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

Will Sacks is Co-Founder and CEO at Kindara, the fertility awareness app that provides tools to understand fertility and be in control of their own body. Kindara has achieved phenomenal success having significant press in the likes of Buzzfeed, Huffington Post, New York Times and Forbes. Their first product Kindara Fertility for iPhone has been ranked #1 on the App Store Medical Charts.  In this incredibly diverse conversation our talk ranges from wire framing and programming to vasectomies and uterus', it's a must listen!   In Today's Episode You Will Learn: Why Will started Kindara and how he got the initial product off the ground, without being able to code? Should Founders learn to code or learn how to be the best CEO they can be? How and what was the wire framing process like? What advice does Will have for other non-technical co-founders? How does Will feel being a male CEO for a female product? How has Will created this community of incredibly engaged users? How has Will managed to grow his audience so effectively? What has Will learnt from raising $1.7m in angel and VC funding? What is the hardest aspect of fundraising? What advice would will give to a startup thinking of raising funds? How is Will planning to transition into the world of hardware? What theories of The Lean Startup did not work for Will? Items Mentioned in Today's Show: Will's Favourite Books: Traction: A Startup Guide to Getting Customers by Gabriel Weinberg 4 Steps to the Epiphany: Successful Strategies for Products That Win by Steve Blank Eric Ries: The Lean Startup Will's Fave Blogs Seth Godin: Circles of Marketing Brad Feld: Blog Paul Graham: How to raise money Marc Andreesen: Reasons You Won't Get Funded Will's Must Have WireFraming Tool Balsamiq

17 Juli 201521min

Quote of the Day: 'A great entrepreneur has the ability to bend the world to their will'. David Pakman, 20VC David Pakman is a Partner at Venrock, having spent the past 12 years as an internet entrepreneur. This includes David's appointment as CEO of eMusic, the world’s leading digital retailer of independent music, second only to iTunes. Prior to joining eMusic, David co-founded Myplay in 1999, which he later sold, in 2001, to Bertelsmann’s ecommerce Group. Before Myplay, he was Vice President at N2K Entertainment, which created the first digital music download service. If that wasn't enough David is also the co-creator of Apple Computer’s Music Group. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: How David started his career as an entrepreneur and later made the move to VC? How David found the transition from entrepreneur and CEO to being a VC? What is the main value add that both Venrock and David provides to their investments? What makes a great entrepreneur for David? How long do VCs need to know entrepreneurs before making investments? What 3 tips would David give for best sourcing deals as a VC? What areas does David believe are soon to be disrupted? How does David predict the next big industries to be disrupted? What did David think of Jay Z's launch of Tidal? Who will dominate in the music streaming sector in the coming years? Items Mentioned in Today's Episode: David's Fave Book: Mindset by Carole Dweck David's Favourite Blog: Ben Thompson's: Stratechery Dollar Shave Club: Shave Time, Shave Money YouNow Tidal: High Fidelity Music Streaming As always you can follow Harry, David, The Twenty Minute VC and Venrock on Twitter here!

15 Juli 201520min

Quote of the Day: 'Keep an open mind from an early age'. Jonathan Libov, 20VC Jonathan Libov joined the investment team at Union Square Ventures in September of 2014. Jonathan hails from New York but has lived for the last few years in Tel Aviv, where he most recently worked as a Product Manager at Appsfire. He's a graduate of Vassar College with a degree in Cognitive Science and began his career in neuroscience research. He designs and codes, with Fifty among his side projects. In Today's Show You Will Learn: How Jonathan made his move from product guy to VC at USV? What is the key determinant for USV's success? How Fred Wilson and USV use blogging to market USV as 'smart money'? Is SMS dead? What is and will it be used for in the future? What sectors are ripe for disruption? How can technology and sport be integrated? Apple Music: Success or failure? Items Mentioned in Today's Show: Favourite Book: The Structure of Scientific Revolutions OB1: Making Trade free for everyone, everywhere

