The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

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1. 20VC: GoPuff's Rafael Ilishayev on How GoPuff Has Been EBITDA Profitable From Day 1; The Unit Economics Behind GoPuff, With Intense Competition What Happens To The Food Delivery Space & What It Takes To Launch, Grow and Maintain New Markets

   14 juni 2021 · 35 min

   Afspelen
   Rafael Ilishayev is the Co-Founder & Co-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 550 US cities with over 7,000 employees nationwide. Lees meer

   In Today's Episode with Rafael Ilishayev You Will Learn:

   1.) How Rafael made his way into the world of startups with the founding of GoPuff and how he turned it from a college delivery business into a nationwide leader with over 7,000 employees?

   2.) Funding: Why did Raf wait until 2.5 years into the business before raising funding? What did that time bootstrapping the business teach Raf? How did it change his thinking on unit economics? How were GoPuff able to be EBITDA profitable from day 1? How do they have such superior margins in an industry blighted by low margins?

   3.) New Markets: How does GoPuff determine attractive markets to scale into? What are the leading indicators of "good markets"? What resources are required to open new markets? What is the time to breakeven on new markets? How many micro-fulfilment centres does it take to win a new market? What are the biggest challenges moving into new markets?

   4.) Competition: The market has become a lot more competitive, why does Raf feel this is not a market you can win without years of experience? What have they built that other new entrants do not have? Will this be a consolidatory landscape or will many of the new entrants die? Why is Raf planning to invest hundreds of millions into Europe over the coming years?

   5.) Driver Efficiency & CACs: What have been Raf's biggest lessons when it comes to driver efficiency? How many deliveries does a driver need to make in one hour for the model to work? How does Raf think about the negative network effects of the model where the more d…

2. 20VC: Why and How The Best Companies Build Economies Around Themselves, When, Why and How To Build Effective Partner/Channel Networks & The Power of Compounding Growth in SaaS with Jay Simons, General Partner @ Bond

   10 juni 2021 · 38 min

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   Jay Simons is a General Partner @ Bond Capital, with their $1.25Bn debut growth fund in 2019 they made their mark on the venture landscape and have since made investments in the likes of Revolut, Canva, NextDoor, IronClad and my favourite, On Running. As for Jay, prior to entering venture, he spent an incredible 12 years at Atlassian including 9 years as President, playing an instrumental role in their hyper-growth journey. Jay is also a board member with both Zapier and HubSpot, two of my favourite SaaS companies. Lees meer

   In Today's Episode with Jay Simons You Will Learn:

   1.) How Jay made his way into the world of startups following a stint as a pianist in Asia and how that startup journey led to his joining Bond on the venture side?

   2.) Why does Jay believe the best companies build economies around themselves? What does this look like in reality? When is the right time for the company to start building these economies? As an investor, what are the signs that a founder is proactively thinking about this? What are some of the biggest mistakes people make when building economies?

   3.) Why does Jay believe Partner/Channel networks can be so powerful? When is the right time to build out channel partners? What is the training framework for these partners before they can represent your products in market? How do channel partners change the internal structure and resource allocation for a company? What mistakes do people make with these partners?

   4.) How does Jay think about when is the right time to build a second product? What were the biggest takeaways from his time at Atlassian on building product suites? How does Jay determine when is the right time to move upmarket into enterprise? How does this change in a world of product-led growth?

   5.) Why did Jay decide now was the right time to move into venture with Bond? For what reasons did Jay choose Bond, over all the other firms? What have been the biggest surprises for Jay from his first 100 days in venture? What have bee…

3. 20VC: DoorDash CEO Tony Xu on The Art of Great Leadership Today, Why The Best Give All of the Credit and Take All of the Blame & How DoorDash Have Won The Best Talent Against the Toughest Competition

   7 juni 2021 · 39 min

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   Tony Xu is the CEO and Co-founder of DoorDash, the company empowering merchants to grow their businesses by offering on-demand delivery, data-driven insights, and better in-store efficiency. Prior to their IPO in December 2020, Tony raised over $2.5Bn for DoorDash from some of the best including Sequoia, Coatue, Softbank, Kleiner Perkins and DST, to name a few. Before co-founding the business in 2013, Tony worked in Product at Square, led special projects for the CEO and CFO at eBay, and began his career at McKinsey and Company. Lees meer

   In Today's Episode with Tony Xu You Will Learn:

   1.) How did Tony make his way into the world of startups and what was that founding a-ha moment for Tony with the founding of DoorDash? What were Tony's biggest takeaways from seeing his parents work ethic at such a young age? How did it impact his operating mentality?

   2.) Leadership Style: What does great leadership mean to Tony today? In what ways has Tony's leadership style changed over the DoorDash journey? How does Tony assess his own persistence and grit? Through what framework does Tony decide what to delegate vs what to control?

   3.) Decision-Making & Risk: How does Tony evaluate his decision-making process today? What does Tony mean when he says, "you have to reduce the scope"? How does Tony think about understanding the interplay of different variants in a decision? Through what framework does Tony assess risk today? How has Tony's approach to risk and decision-making changed over time?

   4.) Talent Acquisition: What have been Tony's biggest lessons in acquiring the best talent? What has worked well in the past? In what ways have they not acquired talent they should have acquired? What type of talent worked in the early days? How has that changed? Through what framework does Tony decide between a stretch VP and a stretch too far?

   5.) Culture & Diversity: How does Tony think through the breakpoints in the scaling of culture? At what points did Tony feel the DoorDash culture was not…

4. 20VC: Ramp's Eric Glyman on Why You Should Never Take The Highest Price, Working With Venture Funds vs Crossover Funds and How To Determine What To Buy vs Build as a Founder Today?

   2 juni 2021 · 41 min

   Afspelen
   Eric Glyman is the Founder and CEO @ Ramp, the only corporate card and spend management platform designed to help you spend less. To date, Eric has raised over $390M for the company from some of the best including Thrive, Stripe, Founders Fund, Coatue and Box Group to name a few. Prior to changing the game of spend management, Eric founded Paribus, the price-tracking app that raised seed funding from General Catalyst and Greylock, which was acquired by Capital One in 2016. Lees meer

   In Today's Episode with Eric Glyman You Will Learn:

   1.) Entry to Startups: How Eric made his way into the world of startups with Paribus and how that journey and exit led to his founding the recently minted unicorn, Ramp?

   2.) Decision-Making: How does Eric deal with moments of intense pressure as a leader? How does pressure impact Eric's decision-making quality? Through what framework does Eric evaluate his decision-making process today? Why does Eric believe operational velocity is so key to company success? How does Eric determine between being fast vs spending real time on something?

   3.) Funding Rounds: Why does Eric believe that "funding rounds are science experiments"? What should founders look to prove or disprove with each round? Why does Eric believe "you should never take the highest price"? What are the downsides? How does it impact employee stock options? Does it change investor sentiment? How does it change customer acquisition through referrals?

   4.) The Rise of Crossover Funds: What does Eric make of the rise of crossover funds? In what way does their value differ to the value provided by traditional VCs? How does their communication style differ compared to traditional VCs? Does Eric worry about the signalling risk of having crossover funds invested early? Does Eric believe they will change the landscape of venture?

   5.) Board Management: How does Eric analyse his style of board management today? How has it changed over time? Where does Eric believe many founders go wrong when …

5. 20VC: The Twilio Memo: Bessemer's Byron Deeter on How a $125K Initial Check Became Bessemer's Largest Position, What The Influx of Late-Stage Capital Means For Venture Today & Why The Incumbent Advantage Is Now An Incumbent Disadvantage

   27 mei 2021 · 43 min

   Afspelen
   Byron Deeter is a Partner @ Bessemer Venture Partners and one of the world's leading investors in SaaS and cloud. To date, nineteen of Byron's investments are valued above $1 billion, including ten IPOs and counting. Some of the incredible companies within Byron's portfolio include Twilio, ServiceTitan, Hashicorp, Canva, Intercom, DocuSign, SendGrid, the list goes on. Prior to joining the world of venture, Byron was an entrepreneur, raising a Series A from Bessemer and scaling the company to be one of the first global SaaS companies, reaching profitability and successfully selling to IBM. Lees meer

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   In Today's Episode with Byron Deeter You Will Learn:

   1.) How Deven made his way into the world of venture and how that led to his becoming a Managing Director @ Insight, way back in 2000?

   2.) The Market: Many people passed on Twilio, what did Byron see that others did not? Did Byron have concerns around the TAM? What made Byron feel comfortable they were not too early? How did Byron assess whether customers would churn off Twilio when they scaled to a size they could build their own infrastructure? How does Byron advise founders on this challenge today?

   3.) The Team: What did Byron find some compelling about Jeff so early on? Jeff has been an incredible CEO from pre-seed to post-IPO, what has enabled Jeff specifically to scale with the company so successfully? What does Byron do to build the trust and rapport with founders that he does? What works? What does not work? How does that look today with Zoom?

   4.) The Incumbents & Competition: Why does Byron believe the incumbent advantage is actually an incumbent disadvantage? What specifically has Byron found underwhelming about how the incumbents have tried to respond? In what tangible and specific way are startups better placed to win than incumbents? How does Byron advise founders to assess other startup competitors?

   5.) The Funding: Twilio is Bessemer's single largest position ever, how does Byron k…

6. 20VC: Why Bundling Does Not Work, How The Best Founders Analyse Unit Economics, Why The Way We Approach Mental Health in Venture and Startups is Wrong with Nigel Morris, Co-Founder & Managing Partner @ QED Investors

   24 mei 2021 · 46 min

   Afspelen
   Nigel Morris is the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of QED Investors, one of the leading fintech-focused venture firms of the last decade with numerous unicorn investments, including Credit Karma, NuBank, Avant, SoFi, Klarna, GreenSky, and AvidXchange. Prior to QED, Nigel co-founded Capital One Financial Services in 1994. During his 10-year tenure, Nigel transitioned Capital One from an emerging start-up to an established public company valued at over $20 billion with over 15,000 employees. Finally, Nigel also sits on or has sat on the board of Nubank, Prosper, Zopa, Klarna, The Economist and London Business School to name a few. Lees meer

   In Today's Episode with Nigel Morris You Will Learn:

   1.) How Nigel made his way into the world of startups with Capital One back in 1994 and how that journey led to his founding one of the leading fintech investment firms in QED? What made Nigel want to develop QED from a family office into a large scaling venture firm?

   2.) Where does Nigel's passion for mental health stem from? Why does Nigel believe VC and entrepreneurship is riddled with mental health problems? How does Nigel deal with his own self-doubt and insecurity? In what way does Nigel analyse his own relationship to money today? How has it changed over time? How has that relationship to money changed how he thinks about investing?

   3.) What does Nigel believe it takes to be a great listener? How does Nigel think about asking the risk questions to move the founder to the right insight? How does Nigel create the conditions where the entrepreneur can be much more open? What questions would Nigel never ask? How does Nigel describe his style of board membership? How has it changed?

   4.) How does Nigel think about the centrality of unit economics? What does Nigel look for in the way that the entrepreneur thinks through and analyses unit economics? When does Nigel believe you have tangible data to rely on to justify unit economics? What is the biggest challenge with unit economics? …

7. 20VC: Farfetch Founder, José Neves on Zen Buddhism and Its Impact on Leadership Mentality, Why Head vs Heart is Not the Right Way To Think About Decision-Making & How To Work Through Self-Doubt and Identity as a CEO

   20 mei 2021 · 40 min

   Afspelen
   José Neves is the Founder, CEO & Chairman @ Farfetch, the #1 destination for high-end fashion offering the world's Greatest Selection of Luxury. Now a public company, José has raised over $1.7Bn with Farfetch from some of the biggest names including Alibaba, Richemont, JD.com, Index Ventures and DST to name a few. Prior to Farfetch, José has been involved in the fashion start-up world since the mid-1990s when he launched footwear business SWEAR. José later founded SIX London, a fashion licensing and wholesale company selling to 600 retailers worldwide. Finally, in 2001 José opened the renowned boutique bstore, which won the British Fashion Award for Retailer of the Year in 2006. Lees meer

   In Today's Episode with José Neves You Will Learn:

   1.) How José made his way from creating footwear brands in the days of the Spice Girls and cyberpunk to changing the fashion industry itself with Farfetch?

   2.) Why does Zen Buddhism resonate with José in such a profound way? How does his adoption of it impact his style of leadership today? How does José deal with the loneliness of being a CEO? What does José mean when he says the most successful leaders, "know how to fall and how to get up"? How has José responded to his greatest failures?

   3.) How does José think about decision-making today? What are the biggest misconceptions people have with regards to effective decision-making? Why is head vs heart the wrong way to think about decision-making? How does José adopt a sense of emotional detachment when making decisions? What works? What does not work?

   4.) How does José evaluate his relationship to money today? In what ways has it changed over time? What does José believe that others do not believe when it comes to risk and risk management? How does José balance the demands of Wall St and investors with the knowledge that everything is inherently uncertain?

   5.) Does José ever feel self-doubt? How does he manage it? In what ways does he advise earlier stage founders to grapple with thei…

8. 20VC: Insight Managing Director, Deven Parekh on The Current Funding Mania, Compression of Round Timelines, Fund Deployment Speeds Increasing & How To Think Through Price and Time Allocation Across the Portfolio

   17 mei 2021 · 39 min

   Afspelen
   Deven Parekh is a Managing Director at Insight Partners, one of the leading investing franchises of the last 25 years with $30Bn+ in capital commitments, 400+ primary investments and over 200 portfolio acquisitions. Deven himself has made more than 90 investments since joining in 2000 including in the likes of Twitter, Alibaba, JD.com, Chargebee and Automattic (WordPress) to name a few. Deven also sits on the boards of Checkout.com, Calm, Saks.com, Optimizely and 1stDibs, again naming a few. If that was not enough, Deven also serves on the Board of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Board of the Tisch New York MS Research Center. As a result of his investing success, Deven has been named on Forbes Midas List 5 time and has been selected as a Top 100 Venture Capitalist by CB Insights 4 times. Lees meer

   In Today's Episode with Deven Parekh You Will Learn:

   1.) How Deven made his way into the world of venture and how that led to his becoming a Managing Director @ Insight, way back in 2000?

   2.) How does Deven analyse the current fundraising mania? Does portfolio discipline and temporal diversification matter anymore? How has Deven and Insight seen the velocity of fundraises change over the years? What can Deven and Insight do to get compress their decision-making timeliness with the compression of fundraising timelines?

   3.) How does Deven assess his relationship to price and price sensitivity? What have been some core lessons for Deven when comparing deals that they did which were "cheap" vs "expensive"? How do Insight think about required levels of ownership today? Does Deven believe it is possible to build ownership over time? What is required to do so? What are the challenges?

   4.) How would Deven describe his style of board membership today? How has it changed over time? What advice does Deven have for younger board members scaling into the role? How does Deven think about his time allocation across the portfolio? What is the optimal? How does this dif…

9. 20VC: Qualtrics Founder, Ryan Smith on The 2 Hour Decision Whether To Sell Qualtrics for $8Bn in Cash, Why Tying Your Identity To Your Company Will Never Make You Happy and His Relationship To Risk, Wealth and Responsibility as a Result

   11 mei 2021 · 41 min

   Afspelen
   Ryan Smith is the Founder and Executive Chairman @ Qualtrics, the leader in customer experience and creator of the experience management (XM) category. Ryan has grown the company from a basement startup to one of the fastest-growing technology companies in the world, with 25 offices globally and more than 13,000 customers. Qualtrics raised $400M in funding from Accel, Sequoia, and Insight Venture Partners. Three days before the company was initially scheduled to go public, SAP announced its intent to acquire Qualtrics for $8B, which was the largest private enterprise software acquisition ever. In 2020, Qualtrics and SAP announced plans to take Qualtrics public as an independently operated company. Lees meer

   In Today's Episode with Ryan Smith You Will Learn:

   1.) How Ryan made his way into the world of startups having travelled the world and came to found Qualtrics in his basement over 21 years ago?

   2.) How does Ryan think about his relationship to happiness and what it means to "be happy"? How does Ryan think about identity and founders aligning their identities to their company? How does Ryan think, if not careful, tech can eat you up? What does Ryan mean when he says he would rather be "opportunistic than an entrepreneur"?

   3.) How does Ryan approach decision-making today? In what situations does Ryan think with his head vs his heart? How does Ryan approach risk today? How has his relationship to risk changed over time? What did the sale process to SAP look like? What was that decision-making process to sell to SAP for $8BN in cash vs IPO? What advice did his wife give him?

   4.) How does Ryan evaluate his relationship to money today? How did it feel when Ryan sold Qualtrics to SAP for $8BN in cash? How does Ryan think about giving his children the right mentality and upbringing while being brought up in extreme wealth? What are the challenges of doing so?

   5.) How does Ryan think about the weight of responsibility? Ryan and his brother Jared, did a lot very young, did Ry…

10. 20VC: MercadoLibre Founder Marcos Galperin on Optimising Decision-Making, Effective Resource Allocation, Growth vs Profitability, Fundraising Strategies and more on the Journey To Build a $72Bn Market Cap Company

    7 mei 2021 · 34 min

    Afspelen
    Marcos Galperin is the Founder and CEO @ MercadoLibre, one of LATAM's most successful companies of the last 2 decades. Today MercadoLibre's market cap exceeds $78Bn and the business includes everything from commerce to payments to logistics. Marcos is widely considered one of the great entrepreneurs of the last 2 decades scaling the business from its founding in 1999 while in business school at Stanford to today, a leader in LATAM operating across 18 countries and plans to end 2021 with over 32,000 employees. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode with Marcos Galperin You Will Learn:

    1.) How Marcos made his way into the world of startups and came up with the idea for MercadoLibre while at Stanford Business School?

    2.) Talent Acquisition and Retention: What have been some of Marcos' biggest lessons on what it takes to acquire A* talent? Does Marcos believe individuals can scale across company stages? When is a stretch hire a stretch too far? What has been the secret to Marcos having such a retained leadership team? What works? What does not?

    3.) Risk and Decision-Making: How does Marcos evaluate his relationship to risk today? What frameworks does Marcos use to make effective decisions today? How does Marcos think about short term vs long term when it comes to resource allocation? How does Marcos prioritise where he makes decisions vs where he is willing to delegate?

    4.) Funding and The Crash: How does Marcos reflect on his biggest lessons from going through 2 crashes with MercadoLibre? How did he change the way he ran the business post crash? How does Marcos advise founders today when big rounds are on offer, take the money or wait? What other components are important to consider in this decision?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode with Marcos Galperin

    Parker's Favourite Book: Built To Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies

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11. 20VC: David Tisch on Why Ownership in Venture Does Not Matter, His Biggest Investing Misses and Hits and How His Investing Style Changed as a Result & 3 Core Reasons VCs Pass That Do Not Make Sense

    4 mei 2021 · 37 min

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    David Tisch is the Founder and Managing Partner @ Box Group, one of the leading seed focused firms of the last decade with a portfolio including Airtable, Glossier, PillPack, Plaid and many more. Prior to founding Box, David was Managing Director of Techstars New York and was a prolific angel investor making early angel investments in the likes of Vine and Warby Parker to name a few. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode with David Tisch You Will Learn:

    1.) How David made his way into the world of tech and startups and came to change the state of seed funding in NYC with the founding of Box Group?

    2.) Why does David believe that ownership requirements are "VCs projecting their problems on founders"? Why does David believe that ownership today fundamentally does not matter? How does David feel about his own relationship to price? Why is it important to be price aware across the portfolio, not on a per deal basis?

    3.) What does David make of the rise of pre-emptive rounds? How does David advise portfolio founders who have them on the table? What other arguments does David use to founders contemplating taking seed rounds from multi-stage funds? How does David believe founders should assess their importance to the fund investing in them?

    4.) How does David feel about his relationship to FOMO today? What have been some of his biggest misses in recent years? How have some of his biggest misses changed how he acts as an investor today? How have some of his biggest successes changed his investing lens? What changes did David and Box make to their decision-making process as a result?

    5.) What does David believe are the biggest mistakes to turn down a company? Why is "too early" never a reason to turn down a company? How does David assess and think about market size today? Through what framework does David evaluate and assess competition today? What does David believe are some core concerns that are reasonable to turn down an opportunity?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode with David T…

12. 20VC: The Roblox Memo: First Round's Chris Fralic on The 17 Year Journey to Build a $41BN Market Cap Company, Why It Is Way Harder To Increase Ownership Across Rounds Today & What Happens Post SPACMania

    29 april 2021 · 37 min

    Afspelen
    Chris Fralic is a Board Partner @ First Round Capital, one of the leading seed-stage venture firms of the last decade with investments in the likes of Uber, Square, Notion, Warby Parker and more. As for Chris, he has led deals in Roblox, Ring.com, HotelTonight, Rec Room and many more incredible companies. Prior to the world of venture, Chris was VP of Business Development at social bookmarking and tagging company del.icio.us through the Yahoo! acquisition. He was also one of the early employees at Half.com and after the eBay, acquisition spent six years with eBay in a variety of business development, media and entertainment roles. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode with Chris Fralic You Will Learn:

    1.) How did Chris come to first meet Dave and the team at Roblox? Where was the first meeting? Who was in attendance? How did Chris feel post that first meeting with the team?

    2.) Turning the company down: Why did First Round turn down Roblox on first look? How does Chris assess his own relationship to price? Through what mechanism does he determine whether to pay up or not? How does Chris retain relationships with founders when saying no? Does Chris believe you can buy up ownership post first check today, with the capital proliferate we have?

    3.) What does Chris mean when he discusses the lessons from First Round's portfolio when it comes to "slow bake vs fast bake"? How did the First Round partnership analyse the Uber, Square, Roblox portfolio at the time? Through what framework does Chris think about reserves management given the challenge of "slow bake companies"? How does he address it today?

    4.) What does Chris mean when he discusses the hype to substance ratio? Why is it more important than ever today? What does this mean for startups? How can startups with a low hype to substance ratio raise funds at good prices? What advice does Chris have for them? How does Chris think about the importance of firm and individual brand in venture today?

    5.) How has Chris seen Dave evolve …

13. 20VC: Rippling's Parker Conrad on Why The VC/Founder Marriage Analogy is Weird, Why The Notion of Focus, Focus, Focus is Overrated, Why Narrow Point Solutions Are Not Best in Class Products & The Rise of the "Compound Startup"

    26 april 2021 · 41 min

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    Parker Conrad is the Founder and CEO @ Rippling, the employee management platform allowing you to manage your employees' payroll, benefits, devices and more—in one place. To date, Parker has raised over $197M for Rippling from the likes of Founders Fund, Kleiner Perkins, Initialized, Bedrock, Greenoaks and Coatue. Prior to founding Rippling, Parker was the Co-Founder and CEO @ Zenefits and if that was not enough, Parker is also a prominent angel having invested in the likes of Census, Pulley and then also AgentSync and TrueNorth, alongside 20VC Fund. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode with Parker Conrad You Will Learn:

    1.) How did Parker make his way into the world of technology and startups? What was the founding a-ha moment for Parker with Rippling? How did his journey with Zenefits change or alter his leadership style today with Rippling?

    2.) Why does Parker believe that the conventional advice of focus, focus, focus is BS? What does Parker mean when he states, "The Compound Startup"? How does the approach of the compound startup differ from traditional approaches of product and company building? What are the core benefits of using the compound startup approach?

    3.) How does Parker think about providing sufficient product quality with an increasing breadth of product offering, entailed within a compound startup? In what way does pricing differ when comparing compound startups to traditional startups? How can compound startups optimise their pricing on a bundle basis? What has Slack and Microsoft taught us about this?

    4.) Why does Parker disagree with the conventional analogy of the VC <> founder relationship being a marriage? Why does Parker refer to it more as a "General Contractor" relationship for a house? What can founders do to sufficiently protect themselves from overarching VCs? What can VCs do to be the very best partners to the founders they work with?

    5.) How does Parker evaluate his relationship to money today? How has it changed over time? What does Parker kno…

14. 20VC: Segment Founder Peter Reinhardt on His Learning Process, How Great Leaders Listen and Encourage Debate within Their Organisation & How To Use Data Intelligently To Improve Decision-Making

    22 april 2021 · 29 min

    Afspelen
    Peter Reinhardt is the Founder and CEO @ Segment, the leading customer data platform with over 20,000 companies using Segment to collect, clean, and control their customer data. Prior to their $3.2BN acquisition by Twilio in 2020, Peter raised over $283M for Segment from Accel, Thrive, Meritech, GV, General Catalyst and Kleiner Perkins to name a few. Peter is also an active angel investor having made investments in the likes of Retool, Newfront, Pilot and more. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode with Peter Reinhardt You Will Learn:

    1.) How Peter made his way into the world of startups and how he came to found a company, Segment, by actively trying to prove to his co-founder that it would not work? Why does Peter believe the Airbnb story is the most destructive myth for founders to follow?

    2.) Learning: How does Peter think about learning frameworks for new topics? How does he construct his? How does Peter use data within this learning process to increase his rate of learning? Where do the majority of people go wrong in constructing their framework for learning?

    3.) Listening and Debate: What does Peter believe is required to be "a good listener"? What questions do the best listeners ask? What tone do they use to ask these questions? How does Peter create an environment of safety internally where people feel they can debate? How does one balance between debate and thinking vs putting those thoughts into action?

    4.) Problem-solving: How does Peter breakdown problems into their component parts? Through what mechanism does he determine what to prioritise first? How would Peter describe his decision-making process? How does he determine between head vs heart in decisions? In what way does Peter use data to further inform the decisions he makes?

    5.) How would Peter describe his management style today? Has it changed over time? In what way has working with a coach changed the way Peter thinks about leadership? What elements do they focus on? How often does he see his coach? What ha…

15. 20VC: Greylock's David Sze on His Biggest Lessons Working with Mark Zuckerberg and Reid Hoffman, The Rise of Pre-Emptive Rounds, How To Think Through Price Discipline Today and How Truly Strong Venture Partnerships Function

    19 april 2021 · 43 min

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    David Sze is a General Partner @ Greylock where he has led some of the firms most notable investments including Facebook, LinkedIn and Pandora. David has consistently been at the forefront of innovation in the consumer landscape leading to his investments in Discord, Roblox, Medium and more. Prior to Greylock, David was SVP of Product Strategy at one of the first search pioneers, Excite and then Excite@Home. Before Excite, he was in interactive entertainment — in product marketing at Electronic Arts and development at Crystal Dynamics. As a result of his incredible investing track record, David has been frequently named to the Forbes Midas List. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode with David Sze You Will Learn:

    1.) How David made his way into the world of venture and came to lead consumer investing at Greylock with investments in Facebook, Linkedin, Roblox and Discord?

    2.) How did David's investments in Facebook and Linkedin challenge Greylock's investment strategy at the time? Paying $500M for Facebook, how does David reflect on his own relationship to price and price sensitivity? How does David evaluate the rise of pre-emptive rounds today? Is David concerned by the excess supply of capital in the market today?

    3.) Having worked with Mark @ Facebook, Reid @ Linkedin, David @ Roblox, what are the commonalities of these incredible founders? What does David do to build relationships of trust and vulnerability with founders? How does David do this in the compressed fundraising timelines we have today?

    4.) The Partnership: What does David believe Greylock have done well in terms of creating an environment of safety within the partnership where people can really challenge each other? What works? What does not? For younger VCs, what is the difference between those that succeed and those that do not? What is David's biggest advice to those in the earlier years of their VC career?

    5.) The Board: How does David evaluate his own style of board membership today? How has it changed over…

16. 20VC: Scaling Zapier To $140M ARR and a $5Bn Valuation on $1.4M of Funding, What Founders Misunderstand About Fundraising & How Founders Should Think About Secondaries Today with Wade Foster, Founder & CEO @ Zapier

    15 april 2021 · 32 min

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    Wade Foster is the Co-Founder & CEO @ Zapier, the company that moves info between your web apps automatically, so you can focus on your most important work. Post YC in 2012, Wade raised $1.4M for the company from Bessemer and Threshold but since that round, he scaled the company to $140M in ARR and a $5Bn valuation with Sequoia and Steadfast buying out some early investors earlier this year. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode with Wade Foster You Will Learn:

    1.) How Wade made his way from email marketing manager to founding one of YC's most successful alum in the form of Zapier? Does Wade agree with the "fake it till you make it theory"? How does Wade advise grads on starting a company vs joining a startup vs joining an incumbent?

    2.) Remote Work: Zapier has been remote since 2012, what do Zapier do very specifically that Waade believes has enabled them to be so successful remote? What did not work? What were some of the biggest challenges of scaling the team remotely? In terms of tooling, what specific tools do Wade and Zapier use to make the org as transparent as possible?

    3.) In the scaling journey, what have been the most significant breakpoints in the org scaling? How has Eade scaled his style of leadership? What has been the most challenging element to scale? How does Wade structure internal meetings? Who is invited to what? What materials are shared? How are the meetings structured?

    4.) Why did Wade decide not to take the venture path and scale the company from revenues? What does Wade believe so many founders misunderstand when it comes to fundraising? What does Wade believe they gained from the bootstrapped approach? Why did Wade still maintain relationships with VCs? How did he choose those he wanted to stay in touch with?

    5.) How does Wade feel about his relationship to money? What does Wade think about the rise of secondaries? In what framework does Wade advise founders who have the chance to take secondaries? What is the right amount to take off the table? How d…

17. 20VC: Revolut Founder Nikolay Storonsky on His Leadership Style and Relationship To Ambition, His Biggest Lessons From Scaling Revolut Globally; What Worked, What Did Not & Why Speed of Product Shipment is The Most Important Thing

    12 april 2021 · 24 min

    Afspelen
    Nikolay Storonsky is the Founder & CEO @ Revolut, one of the world's largest and fastest-growing fintechs offering everything from personal to business banking, providing a better way to manage your money. To date, Nikolay has raised over $905M with Revolut from Ribbit, Index, DST, Balderton and Bond Capital to name a few. Nikolay has scaled Revolut to over 2,000 employees across 4 continents. Before changing the world of neo-banking, Nikolay spent 8 years as a derivatives trader at both Lehman Brothers and Credit Suisse in London. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode with Nikolay Storonsky You Will Learn:

    1.) How Nikolay made his way into the world of startups from derivatives trading and how that led to his changing the world of fintech with Revolut?

    2.) How would Nikolay describe his style of leadership today? How did his time in banking impact his operating style? What elements has Nikolay found the hardest to scale into as a leader? How does Nikolay assess his relationship to ambition? What drives him today? How does Nikolay deal with self-doubt and vulnerability in leadership?

    3.) Why does Nikolay feel the most important thing in a company is the speed of product shipment? From a product perspective, how does Nikolay determine what to do next vs what to do later? What does that prioritisation process look like? Has it changed over time?

    4.) How does Nikolay think about gepgraphic expansion today? Given Monzo's challenges in the US, why did Revolut decide the US remained a good strategy? What does it take to launch and scale a new country? How does Nikolay think about the relationship between growth and profitability? What companies does Nikolay admire most for their international scaling?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode with Nikolay Storonsky

    Nikolay's Favourite Book: Principles by Ray Dalio (PDF)

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

    Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

18. 20VC: Checkout.com Founder Guillaume Pousaz on The Transition From Bootstrapped Founder to Raising $830M and a $15Bn Valuation, What It Means To Have "3 Roadmaps For Life" & How Becoming a Parent Changes the Type of Leader You Are

    8 april 2021 · 32 min

    Afspelen
    Guillaume Pousaz is the Founder and CEO of Checkout.com, one of the world's leading global payments solutions providers and one of Europe's most valuable private companies. Guillaume founded Checkout.com in 2012 and bootstrapped the business until its record-breaking $230M Series A led by Insight and DST in 2019. Since, Guillaume has raised a further $600M for Checkout from the likes of Coatue, Tiger, Blossom, GIC and Greenoaks. As part of this process, Guillaume has scaled the team to over 900 people around the world and Checkout as one of the category leaders in payments with a reported $15Bn valuation. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode with Guillaume Pousaz You Will Learn:

    1.) How Guillaume made his way into the world of payments following a travelling experience? How that experience led to his founding the now $12Bn, Checkout.com?

    2.) Why did Guillaume wait 7 years into the running of the business before raising a massive $230M Series A? Why was then the right time? Was it a difficult mental transition to move from lean, capital efficiency to raising $230M? Why have Checkout never spent a single dollar on marketing? Is it true, Checkout has never spent a single dollar you have raised?

    3.) What does Guillaume mean when he says he "has 3 roadmaps for life"? How does he structure his planning for the next 2,5 and 10 years? How does Guillaume think on his own identity and how it is tied to Checkout, the company? How does Guillaume advise founders in terms of tying their identity to their company?

    4.) Why does Guillaume believe that becoming a father made him a better CEO? How did it impact his operating style? How does Guillaume analogise the role of the CEO to the profession of being a sailor? How does Guillaume think through his relationship to money today? How has it changed over time? How does he think about ensuring it does not impact his children?

    5.) In what way does Guillaume structure his decision-making process today? What does Guillaume believe it is about the ve…

19. 20VC: Datadog CEO Olivier Pomel on The Scaling Journey to a $26Bn Market Cap, The Challenges in Moving From Single To Multi-Product Company & How To Scale Efficiently into $M+ Enterprise Deals

    5 april 2021 · 36 min

    Afspelen
    Olivier Pomel is the Founder & CEO @ Datadog, the company building the next generation of tools for DevOps teams. Prior to their incredibly successful IPO in 2019, Olivier raised over $147M for the company from Index, ICONIQ, Meritech, IA Ventures, Amplify and OpenView, to name a few. Prior to founding Datadog and changing the world of devops, Olivier was a VP with Wireless Generation for 8 years leading an engineering team of close to 100 of the best developers in NYC. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode with Olivier Pomel You Will Learn:

    1.) How Olivier made his way into the world of startups and what was the a-ha founding moment for his creating of Datadog, changing the world of devops?

