Casey Fenton, co-founder at the legendary Couchsurfing and currently founder and CEO at Upstock.io talks about what RSUs are and how are they different from standard stock options. We also discussed why exactly Casey hates stock options so much and what is so wrong about them. And of course we talked about Casey's experience with couchsurfing and its transition from a non-profit into a for-profit company. Upstock: https://www.upstock.io/ Casey's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/caseyfent...
Thomas Li, Co-Founder and CEO at Daloopa talks about explaining complicated tech in simple terms and selling it to investors and buyers. We also discussed deep tech in greater detail and who are the primary targets for fundraising in these cases. We also touched onto the importance of listening to your customers and how that can directly affect your fundraising process (great quote at the end of the episode).
Omry Ben David, General Partner at Viola Ventures talks about investing in Israel and Israeli founders all over the globe and why it seems to be working than most other demographics. We also discussed how does Viola Ventures work and why is it spread over 4 funds and how do they cooperate.
Andrew Milich, Co-Founder at Skiff talks about the importance of college education while building a company and raising funding. He also talked about how investors reacted to him as the first time founder and how it affected his fundraising efforts. Andrew's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amilich/ Skiff's website: https://www.skiff.org/ Skiff's Twitter: https://twitter.com/skiffprivacy
Christopher Lustrino, Founder & CEO at KingsCrowd in this educational episode talks about equity crowdfunding, what are the major pitfalls in it and how to avoid them. He also gave a brief step-by-step guide on raising money through equity crwodfunding and shared some of the knowledge about the process that he gained while raising money for KingsCrowd. Checklist: 1) Be prepared for the time frame: 4-12 weeks to go live on equity crowdfunding platform. 2) Determine how much you want to rais...
Christopher Lustrino, Founder & CEO at KingsCrowd talks about his experience raising 100% of the funding for his company online. We discussed what are the major pros and cons of equity crowdfunding and how he maneuvered through them. Crhistopher also spoke about the repeat investor and their importance in any type of fundraising process and he explained how to stay in touch with your existing investors to make sure the next round will be easier to raise.
Akeel Jabber, Investment director at Horizen Capital talks about rules of growing a SaaS business and later on selling it. He explained how Horizen Capital makes its investment decisions and how a startup founder can get closer to an acquisition.
Tanvi Gupta, Founder and CEO at SwoonMe talks about how she left Facebook and stability that it provides in order to build her own company. We also spoke about building a startup in a crowded space (online dating) and how she managed to stand out from the crowd and get her pre-seed round oversubscribed.
Hussein Kanji, co-founder at Hoxton Ventures who presents himself as an analyst on LinkedIn to avoid spam messages from dozens of founders (I just find it hilarious that those messages go so out of hand, this kind of measures have to be taken so decided to mention it here). We spoke about the way Hoxton got to such a high rate of IPOs per investment and how Hussein finds those companies. We also spoke about IPOs and some other good stuff.
Billy Libby, Co-Founder & CEO at Upper90 talks about what the term "hybrid fund" implies and how is it different from a "regular" fund. We talked about who should try raising debt and how can a startup separate the part of their business that is safe and raise debt backed by that chunk of their business. We also discussed what kind of companies should really go after debt and how to do it.
We got to the 300th episode and decided to celebrate with a bit of extra fun for our listeners. This episode is about the mistakes that were made during the creation of this podcast - it includes the stories of the team and some random bloopers that were removed from the original episodes and saved "for later use" and the day for that "later use" came! We hope you enjoy:)
Anthony Baker, Founder and CEO at Satellite VU talks about fundraising for his company that is about to launch multiple satellites into space. We spoke about testing out such a complicated idea with low budget and presenting it to investors in order to actually implement the idea. For founders in deep tech space this will be an extremely interesting episode about idea testing and implementation. Anthony's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthonybaker2/ Satellite VU: https://www.satellite...
Cynthia Phitoussi, Co-Founder & Managing Partner SeedIL Ventures talks about investing in Israel and explains the major differences between American and Israeli founders and shares the best qualities of both. We also discussed the major changes in the Israeli startup ecosystem that Cynthia saw over the past 7 years.
Mark Peter Davis Managing Partner at Interplay Ventures, podcast host at Innovation with Mark Peter Davis and an author of The Fundraising Rules talks about the fundraising rules, the lessons he learned from being a VC. We also spoke about who should try to create content and in what form this content should be.
Duane Good, Co-founder & President at Tribal Credit talks about some of the indicators of the future growth in companies, red flags that can be spotted in metrics of a company and how Tribal credit raised $43 million. Duane's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/duanegood/ Tribal Credit: https://www.tribal.credit/ Follow Tribal Credit on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/tribal-credit/ Here is a TechCrunch article about Tribal Credit, if you would like to learn more: https://techcru...
Dana Loberg, Founder of Leo AR, co-founder of MojiLaLa and previously the co-founder of MovieLaLa that was acquired by Gifycat talks about her story of acquisition and the launch of a new company. We also spoke about who should join the accelerator and does it make sense to join an accelerator if you already ran a startup in the past.
Heidi Lindvall, General Partner at Pale Blue Dot talks about investing in ClimateTech startups in Europe and US and about the major differences between startups in the US and Europe. We spoke about some successful exits in climate-tech and how founders get there and much more useful stuff that I forgot to write down in notes.
Mike Dowdle, Founding Partner at Circadian Ventures shares his 22+ years of experience in the VC space, explains how it changed in the past decades and how it affects startup founders who are trying to raise. We also discussed the differences between funds, syndicates and solo angels as sources of capital for founders.
Shayn Fernandez, Corporate Attorney at Rockridge Venture Law talks about the use of the "B-corp" signature and how to obtain one and if it's even worth it obtaining it. We also discussed how startup founders should interact with their lawyers and when it might be a good idea to use software automation. Shayn's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shaynfernandez/ Rockridge Venture Law website: https://rockridgelaw.com/ Here are the software automation that might help you avoid huge legal fees...
Mayank Sanganeria, software engineer at Instagram talks about his experience at Instagram and at smaller startups. We discussed how can an early stage startup attract a veteran software engineer like Mayank without going broke and how they should reach out. Mayank also talked about some of the best practices he sees being used at Instagram and some of the great practices he used at smaller startups.
Vik Sasi, Partner at Dreamers VC—co-founded by Will Smith—talks about spotting unicorns, the epic takeoff of Clubhouse and about the ways founders can be sure that investors see their venture as a future unicorn. We also spoke about partnering up with celebrities (such as Will Smith) while being a founder and how much sense those partnerships make.
Eddy Badrina, CEO of Eden Green, previously the Co-founder of Buzzshift talks about his transition to the startup world and the major lessons he learned along the way. We speak about his first time fundraising and some mistakes that Eddy made. We also speak about the acquisition of Buzzshift and how he got reached that point.
Brian York, Co-Founder & CEO at Cubbo, and Founder and GP at Bassin Ventures talks about Latin America and how it differs from the U.S. startup ecosystem. We also talk about exits from LatAm and Brian shares his advice to founders trying to expand their network in a new country.
Amos Schwartzfarb, Managing Director at Techstars and Trevor Boehm, Venture Partner at Saturn Five, co-authors of LEVERS - The Framework For Building Repeatability into Your Business talk about writing a book together and their motivation behind it. We also talk about content generation in general and who should consider taking their time to generate content.
