme Networks (acquired by Microsoft, discussed on 20VC with Emil Michael), and iLike (acquired by Newscorp). Hadi has also been an active advisor and angel investor to some of the best including Facebook, Dropbox, airbnb, and Uber. If that was not enough, Hadi currently serves on the Board of Directors of Axon and MNTN. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Hadi Partovi:
1.) From the Iran-Iraq War to Founding Startups:
How Hadi and his family made their way from war-torn Tehran to the US and Silicon Valley?
How did seeing his family have nothing and struggle financially impact Hadi's mindset as an entrepreneur?
What does Hadi believe he is running from? What is he running toward?
2.) Lessons from Ballmer and Zuckerberg:
How did Hadi first come to meet a young Mark Zuckerberg when TheFacebook had less than 10 employees? Why did Hadi believe he was so special from that first meeting?
What are Hadi's biggest takeaways from working with Steve Ballmer? How did the reign and leadership of Ballmer compare to the reign of Bill Gates?
Hadi has helped both Facebook and Dropbox with their engineering hires, what is the secret to hiring amazing engineers? How does he structure the process? Where do so many go wrong?
3.) Hadi Partovi: The Leader:
How does Hadi define "high performance" in leadership? How has it changed with time?
What is Hadi's framework for making tough decisions? How does Hadi teach that framework to his team? What are the biggest mistakes leaders make in decision-making?
How important does Hadi believe speed of execution is? How does Hadi determine when is the right time to go slow to go fast?
4.) Hadi Partovi: The Person:
How does Hadi analyze his relationship with money today? How does it change over time?
Hadi stepped off the for-profit treadmill with Code.org, why did he make that decision? How doe…
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20 Sales: Webflow's Maggie Hott on When to Start and How to Scale the Best Outbound Sales Team, Why Founders Should Not Hire a Head of Sales First, The Must Ask Questions When Hiring Sales Reps and How To Structure the Process
14 december 2022 · 1 uur 4 min
Maggie Hott is the Director of Sales @ Webflow where she leads their Sales Dev, Account Executive, and Solution Engineering orgs. Prior to Webflow, Maggie spent an incredible 6 years at Slack in a period of hypergrowth for the company having joined as the founding AE scaling to a Sr Enterprise Leader. Before Slack, Maggie was the founding Sales hire at Eventbrite. If that was not enough, Maggie is also an active angel investor, an advisor to Cowboy Ventures, Scribble Ventures, and is a Founding Operator and LP @ Coalition Partners. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Maggie Hott We Discuss:
1. The Cold Email that Led to a World-Class Sales Career:
How a cold email to Kevin Hartz @ Eventbrite led to Maggie's career in sales?
What are the 1-2 biggest takeaways from her time at Slack? How did they impact her mindset?
What does Maggie know now that she wishes she had known when she entered sales?
2. The Sales Playbook: PLG and Enterprise:
How does Maggie define the sales playbook? What is it? What is it not?
Is it possible for early-stage companies to do both enterprise and PLG at the same time?
When is the right time to add enterprise to a PLG motion?
What are the steps to build an outbound sales engine in enterprise? Where do many go wrong?
3. Building the Bench: Hiring Your First Sales Team:
Should founders look to hire a Senior Head of Sales first or a more junior sales rep?
Should they be hired one at a time? What are the benefits of hiring many at the same time?
What is the right process to hire your first sales hire?
What are the core traits and habits that make the first 10x sales hire?
What are the right questions to ask to unveil those characteristics?
4. Making the Machine Work: The Process:
What can sales leaders do to proactively build relationships with other parts of the org?
How can more junior sales reps build relationships with other functions?
Why does Maggie believe that mis-hiring can be a $1M mistake? What are the early signs that a new hi…
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20VC: Mailchimp's Ben Chestnut on The Biggest Leadership Lessons Scaling to a $12Bn Acquisition and $1BN+ ARR, The Secret to Happiness, Being a Great Husband and Father & Why 2021 was the Right Time To Sell to Intuit
12 december 2022 · 51 min
Ben Chestnut is the Co-Founder of Mailchimp, the all-in-one marketing platform for small businesses. Last year, in Sept 2021 it was announced that Intuit would acquire Mailchimp for a reported $12BN. There are so many things to love about the Mailchimp journey to this point. First, Mailchimp was founded as the result of a side project of a design agency Ben and his co-founder, Dan, used to run. Second, Mailchimp is and has always been based in Atalanta, eschewing the notion you have to be in SF or NYC to build a massive business. Then third, they never raised venture funding for the business all the way until their $12BN acquisition. Ben led Mailchimp to over 1,200 employees and millions of global users. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Ben Chestnut We Discuss:
1. From Mama's Kitchen to the Smell of Business and Founding Mailchimp:
How did Ben turn a mediocre agency into the founding of Mailchimp? What was the a-ha moment?
At what stage of the business did Ben quit the agency and go all in on Mailchimp? What sign did he need that Mailchimp had true product-market fit?
When Ben's mother died, he bought every flower in the local town to commemorate her. How did Ben's mother impact the type of father and husband he is today? How did she impact the way that he led Mailchimp as CEO?
Ben's fishing trips with his father played a big role in his early years, what were the single biggest lessons for Ben from his fishing trips with his father?
2. Ben Chestnut: The Leader:
How does Ben define the term "high performance" in leadership?
What does Ben mean when he says "the secret to happiness is to stay in your lane"?
Why would Ben describe himself as the "leader of the misfits"? How did that early experience and labeling impact both the people he hired and the culture he created at Mailchimp?
What does Ben mean when he says he used to have a "hands off, eyes off" leadership style? What have been the single biggest drivers in his development as a leader?
3. Ben Chestnut: The…
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20VC: The Story of Turning Around MTV, AOL and Time Warner | How To Be Effective When Making Hard Decisions | Tactics vs Strategy and Why Plans Are BS with Bob Pittman, CEO @ iHeartMedia
9 december 2022 · 54 min
Bob Pittman is Chairman and CEO of iHeartMedia, Inc., the number one audio company in America. Prior to iHeart, Bob has just had the most amazing career as a co-founder and programmer who led the team that created MTV. He has also led some of the most incredible turnarounds as CEO of MTV Networks, AOL Networks and Time Warner Enterprises and as COO of America Online, Inc. and later AOL Time Warner. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Bob Pittman We Discuss:
1. From Flying Lessons to Radio:
How Bob first made his way into radio at the age of 15?
What does Bob know now that he wishes he had known when he started his career?
What is the most painful lesson Bob has learned in his career that he is pleased to have learned?
2. Decision-Making in Leadership:
How does Bob structure all decision-making as CEO today?
Why does Bob ensure that all decisions are made within 24 hours? What are the pros and cons?
How does Bob prevent consensus decision-making? How does Bob create dissent in a discussion?
How do the best leaders know when to kill a project? What do most do instead?
3. Tactics vs Strategies: Why Plans Are BS!
What is the difference between a tactic and a strategy?
When is the right time to change your strategy and tactics?
What have been Bob's biggest lessons on how to get teams on board with tactical changes?
Why does Bob believe that plans are BS? When can they be useful?
4. The Secret to Messaging and Storytelling:
What does Bob believe is the universal truth to successful consumer messaging?
What has changed and what has not changed in the way companies tell stories to their customers?
Is there a difference between a great product and a great company? What are examples?
What excites Bob most about consumer habits today?
5. Bob Pittman: AMA:
What does Bob believe is the success to successful parenting? How has it changed?
How does Bob analyze his own relationship to money today? How has that changed?