    2.) Why does Olivier believe that "short term failure is a source of long term success?" Why did both seed and Series A investors not get Datadog? What would Olivier have done differently if fundraising again? What do investors misunderstand today when investing in big markets looking for the "entry wedge"?

    3.) What has been Olivier's biggest learnings on how to run Datadog during a pandemic? What attributes does Olivier look for when hiring senior leaders? Why does Olivier believe the CEO has to be the "equaliser in chief"? What does that mean in practice? How can leaders creat eenvironments of safety where their team can approach them with anything?

    4.) What have been the biggest challenges in moving from a single product to a multi-product company? How does one know when is the right time to add additional products? What is Olivier's decision-making process to determine which products to build next?

    5.) How does Olivier assess his relationship to money today? How has it changed over time? In what ways has becoming a father impacted Olivier's operating mindset? What 3 traits would Olivier most like his children to adopt?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode with Olivier Pomel

    Olivier's Favourite Book: Kurt Vonnegut

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

20. 20VC: How To Deliver Feedback with Compassion and Clarity, WTF Are Values Really and How To Instill Them & Raising $50M+ From Index and Greylock but Remaining in Stealth for 12 Months with Linda Lian, Co-Founder & CEO @ CommonRoom

    1 april 2021 · 39 min

    Afspelen
    Linda Lian is the Co-Founder and CEO @ CommonRoom, the place where your organization and your community come together. To date, Linda has raised over $50M with CommonRoom from the likes of Danny Rimer @ Index Ventures, Sarah Guo @ Greylock, Dylan Field @ Figma, Dick Costolo and of course 20VC Fund. Prior to changing the world of community though, Linda spent close to 3 years at Amazon as a Senior Product Manager on AWS and Alexa. Before Amazon, Lida was on the other side of the table in venture as an associate at Madrona. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode with Linda Lian You Will Learn:

    1.) How Linda made her way into the world of startups and came to start on the venture side with Madrona? How did Linda's time at Amazon shape her thinking around founding CommonRoom? What were Linda's biggest lessons from her time at Amazon and then also being mentored by Jeff Weiner

    2.) How does Linda describe her leadership style today? What are the biggest lessons Linda has learned in terms of how to speak with compassion but also directness and clarity? Why is Linda not a fan of "the shit sandwich"? What is the most effective way to give feedback?

    3.) What did Linda decide to only hire senior and experienced individuals with CommonRoom? What are the benefits of doing so? What are the downsides? How does Linda approach hiring such senior talent? What works? How is this also challenging? What does Linda mean by "the long poach"?

    4.) How does Linda approach delegation today? What framework does Linda use to determine what to do vs what to delegate? How does Linda approach head vs heart when it comes to decision-making? What does it take for Linda to change her mind? What is required?

    5.) What does Linda believe are the biggest misnomers around the search for product market fit? Why did Linda deliberately choose to stay in stealth despite raising over $50M from some of the world's best investors? How did that impact their ability on both product and customer discovery?

    As always you can fo…

21. 20VC: Benchmark's Peter Fenton on The Single Question That Defines The Art of Early Stage Venture, Marketing Timing Risk, Why The Oversupply of Capital Is Good & His Biggest Lessons from 12 Years On The New Relic Board

    29 maart 2021 · 35 min

    Afspelen
    Peter Fenton is a General Partner @ Benchmark, one of the great venture firms of the last 3 decades with a portfolio including the likes of SNAP, Twitter, eBay, New Relic, Stitchfix and many more. As for Peter, he has led deals, sits or has sat on the boards of Elastic, New Relic, Digits, Docker, Optimizely, Yelp and Zuora to name a few. Prior to Benchmark, Peter was a General Partner @ Accel Partners in San Francisco. As a result of his incredible track, Peter has been on the Forbes Midas List more times than I have done podcast episodes! Lees meer

    In Today's Episode with Peter Fenton You Will Learn:

    1.) How a round of golf led to Peter Fenton leading the New Relic Series A? What did the deal look like both in check size and valuation? What does Peter think that round would be in today's market?

    2.) How does Peter create an environment of safety with entrepreneurs where they feel they can be vulnerable with him? How does Peter approach building relationships of trust in compressed fundraising timelines? In what way has Peter seen relationships go bad? What can been done to mitigate that and optimise the Founder <> VC relationship?

    3.) How does Peter assess market timing when making investments today? What does Peter mean when he says, "you have to understand whether you are unlocking consumption"? What does unlocking consumption look like in reality? How does Peter think about positive or negative externalities that could impact the business?

    4.) Does Peter agree with Bill Gurley that the biggest challenge today is the "oversupply of capital"? Where does the oversupply of capital become a real challenge? What does Peter advise growth-stage founders do to prevent this from damaging them? How does Peter think about capital efficiency in the companies where he is on the board?

    5.) What were Peter's biggest lessons on what it takes to be a great board member from his 12 years at New Relic? How did he see his style of board membership change? On the founder side, how do th…

22. 20VC: Nubank CEO David Velez on Scaling Nubank to a $25BN Company, Why What Makes a Great Founder Does Not Make a Great CEO & The Responsibility Framework and How Leaders Can Use It To Drive Efficiency

    26 maart 2021 · 38 min

    Afspelen
    David Velez is the Founder & CEO @ Nubank, one of the fastest growing digital banks in the world with operations in Brazil, Mexico, Argentina and Colombia. To fuel this growth, David has raised over $1.5BN for Nubank from some of the best in the business including Doug Leone @ Sequoia, Micky @ Ribbit, Thrive, Founders Fund, DST, Tiger and more. Before changing the world of LATAM finance, David was a Partner @ Sequoia where he was responsible for all LATAM investments. Prior to Sequoia, David was the co-founder of General Atlantic's South American investment programme. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How David made his way into the world of startups through becoming a Partner @ Sequoia? How that led to his founding of Nubank? How his time at Sequoia impacted how he thought about building Nubank?

    2.) How does David think about the relationship between growth and quality in company scaling? When scaling so fast, what are the first things to break? How does one know when is the right time to expand geographically? What is the right thought process to go through when determining how to know when is the right time to expand product lines?

    3.) Looking at the market today, how does David for-see the future of digital banks? Will we seen increased consolidation over the coming years? How does David think through the verticalisation of neo-banks? What does the reduction in barriers to creating neo-banks really mean? How did Nubank scale to the scale it is today with $0 CACs?

    4.) How has David seen his leadership style change with the growth of the company? Why does David feel it is wrong that the titles of Founder & CEO are so inextricably linked? What element of being a great founder are actually not good for CEOs to have? What elements of great CEOs are bad for founders to have? What has David found the hardest to scale in himself?

    5.) How does David use "the responsibility framework" when making decisions today? What are David's thoughts on imposter syndrome …

23. 20VC: The Pinterest Memo: Bessemer's Jeremy Levine on The Secret To Success within User Generated Content Plays, Where Most Investors Make Mistakes When Analysing Consumer Social and How The Pinterest Deal Wouldn't Have Happened without a Diverse Partners

    24 maart 2021 · 44 min

    Afspelen
    Jeremy Levine is a Partner @ Bessemer Venture Partners, one of the leading venture firms of the last 2 decades with a portfolio including the likes of Pinterest, Shopify, LinkedIn, Yelp, Twilio and many more. As for Jeremy, five of his early-stage investments—LinkedIn, MindBody, Pinterest, Shopify and Yelp—grew into billion-dollar publicly traded companies. As a result of his incredible portfolio, he has featured on the Forbes Midas List for several years running. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode with Jeremy Levine You Will Learn:

    1.) How Jeremy came to make one great decision and make one big mistake all in one rainy afternoon in Palo Alto? What was the story behind meeting the Pinterest team for the first time? Who was there? How did it go down?

    2.) Market: How did Jeremy analyse the market at the time of the investment? What had been some core lessons Jeremy had learned on what made successful user-generated content plays? Where was Jeremy wrong in how he analysed the market? In what way is Jeremy surprised with how the market evolved? How does Jeremy analyse market timing today?

    3.) Team: Jeremy has previously called Ben Silberman a "product visionary", what made Jeremy say this about Ben? How did Jeremy get over the concern of many VCs that Pinterest did not have a technical co-founder? Having seen Ben change over the last decade, what have been the biggest changes in Ben's leadership style over the last 10 years?

    4.) Traction: When evaluating traction, where does Jeremy think so many investors make mistakes today? How should founders determine what is their core North Star metric? What gave Jeremy the confidence Pinterest could "cross the chasm"? How did the early Pinterest cohorts look both from usage and retention? What elements surprised and impressed?

    5.) Pre + Post Mortem: What did Jeremy see as the likely reasons why Pinterest would not work? How did Jeremy think through what it took for UGC platforms to monetise at the time? Where was he wrong here? What did J…

24. 20VC: Basecamp CEO Jason Fried on His Relationship To Risk, Money, Vulnerability and Self-Doubt, Fantasising About Being Fired, How To Optimise Decision-Making and Minimising Regret

    22 maart 2021 · 44 min

    Afspelen
    Jason Fried is the Founder & CEO @ Basecamp, the project management and team communication tool trusted by millions. Over an incredible 22 year journey, they have scaled to over 3.5M accounts and in 2020 they went back to being a multi-product company with the launch of their integrated email client & service, HEY. 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 Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Jason Fried made his way into the world of startups and came to found one of the leading project management and team communications tools in the form of Basecamp?

    2.) How does Jason analyse and evaluate his relationship to money? Why does Jason believe that he has this inherent downside protection when it comes to money? How does he structure his personal finances between stocks, cash, crypto etc etc? What have been some of Jason's biggest lessons when it comes to tying happiness to monetary levels?

    3.) What does Jason mean when he says, "I have a fantasy of getting fired"? How does Jason think about knowing when is the right time to step away from the business? What would he like to do with that time? How does Jason feel about the challenge of tying his identity to his company? What are the dangers of doing so?

    4.) How does Jason approach decision-making frameworks? What does Jason believe is the right way to respond when a decision does not go as planned? Where do many make mistakes here? Does Jason feel regret with decisions? How does Jason try and minimise regret?

    5.) How does Jason feel about his biggest insecurities as a leader and CEO today? What are Jason's views on a CEO's ability to have self-doubt and be vulnerable? How have his views on this changed over the years? In what way has having kids impacted Jason's operating mindset? How has it changed what he values and appreciates?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode

    Jason's Favourit…

25. 20VC: Rappi Founder Simón Borrero on Growth vs Profitability, Capital Efficiency, Raising $1.7Bn as a LATAM Company and Why Uber Eats Did More To Help Than To Hurt Rappi

    18 maart 2021 · 31 min

    Afspelen
    Simón Borrero is the Founder & CEO @ Rappi, the startup that has become a cornerstone of the Latin American mobile ecosystem, coined as "the next Everything Store of Latin America". To date, Simon has raised over $1.7Bn for the company from the likes of Sequoia Capital, a16z, Softbank, DST Global, Y Combinator and more. Prior to Rappi, Simon was the founder of multiple former companies including Imaginamos, a software studio he grew to over 300 people. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Simon made his way into the world of startups and came to found "the next Everything Store of Latin America" in Rappi?

    2.) How does Simon think about the importance of zone density for a business like Rappi? What are the number of deliveries required for Rappi to make for the business to be breakeven? What is the key metric that determines the success of the business for Rappi today?

    3.) How does Simon approach the balance of capital efficiency vs growth? How does one know when to pour fuel on the fire and go for growth? When is the right time to really focus on unit economics? Why does Simon believe expanding Rappi can be analogised to scaling a coffee shop?

