Episodes
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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?
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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?
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Episodes manquant?
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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:
Why does Karri believe it is BS advice that founders should “always be raising”?
What is Karri’s biggest advice to founders on minimising dilution?
What do most founders think they know about fundraising but do not?
What is the best way to put your VCs to work? How can you give them homework to do?
What has been the single best VC meeting Karri has had?
What has been the worst VC meeting?
Product and Growth:
What does Karri mean when he says “founder must focus on quality growth over hypergrowth?”
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?
What have been the single biggest product lessons for Karri from Airbnb and Coinbase?
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?
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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?
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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?
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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?
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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?
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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:
Why does Antoine believe that the best product and growth teams do not need to do A/B tests?
Why does Antoine believe the best growth teams do not believe in anything?
What growth tactics have worked best for Revolut? What did they learn?
What have been the biggest growth flops? How did that change their approach?
Why does Antoine believe localisation in product is BS and overrated?
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?
What does Antoine mean when he says “growth is a bidding war”? How does one win the “bidding war” today?
Why does Antoine believe the best growth teams focus on optimisations and 1% gains not moving the needle for a company?
What are the single biggest mistakes growth teams make today? What used to work that no longer works?
What growth tactic is most effective but also most under-utilised? How can startups take advantage of this?
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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?
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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?
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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:
AI Investing: Why will most AI investments not do better than the S&P 500?
Building SaaS Tools with AI: Why is it crazy for companies to follow Klarna and use AI to build their own tools?
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?
Early-Stage is F*******: Why is the early-stage venture ecosystem as an asset class f******?
Founder Mode: Why does Eoghan believe all of the best founders are unbalanced? What is the difference between Founder vs Manager mode?
Political Voice: Why did Eoghan decide he had to voice his political opinions now?
The Danger of Harris: Why does Eoghan believe a Harris administration would rob the US of immense freedom, democracy and civil liberty?
Why Vote Trump: Why does Eoghan believe that Trump will regain immense freedom for the sovereign individual?
Freedom of Speech: How does Eoghan determine right vs wrong when freedom of speech leads to harm and injustice?
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?
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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?
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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?
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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 Angelidou1. 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? -
Bret Taylor is CEO and Co-Founder of Sierra, a conversational AI platform for businesses. Previously, he served as Co-CEO of Salesforce. Prior to Salesforce, Bret founded Quip and was CTO of Facebook. He started his career at Google, where he co-created Google Maps. Bret serves on the board of OpenAI.
In Today's Discussion with Bret Taylor:1. The Biggest Misconceptions About AI Today:
Does Bret believe we are in an AI bubble or not? Why does Bret believe it is BS that companies will all use AI to build their own software? What does no one realise about the cost of compute today in a world of AI?2. Foundation Models: The Fastest Depreciating Asset in History?
As a board member of OpenAI, does Bret agree that foundation models are the fastest depreciating asset in history? Will every application be subsumed by foundation models? What will be standalone? How does Bret think about the price dumping we are seeing in the foundation model landscape? Does Bret believe we will continue to see small foundation model companies (Character, Adept, Inflection) be acquired by larger incumbents?3. The Biggest Opportunity in AI Today: The Death of the Phone + Website:
What does Bret believe are the biggest opportunities in the application layer of AI today? Why does Bret put forward the case that we will continue to see the role of the phone reduce in consumer lives? How does AI make that happen? What does Bret mean when he says we are moving from a world of software rules to guardrails? What does AI mean for the future of websites? How does Bret expect consumers to interact with their favourite brands in 10 years?4. Bret Taylor: Ask Me Anything: Zuck, Leadership, Fundraising:
Bret has worked with Zuck, Tobi @ Shopify, Marc Benioff and more, what are his biggest lessons from each of them on great leadership? How did Bret come to choose Peter @ Benchmark to lead his first round? What advice does Bret have to other VCs on how to be a great VC? Bret is on the board of OpenAI, what have been his biggest lessons from OpenAI on what it takes to be a great board member? -
Donald Tang is the Executive Chairman of SHEIN, with oversight of public affairs, business strategy, corporate development, and finance. Donald began his career at Merrill Lynch & Co. He later joined Bear Stearns & Co. Inc. in Los Angeles as Senior Managing Director of Investment Banking. At Bear Sterns, Donald quickly rose to become the Vice Chairman of the firm, as well as Chairman and President of Bear Stearns International Holdings, Chairman and CEO of Bear Stearns Asia, Ltd, and a member of the board of directors at Bear Stearns & Co.
In Today's Episode with Donald Tang We Discuss:1. How SHEIN Became a Global Giant:
As specifically as possible, what did you and the SHEIN team do that enabled you to be one of the fastest-growing companies on the planet? Real-Time Retail: What is this? How is it the core of SHEIN's growth and efficiency? Supply Chain Innovation: How did SHEIN innovate on the supply chain to give them such an advantage over the competition? Price King: How does Donald respond to the statement that SHEIN wins due to price, not quality? Social Media: What social media tactics allowed SHEIN to grow so fast? What did not work? Paid Media: How have SHEIN approached paid marketing? What works? What does not?2. The Big Questions: IPOs, Impact on Climate and Worker Conditions:
IPO: Why does SHEIN want to go public? Is London the right place for the company to go public? Climate: How does Donald respond to the common idea that "SHEIN is bad for the climate" and encourages fast fashion like never before? Tariffs: How does Donald respond to the common question around tariffs and SHEIN benefitting from being under a certain tariff threshold?3. Marriage, Fatherhood and Happiness:
Marriage: What have been Donald's biggest lessons on how to have a successful marriage? Fatherhood: What does being a great father mean to Donald? If he could call himself up the night before his first child was born, what would he advise himself? Happiness: How does Donald think about happiness today? What does everyone get wrong about happiness? -
Jeetu Mahtani was an early member of the HubSpot team. Under his leadership and the sales organization, the business grew its non-US revenue from $3M ARR to close to $1B ARR. After running the International business as the global MD and Sales leader, he then moved to lead the customer success org which expanded to managing 1,500 people in customer success.
In Today's Episode with Jeetu Mahtani We Discuss:1. How to Go International for Startups:
What are Jeetu's biggest lessons from Hubspot on what startups can do to make their international expansion a success? What were the biggest mistakes Hubspot made in their international expansion? How should every team in each new location be structured? What should the ramp time and onboarding process look like or each new team and expansion?2. Scaling Sales from $3M to $1BN in ARR:
What did Hubspot do so well to successfully scale to $1BN in international ARR? What were the biggest mistakes Jeetu made in the expansion of Hubspot's sales teams? What are the first things to break in sales teams? How do you handle them? Why does Jeetu hate discounting? Why does Jeetu not like customer references?3. Scaling Customer Success to 1,500 CS Reps:
When should founders make their first customer success hires? What are the biggest mistakes people make in the scaling of CS teams? Why should customer success be incentivised in the same comp plans that sales teams have? How do the best CS teams work with sales and product teams most effectively?4. Hiring the Best and Ramping Them:
What does Jeetu's hiring process look like for all new sales reps? What are the must ask questions for Jeetu in all candidate interviews? How fast do you know when you have made a mistake with a new hire? What is the secret to effective onboarding? What are the biggest mistakes people make in onboarding?20Sales: Scaling Hubspot from $3M to $1BN in ARR | How to Hire and Ramp Sales Teams | How to Scale Customer Success Successfully | How and When to Go International and Crush It with Jeetu Mahtani
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Eric Vishria is a General Partner @ Benchmark Capital, one of the world's leading venture firms. At Benchmark, Eric has served on over 10 boards including Confluent (CFLT), Amplitude (AMPL), Benchling, Contentful, Cerebras and several other private companies. Prior to joining Benchmark, Eric was the Co‐Founder and CEO of RockMelt, acquired by Yahoo in 2013.