Why does Bob not believe in legacy? What do people…
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20 Product: Marty Cagan on The Four Questions of Great Product Management, Product Lessons from Marc Andreessen, Ben Horowitz and eBay's Pierre Omidyar & The Difference Between Truly Great Product Teams and the Rest
7 december 2022 · 58 min
Marty Cagan is one of the OGs of Product and Product Management as the Founder of Silicon Valley Product Group. Before founding SVPG, Marty served as an executive responsible for defining and building products for some of the most successful companies in the world, including Hewlett-Packard, Netscape Communications, and eBay. He worked directly alongside Marc Andreesen and Ben Horowitz at Netscape and Pierre Omidyar at eBay. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Marty Cagan We Discuss:
1. Entry into the World of Product From Engineering:
How Marty first made his way into the world of product, having started life as an engineer?
What does Marty know now that he wishes he had known when he started in product?
What are Marty's biggest tips to anyone making the move from engineering to product?
2. Lessons from Marc and Ben at Netscape and Pierre @ eBay:
What are the single biggest lessons Marty took from working side by side on product with Ben Horowitz and Marc Andreesen?
What did Netscape do right? What did they do wrong? With hindsight, what would Marty have done differently?
How did Marty break all of his rules by working with Pierre Omidyar?
3. Hiring a World Class Early Product Team:
When is the right time to make your first product hire as a startup?
What is the right profile for that first product hire? Senior or junior?
If you go for the junior hire, how do you structure the rest of the team? If you go for the Senior hire, how do you structure the rest of the team?
What are the single biggest mistakes startups make when hiring their first in product?
Does Marty prefer someone with or without expertise in the domain you are in?
4. Mastering the Onboarding Process:
What is the optimal onboarding process for all new product hires?
How can leaders ensure that product hires see and understand all areas of the business?
What can product leaders do to proactively impress in the first 30-60 days?
What are clear red flags that a new product hire is not working ou…
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20VC: a16z's Martin Casado on How the Venture Model is Broken, Why VCs Should Be Running Wall St, Who Wins and Who Loses in the Next Generation of Venture & Investing Lessons from Marc Andreesen, Ben Horowitz and Chris Dixon
5 december 2022 · 52 min
Martin Casado is a General Partner @ a16z where he focuses on enterprise investing. At a16z, Martin has led investments and serves on the board of dbt Labs, Fivetran, Material Security, Ambient AI and many more incredible companies. Before venture, Martin was previously the Co-Founder and CTO at Nicira, acquired by VMware for $1.26 billion in 2012. While at VMware, Martin served as Senior VP and General Manager of the Networking and Security Business Unit, which he scaled to a $600 million revenue run-rate business. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Martin Casado We Discuss:
1. From $1.26BN Founder to Leading Enterprise Investing for a16z:
How did Martin make his way into the world of VC and come to lead enterprise investing for a16z?
What does Martin know now that he wishes he had known when he started investing?
What have been some of his biggest investing lessons from Marc and Ben?
2. The VC Model is Broken and Why:
Why does Martin believe that the current model for venture is broken?
Why does Martin believe that VCs are not oracles and they were not gifted with picking ability?
How will asset allocation more broadly fundamentally change over the next decade? Why will Silicon Valley take over and run Wall St?
Why does Wall St not care about innovation and true technological development?
Who will be the winners and who will be the losers in the next 10 years of venture?
3. Surviving a Crash - What Founders Need To Know:
Layoffs: What is Martin's advice to founders on doing layoffs today? How much is the right amount to cut? Should it be done in one go? How should this be communicated to investors and the board?
Scenario Planning: What three scenario plans should all founders be creating right now? How should they know which one is the right one to execute against?
Comparisons: How should founders use and look to public company performance and market cap to determine which plan they should choose?
Hiring Freeze: Why does Martin believe the biggest companies …
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20VC: Plaid and Column Co-Founder, William Hockey on Why the Brands that Win in Fintech Will Not Be Financial Services Brands, What US Banking Can Learn from China & Why Companies Can Be Built Slower than People Think?
2 december 2022 · 50 min
Will Hockey is the Co-Founder and Co-CEO @ Column, the only nationally chartered bank built to enable developers and builders to create new financial products. Before co-founding Column, Will was the Co-Founder, President, and CTO @ Plaid, a world-leading data network and payments platform. In 2020, Visa attempted to acquire Plaid for $5.3BN, however, this was blocked due to regulatory issues and the company went on to raise at a reported $13.4BN valuation just 9 months later. Additionally, Will is on the board of Scale.ai. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Will Hockey We Discuss:
1.) The Founding of $13.4BN Plaid:
How did Will make his way into the world of startups and come to found Plaid with Zach?
If we are all a function of our histories, what is Will running from? What is he running toward?
What does Will know now that he wishes he had known when he started Plaid?
2.) Will Hockey: The Makings of a Decacorn Founder:
What does the term "high performance" mean to Will? How has this changed over time?
Having had such a successful time building Plaid to $13.4BN, how does Will assess his own relationship to risk and his relationship to money?
How does Will approach his own personal portfolio planning? Equity, debt, real-estate? How does Will optimize his own personal wealth?
Column is his second time founding a company, what did Will decide to take from Plaid that worked well? What did he decide he would not do having seen it work badly at Plaid?
3.) The Building of Truly Great Teams:
Why does Will believe that companies can be built so much slower than people think?
How does Will determine the decisions that have to be made fast vs those with time?
How does Will ensure the same size of urgency and speed within his team without this time or funding pressure?
What have been Will's single biggest lessons when it comes to people acquisition and retention?
4.) Fintech: The Next 10 Years:
How will the next 10 years look different from the last in fintech? What ch…
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20VC: Jason Lemkin on Why Founders Do Not Care About Their VCs Anymore, Why Zoom Made Us All Worse Investors, Why 80-90% IRR Should Have Been Warning Signs and the Algolia Journey From Seed to $2.25BN Valuation
30 november 2022 · 1 uur
Jason Lemkin is one of the OGs of SaaS of the last decade. As the Founder of SaaStr, he has inspired more SaaS founders than one can imagine building "The World's Largest Community for Business Software." Jason also invests out of the $100M SaaStr Fund and in the past Jason has led rounds into TalkDesk, Pipedrive, Algolia, Gorgias, Salesloft, and many more incredible companies. Prior to founding SaaStr, Jason was the Co-Founder of Echosign, an early e-signature business, funded by Emergence Capital and that was acquired by Adobe for $100M. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Jason Lemkin On Algolia We Discuss:
1.) Meeting the Unicorn: Algolia:
How did Jason first come to meet Nicolas (Founder) and Algolia?
What specific elements of cold emails make the best attract Jason's attention? What do they have in them? What are the most common mistakes people make with cold emails?
What is the single biggest mistake Jason made when making the deal with Algolia? How did Jason lead their seed round when their round was "oversubscribed"?
2.) Competition and TAM: The Reasons To Say No:
Competing with Free: How did Jason analyze the competitive landscape Algolia was facing? How did he gain comfort that they could compete and win against free and open-source?
TAM Analysis: The TAM at the time for Algolia was $2M. How did Jason analyze the TAM at the time? How did he get comfortable with such a small TAM?
What are the single biggest mistakes investors make when analyzing competition today? What are the biggest mistakes founders make when presenting the competitive landscape?
What are the single biggest mistakes investors make when analyzing TAM today? What are the biggest mistakes founders make when presenting the TAM and how it breaks down?
3.) Investing Lessons Transition from CEO to VC:
Jason has previously said one of his biggest lessons is "bet on what you know when you go from CEO to VC"? What did he mean by this?
How can one keep this operator knowledge and mentality when …
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20VC: Wolt CEO, Miki Kuusi on Leadership Lessons Scaling to a Reported $8.1BN Exit to Doordash, Building Teams not Families, The Difference Between Trust and Safety Within Companies, How To Use Compensation to Create Culture & Why You Should Not Be Lookin
28 november 2022 · 1 uur 4 min
Miki Kuusi is the CEO of Wolt and Head of DoorDash International. In 2014 Miki founded Wolt with a mission to turn the smartphone into a remote controller for life, starting with delivering your favorite restaurant food, to you at home. Today Wolt operates in 23 countries, across several different categories, has over 4,000 employees, and last year, Doordash made the move to join forces with Wolt in a deal worth a reported $8.1BN. Previously, Miki was the CEO of Slush, one of the leading tech and investor events in the world attended by more than 25,000 people annually. Lees meer
In Today's Discussion with Miki Kuusi:
1.) Founding Slush and Wolt: An Entry into Startups:
How did Miki come to found Wolt? What was that a-ha moment?
Did Wolt have product-market-fit from Day 1? What was the turning point when they did?
What does Miki know now that he wishes he had known when he started Wolt on Day 1?
2.) The Makings of a Truly Great Leader:
How does Miki define "high performance" today in leadership?
How does Miki think about what focus means in leadership? What is the hardest decision Miki has had to make when it comes to focusing the company? What did he learn from Ilkka @ Supercell?
What does Miki believe is the KPI of success as the CEO? How does it change?
What does Miki believe is the difference between good vs great leadership?
What does Miki believe is the biggest sacrifice he has made as the CEO?
3.) Hiring a Team to Compete on a Global Stage:
How does Miki use compensation to create a culture of ownership and accountability?
Does Miki start from a position of trust and it is there to be lost or no trust and it is there to be gained?
What is the difference between a team and a family in company building?
What is the core difference between trust and safety in company building? Why does Miki always want to have trust but not want to have safety?
What are the single biggest hiring mistakes that Miki has made? How has he learned from them?
Why does Miki be…
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20VC: When to Make Your First Growth Hire? Senior or Junior? How To Onboard Them? How To Monitor Their Progress? from Growth Leaders @ Facebook, Instagram, Lyft, Instacart, Miro and more
25 november 2022 · 34 min
Casey Winters is the Chief Product Officer at Eventbrite. Prior to Eventbrite, Casey led the growth product team at Pinterest. Before Pinterest, Casey started the marketing team at Grubhub and scaled Grubhub's demand-side acquisition and retention strategies. Lees meer
Elena Verna is the Interim Head of Growth at Amplitude. Former exec @ Miro, Netlify, SurveyMonkey. Growth Advisor to companies including Krisp, MongoDB, Ledgy, Builder.io and SimilarWeb.
Kieran Flanagan is SVP Marketing at HubSpot, where he has helped the business grow internationally, move to a product-led business, quadrupled its marketing demand, and built out its media team, including the acquisition of 'The Hustle.'
Andy Johns career started in growth at Facebook when the company scaled from 100M-500M active users. Since he has worked in some of the leading growth orgs at companies like Twitter, Quora and more recently at Wealthfront as Head of Growth and President.
Bangaly Kaba is the Director of Product Management @ Youtube. Prior to Youtube, Bangaly led the product growth and consumer product orgs at Instacart and before Instacart was Head of Growth @ Instagram, helping grow Instagram from 440M to > 1B monthly actives in 2.5yrs.
Ed Baker is a growth advisor to various startups including Lime, Zwift, Whoop, Crimson Education, GoPeer, and Playbook. Ed was the VP of Product and Growth at Uber from 2013-2017. Prior to Uber, Ed was the Head of International Growth at Facebook.
Adam Fishman was the Chief Product and Growth Offer @ Imperfect Foods. Before Imperfect, Adam was VP of Product and Growth @ Patreon, Before Patreon, Adam was the Head of Growth @ Lyft, Adam was the first growth and marketing employee hired and grew the team to 18 people.
In Today's Discussion on When To Hire a Head of Growth:
1.) When is the right time to hear your first growth hire?
2.) Is this hire a senior growth leader or a more junior growth engineer?
3.) What can early-stage startups do to entice senior growth leaders…
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20VC: Why Operating Experience Becomes Irrelevant Fast and Operators Often Give Bad Advice to Founders, Is Silicon Valley Really Dead? Are Gen Z the Most Entitled Employees? What Will Happen to a Generation of Pre-PMF Companies with $50M in the Bank with
23 november 2022 · 39 min
Jeffrey Katzenberg is an entertainment industry executive and entrepreneur, who throughout his career has repeatedly reshaped the media landscape. Jeffrey co-founded DreamWorks SKG, serving as CEO of DreamWorks Animation, which he grew into the world's largest animation studio, known for Shrek, Kung Fu Panda, Madagascar and more. In 2016, DreamWorks Animation was sold to Comcast for $3.8 billion. Before founding DreamWorks, Jeffrey was Chairman of The Walt Disney Studios, where he took the studio from last place to first at the box office with hits like Three Men and a Baby, Pretty Woman, Father of the Bride and Sister Act. Most recently, Jeffrey co-founded WndrCo alongside Sujay Jaswa and has led WndrCo's investments in Airtable, Frame.io, Quibi, Vise, Placer.ai, NexHealth, Deel, and ID.me. Lees meer
Sujay Jaswa is one of Silicon Valley's leading business innovators. At Dropbox, he created and led the company's global business and finance organizations. Sujay and his teams raised over $1 billion, launched and scaled Dropbox's products for businesses, created partnerships responsible for over 100 million users, executed some 20 acquisitions, and scaled the global business team from two to more than 500 employees in seven global offices. During this period, the company significantly scaled overall revenue from $12 million in 2010 to over $500 million run rate, Dropbox for Business revenue from $1 million to over $200mm run rate, and users from 15 million to 300 million. Most recently, Sujay Jaswa and Jeffrey Katzenberg co-founded WndrCo and Sujay has led WndrCo's investments in Figma, 1Password, Databricks, Pango, Pilot, Rally, Zagat / The Infatuation, and other great companies.
In Today's Episode with Jeffrey Katzenberg and Sujay Jaswa:
1.) From Dreamworks and Dropbox to Venture with WndrCo:
How did Jeffrey and Sujay both make their way into the world of venture from Dropbox and Dreamworks?
What was Jeffrey's single biggest lesson from his time leading Dreamworks and be…
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20VC: Semil Shah on The Biggest Mistakes VCs and LPs Made Over the Last 24 Months, Why LP Churn is Coming, Core Lessons on Scaling from $1M Haystack Fund I to Today and How To Find, Win and Manage LPs as an Emerging Manager
21 november 2022 · 1 uur 5 min
Semil Shah is the Founder of Haystack, one of the leading pre-seed and seed firms of the last decade. Among Semil's portfolio include the likes of DoorDash ($DASH), Instacart, Hashicorp ($HCP), Opendoor ($OPEN), Figma (acquired by Adobe), Carta and many more exceptional companies. Semil's first fund is marked between a 30 and 40x fund, astonishing. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Semil Shah We Discuss:
1.) The Makings of Semil Shah:
What is Semil running away from? What is he running towards?
What does Semil know now that he wishes he had known when entering venture?
What is Semil's biggest advice to managers raising their first funds now?
2.) Fund Sizing: Growing vs Staying Disciplined:
Question from Hunter Walk: How does Semil determine the right size fund to raise with each fund
Question from Satya Patel: Why have you resisted increasing AUM?
In the last episode Semil mentioned a three-year deployment cycle for the fund, did he stick to it? What are the benefits and drawbacks?
What investing mistakes did Semil make over the last 3 years that he wishes he had not made?
3.) The Secret to Fundraising for a Fund:
What is Semil's biggest advice to emerging managers on finding new LPs? What works?
What materials do managers need to have in place for a new fundraise? Deck? Dataroom?
What are the most common mistakes VCs make when pitching LPs their funds?
How does Semil follow-up with potential LPs post-call? What works? What does not?
How does Semil suggest creating a sense of urgency for LPs to commit to a fund?
How does Semil feel about giving preferential terms to convince LPs to commit to the first close?
4.) The Current Landscape:
For VCs:
How will the current landscape impact emerging managers' ability to raise?
What advice would Semil give to them? Raise smaller?
Kyle Harrison said on the show recently, "differentiation will kill 80% of venture firms, especially the so-so ones". Does Semil agree? Who is set to struggle? Who is set to thrive in thi…
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20VC Rising Star: Why Founders Should Expect More From Their VCs | How To Know Pre-Investment Whether a VC Will Be Valuable and How to Get the Most Value Out of Them | Is There a Misalignment Between Founders and VCs with Oana Olteanu, Partner @ SignalFir
18 november 2022 · 38 min
Oana Olteanu is a Partner @ SignalFire where she focuses on enterprise software at Seed, Series A and Series B. Prior to joining SignalFire, Oana was at Scale Venture Partners where she invested in applied ML and developer tooling. Oana sourced Scale's investments in Observe.ai, Flatfile, and Proscia. She was part of the deal teams for Honeycomb and AllyO (acquired by HireVue). She also supported existing portfolio companies such as Dialpad, Matillion, and BigID. Prior to Scale, Oana was an AI seed investor at SAP.io, SAP's $35M seed fund, where she sourced the investments in Plum.io, Oto.ai, and Akorda. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Oana Olteanu We Discuss:
1.) From Tank Driving in Romania to VC's Rising Star:
How Oana made her way from driving tanks in Romania to becoming a VC?
How did leaving Romania for Germany and then moving to the West Coast impact her mindset?
What does Oana know now that she wishes she had known when she entered VC?
2.) How to Assess a VC: The Founders Guide:
Pre-investment, how can founders know whether a VC can add value? What are the signs?
What three core questions will reveal how much value a VC can add?
Post-investment, what can founders do to extract the most value from their VCs?
What should the founders ask their investors for help with? What should they do themselves?
3.) The VC <> Founder Relationship:
Oana has the highest founder NPS of any VC I have ever had on 20VC, what does Oana believe makes her founders rate her contribution so highly? What works? What does not?
How does Oana give sometimes very hard feedback to founders but retain that relationship of trust and safety at the same time? What mistakes do other VCs make in giving feedback?
What does Oana believe are the single biggest misalignment between VCs and founders?
4.) VCs Behaving Badly: 101
What are the single biggest ways Oana sees VCs behaving badly?
How does Oana think founders expectations of the product of venture should change?
Does Oana believe …
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20 Sales: The Ultimate Guide to Sales Onboarding for New Sales Reps and Sales Leaders, The Biggest Red Flags in the First 30 Days & What Can Be Done to Set Them Up for Success with Leaders from Figma, Dropbox, Miro and more.
16 november 2022 · 31 min
Oliver Jay (OJ) is one of the most successful sales leaders of the last decade. Most recently, OJ spent 6 years as CRO @ Asana and grew the team from 20 to over 450, becoming a master in sales onboarding in the process. Before Asana, OJ spent 4 years at Dropbox, where OJ was Head of APAC & LATAM. Lees meer
Jordan Van Horn is a Revenue Leader @ Monte Carlo. Prior to this role, Jordan spent 4 years at Segment as VP of Sales, leading a sales team of 50+ Account Executives. Before Segment, Jordan was at Dropbox for 4 years leading enterprise sales for Dropbox Business.
Dannie Herzberg is a Partner @ Sequoia Capital and before Sequoia, Dannie spent 4 years at Slack as their Head of Enterprise Sales, growing the business from $100M – $1B in revenue. Before Slack, Dannie spent over 5 years at Hubspot building sales teams.
Zhenya Loginov is the CRO @ Miro. At Miro, Zhenya runs the go-to-market team of 700+ people across. Prior to Miro, Zhenya was the COO @ Segment where he built and ran the global go-to-market team of 200+ people. Pre-Segment, Zhenya led a 100-person team at Dropbox across different functional areas.
Lauren Schwartz is VP of Enterprise Sales at Fivetran, where she has scaled the team to nearly 100, while more than tripling enterprise revenues. Previously, Lauren spent close to 4 years at Segment where she started as the first female AE and ultimately built and led sales teams in enterprise and growth.
Kyle Parrish is VP Sales @ Figma, where he built the sales engine from scratch to today, with over 100 in sales. Before Figma, Kyle spent over 5 years at Dropbox in numerous different roles including Head of Sales, and Global Partnerships lead, responsible for growing Dropbox's partner ecosystem.
In Todays Episode on Sales Onboarding We Discuss:
1.) How should the onboarding process for all new sales reps be structured?
2.) How should the onboarding process for a new sales leader be structured?
3.) What specific things can leaders do to set both reps and leade…
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20VC: ARK Invest's Cathie Wood on Why ARK Has Not Had More Outflows Despite Performance, How the Global Tech Equities Market Will Go From $7Trn to $210Trn in 8-10 Years, The Future for Facebook and How Elon Musk and Jack Dorsey Could Create the Biggest Di
14 november 2022 · 47 min
Cathie Wood is the CEO & CIO @ ARK Invest, focusing solely on disruptive innovation, primarily in the public equity markets. ARK has become renowned for opening up its research and becoming a 'sharing economy' company in the asset management space. Prior to ARK, Cathie spent twelve years at AllianceBernstein as CIO of Global Thematic Strategies where she managed over $5 billion. Cathie joined Alliance Capital from Tupelo Capital Management, a hedge fund she co-founded, which managed $800 million in global thematic strategies. Prior to Tupelo Capital, she worked for 18 years with Jennison Associates LLC as Chief Economist, Portfolio Manager and Director. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Cathie Wood We Discuss:
1.) Entry into Hedge Funds at 20:
How did Cathie get her first role in the world of finance at the tender age of 20?
What is Cathie running from? What is Cathie running towards?
What are some of Cathie's biggest lessons from seeing the dot com bust at Tupelo?
What does Cathie know now that she wishes she had known when she started investing?
2.) Why Benchmarks and Passive Investing are Bad:
Why does Cathie believe that benchmarks and indexes have become dangerous for consumers?
Why does Cathie not believe what everyone else does regarding inflation?
How much of the performance of large-cap tech stocks is tied to the growth of passive investing?
Why does Cathie think the Fed is making a huge mistake?
3.) Time to Pick Companies:
Why does Cathie believe that Facebook is emerging as an attractive value stock?
How does Cathie believe Elon Musk and Jack Dorsey could build the largest universal wallet?
If Cathie were to put all her money into one of their companies, what would it be?
Why does Cathie believe Zoom is one of the most misunderstood companies?
4.) Why Venture: Why Now:
Why did Cathie decide to do a venture fund with ARK now?
Why did Cathie decide to do a no-carry structure with a higher management fee? How does that align incentives with investo…
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20VC: Why Market Size is Everything | Three Signs of a Bull Market and How To Remain Disciplined | Why Investing is a Young Person's Game | The Secret to Negotiation | Missing a $200M Opportunity in Nubank and more with Martín Escobari, Co-President @ Ge
11 november 2022 · 46 min
Martín Escobari is Co-President, Managing Director and Head of General Atlantic's business in Latin America. Martín is Chairman of the firm's Investment Committee and also serves on the Management and Portfolio Committees. Before joining General Atlantic in 2012, Martín was a Managing Director at Advent International. Prior to that, he was Co-Founder and CFO of Submarino.com, a leading Brazilian online retailer that went public and was sold to Lojas Americanas in 2006. Martin started his career as a management consultant at The Boston Consulting Group. Thanks to Seba Kanovich @ dlocal for the introduction today. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Martín Escobari:
1.) From Bolivia to Harvard to Leading General Atlantic:
How did Martin make his way into the world of venture from a small town in Bolivia?