    4.) Rappi has now raised $1.7Bn from some of the best investors in the world, what does Simon believe Rappi did to enable them to be so successful fundraising? Was it a difficult shift for Simon to make moving from lean to capital abundance with the successful fundraises? What changed? How did Simon change as a leader? What is the story of Sequoia coming in?

    5.) Customer acquisition: What were some of the biggest challenges when it came to initial customer acquisition for Rappi? What does Simon mean when he says "donuts for downloads"? What is the story there?

    6.) Driver acquisition: In the UK and the US, driver acquisition is a big challenge, what did Rappi to do enable them to scale their driver supply so efficiently? What works? What does not work?

    7.) Restaurant acquisition: What were the hardest elements of…

26. 20VC: Tony Fadell "The Father of The iPod" on Mentors, Self-Doubt, Vulnerability, His Relationship To Money, Why Entrepreneurs Need to Be Coachable, Why VCs Need To Be More Direct & Why The First Trillionaire Will Innovate Around Climate Change

    15 maart 2021 · 49 min

    Afspelen
    Tony Fadell, often referred to as "the father of the iPod," is currently Principal @ Future Shape, a global investment and advisory firm coaching engineers and scientists working on foundational deep technology. Prior to Future Shape, Tony was the Founder & CEO @ Nest Labs, the company was ultimately acquired by Google for a reported $3.2Bn. Before Nest, Tony spent an incredible 9 years at Apple Inc, where, as SVP of Apple's iPod division, he led the team that created the first 18 generations of the iPod and the first three generations of the iPhone. Fun facts, Tony has filed more than 300 patents for his work and is also a prolific angel investor having invested in the likes of mmhmm and Nothing to name a few. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode With Tony Fadell You Will Learn:

    I. The building blocks of an entrepreneur

    What was the moment that Tony realised that he wanted to be an entrepreneur?

    "I got my first money when I was in third grade, because I had an egg route. We'd go get eggs from the farmer, and I'd load them in my wagon. Then my younger brother and I would go door to door around the neighborhood, and we'd sell eggs. And that was an every week or every other week situation. And I got money in my hands. And I was like, Oh my God, I can do whatever I want with that money – I don't have to ask anybody, I can just do it. And so that was the level of freedom that, especially when you're young, feels really cool. And then as I got older, I started to buy Atari video game cartridges for my 2600 (yes, I'm that old!), and that was really, really fun too."

    What was the biggest lesson that Tony learned from his father on sales and building trusted relationships?

    "And he said, very clearly, Look, this is a relationship. If I make this person successful, he's gonna want to come back to me over, and over, and over. But if I sell him something and it doesn't sell, and he has to discount and he loses money, he's not going to come back. Even if I don't have the right product, I'l…

27. 20VC: NEA's Scott Sandell on SPACS and Why Liquidity is One of the Challenges of our Time, Why We Are At An Inflection Point For Secondaries & Why There Is Nothing To Suggest The Boom Will Not Continue

    11 maart 2021 · 38 min

    Afspelen
    Scott Sandell is the Managing General Partner of NEA, one of the leading firms of the last 3 decades with now close to $24Bn under management and a portfolio including the likes of Salesforce, Robinhood, Plaid, Databricks and many more incredible companies. As for Scott, since joining the firm in 1996 he has led investments in many industry-transforming technology companies including Salesforce.com, Tableau Software, WebEx and Workday. Scott also serves on the board of rocketships including Robinhood, Cloudflare, Coursera and Divvy to name a few. As a result of this investing success, Scott is among the most frequently named venture capitalists to the Forbes Midas List. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Scott made his way into the world of venture close to 3 decades ago back in 1996? How he came to be Managing General Partner of NEA today? What is entailed in the role of "Managing General Partner"?

    2.) What has been the single biggest change in the venture landscape that Scott has observed since his entering in 1996? How did the boom and bust of the dot com and 2008 impact his investing mindset? Consequently, how does Scott advise founders to think about capital efficiency and business model flexibility? What concerns Scott today?

    3.) Why does Scott believe "this is an incredible moment in history for the asset class of venture"? How does Scott think about the core physics of company building changing? How is it companies are able to scale and grow so much faster today? Does their speed of growth change their capital requirements?

    4.) Does Scott agree with Bill Gurley, "the biggest challenge is the oversupply of capital today"? How does Scott analyse his own relationship to price and price sensitivity? What is Scott's framework for determining when to pay up vs when to remain disciplined? How does Scott feel about the rise of SPACs? How will this shake out over the coming years?

    5.) How much have NEA companies raised over the last decade? Of that, ho…

28. 20VC: Spotify Founder Daniel Ek on Optimising Decision-Making, Structuring Effective Learning Processes, The Trials and Tribulations in The Transition From Founder To CEO & The Future of Building Prima Materia with Shakil Khan

    8 maart 2021 · 51 min

    Afspelen
    Daniel Ek is the founder, Chief Executive Officer, and Chairman of the board of directors of Spotify, the world's most popular audio streaming subscription service with 345m users, including 155m subscribers, across 170 markets. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode With Daniel Ek You Will Learn:

    1.) How Daniel made his way into the world of startups and came to found the most popular audio streaming subscription service in the world in the form of Spotify?

    2.) How does Daniel approach effective decision-making today? What is his core process? How does Daniel determine between reversible and irreversible decisions? What does Daniel's learning process look like for new topics and material? How does this differ from topic to topic? What does Daniel mean when he says "I look to become the Chief of X Officer" for a time?

    3.) How does Daniel think about the transition from Founder to CEO? Why is the topic not discussed enough? Where does Daniel see many founders struggle to make the transition? Which elements did Daniel find the most challenging? How has he scaled into them over time? Is it possible to change who you are as a person with this transition?

    4.) How does Daniel think about what it takes to create an environment of safety where everybody can feel free to express their ideas, thoughts and concerns? What sort of failure does Daniel accept? What sort of failure does Daniel not accept? How does good news flow through an organisation differently to bad news? How does Daniel determine when to quit a project vs when to persist and stick to it?

    5.) Prima Materia: Why is Prima not just another fund? How is Prima fundamentally different? What does Daniel believe Shak is world-class at? A walkthrough of Shak and Daniel's decision-making process for choosing to partner with each other on Prima? What has been their first investment? Why gave them the conviction to write this check as their first?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode with Daniel Ek

    Daniel's Favourite Book: Shantaram
    …

29. 20VC: Robinhood Founder Vlad Tenev on His Biggest Lessons Managing Through A Crisis, The Events of The Congressional Committee, Raising $2.4Bn Fast and Why It Was Necessary & Why It Is Ludicrous To Suggest Robinhood Put The Business Ahead of it's Customer

    4 maart 2021 · 35 min

    Afspelen
    Vlad Tenev is the Founder & CEO @ Robinhood, the company that provides commission-free investing, plus the tools you need to put your money in motion. To date, Vlad has raised over $5.6BN with Robinhood including a $2.4Bn raise this month and some of their investors include the very best in the business; Ribbit, Sequoia, Greenoaks, Index, IVP, Thrive, GV and more incredible names. Before Robinhood, Vlad started two finance companies in New York City. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Vlad made his way into the world of startups and how the "Occupy Wall St" movement spurned much of the inspiration for the founding moment of Robinhood?

    2.) Looking back over the last month, does Vlad believe Robinhood is a victim or an enabler of the crisis? What does Vlad believe upset customers the most? With the benefit of hindsight, what would Vlad have done differently? What does Vlad believe are some of the biggest misconceptions about how the last few weeks played out?

    3.) Funding: Why did Robinhood need the scale of funding that it took, so fast? What are the capital requirements for a business like Robinhood? Who regulates their compliance? Was Robinhood forced to put the interests of the business ahead of the interests of their customers? Why does VAR need to be changed as a risk estimation mechanism?

    4.) What has Vlad learned as CEO about managing through a crisis? What did Vlad do to ensure morale remained high internally, despite the external events? What works? What does not work? What did Vlad learn about himself through the experience of the congressional committee and testifying before them?

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

    Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

30. 20VC: Klarna Founder Sebastian Siemiatkowski on Scaling Europe's Most Valuable Private Tech Company, How To Motivate and Challenge Your Team Most Effectively & The Biggest Lessons From Working with Mike Moritz

    1 maart 2021 · 37 min

    Afspelen
    Sebastian Siemiatkowski is the Founder and CEO @ Klarna, the company that makes online shopping simple, allowing you to buy what you need today and pay later. To date, Sebastian has raised over $2.1Bn for the company from the likes of Sequoia, Silver Lake, Blackrock, DST, Northzone, Creandum and even Snoop Dog to name a few. Klarna has been an incredible 16-year journey for Sebastian with it now being the most valuable private technology company in Europe with over 3,500 employees. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    I. The Importance Of Learning To Learn Fast

    What is the best way to learn fast?

    "People talk about it like there's this learning curve, and the best spot is at the place where you're challenged to the precise point where you're almost giving up, but not entirely. That's exactly it.

    "And I have this amazing swim teacher for my children, her name is Petra, and she's just fantastic. I just love watching her because she has this ability of taking my children in the pool and pushing them to that exact point where they are almost, almost giving up, and they're learning at such a pace. And if I can recreate such an environment in Klarna, if I can create an environment, if I can be part of creating an environment where we put people in that position where they just are exactly at that curve where they are challenged, supported, and kind of at the edge and being given the ability to learn really fast and really discover what it means to have an impact."

    Does Sebastian compare his work to other companies'?

    "I don't think that much about what other people or other companies or other things out there could have done different. And there's pros and cons to that. But the benefits of that is that it speeds up my learning. Because a lot of people – and I've realized that as I manage other people – is that because they're so obsessed with trying to think about what other people could have done differently, and why situations arose, and why it wasn't their respons…

31. 20VC: Sonos CEO Patrick Spence on His Biggest Lessons Building and Growing Blackberry, The Right Way to View Competition and Innovation Cycles & How To Make The Transition From COO To CEO Most Effectively

    26 februari 2021 · 37 min

    Afspelen
    Patrick Spence is the CEO @ Sonos, the sound experience company connecting millions of listeners around the world to the content they want. Prior to their IPO, they raised over $450M from the likes of Mike Volpi @ Index, Satish @ Redpoint and e.ventures to name a few. As for Patrick, prior to Sonos, he spent an incredible 14 years with RIM (makers of Blackberry) across multiple different roles. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Patrick made his way into the world of tech and startups and became an instrumental part of the exec team at Blackberry? How that led to his joining Sonos as COO and later becoming CEO?

    2.) How did building and growing RIM influence everything that Patrick does at Sonos? From the battle with Apple, what were Patrick's biggest lessons on the right way to approach competition? How does Patrick think about both partnering with Google today whilst also suing them at the same time?

    3.) From COO to CEO: How did Patrick make the transition from COO to CEO so successfully? What were the most challenging elements to scale into? How does Patrick empower his team to have the confidence to stand up and say no to the CEO? How can one encourage debate and dissent in the team?