In Today's Episode with Eric Vishria We Discuss:1. How to Make Money Investing in AI Today:
How does Eric think through where value will accrue in the stack between chips, models and applications? Why does Eric believe foundation models are the fastest commoditising asset in history? Why does Eric believe that Nvidia will not be the only game in town in the next 3-5 years?2. How to Invest in AI Application Layer Successfully:
How does Eric analyse between a standalone and deep product vs a product that foundation model will commodities and incorporate into their feature set? How does Eric differentiate between the 10 different players all going after customer service, or sales tools or data analyst products etc? How does Eric analyse the quality of revenue of these AI application layer companies? What does he mean when he describes their revenue as "sugar high"?3. How the Best VC Firm Makes Decisions:
What is the decision-making process for all new deals in Benchmark? As specifically as possible, how does the voting process inside Benchmark work? What deal was the most contentious deal that went through? What did the partnership learn? How has the Benchmark decision-making process changed over 10 years?4. Does AI Break Venture Capital Models:
Does the price of AI deals and size of their rounds break the Benchmark model? Will foundation model companies all be acquired by the larger cloud providers? Unless multiples reflate in the public markets, does venture as an asset class have hope? Why does AI make paying ludicrously high prices potentially rational? -
Dmitry Gurski is the Co-Founder and CEO of Flo Health, the leading women's health app and the first European femtech unicorn. Launched in 2015, Flo Health has grown to over 70 million monthly active users and 5 million paid subscribers. The app is recognized as the #1 recommended tool for period and cycle tracking, and it recently achieved a valuation exceeding $1 billion. Beyond Flo, Dmitry is a partner at Palta, a co-founding company with a portfolio of successful startups including Simple App, MSQRD (acquired by Facebook), AIMatter (acquired by Google), and Wannaby (acquired by Farfetch).
In Today's Episode with Dmitry Gurski We Discuss:1. Why 99% of Startup Advice is BS:
Why does Dmitry believe that speed is not the most important thing? Why does Dmitry believe that competition is actually a good thing? Why does Dmitry believe that craziness not intelligence is the most important trait in founders? Why does Dmitry believe that fundraising is simply a numbers game? What does no one understand about retention that everyone should know?2. From Potato Farms to Billion Dollar Apps:
What a childhood in potato farming taught Dmitry about leadership and technology? How mushroom farming taught Dmitry about diversification and focus? How does Dmitry advise people analyse the hardest moments in their life? Why Dmitry does not believe in talent? What else is there?3. Scaling to Flo's First 1M Users:
What were Dmitry's biggest lessons from two failed prior versions of Flo? What is the secret to success in consumer subscription? How did Flo acquire their first customers? What worked? What did not work? Why does Dmitry not believe in brand and PR?4. Building a $200M Revenue Market Leader:
What have been Dmitry's biggest lessons on monetisation? How does Dmitry think about retaining product simplicity with time? What are the first things to break in the scaling of a company? What did they do with Flo that he wishes they had not done? -
Phil Carter is one of the best growth leaders of the last decade helping world-class companies like Faire, Quizlet, and Ibotta accelerate their growth. Today, Phil is a growth advisor and angel investor who helps Seed - Series C consumer subscription businesses define their growth strategy.
In Today's Episode with Phil Carter We Discuss:The Seven Core Levers to Win at Consumer Subscription:
How to Optimize Subscription Pricing and Packaging:Step:
Single vs multiple subs tiers? Monthly, weekly or annually? How often should it be revisited? Biggest mistakes companies make with pricing and packaging? How to deliver immediate value through new user onboarding?Target Metrics:
Best tactics for delivering value in the shortest amount of time? Biggest mistakes companies make in user onboarding? Thoughts on the very long surveys companies like Noom make people fill out pre getting access to the product? How to boost paid marketing efficiency by investing in desktop web flows?Target Metrics:
Why is now the time to be investing in desktop workflows? What are the most effective and specific tactics to do so? How to optimize paywall visibility and conversion?Target Metrics:
Why is paywall view rate so important? What is good vs bad? What are the most common places to trigger paywall? Thoughts on hard paywall vs consumer value first? Specific tactics to refine paywall design to maximize conversion? Single biggest mistakes companies make when it comes to paywall conversion? How to distinguish and emphasize premium value props?Target Metrics:
What are the most effective ways to do this? Who does it best? Lessons from them? How to leverage motivation tactics (stats, streaks, badges, leaderboards, notifications)?Target Metrics:
What is the most effective? Do we not have notification overload? What used to work but now does not work? Who does this best? Why them? How to leverage strategic discounts and promotions?Target Metrics:
What are the most effective discounting methods used? What are the biggest mistakes companies make when using promos or discounts? Who does it best? What do they do? - Montre plus