How did being an operator going through a bust impact how Martin invests and works with founders?
How does Martin advise young members on his team about surviving through a bust?
2.) Market Matters: Founders, Product or Market:
Why does Martin believe the single most important element when investing is the market you are entering?
How does Martin assess both market size and market growth?
What does Martin believe makes a "beautiful business model"? What is the difference between good vs great? Why have we seen a generation of bad business models?
How did Martin's analysis of Nubank's market lead him to turn them down? How did Martin change his approach to investing on the back of turning down Nubank?
3.) The Venture Landscape:
What made Martin believe there was a downturn last year? What three signs always suggest we are in a bubble?
As a result, how did General Atlantic retain their discipline when others did not? Where did they lose their discipline and invest at the top of the market?
How does Martin analyse the performance of the crossover funds in the last 24 months? Who did well? Who did not? Do they remain in the market?
Is Martin concerned by the exodus of…
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20 Product: Hugo Barra on Lessons Building Hardware Products at Android, Xiaomi, Oculus, and Detect; Feature Kings vs. Budget Kings; 996 Work Culture in China; There Are No MVPs in Hardware; The 3.5-Hour Recruiting Interview
9 november 2022 · 53 min
Hugo Barra is the OG of consumer hardware of the last decade. In Hugo's current position, he is the CEO @ Detect, building tools that empower people to understand their health and make informed, timely decisions. Before Detect, Hugo spent an incredible 4 years as VP of VR @ Meta with Oculus. Prior to Oculus, Hugo was in China as VP of Global @ Xiaomi, the 3rd largest phone maker in the world. Finally before Xiaomi, Hugo was a product leader @ Google for over 5 years including as VP of Android Product Management. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Hugo Barra We Discuss:
1.) Entry into Product:
How did Hugo make his way from Brazil to Silicon Valley and Beijing Product OG?
What is one takeaway from Google, Meta, and Xiaomi that influenced the way Hugo approaches product today?
What is 996 Chinese work culture? How does the experience of working and leading teams in China impact his approach to team building today?
2.) The Secret to Success in Hardware:
Why is hardware so much harder than software? What are the main differences?
What are the biggest challenges faced when building V1 and V2 in hardware? How much do you rely on data vs gut and intuition?
What are some of Hugo's biggest consumer product hardware failures? What did he learn from them?
3.) Feature King vs Budget King:
Previously Hugo has said, "in the beginning, there is only two types of consumers." What does he mean by this? How does that impact his approach to product building?
Can a budget king product leader also be an amazing feature king leader? What is the difference in the two? Why is it harder to be a budget king product leader?
What happens if you have both budget king and feature king in one product? What happens then?
4.) Product Management 101:
How does Hugo define product management today? What does it really mean to Hugo?
Gustav @ Spotify has said before, "details are not details, they are the product." How does Hugo think about this statement in terms of great product management today…
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20VC: Coinbase's Brian Armstrong on Real vs Fake Emergencies, Coinbase's Failed NFT Launch, The Politicisation of Leadership, Why This Crypto Winter is Different From The Past & Brian's Development and Insecurities as a Leader
7 november 2022 · 42 min
Brian Armstrong is the Co-Founder and CEO @ Coinbase, the easiest place to buy and sell cryptocurrency. Over the last 10 years, Brian has led Coinbase to today, a public company with over 3,500 employees and revenues of over $7.5BN in 2021. Brian also raised venture funding before going public from some of the best including Fred Wilson @ USV, Micky Malka @ Ribbit, Marc Andreesen @ a16z and Garry and Alexis at Initialized. Prior to founding Coinbase, Brian was a Product Manager @ Airbnb. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Brian Armstrong We Discuss:
1.) Founding Coinbase:
How did Brian make his way from PM @ Airbnb to founding Coinbase?
What is Brian running from in his past? What is he running toward in his future?
What does Brian know now that he wishes he had known at the start of Coinbase?
2.) Brian Armstrong: The Leader:
What does "high performance" mean to Brian in leadership?
How does Brian think about stepping off the treadmill for a second and appreciating what has been achieved? How does one celebrate as a team without creating laziness or arrogance?
How has Brian most changed as a leader over the last 10 years?
On reflection, what does Brian believe are his biggest weaknesses today?
3.) Crucible Moments in the Coinbase Journey:
What does Brian mean when he says, "you need to be able to differentiate between a real emergency and a fame emergency?" What is the difference?
When Brian made the speech to the Coinbase team on political views in the company, was that a real or fake emergency? What happened? What would he have done differently?
Is the failed NFT launch, a real or fake emergency? What big mistakes were made? What are Coinbase doing to correct and improve them?
"Bankrupt Coinbase" campaign on social earlier this year, real or fake emergency? What has been Brian's biggest lessons on how to deal with fake news?
4.) Crypto and The Ultimate Mission for Coinbase:
What is different about this crypto winter from all other crypto winters?
Why did B…
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20VC: Michael Mauboussin on Good vs Bad Investment Decision-Making Processes, How To Improve Your Process, How To Know When it Needs Improving and The Single Biggest Mistakes People Make In Their Decision-Making Process
4 november 2022 · 49 min
Michael Mauboussin is Head of Consilient Research at Counterpoint Global. Previously, he was Director of Research at BlueMountain Capital, Head of Global Financial Strategies at Credit Suisse, and Chief Investment Strategist at Legg Mason Capital Management. He is also the author of three incredible books, including More Than You Know: Finding Financial Wisdom in Unconventional Places, named in The 100 Best Business Books of All Time by 800-CEO-Read. Michael has taught at Columbia Business School since 1993 and received the Dean's Award for Teaching Excellence in 2009 and 2016. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Michael Mauboussin We Discuss:
1.) Entry into Venture and Finance:
What does Michael actually do as "Head of Consilient Research"?
What does Michael know now that he wishes he had known when he entered finance?
How did Michael and Bill Gurley meet in business school? What does Michael believe makes Bill such a special investor today?
2.) Booms and Busts: How This Compares?
How does the current macro downturn compare to prior crashes Michael has worked through?
What is the same? What is different? How do political and health events impact the macro?
Why was 1987 the end of the world at the time? How did the recovery take place?
How does Michael analyze the duration of bull markets vs the duration of recovery time?
What advice does Michael give to young people today questioning if they are good investors?
3.) The Investment Decision-Making Process:
How does Michael advise on the structuring of your decision-making process?
What makes a good process vs a bad process?
What can be done to remove politics from the decision-making process?
What can be done to ensure all people, regardless of hierarchy feel safe in the process and feel they can share their thoughts without repercussions?
What are the single biggest mistakes Michael sees people make in their decision-making process?
How do you know when is the right time to change your process?
4.) Everythin…
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20VC: The GoPuff Memo: Why 10-15 Minute Delivery is an Unsustainable Model, The Plan to Make GoPuff Profitable by 2024, Mistakes Made in Europe and What the Europe Plan Should Have Been and What Does Quick Commerce Look Like in 5 Years with Rafael Illisha
2 november 2022 · 43 min
Raf Illishayev is the Co-Founder and CEO @ GoPuff, one of the market leaders delivering daily essentials in minutes. GoPuff's latest funding round priced the company at a reported $8.9Bn in March 2021 and to date, Rafael has raised over $2.4Bn for the company from the likes of Accel, Softbank, Fidelity, Baillie Gifford, D1 Capital and more. Rafael has scaled the company to over 1/3 of the US with over 12,000 employees nationwide. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with GoPuff's Rafael Ilishayev You Will Learn:
1.) From Student to Global CEO:
How Raf came up with the idea for GoPuff and started the company as a student with no funding?