    4.) How does Patrick feel about the role that vulnerability has to play in leadership? How does Patrick approach his own self-doubt as a leader today? How does he manage it? How does he advise founders unsure if they can scale into their leadership roles? What mentors does Patrick have? What has he learned from them?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode

    Patrick's Favourite Book: The Infinite Game: How Great Businesses Achieve Long-Lasting

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

    Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

32. 20VC: The Snapchat Memo: Lightspeed's Jeremy Liew on The 4 Key Elements To Consider When Evaluating A Consumer Social Product, What is Good/Great/World Class For Retention, Usage and Downloads in Consumer Social Today & The Core Insight Development of Eva

    24 februari 2021 · 40 min

    Afspelen
    Jeremy Liew is a Partner @ Lightspeed Venture Partners, one of the leading firms of the last decade with a portfolio including the likes of Affirm, Snapchat (Snap), Mulesoft, Epic Games, Carta and more amazing companies. As for Jeremy, in the past he has led deals and sat on the boards of Snap, Affirm, Blockchain.com and The Honest Company to name a few. Before Lightspeed, Jeremy was with AOL, first as SVP of corporate development and chief of staff to the CEO, and then as general manager of Netscape. Due to his incredible investing success, Jeremy has been featured on the Forbes Midas List multiple times. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode We Dissect The Snapchat Memo:

    I. How Jeremey first learned of Snapchat

    How Jeremy Liew first heard about Evan Spiegel and Snapchat?

    "It's actually kind of a roundabout story. We first heard about Snapchat, because one of my partners Barry Eggers is a very involved dad. And he noticed that his daughter had started taking weird selfies"

    What was the process to first get in touch with Evan?

    "The challenge was, the website only had info at Snapchat email address was the only info The only contact info available. So I emailed them, and I never heard back.

    Why was it such a challenge?

    "I then looked up Snapchat on LinkedIn, and I couldn't find any contact information. And I was in a little bit of a loss, I wasn't getting any responses from the email, there was nothing listed on LinkedIn. So I ended up doing a who is look-up to try to find out who had registered the Snapchat URL, and I got an info@ snapgrouplimited email. So I emailed that. And then as again, I didn't get any response.

    What was the breakthrough in the end?

    "....Finally, what I decided to do was since Evan was a student at Stanford, and since I graduated from Stanford for business school, at that time, Facebook allowed you to message people who were in the same network, and Stanford constituted that. So I messaged him through Facebook, and I finally got a response. But this t…

33. 20VC: Okta CEO Todd McKinnon on How To Approach Effective Decision-Making in Leadership, When Is The Right Time To Hire Recruiters and Heads of People, Balancing the Expectations of Wall St with Long Term Vision and What Truly Successful Board Management

    22 februari 2021 · 42 min

    Afspelen
    Todd McKinnon is the Co-Founder & CEO @ Okta, the identity layer for the internet, providing one trusted platform to secure every identity, from customers to your workforce. Prior to their IPO in 2017, Todd raised over $229M for the company from some of the best in the business including Sequoia, a16z, Greylock, Khosla and Floodgate to name a few. Prior to founding Okta, Todd was VP of Development @ Salesforce.com where he spent an incredible 5 years and before that enjoyed an 8 year run in the software development team @ PeopleSoft. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Todd made his way into the world of startups with PeopleSoft and Salesforce? What was the a-ha moment for Todd with the founding of Okta? What were the biggest management takeaways from his time with PeopleSoft and Okta? How did Todd convince his wife that leaving a safe job with Salesforce to found a company was the right decision?

    2.) How does Todd approach decision-making today? What frameworks does he use to optimise his decisions? How does Todd analyse reversible vs irreversible decisions? How does Todd know when he has done enough work and is ready to make the decision? Who does he debate the most important decisions with?

    3.) What does Todd believe makes for a truly great enterprise software entrepreneur today? What were the first elements to break in the scaling of Okta? When is the right time to hire your first recruiters and Head of People? What should you look for in those people? How did Todd make mistakes when it comes to hiring recruiters?

    4.) What are Todd's biggest lessons on successful board management? How would Todd describe his style of board management? How has it changed over the years? What can CEOs do to extract the most value from their board? What were the biggest mistakes Todd made in the early interactions with his board?

    5.) How does Todd balance the growth expectations of Wall St on a quarter by quarter basis with the long term vision and strategy? Why does …

34. 20VC Special: The Real Estate Fintech OGs on Why This Is Not The End For The Bay Area and What Can Be Done To Solve It, The Pros and Cons of Working with Corporate Investors and How Leading Their Teams Has Fundamentally Changed in a COVID World

    18 februari 2021 · 44 min

    Afspelen
    Assaf Wand is the Founder & CEO @ Hippo Insurance, with over $700M in funding Hippo are setting a new standard for home insurance and offer protection for what's important to today's homeowner. Lees meer

    Nima Ghamsari is the Founder & CEO @ Blend, with over $665M in funding they are the digital platform streamlining the journey from application to close — for every banking product.

    Max Simkoff is the Founder & CEO at States Title, with $229M in funding States Title are using machine intelligence to create a vastly more simple and efficient closing experience for lenders, real estate professionals, and homebuyers.

    Brendan Wallace is a Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Fifth Wall, with over $1.3Bn in commitments and AUM across multiple different vehicles, they are the largest venture firm focused on the real estate industry and property technology for the Built World.

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) 3 of the largest and most successful founders in the financial real estate market, what have been their biggest learnings from their friendship over the last 5 years? What have been some of the most hotly debated topics they have had as a group? How did their opinions and views change as a result?

    2.) How do they think and feel about the tech exodus from Silicon Valley, temporary movement due to COVID or fundamental shift? How closely correlated is the move out of California with the explosion of liquidity from IPOs and acquisitions? What pisses Max off most about people leaving CA currently?

    3.) How have their roles as leaders changed in the time of COVID? What have been the most challenging elements? What have they had to embrace? What have they had to disregard or stop? What advice do they give to other founders scaling into hyper-growth in a remote format?

    4.) What do they believe is the fundraising strategy that allowed them to raise over $1.5Bn as a group? How do they think about what they look for in each stage of investors? How does it change when entering g…

35. 20VC: Wunderlist & Pitch Founder, Christian Reber on His Personal Relationship with Risk, Money, Whether the Sale to Microsoft was a Mistake, What Great Product Designs Means Today & Why Founders Investing External Capital is a Distraction

    15 februari 2021 · 36 min

    Afspelen
    Christian Reber is the Founder & CEO of Pitch, the collaborative presentation software for modern teams. To date, Christian has raised over $52M for Pitch from some of the best in the business including Index, Thrive, Blueyard and then some amazing individuals including Instagram's Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger, Zoom's Eric Yuan, Datadog's Olivier Pomerol and Tiny's Andrew Wilkinson. Prior to Pitch, Christian was the Founder @ Wunderlist, raising $35M from the likes of Sequoia and Atomico before being acquired by Microsoft. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Christian Reber made his way into the world of startups? How that led to his founding te global phenomenon, Wunderlist? How his experience with Wunderlist led him to start Pitch most recently?

    2.) Does Christian regret selling Wunderlist to Microsoft? What was the reasoning and logic behind it? What does Christian believe Microsoft did wrong that resulted in Wunderlist no longer being in existence today? How did Christian deal with the personal depression post the sale of Wunderlist?

    3.) How does Christian assess and evaluate his personal relationship to risk? What does he do when making risky and large decisions to ensure he is comfortable? How does Christian feel about his relationship to money? How has it changed over time? How does Christian approach personal finance today between startup investing, fund investing, cash and savings?

    4.) How does Christian think about what great product design means today? How does he balance gut and instinct with granular data when making product decisions today? How has this changed over time? How has Christian structured his team to make the fastest and most efficient product decisions?

    5.) How would Christian reflect on his own style of board management? How has it changed over time? What element does he still to this day find most challenging? What board moment would he say is his most memorable? Who has been his favourite board member to work alongside?
    …

36. 20VC: Scaling to a $1.3Bn Valuation While in Stealth, The Power of Different Network Effects Within Payment Platforms & How To Leverage Your Board and Investor Base for the Most Value with Matan Bar, Founder & CEO @ Melio

    11 februari 2021 · 34 min

    Afspelen
    Matan Bar is the Co-Founder & CEO @ Melio, the company that provides the simplest way to pay vendors and contractors. To date, Matan has raised over $254M for Melio from the likes of Accel, Bessemer, Aleph, Coatue and General Catalyst to name a few. Prior to founding Melio, Matan Bar was Head of PayPal Consumer Product Center and before that was a Head of Product and GM @ eBay in their Israel Innovation Center. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Matan Bar made his way into the world of startups and came to found one of the fastest-growing companies today in the form of Melio?

    2.) What is the single most important thing in a financial transaction business? How does Matan think about the balance between optimising for transaction volume vs revenue? What does Matan believe are the core network effects within payments businesses? Why do most opt for closed network effects? How is Melio different?

    3.) What have been some of the biggest challenges of adding 170 people in one year? What breaks first? What needs to be in place to ensure the culture can scale with the headcount? How does Matan structure the leadership team to manage this hyper-growth? Has Matan struggled with self-doubt in his leadership during this hyper-growth?

    4.) What specifically has Melio and Matan done to achieve a 49% female to male ratio within the company? What works when it comes to implementing diversity at scale? Where do so many people make mistakes? What specific strateies have allowed Melio to hire some of the best female engineers?

    5.) How does Matan most like to interact with his board? How does he determine the advice to ingest vs the advice to reject? What have been some of his biggest lessons when it comes to successful board management? Where do many first time founders make mistakes when it comes to investor value add and extraction?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode

    Matan's Favourite Book: The Unbanking Of America: How the New Middle Class Survives

    As always you ca…

37. 20VC: Aleph's Michael Eisenberg on Why Generalists Over Specialists, Why Boutique Smaller Firms Over Multi-Stage Firms, Portfolio Construction Theory, Capital Concentration Limits and How To Think Through Reserve Allocations with Market Cycles in Mind?

    8 februari 2021 · 45 min

    Afspelen
    Michael Eisenberg is a Co-Founder and Equal Partner @ Aleph, with over $550M under management and a portfolio including the likes of Lemonade, Melio and HoneyBook, they are one of the leading early-stage firms of the last decade. Prior to founding Aleph, Michael spent 15 years as a General Partner @ Benchmark and before that, made his way into venture with Israel Seed Partners where he built an incredible portfolio over an 8 year period. If all of this was not enough, Michael is also an author having published 4 books. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Michael made his way into venture over 25 years ago and how his 15 years at Benchmark led to his founding Aleph?

    2.) How has seeing multiple booms and busts impacted Michael's investing mindset? What do many misunderstand when it comes to reserve allocations in market cycles? Why does Michael believe busts are more psychologically impactful than financially impactful?

    3.) How does Michael approach portfolio construction with Aleph today? How does Michael think about the right level of portfolio diversification? How does Michael think about the right level of capital concentrated into one company? How does Michael assess the difference between risk and uncertainty? What do many misunderstand between the two?

    4.) Why does Michael believe in generalist VCs over specialist VCs? Why do they win? Why does Michael believe in small boutique firms vs large multi-stage firms? How does Michael think about the notion of ownership on first check? Is it possible to really build ownership across rounds today?

    5.) How does Michael reflect on his own style of board membership today? How has it changed? What have been some of Michael's biggest lessons on board membership from Bruce Dunlevie @ Benchmark? What advice does Michael have to newer investors joining boards for the first time?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode

    Michael's Most Recent Investment: Melio

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC o…

38. 20VC: Why VCs Should Care More About Cost of Capital and Less About Ownership, Investing Lessons from working with Peter Thiel at Founders Fund, Why Liquidity Aligns Incentives Between Founders and Investors & Why It Is The Last Double That Matters in Ven

    4 februari 2021 · 40 min

    Afspelen
    Justin Fishner-Wolfson is founder and the managing partner of 137 Ventures, a growth-stage venture firm that provides customized liquidity solutions to founders, investors, and early employees of high-growth private technology companies. Their portfolio includes the likes of SpaceX, Wish, Anduril, Flexport, and Rigup to name a few. Previously, Justin worked on the investment team at Founders Fund and before that served in the US Department of State under Alan Larson, Undersecretary for Economic, Business and Agricultural Affairs. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Justin made his way into the world of venture with Founders Fund and how that led to his founding 137 Ventures? What specific lessons did he learn from Peter Thiel that he has applied to his investing mindset?

