20VC: Affirm Max Levchin on Why Grading Talent by Letter (A or B) is Total BS | How to Create a Culture of Post Mortems and Writing | Why You Should Only Study Failure Not Success & The Biggest Surprises Scaling to $18.7BN Market Cap

Roger Ehrenberg is a legend of the venture industry as the Founder of IA Ventures, among the most successful seed-stage venture firms of this generation, having seeded companies including Datadog (NASDAQ: DDOG), Digital Ocean (NYSE: DOCN), The Trade Desk (NASDAQ: TTD) and Wise (LSE: WISE.L). Today Roger is the Founder and Managing Partner of Eberg Capital, a pioneer in bridging the gap among sports franchises, sports betting, media and entertainment. Roger’s current sports investments include stakes in the Miami Marlins, Real Salt Lake, Alpine Racing, Betr, Commonwealth, Kero Sports, Simplebet, SlamBall, Smarkets and WagerWire. In Today's Episode with Roger Ehrenberg We Discuss: 1. The Commoditisation of Venture and Worsening Returns: Why does Roger disagree with Doug Leone that "we have moved from a boutique high margin business to a commoditised low margin industry"? Why does Roger believe we will see consistently worsening returns in venture? Is this influx of LP capital cyclical or is it here to stay? 2. The New LPs and The Broken Existing LP World: Why does Roger think the existing incentive structure for LPs is totally broken? Who are the most important new LPs entering the venture market? How do sovereigns and pension funds entering venture change the industry? Which players have capitalised on this new LP class best? 3. Where Does the Liquidity Come From: With the closed IPO window and lack of M&A, where will liquidity come from in the next 24 months? Would a Trump administration open M&A markets? Does Roger agree M&A markets are shut down? When does Roger believe IPO markets will open again? Will Databricks and Stripe go out in 2024? If Roger were to run a continuity fund strategy, how would he structure it? What would he do? 4. When to Sell and When to Hold: How does Roger advise managers on when to sell vs when to hold? How important is it for a new firm to have a company go public in the first five years? What are Roger's biggest lessons from selling The Trade Desk at a $2.5BN valuation? How does Roger think about managers thinking they should manage the public book of their portfolio for their LPs? What are the pros and cons? 5. Relationship to Money: Do rich investors make better investors? How does investing when you have a lot of cash already change your mindset around investing and exiting? How does Roger analyse his relationship to money today? What have been the single biggest needle movers in his wealth journey? How did it feel when he made a $6M bonus? 6. The Secrets to Parenthood and Marriage: What does it mean to be a great father for Roger? How does Roger think about bringing his children up with the same level of hunger and ambition, despite being brought up with such wealth? What are Roger's two biggest lessons on the secret to a great marriage?

19 Helmi 20241h 11min

Christian Hecker is the Founder and CEO of Trade Republic, the company making it easy and inexpensive for everyone with a smartphone to invest. To date, Christian has raised over $1.3BN for the company from the likes of Sequoia, Founders Fund, Accel and Creandum to name a few. Previously, Christian worked in Bank of America Merrill Lynch’s Investment Banking department. Johan Brenner is a General Partner at Creandum. Johan has led Creandum’s investments in iZettle (acquired by PayPal for $2.2bn in 2018), Trade Republic, Klarna, Pleo, Neo4J, Vivino and more. Johan was previously a repeat entrepreneur, founding one of the first online brokers in Europe in 1997 (sold to E*TRADE in the US), then JobLine (sold to Monster), Bookatable (Michelin) and Tradera (Ebay). In Today's Episode with Christian Hecker and Johan Brenner We Discuss: 1. Selling 75% of Trade Republic for €600,000: How did Christian come to sell 75% of Trade Republic for €600K? How did Johan and Creandum solve this challenge when they invested? What are some of Christian's biggest pieces of advice on cap table construction? 2. Raising $1.3BN From the Best Investors in the World: What are Christian's biggest fundraising lessons from raising $1.3BN from the best in the world? How did Doug Leone and Sequoia come to lead Trade Republic's round? What was the meeting with Doug like? What questions did he ask? How did it go? How important of a skill does Johan believe being a great fundraiser is for founders? 3. Scaling into Europe's Next Decacorn: What are the single biggest issues that arise when scaling so fast? What breaks first? Does CAC increase with time or decrease? Why did Christian decide to stop paid marketing on Google and Facebook and stop spending $100M+ there overnight? Why is Christian so bullish on influencer marketing? What works? What does not work? 4. Europe: A Hub for Innovation or a Retirement Home: Does Christian believe that young people in Europe work hard enough? What are the biggest challenges to scaling teams in Europe? Why does Johan believe the biggest challenge in Europe is the lack of exit markets? What can Europe do to improve and increase our chances of being successful?

