Outbrain: closing a funding round with gunfire in the background -Co-Founder & Co-CEO Yaron Galai

It’s pretty rare that investors have to ask the Founder they’re speaking to if they’re in a warzone, or insist they have to leave their country for somewhere a little more ‘peaceful’ but that’s exactly what happened to Yaron Galai, the Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Outbrain. Yaron was a captain in the Israeli Navy before smashing it out the park with a few startups he founded. Yaron’s latest company Outbrain (founded in 2006) is one you may not have heard of but you’ve probably used - they power recommended articles on loads of the world’s top news sites. They nearly merged with their biggest competitor (Taboola) a year ago only for that deal to not work out and float instead on the Nasdaq for $1.25 billion. As Yaron says, an exit is a great outcome but a terrible plan, so what was his plan? How has he got multiple exits under his belt? What are the secrets to his success? We talk about: The struggle for funding Israeli military/life/work balance Parents investing to make sure their children got paid Exiting for $400m Why it’s easier to make acquisitions when you’re public -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes