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

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC) interviews the world's greatest venture capitalists with prior guests including Sequoia's Doug Leone and Benchmark's Bill Gurley. Once per week, 20VC Host, Harry Stebbings is also joined by one of the great founders of our time with prior founder episodes from Spotify's Daniel Ek, Linkedin's Reid Hoffman, and Snowflake's Frank Slootman. If you would like to see more of The Twenty Minute VC (20VC), head to www.20vc.com for more information on the podcast, show notes, resources and more.
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Now displaying: 2024
Dec 4, 2024

Nik Storonsky is the Co-Founder and CEO of Revolut, one of the fastest-growing companies in the world with a $45BN valuation and 50M customers around the world. In July 2024, Revolut posted a whopping $2.2BN in revenue with $545M in pre-tax profit in 2023. To date, Nik has raised $1.8BN for the company from the likes of Index, Balderton, Ribbit, DST and TCV. 

In Today’s Show with Nik Storonsky We Discuss:

1. When & Where Will Revolut IPO:

  • What does Revolut need to do or change before they are ready to go public?

  • When would Nik like for Revolut to go public?

  • When they do go public, where would Nik list? Would it be in London?

  • How does Nik respond to claims that he has moved to Dubai for tax reasons?

2. What Revolut Needs to Achieve to Hit $100BN:

  • Why has no challenger bank won the US market yet?

  • What will Revolut do differently to allow them to win the US market?

  • What market share will Revolut have in Europe in 3 years time?

  • What line of the business that does not exist today, will be the biggest in 5 years time?

3. How to Build an Execution Machine:

  • Why does Nik believe the biggest mistake he made was hiring senior managers?

  • What have been Nik’s biggest lessons on how to hire for roles you have never hired for before? What works? What does not?

  • How does Nik retain insane velocity of execution at scale?

  • How does Nik bucket people into three different buckets? What does each bucket mean for the type of work they do and the expectations placed on them?

4. How Revolut Tests New Products:

  • How does Revolut use a portfolio approach to test new product ideas?

  • How are teams for new ideas structured? What roles do they have?

  • How much time and resources are they given?

  • What is the tracking process to determine the success of new products?

  • What % of new products do succeed and progress to the core app?

  • Which product did Nik think would be massive but turned out to be a flop?

  • What did Nik not expect to be massive and turned out to be mega hit?

5. The UK and Europe: Are We F******:

  • The Chancellor has said we will have no growth in the UK for the next 3 years. How does it feel for Nik to grow Revolut in this environment?

  • If Nik could advise Keir Starmer on how to turn the UK around, what would he say?

  • Why does Nik believe the US has created so many more $100BN companies?

  • Why does Nik believe that work/life imbalance is the secret to success and happiness?

 

 

Dec 4, 2024

George Arison is the CEO of Grindr. The app that results in 40% of lesbian and gay marriages, the average user uses the app for 1 hour per day and sends more messages on Grindr than they do Whatsapp. The company will do over $300M in revenue in 2024 with a 40% EBITDA margin. One of the insane public company success stories. Prior to Grindr, George was the Founder and CEO of Shift, which he took public in 2020.

In Today’s Episode with George Arison We Discuss:

1. Wild Story of How the Chinese Bought and Lost Grindr: 

  • How did the Chinese come to buy Grindr and then fire the founder?

  • Why did the US government force the sale of the company from the Chinese?

  • What happened when the whole development team was in Taiwan and then resigned overnight?

  • George got the CEO role in Sept and the company went public in Oct. How did that all happen so fast?

2. How Grindr is a Free Cash Flow Machine:

  • What are the three core ways that Grindr is able to print money with a 40% EBITDA margin?

  • Why does Grindr not spend any money on marketing or customer acquisition?

  • Why does George think that most companies have way too many people?

  • Why does George believe that most startups are very badly managed?

  • What will Grindr do with the insane amount of free cash flow the company is producing?

3. Lessons Building Grindr to $300M in Revenue:

  • What has George done with Grindr that he wishes he had not done?

  • What has he not done that he wishes he had done?

  • Why does George not make political statements today? Does George think we have freedom of speech when CEOs face such repercussions for political views?

  • What does Wall St not understand about Grindr that it really should understand?

 

Nov 29, 2024

Guy Podjarny founded Tessl, Snyk and Blaze. Tessl is reimagining software development for the AI era and shaping AI Native Development. Snyk created and leads the Developer Security category, and is now a multi-billion dollar company with over 1,000 employees. Guy was previously CTO at Akamai (following its acquisition of Blaze), is an active angel investor, and co-hosts of the AI Native Dev podcast.

In Today’s Episode with Guy Podjarny We Discuss: 

03:02 Discussion on NVIDIA's Market Position

04:14 Will We See a Trough of Disillusionment in AI

07:36 The Future of AI Development and Specialized Models

10:17 Challenges and Opportunities in AI Dev Tools

17:41 Concerns About Closed vs. Open Development Platforms

21:27 Speculations on AI's Role in Application Layers

24:40 Google's Competitive Edge

25:28 IPO and M&A in the Trump Era

26:45 The Future Role of Software Developers

32:20 Security Challenges in AI Development

33:41 Spicy Questions and Charity Donations

36:05 Quickfire Round: Insights and Advice

 

 

 

Nov 27, 2024

Klaus Hommels is one of Europe’s leading start investors of the last decade with a portfolio including the likes of Spotify, Airbnb, Facebook, Coinbase, Revolut and more. Among his many responsibilities, Klaus is the Founder of Lakestar, his own venture fund and chairs the board of directors of the NATO Innovation Fund.

In Today’s Episode with Klaus Hommels We Discuss: 

1. The Investing Rules that are BS:

  • Why does Klaus totally reject the idea of price sensitivity?

  • Why does Klaus hate the idea of “building portfolios”?

  • Why does Klaus believe the best investments are made when there is not a fundraising round in motion?

  • Why does Klaus believe that capital concentration limits on a per company basis are BS? How concentrated is Klaus happy to be?

2. Europe: What The F*** is Going On:

  • Why is Europe underfinancing innovation by a factor of eight?

  • Why is Europe unable to send satellites into space for six years?

  • What should Europe do to become a global superpower once again? What needs to change?

  • Why should European pension funds be forced to invest in venture capital?

3. The Stories Behind the $BN Returns:

  • How did a dinner with Klaus’ son lead to his investing in Revolut?

  • How did Klaus analysis of Friendster and MySpace lead to his buying Matt Cohler @ Benchmark’s Facebook shares?

  • How did a small investment in a Swedish company, Stardoll, lead to Klaus investing in the seed round of Spotify?

  • How did a conversation with Madonna’s manager lead to Klaus investing in Airbnb?

 

 

Nov 25, 2024

Jason Citron is the Co-Founder and CEO of Discord, a voice, video and text platform for friends playing games. Jason has raised $1BN for the company and was able to scale to 200M users. Prior to co-founding Discord, Jason founded OpenFeint, the biggest social mobile gaming platform, which sold to GREE in 2011 for $104 million.

In Today’s Episode with Jason Citron We Discuss: 

1. Leadership Lessons That are Total BS:

  • Hiring: Why does Jason believe hiring experienced executives is the worst thing you can do for your company? What did he learn by doing it?

  • Culture: Why does Jason believe that empowerment and alignment are total BS? How does Jason empower people when they are told what to do vs choose what to do?

  • Strategy: What does Jason believe is the most effective way to drive and implement the strategy? 

2. The Untold Moments Behind Scaling to 200M Users:

  • Why did Jason offer to give investors their money back at one point? What was the hardest round to raise and why?

  • Why did Jason turn down the chance to sell to Microsoft for $12BN? 

  • What one single change in how Jason communicated with the first 100 users changed the trajectory of the entire company?

  • What do most founders think they know about product market fit that they do not?

3. The Makings of a Unicorn Founder:

  • Does Jason believe that richer founders make better founders?

  • Why does Jason believe that entrepreneurs who play video games have a higher chance of being successful in the future?

  • What single trait does Jason believe he has that has made him such a successful founder? Does Jason ever have imposter syndrome? When? 




Nov 22, 2024

Dan Fougere is one of the most successful sales leaders of the last decade. Most recently, Dan was Chief Revenue Officer for Datadog, growing revenues from $60 million to $1BN ARR. Before Datadog, Dan was Head of Global Sales at Medallia where he created the Mediallia sales playbook. In addition, Dan is also a minority owner of the New York Yankees. 

In Today’s Episode with Dan Fougere: 

1. Lessons Scaling Sales to $1BN in ARR at Datadog:

  • What did Datadog not do that Dan wishes they had of done?

  • What did they not do that Dan wishes they had done?

  • What does Dan know about scaling sales to $1BN in ARR that he wishes he had known at the beginning?

  • What stage of the scaling process was hardest? Why?

2. How to Hire the Best Sales Team:

  • What are the top signals of the best sales candidates?

  • How does Dan structure the interview process for new candidates?

  • How does Dan use tasks and take-home assignments to test candidates?

  • What does Dan think of hiring panels?

  • What are the biggest hiring mistakes Dan has made? What did he learn?

3. Discounting, Logos and Deal Reviews:

  • Is discounting always wrong? How should sales leaders use it?

  • How important is the quality of logo in the early days vs revenue in the door?

  • What is the right way to structure deal reviews? What makes good vs great?

  • Is outbound dead in 2024? Advice to founders on outbound?

 

Nov 20, 2024

Cem Sertoglu is one of the great venture investors of the last decade. Cem is famed for writing the first check into UiPath and over several rounds turning $16.5M into $2.1BN. Cem recently started Bek Ventures, a $250M fund that was 3x oversubscribed. 

In Today’s Show with Cem Sertoglu We Discuss:

1. Has Venture Capital Been Commoditised:

  • Why does Cem believe that VC has not been commoditised?

  • Why does Cem believe many VCs today are not even VCs anymore?

  • How does Cem advise founders who have offers from large multi-stage firms? What questions should they ask them pre-working with them? 

  • How do the best founders select the VC they choose to work with?

2. Price, Reserves, Loss Ratios:

  • Why does Cem believe that price does not matter?

  • How does Cem approach reserves and reserves management?

  • What does Cem know now about reserves that he wishes he had known when he started investing?

  • Does Cem care about loss ratio? Does he do scenario planning when making investments?

3. Making $2.1BN on UiPath: 

  • How did Cem meet Daniel for the first time? Was it obvious he was incredible?

  • Why did they only write a $1M check and not take the whole round with $1.5M?

  • Why did 40 of the best investors in Europe all turn down UiPath for the Series A?

  • What did doing the bridge round for UiPath teach Cem about reserves?

  • When was it obvious UiPath was going to be a mega hit?

  • How did they continue to concentrate capital with each round?

  • When did they first start to sell shares in UiPath?

  • What was their approach to the selldown of their position?

  • When the company IPO’d, how much of it did they have? 

4. AMA with One of Europe’s Best:

  • Does signalling exist? How does Cem advise founders on this?

  • What has been his biggest loss? How did that change his mindset?

  • What has been Cem’s biggest miss? What did he not see?

  • Why does Cem always believe you should manufacture arguments with founders before investing?

  • Why does Cem believe a high GP commit can actually misalign the GP and the LP?

 

 

Nov 18, 2024

Alain De Botton is one of the greatest philosophers of our time. His work has had a profound impact on me more than any other. I have wanted to do this episode for the last 8 years. 

In Today’s Episode with Alain De Botton We Discuss:

1. Why Status is Making You Miserable: 

  • Why are we richer yet more anxious than ever?

  • What is the right way to define status? Why do we want it so much?

  • Is it bad to want status? What are some non-obvious signs that you are seeking status when you do not realise it?

  • Does social media enhance the desire for status? How so?

  • Do the happiest people want status the least? What are Alain’s biggest observations in how truly happy people think about status?

2. Why Parents Want You To Fail: 

  • Why is the sign of good parenting when your child does not want to be famous?

  • Why do your parents sometimes want you to fail? 

  • What should parents do if their child wants to chase an unachievable goal?

  • Why should parents encourage their children to start very early? 

3. Why Meritocracy is a Fallacy & Meaningful Work:

  • Why does Alain believe a true meritocracy is an impossible dream?

  • Why is meritocracy a bad thing when taken to the extreme?

  • Why does Alain believe that companies are not families?

  • Why does Alain tell people that they should not bring their full selves to work? 

4. WTF is “Meaningful Work”: 

  • What does it mean to do “meaningful work”?

  • Why do humans need to do “meaningful work” today in a way that we did not many years ago?

  • What are Alain’s biggest pieces of advice to young people today, unsure of what they should do with their lives and careers?

  • Why does Alain believe the idea of a “calling” is BS?

5. Ambition, Achievement and Sacrifice:

  • What does Alain mean when he says “you have to tolerate your own averageness”?

  • What does Alain say to the young generation who want work/life balance?

  • What does Alain mean when he said you “cannot be at war with yourself”?

  • Does Alain agree that to achieve you must sacrifice?

 

 

Nov 15, 2024

Raman Malik is the Head of Growth at Perplexity where he is responsible for growth marketing, onboarding, activation, retention, and monetisation. Prior to Perplexity, Raman, was an early member of the growth team at Lyft and joined Perplexity earlier this year after his own startup journey. 

In Today’s Episode with Perplexity’s Head of Growth: 

1. Inside the Perplexity Growth Machine:

  • What have been the single biggest needle movers in the growth of Perplexity?

  • What has not worked? What have they learned from that?

  • How have partnerships driven growth? Lessons on what makes a good vs bad partnership?

  • Why does Raman think paid acquisition is a drug and Perplexity do not do it? How does Raman advise other founders when it comes to paid acquisition?

2. Acquisition, Retention, Churn: Mastering the Basics:

  • Why does Raman think that brand marketing is BS? When does it become more important?

  • What are the simplest things startups and product teams can do to drive retention up?

  • How do Perplexity count an “engaged user”? What metric suggests they have a retained user?

  • What is the good, the bad and the ugly when it comes to A/B tests?

3. How Perplexity Built a Growth Machine:

  • Why does Raman advise all founders to hire more former founders?

  • How does the way you manage founders turned employees differ from employees who have never been founders?

  • What is the must under appreciated growth channel today that has worked for Perplexity?

  • What growth channel has been the biggest flop for Perplexity? What did Raman learn from losing money on the channel?




Nov 13, 2024

Markus Villig is the Founder and CEO of Bolt, a global mobility platform with more than 200 million lifetime customers in more than 50 countries and 600 cities. Bolt has raised over €1 billion in funding from investors like Sequoia, D1 and G Squared, making Markus the youngest founder of a billion-dollar company in Europe.

In Today’s Episode with Markus Villig:

1. Starting an $8BN Company:

  • How did Markus come up with the idea for Bolt before Uber existed?

  • How did Markus find his co-founder? Why did 30 people turn down the chance to co-found Bolt? What are Markus’ biggest tips on finding a co-founder?

  • How did Markus use a $5K loan from his parents as the pre-seed round?

  • How did Markus get the first riders for Bolt? What worked? What did not work?

  • How did Markus get the first driver for Bolt? What worked? What did not work?

2. Expanding to be a Global Champion:

  • How did Markus expand Bolt to $10M in ARR on just $1M of funding?

  • What did the international expansion playbook look like? What worked? What did not work? How has it changed over time?

  • What one simple change led to their becoming the leader in Africa?

  • What was the best country to launch? What was the worst?

  • What is the most profitable country today? What is the least?

3. The $8BN Company that no VC Wanted to Fund:

  • Why did every large VC in Europe turn down Bolt early on?

  • How did a real estate company in the Baltics save Bolt with lifeline funding?

  • When did Sequoia come into the mix? Does Sequoia move the needle for your company when they invest?

  • How do New York financially driven investors differ to the traditional VC ecosystem?

  • What would Markus most like to change about the world of VC?

4. The Future: Micromobility, Self-Driving Cars, Uber:

  • Will the rise of self-driving cars harm or help companies like Bolt and Uber?

  • What is the future for micromobility? Does it cannibalise the core business for Bolt and Uber?

  • What is Uber better at Bolt doing? What are Uber worse at than Bolt? How will that change moving forward?

  • Waymo, buy or short? Why?

 

Nov 11, 2024

Matt Grimm is the Co-Founder and Chief Operating Officer of Anduril Industries, an American defense technology company that specializes in advanced autonomous systems. To date, Anduril has raised over $3.7BN with the latest round pricing the company at a whopping $14BN. Before Anduril, Matt was a Principal at Mithril Capital Management alongside Peter Thiel. Before Mithril, Matt was an early hire at Palantir, where he was deployed to both Iraq and Afghanistan to ensure U.S. forces had the best technology for the mission. 

                           In Today’s Episode with Matt Grimm We Discuss:

1. China/Taiwan, Ukraine/Russia & Israel/Gaza:

  • How will a Trump administration change US foreign policy and approach to conflict?

  • Will China invade Taiwan? What does Matt expect to see happen there?

  • Will Trump put an end to the war in Ukraine? What will be the outcome?

  • Is Israel wrong to defend itself in the way it has? How will the situation in Gaza be resolved?

2. The Future of War:

  • What will war look like in the future?

  • How is software and autonomy changing the world of war? 

  • Why does the incentive structure of governments buying military equipment need to change around the world?

  • Will we see a world of robodogs fighting on battlefields? What does weaponry of the future look like?

3. Are We In a Defence Bubble:

  • With the massive increase in funding to defence companies, does Matt think we are in a defence bubble?

  • What does Matt believe all investors should know about the defence industry before they make investments in the space?

  • What should defence founders at the early stage know about building a defence company at scale? What changes?

  • Who will be the buyer for the many defence companies that have raised early rounds of funding and go out of business? 

4. Matt Grimm: AMA:

  • Does money make you happy?

  • What is the biggest luxury purchase you have made?

  • Should TikTok be banned in the US?

  • What would Matt do today if he knew he would not fail?

Nov 4, 2024

Sam Altman is the CEO of OpenAI, one of the most important companies in history. OpenAI is on a mission to ensure that artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity. Prior to OpenAI, Sam was the President of Y Combinator and an angel investor in Stripe, Airbnb, Reddit and Instacart. 

                                         15 Questions with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman:

1. Will the trajectory of model capability improvement keep going at the same rate as it has been?

2. When did Sam doubt the continuance of scaling laws most? What has been the hardest technical research challenge OpenAI have overcome?

3. How worried is Sam about semiconductor supply chains and international tensions around them? 

4. What is Sam’s biggest worry today? How has it changed over the last 12 months and 5 years?

5. In what ways does Sam feel he was and is unprepared for the role of CEO of OpenAI?

6. Was Masa Son right to suggest that $9TRN of value will be created every year by AI?

7. Why does Sam disagree with Larry Ellison’s statement that it will cost $100BN to enter the foundation model race?

8. Was Keith Rabois right that the best way to build companies is to hire under 30s? 

9. What unmade decision weighs on Sam’s mind most often?

10. What is Sam most grateful to Y Combinator for? 

11. What would Sam build if he were a 23 year old starting today with the foundational AI technology that is already in place?

12. What should startups not try and build as OpenAI will steamroll them? What should they try and build where OpenAI will not go?

13. What does Sam believe is the most exciting use of agents that he has not seen created yet?

14. How does Sam believe that human potential is most wasted today?

15. Who does Sam most respect in the world of AI today? Why them?

 

 

Nov 1, 2024

Vlad Tenev is a Co-Founder and CEO of Robinhood, the commission free stock trading and investing app with a market cap today of $20.7BN. Over the incredible 11 year journey Vlad has raised over $5BN from some of the world’s best investors including Sequoia, a16z, DST, Ribbit and Index. Before Robinhood, Vlad started two finance companies in New York City. 

In Today’s Episode with Vlad Tenev We Discuss: 

1. Surviving a Scandal: The Gamestop Saga:

  • What was the single hardest element of the sage for Vlad?

  • What did the sage teach Vlad about how to tell stories effectively?

  • What did Vlad not do in the period that he wishes he had of done?

  • What did he do that he wishes he had not done?

  • What advice does Vlad have for any founder going into a crisis?

2. Founder Mode and The Biggest BS Myths of Leadership:

  • How does Vlad analyse and assess Paul Graham’s “Founder Mode”?

  • Where is Founder mode right? Where is it dangerous?

  • What canonical leadership statements and lessons does Vlad most disagree with?

  • How has Vlad changed most significantly as a leader?

3. 8x $100M Revenue Lines: Scaling a Juggernaut:

  • What have been the single biggest challenges of scaling 8 lines of revenue each with over $100M in them?

  • What have been Vlad’s biggest lessons on when and how to release new products?

  • Why did Vlad decide to abandon the Europe launch? Was it right with the benefit of hindsight?

  • What did Vlad not invest in with Robinhood that he wishes he had of done?

 

Oct 30, 2024

Karri Saarinen is the Co-Founder and CEO of Linear. The company has raised from some of the best in the business including Sequoia and Accel. Before founding Linear, Karri was the principal designer at Airbnb and the founding designer at Coinbase. 

10 Lessons with One of Silicon Valley’s Most In-Demand Founders:

How to Become a Master Fundraiser:

  1. Why does Karri believe it is BS advice that founders should “always be raising”?

  2. What is Karri’s biggest advice to founders on minimising dilution?

  3. What do most founders think they know about fundraising but do not?

  4. What is the best way to put your VCs to work? How can you give them homework to do?

  5. What has been the single best VC meeting Karri has had?

  6. What has been the worst VC meeting?

Product and Growth:

  1. What does Karri mean when he says “founder must focus on quality growth over hypergrowth?”

  2. How does Karri advise founders on how soon to release and monetise their first product? Wait for platform ready or ship more feature products and monetise?

  3. What have been the single biggest product lessons for Karri from Airbnb and Coinbase?

  4. What are the most commons ways that growth plateaus? What breaks first?

Karri AMA:

  • Brian Armstrong or Brian Chesky; who would you invest in first?

  • Would you sell Linear today for $3BN in cash?

  • What do you know now that you wish you had known when you started?

  • What did you believe that you now no longer believe?

 

Oct 28, 2024

Daniel Khachab is the co-founder and CEO of Choco. Today, Choco’s AI platform facilitates half of all food traded in major cities like New York, Paris, London, and Berlin, cutting food waste and streamlining distribution. Since its founding in 2018, Choco has raised $330 million from Bessemer, Coatue (its first European investment), and Insight, reaching unicorn status within 2.5 years. Previously, Daniel was the youngest Managing Director at Rocket Internet, where he oversaw growth across Latin America, Southeast Asia, Australia, and the Middle East.

                                    From Seed to $1BN in 30 Months:

1. We Killed a $BN SaaS Business to be AI First:

  • Why does Daniel believe that SaaS is dead?

  • What does an AI-first company mean? 

  • Why does Daniel believe AI-first companies will win the next 10 years?

  • What foundation models does Daniel and Choco use today?

  • How has the cost of using different models changed?

  • What categories are vulnerable to being attacked with vertical products from the foundation model providers?

2. Europe is F*******: Why and What To Do:

  • Why does Daniel believe Europe is at a massive disadvantage in the next 10 years of AI?

  • Chips: What can Europe do to encourage chip production and manufacturing to take place on European soil?

  • Energy: What can European governments do to encourage energy providers and new forms of renewable energy to innovate to provide the energy AI needs?

  • Talent: Why does Daniel believe AI talent is the hardest problem that Europe faces? What can governments in EU do to resolve this problem?

3. Lessons Scaling to $1BN in 30 Months:

  • Does Daniel regret raising at a $1.1BN valuation? 

  • Why did he throw a unicorn party with the round? Why does he regret it so much?

  • What did Daniel spend money on that he wish he had not spent money on?

  • What did Daniel not spend money on that with the benefit of hindsight, they should have spent money on?

  • When your competition raises a lot of funding, does that mean you should also?

 

Oct 25, 2024

Mark Goldberg is a Managing Partner and Co-Founder at Chemistry, a $350M fund announced just yesterday with the mission to lead the best seed and Series A rounds. Before Chemistry, Mark was a Partner at Index Ventures, where he led early stage investments in Plaid, Bridge, Pilot, Anrok and Persona. Prior to Index Ventures, Mark was one of the first business hires at Dropbox.

In Today’s Episode with Mark Goldberg We Discuss:

1. The Truth About Multi-Stage Firms:

  • Why are portfolio services there to help the investing partners and not the founders?

  • What are the most broken elements within a multi-stage firm?

  • How does decision-making break down in large partnerships?

  • When is the right time to work with multi-stage firms? When is not?

2. From Boutique High Margins to Commoditised Low Margins: 

  • With the immense amount of cash that has entered VC, will returns simply get worse?

  • Who will be the winners in the next 10 years of venture?

  • Who will be the losers? What can they do today to change this?

  • What element of the future of venture are not enough people spending time on?

3. Lessons from Leading Unicorn Company Rounds:

  • What happens to all the unicorns with insanely high prices they cannot grow into?

  • What has been Mark’s biggest hit? What did he learn?

  • What has been his biggest miss? How did that change his go-forward approach?

  • Does Mark agree that 90% of VC do not add value?

 

 

Oct 23, 2024

AJ Tennant is the Vice President of Sales & Success at Glean, Glean has more than 20x'd its revenue and 100x'd its user base in the just two and a half years he's been there. Before Glean, AJ had incredible runs at Slack and Facebook. At Slack, AJ helped grow revenue from $6 million to more than $1 billion. 

In Today’s Episode with AJ Tennant We Discuss:

1. How to Sell AI Tools in 2024:

  • Are we still in the experimental budget phase for AI?

  • How does selling AI tools differ to selling traditional SaaS?

  • What are enterprises biggest concerns when it comes to adopting AI tools?

  • What buzzwords get enterprises most excited in the sales process?

  • Will we see a massive churn problem when the first renewal cycle for many of these AI products comes?

2. Outbound, Discounting, Closing:

  • Is outbound dead in 2024? What does no one do that everyone should do?

  • How does AJ approach discounting? Biggest lessons and advice?

  • What can sales teams do to create a sense of urgency in a sales cycle?

  • How does AJ do deal reviews and post-mortems? What is the difference between good and bad post-mortems?

3. How to Master Customer Success:

  • What are the biggest mistakes founders make today in managing their CS teams?

  • Should CS be compensated for upsell? How should the comp structure of CS teams change?

  • What can be done to create a good handoff experience for the customer when handing from AE to CS?

  • What are the most common ways CS teams break over time?

4. Hiring the Best Sales Teams:

  • How does AJ structure the hiring process for all new sales hires?

  • What questions does AJ always need to ask when hiring sales reps?

  • What are clear signs of outperformers when hiring new reps?

  • Does AJ give candidates a take-home assignment? What does he want to see from them?

 

 

Oct 21, 2024

Mamoon Hamid is a General Partner @ Kleiner Perkins and one of the greatest venture investors of our time. In the past, Mamoon has led rounds in Figma, Slack, Rippling, Intercom, Glean and Box. Prior to joining Kleiner Perkins, Mamoon was a Co-Founder of Social Capital, and prior to that a Partner at U.S. Venture Partners (USVP). 

In Today’s Episode with Mamoon Hamid We Discuss: 

1. The Greatest Venture Deal of All Time: Figma or Slack:

  • What is Mamoon’s highest returning deal?

  • What did Mamoon see in Dylan and Figma when they had no revenue and very little user data?

  • What compelled Mamoon to write Stewart the check with Slack? What did he not see with Slack that he should have seen?

2. Taking Control of the Great Brand in Venture: Kleiner Perkins:

  • Is it true that Kleiner approached Mamoon and gave him the keys to the Kleiner kingdom? How did it go down?

  • Will Kleiner go back to having multiple products, large growth funds, international funds? What does Mamoon want Kleiner to be in 5 years?

  • What was the hardest element of the transition into Kleiner? What did Mamoon not know that he wishes he had known?

3. Becoming a Generational Defining Investor:

  • Market, founder, product, how does Mamoon rank them 1-3?

  • How has Mamoon changed most significantly as an investor?

  • What does he know now that he wishes he had known when he became a VC 19 years ago?

  • What is his biggest loss? How did it shape his mindset and go forward investing approach?

4. AI Supercycle: The Greatest Time to Invest

  • Where does Mamoon believe the value will accrue in this wave of AI?

  • Where are many investors spending a lot of time but Mamoon believes is not worthy of that time? 

  • Will scaling laws continue?

  • Have we ever seen an incumbent set spend like this incumbent class? How does that change the game for VCs?

 

 

Oct 18, 2024

Antoine Le Nel is the Chief Growth and Marketing Officer at Revolut, one of the fastest growing fintechs on the planet. Prior to Revolut, Antoine spent an incredible 7 years at King (Makers of Candy Crush) overseeing continuous expansion of the world's most famous mobile game as VP of Growth. 

10 Questions with Revolut’s Chief Growth Officer: 

  1. Why does Antoine believe that the best product and growth teams do not need to do A/B tests?

  2. Why does Antoine believe the best growth teams do not believe in anything?

  3. What growth tactics have worked best for Revolut? What did they learn?

  4. What have been the biggest growth flops? How did that change their approach? 

  5. Why does Antoine believe localisation in product is BS and overrated? 

  6. Why does CAC never come up at Revolut? Why do they not believe it is a metric to focus on? What metrics do they focus on instead?

  7. What does Antoine mean when he says “growth is a bidding war”? How does one win the “bidding war” today?

  8. Why does Antoine believe the best growth teams focus on optimisations and 1% gains not moving the needle for a company?

  9. What are the single biggest mistakes growth teams make today? What used to work that no longer works?

  10. What growth tactic is most effective but also most under-utilised? How can startups take advantage of this?

 

Oct 16, 2024

Zach Perret is the CEO and Co-Founder of Plaid, a technology platform reshaping financial services. To date, Zach has raised over $734M for Plaid from the likes of NEA, Spark, GV, Coatue and a16z, to name a few. Today, thousands of companies including the largest fintechs, several of the Fortune 500, and many of the largest banks use Plaid. In addition, Zach is also a Co-Founder of Mischief, an early-stage venture fund in San Francisco. 

In Today’s Episode with Zach Perret We Discuss:

1. Founder Mode:

  • Why “Founder Mode” will be the most dangerous blog post written in the last decade for founders? What is most misleading about it?

  • What are “grinder problems”? Why does Zach believe that grinder problems are the best problems for startups to try and solve?

  • Why does Zach believe that OKRs are BS and should be removed? What should be used instead?

2. Lessons from Raising $734M for Plaid:

  • What is the worst advice that VCs give that most founders take?

  • Why does Zach believe that angel investing is more distracting than helpful for founders to do? What are the pros of investing alongside running a company?

  • Why does Zach encourage founders to raise money as infrequently as possible? What does this mean for the size and price of rounds Zach thinks we should see occur?

3. The $5BN Exit and the $13.4BN Round:

  • Why did Zach turn down the $5BN exit to Visa? Was it the right choice?

  • Does Zach regret raising at such a high price of $13.4BN when the exit did not happen?

  • Would Zach sell the company today for $13.4BN if offered it?

  • What did Zach not do that he wish he had done? What did he do that he wishes he had not done?





Oct 14, 2024

David Frankel is the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Founder Collective, one of the best seed firms of the last decade. David has led rounds in companies such as Suno, Coupang, SeatGeek and PillPack (sold to Amazon for ~$1B). Previously, David was Co-Founder and CEO of Internet Solutions (IS), the largest ISP in Africa, ultimately acquired by NTT Japan. David has been named to the Midas List six times. In 2023, he was #11 and in 2024, he appeared at #15 on the Midas List of the world's best venture capital investors and at #2 on the Midas list of seed investors. 

10 Questions With One of the World’s Best Seed Investors:

1. Reserves: Why are reserves the hardest part of venture? What have been David’s biggest lessons in how to do them well?

2. Why does David believe that pro-rata is the original sin of VC? 

3. Has DPI died in 2024? Is PE the salvation for the VC exit market and liquidity?

4. Why does David believe LPs are so pissed of with VCs right now? What will change that?

5. When will IPO markets open? Are M&A markets shut? What would cause them to open?

6. How does David reflect on price today? When will he pay up and break his rules?

7. Biggest lessons for David on knowing when is the right time to sell? Why does David believe you should never sell your winners? What has David sold that he regrets most?

8. What companies returned the most to Founder Collective Funds? Uber? Coupang? Airtable? The Trade Desk? What did he learn from those mega hits?

9. What have been David’s biggest losses? How did losing the company change his mindset and approach to investing?

10. What does David believe is the future of venture capital? How can seed funds play in a world of mega multi-stage funds? Who wins? Who loses?

 

 

 

Oct 11, 2024

Eoghan McCabe is the Co-Founder and CEO @ Intercom, one of the largest private software companies in the valley with hundreds of millions in revenue and thousands of customers. To date, Eoghan has raised over $238M from Index, Kleiner Perkins, ICONIQ, GV, Bessemer and more incredible firms. Intercom’s goal is to reinvent customer service with AI agents replacing human agents over the next 10 years.

10 Questions with One of the Largest Private Company CEO’s:

  1. AI Investing: Why will most AI investments not do better than the S&P 500?

  2. Building SaaS Tools with AI: Why is it crazy for companies to follow Klarna and use AI to build their own tools?

  3. Going Public: Why is Bill Gurley wrong that more later stage companies should go public? Why did Intercom shelve plans to go public in 2022?

  4. Early-Stage is F*******: Why is the early-stage venture ecosystem as an asset class f******?

  5. Founder Mode: Why does Eoghan believe all of the best founders are unbalanced? What is the difference between Founder vs Manager mode? 

  6. Political Voice: Why did Eoghan decide he had to voice his political opinions now?

  7. The Danger of Harris: Why does Eoghan believe a Harris administration would rob the US of immense freedom, democracy and civil liberty?

  8. Why Vote Trump: Why does Eoghan believe that Trump will regain immense freedom for the sovereign individual?

  9. Freedom of Speech: How does Eoghan determine right vs wrong when freedom of speech leads to harm and injustice? 

  10. Middle East and Nuclear War: Why does Eoghan believe that nuclear war is much closer than we think? Will we see the Middle East descend into war? 

 

Oct 9, 2024

Jeff Wang is the Managing Partner of Sequoia Capital Global Equities (SCGE), a public/private crossover investment firm with investments spanning from late-stage private companies to public companies. As Managing Partner, Jeff has primarily focused on public growth technology companies but has also invested $3 billion in private companies including Bytedance, SpaceX, and Stripe. Prior SCGE private investments that have since gone public include Airbnb, Doordash, MongoDB, Nubank, and Snowflake. Before joining SCGE in 2010, Jeff also worked at TPG Capital and Silver Lake Partners where he focused on investments in technology buyouts.

10 Questions with the Leader of Sequoia’s $9BN Global Equities Fund:

1. Crossover Fund Opportunity: Why are crossover funds more attractive today than ever? Have the tourists gone?

2. Public Market Opportunity: Why is the opportunity in the public markets, not the private markets today?

3. IPO Markets: When will IPO markets open? What will cause them to open?

4. Breaking Hedge Fund Rules: What are the biggest ways that Sequoia break the traditional rules of hedge funds?

5. Google: Why does Jeff believe that Google’s cash cow of search is under threat?

6. Meta: Why does Jeff believe Meta will be the biggest competitor to Google?

7. NVIDIA: Why is NVIDIA’s price today reasonable? What is the bull and bear case?

8. China: Is there a recovery for China? How do Sequoia play China in this market?

9. AI in Public Markets: How are Sequoia playing the AI game in the public markets?

10. Investing Lessons: What have been Jeff’s biggest investing lessons from Mike Moritz, Doug Leone and Roelof Botha?

 

Oct 7, 2024

Eiso Kant is the Co-Founder and CTO of Poolside.ai, building next-generation AI for software engineering. Just last week, Poolside announced their $500M Series B valuing the company at $3BN. Prior to Poolside, Eiso founded Athenian, a data-enabled engineering platform. Before that, he built source{d} - the world’s first company dedicated to applying AI to code and software.

1. Raising $600M to Compete in the AGI Race:

  • What is Poolside? How does Poolside differentiate from other general-purpose LLMs?

  • How much of Poolside’s latest raise will be spent on compute?

  • How does Eiso feel about large corporates being a large part of startup LLM provider’s funding rounds? 

  • Why did Poolside choose to only accept investment from Nvidia?

  • Is $600M really enough to compete with the mega war chests of other LLMs?

2. The Big Questions in AI:

  • Will scaling laws continue? Have we reached a stage of diminishing returns in model performance for LLMs?

  • What is the biggest barrier to the continued improvement in model performance; data, algorithms or compute?

  • To what extent will Nvidia’s Blackwell chip create a step function improvement in performance?

  • What will OpenAI’s GPT5 need to have to be a gamechanger once again?

3. Compute, Chips and Cash:

  • Does Eiso agree with Larry Ellison; “you need $100BN to play the foundation model game”? What does Eiso believe is the minimum entry price?

  • Will we see the continuing monopoly of Nvidia? How does Eiso expect the compute landscape to evolve?

  • Why are Amazon and Google best placed when it comes to reducing cost through their own chip manufacturing? 

  • Does Eiso agree with David Cahn @ Sequoia, “you will never train a frontier model on the same data centre twice”? 

  • Can the speed of data centre establishment and development keep up with the speed of foundation model development?

4. WTF Happens to The Model Layer: OpenAI and Anthropic…

  • Does Eiso agree we are seeing foundation models become commoditised?

  • What would Eiso do if he were Sam Altman today?

  • Is $6.6BN really enough for OpenAI to compete against Google, Meta etc…?

  • OpenAI at $150BN, Anthropic at $40BN and X.ai at $24BN. Which would Eiso choose to buy and why?

 

Oct 4, 2024

Maria Angelidou is a seasoned product leader, having spent close to a decade at Meta where she was VP of Product and General Manager for some of the largest products such as Facebook Groups (2B+ users), Events, Profile, and Search. Before that, Maria led the Facebook App Monetization team, driving billions of dollars in revenue. Today, Maria is the Chief Product & Technology Officer at Personio, an HR tech company with an ambitious mission to unlock the power of people for SMEs.

In Today's Episode with Maria Angelidou

1. How to Hire the Best Product Teams:

  • What are the three different archetypes for PMs today?
  • What non-obvious traits does Maria look for in new product hires?
  • How does Maria structure the hiring process? What works? What does not?
  • Does Maria do take home assignments? How has her approach changed here?
  • What is Maria's biggest advice to candidates on both compensation and title?

2. How the Best Product Teams Do Product Reviews:

  • What does every team get wrong in how they do product reviews?
  • What are the four different type of product reviews?
  • How often does Maria do a product review? Who is invited?
  • Who sets the agenda? How is it structured?
  • What makes good vs great product reviews?

3. Europe vs US: How Product Teams Differ:

  • What is the single biggest difference when comparing product teams in the US vs EU?
  • Does Maria agree that the work ethic is less in the EU?
  • Which class of employee would Maria say is more entitled?
  • What could Europe do to be more competitive with the US?
  • What was the biggest surprise to Maria on returning to Europe from the US?

 

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