16 Helmi 202456min

Martin Gontovnikas, a.k.a Gonto, is a software engineer at heart who moved to the “dark side” to focus on Marketing. With this career transition, he found a way to combine his 2 passions by applying his “engineering thinking” model to Marketing. He is now a B2B SaaS Advisor to Vercel and Airbyte among others and Co-Founder & GP of Hypergrowth Partners. Previously, he was SVP of Marketing and Growth at Auth0. In Today's Episode with Martin Gontovnikas (Gonto) We Discuss: 1. From No Idea to Growth Leader: How Gonto made his way into the world of growth when it was not a thing? What does Gonto know now that he wishes he had known when he entered the world of growth? Why does Gonto believe product and marketing is more important than sales and marketing? 2. Growth: What, When and Who: What is growth? What is it not? What do people misunderstand most with growth? When is the right time to hire your first growth person? What is the right profile for the right first growth hire? Junior? Senior? 3. Mastering PLG and Enterprise: What are the single biggest mistakes startups make when scaling into enterprise? Why does Gonto believe that all PLG companies should start with 6-8 design partners? Is it possible to do enterprise and PLG at the same time? How does one provide enough value in a PLG motion to convert enterprise buyers? 4. Data vs Intuition: Art vs Science: Is growth more art or science? Why does Gonto believe qualitative data is more important than quantitative? How does Gonto think about psychology when selling and marketing? What do so few startups? understand about the psychology of their customers? How does Gonto approach messaging and what is truly great product marketing?

14 Helmi 20241h 10min

Thomas Plantenga is the CEO @ Vinted, one of the fastest-growing marketplaces in the world with a valuation of $4.5BN. Prior to becoming CEO, Thomas worked with a range of organisations including Bookaboat, OLX, Sellit/Wallapop and FJLabs. Alex Taussig is a General Partner @ Lightspeed and co-leads the fund's Consumer investment team. Alex's portfolio includes the likes of All Day Kitchens, Archive Resale, Daily Harvest, Faire, Found, Frubana, Keychain, Kikoff, Vinted, YaySay, and Zola. In Today's Episode with Thomas Plantenga and Alex Taussig We Discuss: 1. The CEO Who Did Not Want to be CEO: How did Thomas come to be CEO @ Vinted? Why did he not want the job at first? What does Thomas know now that he wishes he had known when he started? 2. The Mechanics of the Fastest Growing Marketplace: What is the single most important metric for Vinted? How does Vinted determine what market to open next? What do they look for? How does Vinted think about depth vs breadth in each country? What is the AOV today? How does it vary by country? How long does it take for each country to be cash flow positive? 3. The Biggest BS in Startups: Rule of 40 and EBITDA: Why does Thomas think VC's obsession with "Rule of 40" is BS? Why does Thomas believe EBITDA optimization is BS and useless? What are the hardest elements of scaling a marketplace that no one knows? 4. The Bull, Bear and Investor Approach to Vinted: Alex, what was Lightspeed's pre and post-mortem when investing in Vinted? How does Lightspeed analyze TAM and market sizing when investing? What was Lightspeed's single biggest concern when investing in Vinted? 5. Europe: A Hub of Innovation or a Retirement Home: Does Thomas believe that European young people have a worse work ethic than those in the US? Is Thomas concerned by the state of regulation hampering innovation in Europe? What can be done to improve work ethic and the state of regulation today? Why is Alex and Lightspeed more bullish than ever on Europe today?

12 Helmi 20241h 13min

Doug Leone is the Global Managing 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 and many more. Marcelo Claure is the Founder & CEO of Claure Group, a multi-billion-dollar global investment firm. He is the Executive Chairman and Managing Partner of Bicycle Capital, a $500M Latin America-focused growth equity fund, and was appointed Chairman in Latin America of SHEIN, the global #1 on-demand fashion company in the world. Claure was also the CEO of SoftBank Group International where he launched SoftBank’s $8B Latin America Funds, and had direct oversight for SoftBank’s operating companies.  Geoff Lewis is a Founder and Managing Partner of Bedrock, one of the breakout and new venture firms of the last decade, famously in search of narrative violations. He serves or has served on the Board of Directors for companies including Lyft (NASDAQ: LYFT), Nubank (NYSE: NU), Epirus, and Vercel.  Bill Ackman is the CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management, L.P., an SEC-registered investment adviser founded in 2003. Pershing Square is a concentrated research-intensive fundamental value investor in long and occasionally short investments in the public markets. Martín Escobari is Co-President, Managing Director and Head of General Atlantic’s business in Latin America. Martín is Chairman of the firm’s Investment Committee and also serves on the Management and Portfolio Committees. Orlando Bravo is a Founder and Managing Partner of Thoma Bravo. He led Thoma Bravo’s early entry into software buyouts and built the firm into one of the top private equity firms in the world.  In Today's Episode on Price Sensitivity We Discuss: Doug Leone: Why the attitude of "deploy, deploy, deploy will get so many in trouble"? Marcelo Claure: How to know when price matters and when it does not? Geoff Lewis: What is the right framework to assess price at an early stage? David Tisch: How does the importance of price change vis a vis company vs portfolio? Orlando Bravo: What have been Thoma Bravo's biggest lessons on price? Cyan Banister: Why does Cyan believe there will be a reckoning?