What were the early signs of product-market fit that Raf observed in the early days?
In hindsight, does Raf wish they had raised external funding sooner than they did? What would raising external funding sooner have changed about the way they run the business?
2.) The Rise and Fall of Quick Commerce:
What are the core drivers that have led to capital drying up for players in the quick commerce space?
With the changing environment, is it a race to profitability for all providers in the space?
Is this the perfect time for GoPuff to acquire? What are the characteristics of businesses in the space that GoPuff would vs would not like to acquire?
How does Raf see the quick commerce space looking in 5 years time?
3.) Getting to Profitability: The Levers That Matter:
Customer Service: Why does Raf believe that all players pulling back on investing in customer service are making a massive mistake? What can be done instead?
Delivery Time: Why does Raf believe the 10-minute delivery model is fundamentally unprofitable? How do GoPuff approach it as a result?
Inventory: With a changing macro-environment, why does Raf believe it is prudent to focus more attention on alcohol and convenience goods? What do prior recessions show us about consumer spending patterns changing?
Metrics: What are the single most important metrics which dictate the speed of …
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20VC: Founders Fund's Brian Singerman on The Price Mismatch Between Public vs Private, Why Now Is Not The Best Time To Be Investing, Why Brian Never Thinks About Reserves and Believes in Cross-Fund Investing & Writing a $400M Check Into Anduril Across Rou
31 oktober 2022 · 41 min
Brian Singerman is a Partner @ Founders Fund, one of the best-performing funds of the last two decades. Among their portfolio, they have the likes of Airbnb, Facebook, Stripe, Anduril, and many more generational-defining companies. As for Brian, he has led investments in the likes of Affirm, Oscar Health, Wish, Asana, Oculus, and Postmates to name a few. Brian also sits on the board or is an observer to The Long Term Stock Exchange, Solugen, Cloud9, Modern Health, and of course, Anduril. Prior to Founders Fund, Brian spent a very successful 4 years as an engineer and executive at Google. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Brian Singerman We Discuss:
1.) From Google to Befriending Sean Parker to Founders Fund:
How Brian's friendship with Sean Parker led to his joining Founders Fund over 15 years ago?
What does Brian believe makes Founders Fund such a unique fund?
What does Brian know now that he wishes he had known when he started in venture?
2.) The Landscape Today: Where Are We Now?
Why does Brian believe there is a huge price mismatch between private vs public companies?
How does this impact the pace with which Founders Fund invest? Why does Brian not feel any pressure to invest in this environment?
What are the 10 hypergrowth companies that Brian is looking to invest in today?
What advice does Brian give to young investors today who are concerned at their first market correction and questioning if they are actually any good at this?
3.) Brian Singerman: The Investor:
How does Brian reflect on his own investing style? What is he world-class at? What is he bad at?
Why does Brian think boards are a waste of time? What is better than a board?
Why does Brian not ever think about reserves? How does Brian answer LPs concerns when they cite them on the topic of cross-fund investing?
What does Brian believe is the secret to venture capital? What elements make those at Founders Fund thrive? What characteristics make those that do not work out, fail?
4.) Founders Fund…
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20VC: Chris Sacca, Chamath Palihapitiya, Gary Vee, Brad Gerstner and more on Their Relationship To Money, How It Has Changed with Time and Wealth, How They Bring Up Their Children To Engender the Same Values of Ambition and Hard Work?
28 oktober 2022 · 27 min
Chris Sacca is the Founder and Chairman @ Lowercase Capital, one of the best performing funds in the history of venture capital with a portfolio including Uber, Stripe, Twitter, Instagram, Twilio, Docker and many more. Lees meer
From interviewing some of the world's richest married couples, how did gaining wealth change their relationship and marriage?
What does Chris do to actively ensure his children remain hungry and know the value of money?
Chamath Palihapitiya is Founder & CEO @ Social Capital. Social's portfolio includes the likes of Slack, Yammer, Front, Intercom and Carta to name a few.
What does Chamath mean when he says we need to think through the mindset of "infinite games" not finite games? How does this change how you think about money?
How does Chamath think about his relationship to risk today as a result?
Brad Gerstner is the Founder and CEO of Altimeter. Brad's notable deals that he has helped lead include Snowflake, Mongo, Bytedance, Gusto, Unity, Okta, dbt, Modern Treasury, EPIC Games, Hotel Tonight and Zillow.
What is the most important thing parents can do to ensure that despite wealth, their children remain grounded and ambitious?
Why does Brad, despite being a billionaire, still live in a modest house and not spend on the excesses of life? How does Brad embrace essentialism with wealth?
Cyan Banister is one of the most successful and renowned early-stage investors in the last decade. Her portfolio includes the likes of SpaceX, Uber, Affirm, Opendoor Postmates, Niantic and Thumbtack to name a few.
Why did Cyan used to hate money? Why was she "anti-capitalist"?
How does Cyan approach risk management today? Why does she invest every dollar she makes back into the ecosystem?
George Zachary is a General Partner @ CRV, one of the nation's oldest and most successful early-stage venture capital firms with a portfolio including the likes of Airtable, DoorDash, Dropbox, Niantic and many more.
What did George learn about how the way people view you …
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20Growth: Biggest Growth Lessons from Reddit and Zynga on Scaling to Millions of Users | Why, When and How To Hire Your First Growth Hires | The Biggest Mistakes Founders Make In Hiring, Onboarding and Integration for Growth Teams with Vaibhav Sahgal, VP
26 oktober 2022 · 45 min
Vaibhav Sahgal is VP of Consumer Product @ Reddit where he has been for close to 5 years. Prior to his leading consumer product, Vaibhav spent 3 years as Head of Growth at Reddit. Before Reddit, Vaibhav spent an incredible 8 years at Zynga across different roles including Director of Product and GM for "Words with Friends". Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Vaibhav Sahgal We Discuss:
1.) Entry into Product + Growth:
How did Vaibhav come to lead some of the best growth orgs in the world at both Reddit and Zynga?
What are 1-2 of Vaibhav's biggest takeaways from working with Mark Pincus @ Zynga?
What is the most painful growth lesson that Vaibhav learned that he is also pleased to have learned?
2.) WTF Really is "Growth":
How does Vaibhav define growth today? What is it not?
How does Vaibhav fundamentally differentiate between value connection and value creation?
Is growth an art or a science? What tactics have died a death? What remains stronger than ever?
3.) Hiring Your Growth Team:
How does Vaibhav advise founders on when is the right time to hire their first growth professionals?
Where should they sit within the org? In product? In marketing? Standalone growth team?
What are the biggest mistakes Vaibhav sees founders make when hiring their first growth hires?
4.) The Interview Process:
How does Vaibhav structure the interview process for all new growth hires? What are the steps?
What are the must-ask questions when hiring for growth? What are good answers?
How can founders use case studies and data to determine the quality of a growth candidate?
5.) The Onboarding and Integration:
What is the optimal onboarding process for all new growth hires?
What are signs in the first 3 days that a growth hire will vs will not work out?
What can leaders do to ensure growth hires are integrated with the rest of the teams?
What are the biggest mistakes founders make when onboarding growth hires?
Items Mentioned in Today's Episode:
Vaibhav's Favourite Book: Andrew …
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20VC: Uber's Journey to Becoming the Most Valuable Private Tech Company in History, Raising $3BN From Saudi in Just 60 Days, Uber's $30BN Mistake in Food Delivery, Why Recent Uber M&A Will be the Worst in Tech & Mastering Negotiations and Deal-Making with
24 oktober 2022 · 1 uur 3 min
Emil Michael is the Former Chief Business Officer at Uber and is commonly referred to as Travis Kalanick's right-hand man. At Uber, Emil was instrumental in raising nearly $15BN from some of the largest investors in the world, making Uber the most valuable private tech company ever. Emil was also core to Uber's China strategy and led deals with Didi and Baidu. Before Uber, Emil spent 9 years at TellMe Networks where he was central to Microsoft raising their acquisition price from $300M to $800M. Emil is also an advisor to some of the greats including Raf @ GoPuff, Zach @ Codeacademy, Jared @ Fundera and many more. Lees meer
In Todays Episode with Emil Michael:
1.) From Politics to Travis's right-hand man at Uber:
How did Emil make his way into the world of startups with TellMe networks?