    2.) What does Justin mean when he says, "it is the last double that matters"? Why does Justin believe that liquidity aligns incentives between VCs and founders? When is the right timing for this liquidity and are there limits to the sizes of secondaries founders and teams should take?

    3.) How does Justin think about his own price sensitivity today? Why does Justin believe that the conventional VC views on ownership are outdated and no longer as relevant to this class of company? How does Justin think about diversification among the portfolio today? What is the right level? What is too diversified? What is too concentrated?

    4.) Why does Justin believe that standard thoughts around CAC/LTV are wrong? How have they changed over time? How should founders think about this and present these metrics to investors? Given these metrics, how does Justin feel about the revenue multiples we are seeing today both in private and public markets?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode

    Justin's Favourite Book: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

    Justin's Most Recent Investment: Lattice

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

    Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram …

39. 20VC: Supercell Founder Ilkka Paananen on What it Means To Be "The Least Powerful CEO", His Relationship To Wealth and Risk & How To Create Environments of Safety Where Your Team Can Be Their Best and Most Ambitious Selves

    1 februari 2021 · 30 min

    Afspelen
    Ilkka Paananen is the Co-Founder & CEO @ Supercell, the makers of some of the most wildly successful games of the last decade including Hay Day, Clash of Clans, Boom Beach and more. Prior to Tencent acquiring a majority stake in the company at a reported $10.2Bn acquisition, Ilkka raised over $143M for the company from Accel, Index, Atomico, IVP, LVP, Initial and Lifeline. Throughout his incredible leadership of Supercell he has coined the term, "the least powerful CEO", a fascinating concept and one we dig into in this episode. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Ilkka made his way into the world of startups and came to found one of Europe's most valuable companies in the form of Supercell?

    2.) How does Ilkka think about his own relationship to risk? Why does Ilkka believe the No 1 reason companies die is due to their relationship to risk? How does Ilkka evaluate his relationship to money? How has it changed? How does Ilkka feel the weight of responsibility with his wealth?

    3.) What does being "the least powerful CEO" mean in practice? What does Ilkka belive is key for leaders to really empower their team to be bold and ambitious? How can leaders create environments of safety where it is ok to fail? Where do many leaders go wrong here?

    4.) The first 3 Supercell games were failures, how did Ilkka deal with those really hard times? How can leaders sustain morale in such hard times? Supercell then had 3 big hits in a row, how does one prevent ego and over-confidence in teams? What is the beer vs champagne culture?

    5.) How does Ilkka think about the importance of focus? What has Ilkka done and learned to be a much more focused leader? How does Ilkka approach the aspect of competition today?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode

    Ilkka's Favourite Book: What You Do Is Who You Are: How to Create Your Business Culture by Ben Horowitz

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

    Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here for…

40. 20VC: Why "Founder Insight" is Overrated, Why Big and Bold Product Visions Can Be Dangerous & Why Getting To Product Market Fit by Accident Can Lead to Danger with Hubert Palan, Founder & CEO @ ProductBoard

    29 januari 2021 · 40 min

    Afspelen
    Hubert Palan is the Founder & CEO @ ProductBoard, helping product managers understand what customers need, prioritize what to build next, and rally everyone around the roadmap. To date, Hubert has raised over $64m for ProductBoard from the likes of Sequoia, Index, Kleiner Perkins, Bessemer and Credo Ventures to name a few. Prior to founding the company, Hubert was VP Product Management @ GoodData where he played an instrumental role in their scaling from 6 to 300 people. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Hubert made his way from Eastern Europe to SF, made his way into the world of product management and came to found ProductBoard?

    2.) Why does Hubert believe that "founder insight" is overrated? What strategies and tactics does Hubert give to founders to be more mentally plastic and flexible? How does one know when to persist when things are not working vs when to give up? What is the decision-making framework?

    3.) Why does Hubert believe that "big and bold product vision can be dangerous"? How does Hubert think about when is the right time to release a second product? What are the core elements to tackle when thinking about a second product? Where do many make mistakes here?

    4.) Why does Hubert believe that, "if you get to product market fit by accident, you could be in trouble?" What does Hubert advise in terms of studying if and how you got to product market fit? How can one use post-mortem analyses here effectively?

    5.) Why does Hubert believe that transparency is so necessary today with the team? Should founders be transparent when it comes to M&A, fundraising etc? Where are the limits? What makes it so hard to instil effectively? What do many founders misunderstand?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode

    Hubert's Favourite Book: Elad Gil's High Growth Handbook

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

    Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

41. 20VC: The Memo: Sequoia's Alfred Lin on Why Chasing GMV Leads To Bad Behaviours, How To Approach Competition and Capital Efficiency & The Core Importance of Understanding the Difference Between Input and Output Metrics

    27 januari 2021 · 41 min

    Afspelen
    Alfred Lin is a Partner @ Sequoia Capital, one of the world's most renowned and successful venture firms with a portfolio including the likes of Google, Airbnb, Whatsapp, Stripe, Zoom, Doordash and many more. As for Alfred, he has led deals in the likes of Airbnb, Doordash, Instacart, Reddit and Houzz to name a few. Prior to the world of venture, Alfred was Chairman and COO @ Zappos for 6 years leading to their acquisition by Amazon. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Alfred made his way into the world of venture and came to be a Partner @ Sequoia? How Alfred first met DoorDash? Where did the meeting take place? Who was there? What were the first impressions?

    2.) Market: How did Alfred breakdown the food delivery market when doing the diligence for the investment? How did Alfred forsee the market changing over time? What were some unexpected elements of the market Alfred did not forsee? What does Alfred look for in markets; size or growth?

    3.) Competition: How did Alfred analyse the competitive landscape for food delivery at the time? Why does Alfred believe that great companies are not built by focusing on the competition? What does Alfred mean when he says, "you have to be customer-obsessed and competitor aware"?

    4.) Traction: Does Alfred agree with Sarah Tavel in the dangers of chasing topline GMV? What negative behaviours can chasing GMV trigger? What does Alfred mean when he says, "founders have to be able to distinguish between input and output metrics"?

    5.) Acquisition: What does Alfred believe DoorDash did so well in terms of acquiring drivers more efficiently? How did they retain them so effectively? What allowed DoorDash to compete so effectively when it came to merchant acquisition? What were some of Alfred's biggest takeaways when it came to DoorDash's customer acquisition journey?

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

    Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here for mojito madness and all things 20…

42. 20VC: Evernote & mmhmm Founder Phil Libin on Why We are Beginning a Multi-Trillion Dollar Restructuring of the World, Why Shortcuts are the Biggest Mistakes Startups Make & The Future of Video and The Unbundling of Zoom

    25 januari 2021 · 41 min

    Afspelen
    Phil Libin is the Founder and CEO @ mmhmm, the app that allows you to level up your remote presentations, making high-quality video content in minutes. To date, Phil has raised over $30M for the company from an incredible investor base including Sequoia, Kevin & Julia Hartz, Tony Fadell, Instagram's Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger and Brianne Kimmel. Prior to mmhmm, Phil was a Managing Director @ General Catalyst and prior to his time in venture, Phil most famously founded Evernote, where he led the business with phenomenal success, as CEO for over 8 years. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Phil made his way into the world of startups, came to found Evernote and how that led to his founding of mmhmm, most recently?

    2.) How would Phil describe his management style today? How has it changed over time? Why does Phil believe shortcuts are the greatest mistakes startups make? What does Phil believe you can vs cannot take shortcuts on? What have been some real world lessons there?

    3.) What were Phil's biggest takeaways from his time in venture? How did it change his operating mindset? Does Phil believe there is an incentive misalignment between founder and VC? Why is Roelof Botha the best board member Phil has worked with? What makes him so special?

    4.) How does Phil think about the unbundling/verticalisation of Zoom? How does he predict the market evolving? How does Phil see the differing usage patterns between consumer and business? Why does Phil believe more can be learned from looking at similarities and not differences?

    5.) What does Phil believe are the two classes of mistakes when scaling startups? What have been Phil's biggest lessons on acquiring and retaining the best talent? How does Phil create an environment of dissent where anyone can bring their entire self and beliefs to the table?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode

    Phil's Favourite Book: Kafka on the Shore

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

    Likewis…

43. 20VC: Hims Founder Andrew Dudum on Hims Going Public, The Reasoning and Benefits of SPACs, The Biggest Misconceptions of Successful Company Building & Wall St's Changing Perceptions Towards Growth and Profitability

    21 januari 2021 · 35 min

    Afspelen
    Andrew Dudum is the Founder & CEO @ Hims & Hers, offering a modern approach to health and wellness and one of the fastest-growing companies to reach $1Bn. Prior to their going public on Tuesday this week, Hims raised over $158M from some of the best including Thrive, Forerunner, Founders Fund, IVP, Redpoint and more. As for Andrew, alongside his role at Hims he is also Co-Founder of Atomic, a company builder and venture fund all in one, backed by Peter Thiel and Marc Andreesen to name two. Prior to Atomic, Andrew led product at TokBox managing a team of 30 leading to their acquisition by Telefonica in 2012. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Andrew made his way from Head of Product at Tokbox to venture capitalist with Atomic to changing healthcare with Hims?

    2.) What are the biggest misconceptions people have with regards to what it takes to build a successful company? Why do you not need big teams? How can leaders drive efficiency within small teams? What have been Andrew's biggest lessons in acquiring the best talent in market? What works?

    3.) Hims is the fastest company to scale to $1Bn, how does Andrew reflect on how he managed hyper-growth? What did he do well? What was the first to break? What would he do differently? When is the right time to go from generalist to specialist? When is the right time to add more products?

    4.) Why did Andrew believe now was the right time to IPO just 4 years into the founding of the business? How did the SPAC process play out? What are the core advantages to Andrew of the SPAC over an IPO? Why will more founders use it in the future? How does Andrew assess the importance or lack of, when it comes to the pricing pop on IPO day?

    5.) How does Andrew reflect on his relationship to money? Why does he feel more scared of it now than ever before? How does he think about bringing up his children with an appreciation and respect for money? What 3 traits would Andrew most like his children to have?

    Item's Mentioned In Toda…

44. 20VC: Etsy CEO, Josh Silverman on 2 Defining Traits of Great Leadership, The Danger of Attaching Happiness To Milestones, How To Structure Teams To Optimise for Experimentation and Agility &Whether You Learn More From Success Than Failure

    18 januari 2021 · 45 min

    Afspelen
    Josh Silverman is the CEO @ Etsy, leading the company as it builds a platform that empowers creative entrepreneurs around the world. Prior to their IPO, Etsy raised funding from some of the best in the business including Danny Rimer @ Index, Albert Wenger @ USV and Jim Breyer @ Accel to name a few. Prior to Etsy, Josh served as President of Consumer Products and Services at American Express, was the CEO of Skype, and CEO of shopping.com, and he held various executive roles at eBay. Josh is also currently on the board of directors of Shake Shack. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Josh made his entry into the world of startups, came to be CEO of Skype and how he came to be CEO of Etsy? How did Josh's political background prepare him for being a public markets CEO?