9 Helmi 202428min

Erik Allebest is the CEO @ Chess.com, the #1 online chess service on the planet with more than 150+ million members and 15+ million games played each day. Erik has scaled the company to over 700 people and $100M+ in revenue with no venture funding. In Today's Episode with Erik Allebest: 1. From Unemployable to $100M+ Revenue Founder: How did Erik make his way into the world of tech and startups? Was his MBA worth it? How does he advise others on whether to get one or not? What does Erik know now that he wishes he had known when he started? 2. Scaling to $100M Revenue with No Venture Funding: Why did no one want to invest in Chess.com in the early days? What did Erik do differently as a result of not raising any venture funding? What would Erik have done if he had money from the start? What are Erik's biggest pieces of advice to founders with funding today? 3. Hard Lessons Scaling to 150M Members: What are 1-2 of Erik's biggest lessons on how to scale users with zero budget? What customer acquisition worked? What did not work? How important was COVID and The Queen's Gambit to memberships and sign-ups? What are the single biggest mistakes Erik sees founders make on customer acquisition today? 4. Parenting, Marriage, Metrics and Money: Why does Erik not care about money or capitalism today? How has Erik's style of parenting changed over the years? What works? What does not? What does Erik believe is the secret to marriage? What have been his biggest lessons? Why does Erik hate metrics? If so, how does he run the business towards goals and output? Public.com Disclosure: Options are not suitable for all investors and carry significant risk.  Certain complex options strategies carry additional risk. Options can be risky and are not suitable for all investors. See the Characteristics and Risks of Standardized Options to learn more. For each options transaction, Public Investing shares 50% of their order flow revenue as a rebate to help reduce your trading costs. This rebate will be displayed as a negative number in the “Additional Fees” column of your Trade Confirmation Statement and will be immediately reflected in the total dollars paid or received for the transaction. Order flow rebates are only issued for options trades and not for transactions involving other assets, including equities. For more information, refer to the Fee Schedule. All investing involves the risk of loss, including loss of principal. Brokerage services for US-listed, registered securities, options and bonds in a self-directed account are offered by Open to the Public Investing, Inc., member FINRA & SIPC. See public.com/#disclosures-main for more information.

7 Helmi 20241h 11min

David Tisch is the Managing Partner of BoxGroup, one of the leading seed-stage investment firms of the last decade having invested in over 500 seed-stage startups, including Plaid, Ro, Ramp, PillPack, Amplitude, Stripe, Warby Parker, Harry’s, Flexport, Classpass, Airtable and more. Terrence Rohan is the Managing Director @ Otherwise Fund, a fund that discretely empowers a network of today's top founders to make multi-stage venture investments. Terrence has invested in the likes of Figma, Hugging Face, Vanta, Notion and Robinhood to name a few. In Today's Seed Investing Special We Discuss: 1. Is Seed Investing Now a Commoditised Asset Class: Why does Dave Tisch believe seed investing will remain the most inefficient market? What does that mean for the future of returns at seed? Why should you always pay up and be price-insensitive at seed rounds? Why does David believe that no one is great at seed investing? Why does David believe that you cannot index the seed market? 2. The Biggest BS Elements of Venture Capital: Signaling: Why does David believe that the theory of signaling is total BS? Why does Terrence disagree and think it is valid and common? Group Decision-Making: Why does Terrence believe that investing decisions should be made solo and groups merely encourage consensus decision-making? Reserves: Why does Terrence believe reserves hurt DPI and are not good? How does David respond given his growth fund? Venture Value Add: Why do David and Terrence think venture value add services platforms are BS and not worth it? 3. The World of LPs: What is the single biggest misalignment between VCs and LPs? What are David and Terrence's biggest pieces of advice for emerging managers today? Should LPs expect depressed returns from venture as the asset class commoditises?

5 Helmi 20241h 29min

Will Wu is the CTO @ Match Group, the owner and operator of the largest global portfolio of popular online dating services including Tinder, Match.com, OkCupid, and Hinge to name a few. Prior to Match, Will was VP of Product at Snap Inc. As the 35th employee, Will spearheaded the creation of Snapchat’s “Discover” content platform. He also led the creation and growth of the “Chat” messaging feature, which today is a primary Snapchat engagement driver that connects hundreds of millions of people each day. In Today's Episode with Will Wu We Discuss: 1. The Journey to Snap CPO: How did Evan make his way into the world of product and come to meet Evan Spiegel? What are 1-2 of his biggest takeaways from his time at Snap? What does Will know now that he wishes he had known when he started in product? 2. How to Hire Product Teams: How does Will structure the interview process for new product hires? What are the most telling questions of a candidate's product skills in hiring? What case studies and tests does Will do to assess a candidate? What are 1-2 of Will's biggest hiring mistakes in product? 3. How to Do Product Reviews Effectively: What are Will's biggest lessons on what it takes to do product reviews well? What are the biggest mistakes product leaders make in product reviews? How can teams drive focus in product reviews? What works? What does not? 4. Product: Art or Science? How does Will balance between gut/intuition and data in product decisions? Is simple always better in product design? What is human-centered design? How does it impact how Will approaches product?

2 Helmi 202454min