#150 CEO Box, Aaron Levie w/ Mamoon Hamid: Open For Business
Grit7 Aug 2023

#150 CEO Box, Aaron Levie w/ Mamoon Hamid: Open For Business

Guest: Aaron Levie, CEO of Box, and Mamoon Hamid, partner at Kleiner Perkins

When he was a newly minted venture capitalist at USVP, Mamoon Hamid got a tip that he should meet a young entrepreneur named Aaron Levie, and fought for the right to invest in his cloud storage startup, Box. For years after that initial investment, the two men say, Box’s fate was precarious: “We could have died any day,” Mamoon says, and Aaron recalled several times he had to be talked “down from a ledge.” Today, they tell us how Box established itself as “open for business” — a concept Mamoon hounded Aaron with in the early years — and grew into success.

In this episode, Aaron, Mamoon, and Joubin discuss Box socks, authenticity at work, Josh Stein, living in the office, over-diligence, Google Platypus, the 2008 crash, nostalgia, everything is personal, the ten-person test, burnout, Dan Levin, ChatGPT, Parker Conrad, and Silicon Valley as “technology town.”

In this episode, we cover:

  • “Make mom proud, unless she’s evil” (01:59)
  • How Mamoon and Aaron met (04:38)
  • Mamoon’s first investment in Box (11:15)
  • Pausing the term sheet (16:08)
  • “We could have died any day” (19:01)
  • What is company-building? (23:23)
  • Open For Business (25:27)
  • Getting to cash flow positive (27:52)
  • Slow growth with no burn vs. fast growth, high burn (31:15)
  • Tough feedback (34:31)
  • Overcoming challenges around the Box IPO (36:31)
  • Growing as CEO (38:35)
  • The Apple Vision Pro and AI (44:15)
  • Investing in cutting-edge companies (49:15)
  • Using AI to re-juice growth (51:48)
  • How Aaron educates himself (54:22)
  • Business as a sport (57:14)
  • Who Box is hiring and what “grit” means to Aaron (01:00:44)

Links:

Episoder(281)

#208 CEO & Co-Founder Patreon, Jack Conte: Crowd Surfer

#208 CEO & Co-Founder Patreon, Jack Conte: Crowd Surfer

Guest: Jack Conte, CEO & co-founder of PatreonFor many YouTube video creators, getting millions of views on your videos may seem like the goal. But when Jack Conte and his wife Nataly Dawn became YouT...

16 Sep 20241h 9min

#207 Co-Founder & Chairman Zynga, Mark Pincus: Speed of Play

#207 Co-Founder & Chairman Zynga, Mark Pincus: Speed of Play

Guest: Mark Pincus, founder & chairman of Zynga, and managing member & co-founder of Reinvent CapitalBefore Zynga and Facebook made social gaming mainstream, the video game industry was “extreme on th...

9 Sep 20241h 13min

#206 CEO & Founder Rivian, RJ Scaringe: Electrified

#206 CEO & Founder Rivian, RJ Scaringe: Electrified

Guest: RJ Scaringe, CEO and Founder of Rivian“I’m very comfortable with things not being in their end state,” says Rivian CEO and founder RJ Scaringe. The company’s challenging mission — to help make ...

2 Sep 202457min

#205 CEO Snowflake, Sridhar Ramaswamy: Visibility

#205 CEO Snowflake, Sridhar Ramaswamy: Visibility

Guest: Sridhar Ramaswamy, CEO of Snowflake“People underestimate what it is to go through a complete reset,” says Snowflake CEO Sridhar Ramaswamy. And he knows it: After an incredible 15-year run at Go...

26 Aug 20241h 7min

#204 Founder & Former CEO Blue Bottle, James Freeman: After the Exit

#204 Founder & Former CEO Blue Bottle, James Freeman: After the Exit

Guest: James Freeman, Founder and Former CEO of Blue Bottle CoffeeIn the six or so years since he sold his last shares of Blue Bottle Coffee to Nestlé, James Freeman has had a lot of time to ruminate ...

19 Aug 20241h 7min

#203 CEO Niantic, John Hanke: Buried Ships

#203 CEO Niantic, John Hanke: Buried Ships

Guest: John Hanke, CEO of NianticWhen Pokémon Go launched, Niantic CEO John Hanke was enjoying a tranquil walk through a bamboo forest near Kyoto with his son. When he got back, it was all hands on de...

12 Aug 20241h 9min

#202 Chairman of Qualcomm, Mark McLaughlin: The Right Pitch

#202 Chairman of Qualcomm, Mark McLaughlin: The Right Pitch

Guest: Mark McLaughlin, chairman of the board at Qualcomm When he was 24, Mark McLaughlin thought his career was over. Since childhood, he had dreamed of attending West Point and joining the Army, but...

5 Aug 20241h 13min

#201 CEO Lyft, David Risher: The Ride

#201 CEO Lyft, David Risher: The Ride

Guest: David Risher, CEO of LyftDavid Risher can measure his career in phone calls, from the one that introduced him to Jeff Bezos in 1995, to the call from the Lyft board in 2023, asking him to vie f...

29 Jul 20241h 16min

Populært innen Business og økonomi

lydartikler-fra-aftenposten
stopp-verden
dine-penger-pengeradet
e24-podden
rss-penger-polser-og-politikk
rss-borsmorgen-okonominyhetene
pengesnakk
tid-er-penger-en-podcast-med-peter-warren
finansredaksjonen
pengepodden-2
livet-pa-veien-med-jan-erik-larssen
utbytte
rss-sunn-okonomi
morgenkaffen-med-finansavisen
stormkast-med-valebrokk-stordalen
liberal-halvtime
lederpodden
rss-markedspuls-2
okonomiamatorene
rss-politisk-preik