Harvard, Stanford, Goldman, Politics, which career shaped Emil the most?
When Emil looks at his cohort of Ali and Hadi Partovi, Alfred Lin, and many others, what did they have that Emil believes is core to their success today?
2.) Negotiations 101: A Masterclass:
What is Emil's framework for dealmaking? How has it changed over time?
What are the single most important elements to remember when making deals?
What are the biggest mistakes people make when negotiating?
What is the right way to use leverage in negotiations?
How can one handle an opponent that is emotional or irrational when negotiating?
How did Emil make Steve Ballmer @ Microsoft increase his offer for TellMe from $300M to $800M?
What is the single deal that Emil made that he regrets the most?
3.) Uber: The Journey to the Most Valuable Private Company:
Why were Emil and Travis removed from Uber? Does Emil think it was fair?
Is it true that Travis lost the support of the team? How did his removal take place?
How did the Uber China deal go down with Didi? What got DiDi over the line on the deal?
How did Emil raise $3BN from Saudi in just 60 days with Travis needing to attend only one meeting?
4.) Uber: The Review:…
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20VC: Why 75% of Active Investors Will Disappear in the Next Few Years, The Death of "So So" Venture Firms is Coming, The Rise of Blackstone of Venture Firms and What That Does To Venture Returns, How the World of LPs is Broken and more with Kyle Harrison
21 oktober 2022 · 49 min
Kyle Harrison is a General Partner @ Contrary and one of my favorite writers on the venture space with his blog, Investing 101 2.0. Before joining Contrary, Kyle worked in the ranks of some of the biggest and best names in venture, starting with a spell at TCV before moving to Coatue and making his final stop at Index. Across firms, Kyle has led or participated in investments including Ramp, Pave, Anduril, Gitlab, Databricks and Snowflake to name a few. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Kyle Harrison:
1.) From Film Lover to Technology Investor:
How Kyle went from creating a professional services marketplace around film to joining the ranks of TCV and investing in breakout technology companies?
What was Kyle's biggest takeaway from TCV? How did it impact his mindset?
What was Kyle's biggest lesson from working with the Laffont's at Coatue? How did it change the way he thinks about price and market sizing?
Why was Index such a transformational school of venture for Kyle? How did that experience change how he thinks about what it takes to be a great investor?
2.) The Death of So So Venture Firms:
Why does Kyle believe many of the "so so" venture firms will die?
What does Kyle believe makes a venture firm "so so"? Who is vulnerable then?
How does Kyle think the lifespan and "death" of venture firms will change in the next decade?
3.) The Rise of "The Blackstone of Venture Firms":
How does Kyle define "the Blackstone of VCs"? Who are they?
With increasing fund sizes will we see VC returns denigrate to PE returns?
How is the world of family offices changing the venture environment? Will we see more or less money flood into venture over the coming years?
Of the incumbents, who has done "The Blackstone" model well? Why? Who has failed? Why?
4.) The Rise of Community in Venture:
What does "community" really mean to Kyle? Why does he believe it will play such a prominent role in the way the best invest in the future?
How have existing players failed to build, sustain…
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20 Sales: How To Structure The Interview Process for All Sales Reps, The Must-Ask Questions When Identifying Potential Sales Talent & The 3 Biggest Mistakes Founders Make When Hiring Their First Reps with Lauren Schwartz, VP of Enterprise Sales @ Fivetran
19 oktober 2022 · 48 min
Lauren Schwartz is Vice President of Enterprise Sales at Fivetran, the leading platform for modern data movement. She has helped scale Fivetran's enterprise business from its infancy to a team of nearly 100, while more than tripling enterprise revenues. Previously, Lauren spent close to 4 years at Segment where she started as the first female AE and ultimately built and led sales teams in enterprise and growth. Lauren earned an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business after 6 years at Google where her enterprise sales career began. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Lauren Schwartz:
1.) How Being Rejected as an Eighth Grader Can Lead to World Class Sales Leader:
How Lauren made her way into the world of enterprise sales with Google?
Why, for a while, Lauren wanted to get away from the label of a salesperson? Why "salesperson" does not do the job of sales justice?
Why does Lauren believe that one of the core traits the best salespeople have is being able to cope with rejection? How has Lauren been rejected? How did she respond? What changed their mind?
2.) The Sales Playbook: What, Who, When:
How does Lauren define the term "sales playbook"? What are the nuances?
Does Lauren believe the founder should always be the first sales rep? What are the core signs that a founder is now ready to bring in their first sales hires?
What are the 3 biggest mistakes founders make when they hire their first sales reps?
What are the core traits that the best early sales reps have?
3.) The Hiring Process: Building the Best Sales Team:
How does Lauren structure the hiring process?
What are the most unconventional but useful questions Lauren uses to determine the depth and quality of potential sales hires?
What are the glaring red flags that Lauren looks for in this interview process?
How does Lauren use case studies and deal reviews in the interview process to determine the quality of a candidate?
4.) Scaling the Machine: The Onboarding Process:
What are the single biggest m…
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20VC: Dropbox's Drew Houston on Leadership; Hiring, Firing, Breakpoints in Company Scaling, The Story of Nearly Getting Acquired by Steve Jobs and Apple, How Founders Should Think Through Potential Investors and Acquisitions
17 oktober 2022 · 44 min
Drew Houston is the Co-Founder and CEO @ Dropbox, for over 700 million users and +600,000 teams, Dropbox is the choice for storing and sharing their most important files. Prior to their IPO in 2018, Drew raised funding from some of the best including Sequoia, Index, Greylock, and IVP to name a few. Drew also currently sits on the board of Meta and is a seasoned angel with a portfolio including Gusto, Scale AI, Pilot and Superhuman to name a few. Prior to Dropbox, Drew founded Accolade, a bootstrapped online SAT prep company he started while in college. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Drew Houston We Discuss:
1.) Entry into Startups and Y Combinator:
How did Drew make his way into the world of startups with an SAT prep planning startup?
How did Drew convince Paul Graham to accept him and Dropbox into Y Combinator?
If we are all a function of our pasts, what is Drew running towards and what is he running away from?
2.) Drew Houston: The Leader and CEO:
How does Drew define "high performance" today?
How would Drew describe his style of management? How has it changed over time?
How did taking an enneagram test change how Drew leads? What did he learn?
What have been Drew's biggest hiring mistakes? What mistakes does he see others make?
What have been Drew's biggest lessons in how to let people go the right way?
3.) Crucible Moments: Getting Sequoia, Acquisitions and Steve Jobs:
How did Drew convince the Sequoia team to invest in Dropbox? How did it all start in a rug shop thanks to Pejman Nozad @ Pear?
Has Drew had opportunities to sell the company? Why did he not take them? How does he advise founders on the decision to sell or not?
How did Drew come to meet Steve Jobs? How did the meeting go?
4.) Drew Houston: AMA:
Is Dropbox a B2B company or a B2C company?
What is the hardest element of Drew's role with Dropbox?
What has Drew recently changed his mind on?
When press cycles were against him, how did Drew get through those tough times?