    2.) How does Josh think about 10 year plans? What is the right alternative? What does Josh do when he does not know what to do? How does Josh think about head vs heart in decision-making? How does Josh think about downside protection and risk mitigation with decisions?

    3.) Why does Josh believe that you should, "never let a crisis go to waste"? How does he interpret that? Does Josh believe you learn more from success than failure? Why does Josh believe many succeed in spite of, not because of? How does Josh connote happiness to a milestone of success? What is true happiness for Josh?

    4.) How does Josh think about winning today? What is the framework Josh believes founders need to put in place to optimise their chance of winning? How does Josh structure his team at Etsy to optimise for speed and experimentation? What has worked? What has not worked?

    5.) How can leaders create a system where failure is minimised? How does Josh implement a "red hat vs green hat" decision making process around new ideas at Etsy? What question does Josh and the team ask with every experiment? How should one analyse the cost of rolling back a decision?

    6.) How does Josh determine between dogma and good practice in…

45. 20VC: Databricks CEO, Ali Ghodsi on The 3 Phases of Startup Growth, How to Evaluate Risk and Downside Scenario Planning & Who, What and When To Hire When Scaling Your Go-To-Market

    14 januari 2021 · 42 min

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    Ali Ghodsi is the Founder & CEO @ Databricks, bringing together data engineering, science and analytics on an open, unified platform so data teams can collaborate and innovate faster. To date, Ali has raised over $897M for the company including from the likes of a16z, NEA, Microsoft, Battery, Coatue, Greenbay and more. Prior to Databricks, Ali was one of the original creators of open source project, Apache Spark, and ideas from his research have been applied to Apache Mesos and Apache Hadoop. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Ali made his way from fleeing Iran as a refugee to living in a Swedish ghetto? What was the founding moment for Ali with Databricks?

    2.) How does Ali think about and evaluate risk today? Why does Ali always make his team do downside scenario planning? How does Ali think about his relationship to money today? Why does Ali disagree with gut decisions? What is his process for making decisions effectively?

    3.) Stage 1: The Search for PMF: What are the core elements included in this phase? What types of leaders thrive in this phase? What type struggle? How can leaders sustain morale in the early days when it is not up and to the right? Who are the crucial hires in this phase?

    4.) Stage 2: Scale Go-To-Market: What are the core roles needed to expand GTM fast and effectively? Why should you hire sales leaders before marketing leaders? Why is hiring finance leaders so crucial here? What mistakes are most often made here? How do the board resolve them?

    5.) Stage 3: Process and Efficiency: What are the first and most important processes that need to be implemented? How does Ali need to change the type of leader he is to fit this stage? How does one retain creativity and nimble decision-making at scale and with process?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode

    Ali's Favourite Book: Good Strategy Bad Strategy: The Difference and Why it Matters

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

    Likewise, you can follow H…

46. 20VC: Annie Duke on Reversible vs Irreversible Decisions, How To Evaluate Risk, The Theory of Sunk Cost in Venture & How to Optimise Both the Discussion and Quality of Investment Decisions

    11 januari 2021 · 40 min

    Afspelen
    Annie Duke is a former professional poker player and the author of National Bestseller, "Thinking in Bets" & "How To Decide". During her poker playing days, Annie was a World Series of Poker bracelet winner, the winner of the 2004 Tournament of Champions and the only woman to win the NBC National Poker Heads Up Championship. Today, Annie is also the founder of How I Decide, a non-profit that creates curricula and tools to improve decision making and critical thinking skills for under-served middle schoolers. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Annie made her way from professional poker player to National Bestselling author and coach to the world's leading investors?

    2.) How does Annie evaluate the nature of risk? What is good risk vs bad risk? How does Annie think through reversible vs irreversible decisions? What is her framework? Why does Annie believe most irreversible decisions are actually reversible? How does it change your thinking?

    3.) How does effective solo-decision-making differ from effective group decision-making? What decision-making biases does Annie often see venture being guilty of making? What 3 things can one do to improve the decision-making of the collective group?

    4.) How does Annie think about sunk cost? How does one know when enough is enough and you have to walk away? How does this tie into Annie's thinking on portfolio theory? How does Annie think about pre-mortems? How should they be structured? What is included?

    5.) How does Annie define critical thinking? What tips would Annie give to someone in really advancing their level of critical thinking? What behaviours can one implement to seek to protect critical thinking? How does this differ in team environments?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode

    Annie's Favourite Book: The Success Equation: Untangling Skill and Luck in Business, Sports, and Investing

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

    Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here f…

47. 20VC: Twitter Co-Founder Biz Stone on The 3 Stages of Wealth, The Return To Twitter in 2017 and the Associated Missions and Challenges & Why Silicon Valley is not an "Insiders Only" Universe?

    8 januari 2021 · 36 min

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    Biz Stone is best known as the Co-Founder of Twitter and Medium. Biz is also an investor in the likes of Slack, Square, Intercom, Beyond Meat and Blue Bottle Coffee. Biz also co-founded Jelly, a "human in the loop" AI search service, which was acquired by Pinterest. Due to his many successes, Biz has been recognized as INC Magazine Entrepreneur of the Decade and one of TIME's 100 Most Influential People in the World. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How did Biz make his way into the world of startups and come to found Odeo/Twitter one day on a car trip with Ev Williams?

    2.) How does Biz evaluate his relationship to money? How does Biz think about teaching his son the value of money? What does Biz mean when he says wealth 'accentuates your current self"? How did Biz get off the treadmill of always wanting and chasing more?

    3.) How does Biz think about insecurity and self-doubt? How does Biz approach saying no? How does he get comfortable with not always being Mr Popular? What is so challenging here? How does Biz feel about founding tieing their identities to their company?

    4.) Why did Biz come back to Twitter in 2017? With hindsight, what would he have done differently if he were to return again? What were the biggest challenges when he arrived? Why was internal morale low? What did he and Jack do to increase it? What worked? What did not?

    5.) Why does Biz not feel Silicon Valley is an "insider-only" universe? Why does Biz feel Silicon Valley is a mindset? How does Biz think about the decentralisation of talent moving forward? How does Biz compare the UK to the US startup ecosystem? What is worse in the UK?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode

    Biz's Favourite Book: Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities and Software

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

    Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

48. 20VC: Bill Gurley and Howard Marks: What Happened In 2020? What Can We Expect Looking Forward to 2021?

    4 januari 2021 · 41 min

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    Howard Marks is co-chairman and co-founder of Oaktree Capital Management, a leading investment firm with more than $120 billion in assets. Prior to founding Oaktree, Howard spent 10 years at The TCW Group, where he was responsible for investments in distressed debt, high yield bonds, and convertible securities. Howard has also written two books, most recently Mastering the Market Cycle: Getting the Odds on Your Side, and it was Warren Buffet who said, "When I see memos from Howard Marks in my mail, they're the first thing I open and read. I always learn something." Lees meer

    Bill Gurley is a General Partner @ Benchmark Capital, one of the most successful funds of the last decade with a portfolio including the likes of Uber, Twitter, Dropbox, WeWork, Snapchat, StitchFix, eBay and many many more. As for Bill, widely recognised as one of the greats of our time having worked with the likes of GrubHub, NextDoor, Uber, OpenTable, Stitch Fix and Zillow. Prior to Benchmark, Bill was a partner with Hummer Winblad Venture Partners. Before entering venture, Bill spent four years on Wall Street as a top-ranked research analyst, including three years at CS First Boston.

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) In March Ray Dalio stated we would be entering a "global recession", how do Howard and Bill feel about this statement? How does today's environment remind Howard and Bill of 2010/11? What is similar? What is different? How does Bill think about investing through cycles?

    2.) How does Bill think about investing through cycles? What have Bill's lessons been from seeing many venture vintages on LP performance across cycles? How does Howard think about investing through cycles from a distressed debt perspective? What have his lessons been from Oaktree's performance over the years?

    3.) Do Howard and Bill agree we will not see interest rates go anywhere for the next 3-5 years? What is the impact of this sustained low-interest rate environment? What could be done that would see interest…

49. 20VC: Lessons From Working with Bill Gates, How To Lead Without Authority and The Difference Between Leadership and Management & How Fundraising Changes In A COVID World with Quentin Clark, Managing Director @ General Catalyst

    28 december 2020 · 37 min

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    Quentin Clark is a Managing Director @ General Catalyst, one of the most prominent firms of the last decade with a portfolio including Stripe, Airbnb, Snap, Anduril, Deliveroo and Cazoo to name a few. As for Quentin, at GC he has led deals in the likes of Kernel, Coda, Commure just to name a few. Before entering the world of venture Quentin was the CTO @ Dropbox and before that he was the Chief Business Officer @ SAP. Finally, before SAP, Quentin spent an incredible 20 years at Microsoft in a variety of different roles play a key part in their hyper-growth. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Quentin made his way from CTO @ Dropbox and 20 years at Microsoft to being an MD with General Catalyst today?

    2.) What were Quentin's biggest management takeaways from his 20 years at Microsoft? What is his favourite story about working with Bill Gates? How does Quentin think about the art of delegation? How does Quentin differentiate between leadership and management?

    3.) How does Quentin believe the world of fundraising has changed with COVID? How does Quentin build relationships of trust in these compressed fundraising timelines? What works? What does not work? How can you really build that relationship off Zoom? How does this change the fundraising landscape moving forward?

    4.) What does Quentin mean when he says he likes to "lead without authority"? How does that translate into his management style? How does Quentin evaluate his style of board membership? How does Quentin know whether to wear the investor vs the operator hat on the board?

    5.) Does Quentin believe we are really moving the needle in terms of the projects that venture is funding today? What would Quentin like to see more of? What would Quentin like to change about the world of venture? How does Quentin evaluate market timing risk when investing?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode

    Quentin's Favourite Book: Stranger in a Strange Land

    Quentin's Most Recent Investment: Sprout Therapy

    As always …

50. 20VC: Why the Theory of Pro-Rata is Often False, How Rolling Funds Impact Both Pricing and Competition & The Biggest Lessons from Working with Jack Dorsey with Avlok Kohli, CEO @ AngelList Venture

    21 december 2020 · 36 min

    Afspelen
    Avlok Kohli is the CEO of AngelList Venture which has facilitated the funding of over 5,000 startups including 47 unicorns and is home to 4,300 funds and syndicates with $2.2B in assets under management. This year, AngelList Venture launched the much-discussed, Rolling Funds and Avlok recently launched his own rolling fund, Avlok Capital. Prior to AngelList, Avlok built and sold two companies; FastBite, acquired by Square in 2015 and Fairy, also acquired. If that was not enough, Avlok is also an angel in 25 companies. Lees meer

    In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

    1.) How Avlok made his way into the world of facilitating over $2Bn in AUM having sold 2 prior companies on the other side of the table as a founder? What is Avlok's favourite Jack Dorsey story?

    2.) Why does Avlok believe Rollings Funds are the "printing presses of innovation" for capital markets? Does Avlok believe that everyone should be a fund manager and managing capital? What are the benefits of rollings funds vs traditional micro funds?

    3.) How does the rise of rolling funds impact the early stage pricing of companies? How does it impact the competitive landscape for seed and pre-seed allocations? Is Avlok concerned about a wave of undisciplined capital entering the market?

    4.) How does Avlok evaluate reserve allocations for early stage and micro fund managers today? What does the data show for funds that do reserve for pro-rata vs those that do not? How has this impacted Avlok's own approach to pro-rata and reserve deployment?

    Item's Mentioned In Today's Episode

    Avlok's Favourite Book: Meditations

    As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

    Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.