What is Drew's bigg…
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20VC: Why The CEO Should Make As Few Decisions As Possible, The Trade-Off Between Freedom and Raising Big From VCs & Why Our Jobs Are Not As Hard As We Think and How To Assess Talent and Potential As a Result with Tristan Handy, Founder & CEO @ dbt Labs
14 oktober 2022 · 43 min
Tristan Handy is the Founder and CEO @ dbt, a data transformation tool that enables data analysts and engineers to transform, test and document data in the cloud data warehouse. To date, Tristan has raised over $400M from the likes of Sequoia, Altimeter, Coatue, ICONIQ and GV with the latest funding round valuing the company at $4.2BN. Prior to founding dbt, Tristan was the VP Marketing @ RJ Metrics and got his break in the world of startups through former 20VC guest, Anthony Casalena with a Director of Operations role at Squarespace. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Tristan Handy:
1.) Entry into Startups:
How did Tristan make his way into the world of startups with his first role at Squarespace?
How did Tristan's time with Squarespace impact how he builds dbt today?
What does Tristan know now that he wishes he had known when he founded dbt?
2.) Our Jobs Are Not That Hard:
Why does Tristan believe that our jobs are not that hard?
If going down this line, how does Tristan hire? What does he look for? How does he test for it?
When does experience matter? When does it not matter?
3.) dbt: The Company
Why does Tristan believe that remote work does not work?
What financial packages have dbt put in place to allow their employees this physical interaction?
What does Tristan believe is the hardest element of building a hybrid company? When does everything start to break?
What are the biggest lessons Tristan and dbt have taken from Gitlab?
4.) Tristan: The Leader
How does Tristan conduct and execute on the best performance reviews?
How does Tristan create an environment of safety where people feel they can be honest and transparent?
What are the elements that you cannot be transparent on? Where does transparency break down?
5.) Trading Freedom for Scale:
dbt could have been a small and super profitable company, why did Tristan decide to trade off the freedom and raise big from VCs?
How did Tristan raise over $414M without ever talking about an efficiency metric?…
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20 Product: Spotify's Gustav Söderström on Why Product is 100% Science and 0% Art, Why You Should Look at the Competition and then Do Something Completely Different & Why Talk is Cheap and Product Teams Should Do More of it; Structuring the Best Debate
12 oktober 2022 · 1 uur 8 min
Gustav Söderström is Spotify's Chief Research & Development Officer. He has the CPO & CTO responsibility, overseeing the product, design, data, and engineering teams at Spotify and is responsible for Spotify's product strategy. Gustav is also an entrepreneur and investor who has founded and sold startups that he co-founded to Meta's Oculus in 2014 and then also his first startup which he co-founded and led as CEO, up until their acquisition by Yahoo! Gustav is also the host of the podcast mini-series -- Spotify: A product story -- which offers a glimpse into the decisions that have guided Spotify's product evolution. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Gustav Söderström
1.) From Selling Companies to Yahoo and Meta to Leading Spotify's Product:
How did Gustav first make his way into the world of tech and startups?
What was it that made Gustav so compelled to join Daniel Ek and build Spotify?
What does Gustav know now that he wishes he had known when he started?
2.) "Never Fight a Macro Wind":
What does Gustav mean when he says "never fight a macro wind"?
What models can product leaders construct to measure the size, importance and timing of a macro wind?
What can product leaders do to change the macro wind and have it blowing in their back and not their face?
When did Gustav experience this? What did he change to have the wind blow in his back? How did this alter his mindset and mentality?
3.) "Do Something Completely Different to the Competition":
Why does Gustav believe startups should do the complete opposite to the competition? Does this change if your competition is other startups vs incumbents?
What is the story of how Spotify did the complete opposite to Youtube? Why did it work?
On the flip side, when did Spotify do the complete opposite and it did not work out?
4.) Mastering the Learning Process:
How does Gustav approach the learning process for all new skills and disciplines?
Why does Gustav believe that all technology leaders have to be the master of…
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20VC: Altimeter's Brad Gerstner on Why Supercycles and the Powerlaw is the Most Important Thing In Investing, Why Portfolio Diversification is the Opposite of Risk Mitigation and The #1 Question Brad Asks All New Recruits
10 oktober 2022 · 1 uur 9 min
Brad Gerstner is the Founder and CEO of Altimeter, a life-cycle technology investment firm that manages public and private portfolios. Brad has personally participated in more than 100 IPOs as a sponsor, anchor, and investor. Brad's notable deals include Snowflake, Mongo, Bytedance, Gusto, Unity, Okta, dbt, Modern Treasury, EPIC Games, Hotel Tonight, and Zillow. Prior to founding Altimeter, Brad was a 3-time co-founder where he sold all three businesses (to IAC, Google, and Marchex), a founding principal at General Catalyst; a securities lawyer, a former Deputy Secretary of State of Indiana, and a pilot. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Brad Gerstner We Discuss:
1.) From Humble Beginnings in Indiana to 100 IPOs:
When did Brad realize his original love of finance and entrepreneurship?
What one single question does Brad ask all potential new recruits to determine if they have hustle?
What does Brad know now that he wishes he had known at the beginning of his career?
2.) The Power Law and Supercycles:
What is a power law? Why is it the single most important thing in investing?
How do the best investors in the world build a framework around supercycles?
How does Brad approach market sizing? How does Brad think about market creation when aligning that to his thesis of investing in power laws?
How does Brad determine if a large opportunity is a "super-cyle" or a short, time-stamped fad that is unsustainable? How does Brad assess the importance of market timing?
3.) Building Anti-Fragile Portfolios:
Portfolio Construction: Why does Brad disagree that the answer to risk mitigation is portfolio diversification? How many companies is enough companies for a diverse portfolio?
Price Sensitivity: How does Brad reflect on his own relationship to price? How does this process and mindset change on re-investments? What is needed for Brad to re-invest?
Time to Exit: How does Brad analyze when is the right time to exit a position? What are the single biggest mistakes people make…
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20VC: Kevin Weil on The Biggest Lessons from Leading Product at Instagram and Twitter | How Working With Kevin Systrom Impacted His Approach To Product | 3 Things Instagram Did To Make Stories So Successful and Why Investing Makes Operators Better at Thei
7 oktober 2022 · 45 min
Kevin Weil is President of Product and Business @ Planet and Operator in Residence @ Scribble Ventures. In the past, Kevin has been Head of Product at Twitter, Instagram, and Novi (the digital currency effort within Facebook). During his seven years at Twitter, he helped the company scale from 40 to 4000 people and from $0 to $2B in revenue. He then moved to Instagram in 2016 to lead the product and data teams and led through an inflection point as Instagram grew from 400M to over 1B users, including launching Instagram Stories. Kevin then co-founded Diem (formerly known as Libra) and Novi and built both for three years before moving to Planet in 2021. If that was not enough, Kevin is also on the board of Strava, the Nature Conservancy, and the Black Product Managers Network. Lees meer
In Today's Episode with Kevin Weil We Discuss:
1.) Lessons From Leading Product for Instagram and Twitter:
What does Kevin believe makes Instagram so inherently good at product? How did leading product for Instagram change the way Kevin thinks and operates?
What are 1-2 of Kevin's biggest lessons from working with Kevin Systrom, Instagram's Founder?
What are the biggest takeaways for Kevin from leading product at Twitter?
2.) Launching Products, Customer Discovery and Product Sessions:
What were Kevin's biggest learnings from launching Instagram stories? How did Kevin's conviction impact the product building and success of Instagram stories?
How does Kevin advise founders on the best way to approach customer discovery? What are the best questions to ask to reveal the truth?
How does Kevin approach product testing today? Why does Kevin not like softly softly testing new products?
3.) Kevin Weil: Leadership 101
What are some of the biggest leadership mistakes that Kevin made in his time at Twitter?
How does Kevin approach decision-making frameworks? How does one balance the speed vs the quality of the decision?
What makes a great product strategy? Where do so many go wrong in their …