13 Juli 201529min

Phil Jacobson is Co-Founder At PumpUp, a community for healthy and active living, with over 2m users. Phil leads the operations, finance, marketing, business development and external relations for PumpUp, with great success having accumulated over 220,000 Instagram followers! Prior to PumpUp, Phil held brand management positions at Unilever and PepsiCo. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: How Phil started PumpUp? How Phil got 1,500 downloads in day one? What marketing strategies are PumpUp working on to continue growing? What social media strategies Phil recommends founders attempting to build an online presence? How did Phil accumulate the 220,000 instagram followers organically? What has Phil done to create such a heavily engaged user base? Who are Phil's biggest competitors and how does PumpUp aim to stay ahead of them? Where are PumpUp in the fundraising process, what has Phil learnt from the $2m seed round? How can startups determine how much they need to raise? What are PumpUp doing to ensure customer retention rates remain high?   Items Mentioned In Today's Show: PumpUP App General Catalyst Partners Favourite Book: The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz Favourite Blog: MatterMark Daily As always you can follow Harry, Phil, The Twenty Minute VC and PumpUp on Twitter here! A new one recommended by Phil, click here to follow the awesome Instagram pages of Harry and PumpUp!

10 Juli 201520min

Ari Helgason is a VC at Dawn Capital in London and a former entrepreneur with operational experience in both London and New York. Prior to Dawn, Ari founded SaaS sales and workflow management system World on a Hanger and ecommerce clothing marketplace Fabricly.com. More recently, he launched ecommerce sites for fashion and luxury brands in London and New York. Ari is an alumnus of the Y Combinator startup accelerator and he regularly visits Silicon Valley where he has extensive relationships. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: How Ari made his move into the VC scene? Why Ari decided to bootstrap his first business? Does Ari believe that Founders should always be fundraising? Should Founders take more money than they need, 'a war chest'? What type of goals do VCs want to see from founders? What do investors expect from startups at Series A? How can founders learn what KPI's make sense for their business? How can founders know when is the right time to fundraise? How can startup founders get their foot in the VC door? Items Mentioned in Today's Episode: Predictable Revenue: Aaron Ross (Mandatory Reading for All SaaS CEO's) Elon Musk: How The Billionaire of SpaceX and Tesla is Shaping Our Future Saastr by Jason Lemkin AVC.com As always you can follow Harry, Ari and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

8 Juli 201520min

Alessandra Sollberger is a VC at Mosaic Ventures, a new Silicon Valley style venture firm based in London, focussing on Series A rounds. Alessandra previously worked in private equity at Blackstone, covering sectors ranging from consumer brands to software. Prior to that, she worked in startups in the US and Europe and in M&A at Goldman Sachs. She is also the founder of Bright Mentors, an edtech non-profit teaching coding and science in secondary schools through a network of technology professionals.                      In todays episode you will learn: How Alessandra made her move into the VC world? What are you Mosaic looking for? What is their typical investment size?    What Alessandra thinks of the different paths into venture?   What advice would you give someone looking to enter venture?   Why Alessandra believes there has been a resurgence in marketplaces? What is driving this growth?  What startup marketplaces is Alessandra most excited about?    Alessandra's thoughts on the next big sector to be disrupted and why?   As always you can follow Harry, Alessandra, The Twenty Minute VC and Mosaic Ventures on Twitter here!

6 Juli 201518min

Today is a very special show as James Wise, Principal at Balderton Capital turns the tables on Host of The Twenty Minute VC, Harry Stebbings. In today's brilliant interview by James we delve into what has led to Harry's interest in the VC industry, why did Harry start The 20 Minute VC, how does Harry identify guests to interview, how does he approach those guests, how has Harry found his first experience in the venture industry, what has surpassed Harry about the VC industry, what traits has Harry spotted that are common among the great VCs interviewed, is Harry optimistic or not about the venture industry, what would Harry recommend for other people looking to go into venture. Items Mentioned in Todays Show: Harry's Favourite Books: Tim Ferris: 4 Hour Work Week, 4 Hour Body Shyp Crowdcube, 3DHubs, Tictail MMC Ventures, Founders Forum As always you can follow Harry, James and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

3 Juli 201521min

Jason Lemkin is Managing Director at Storm Ventures focussing on early stage SaaS and enterprise startups. Jason is an acknowledged thought leader in SaaS through his creation of the SaaStr community, connecting thousands of SaaS entrepreneurs and generating upwards of 1,000,000 views a month around core SaaS topics, with a particular focus on accelerating revenue and early-stage SaaS sales and marketing. Prior to Storm, Jason served as CEO and co-founder of Storm Ventures-backed EchoSign, the web’s most popular electronic signature service. Jason led EchoSign from inception through its acquisition by Adobe Systems Inc. in 2011. He then served as Vice President, Web Services at Adobe, where he oversaw the growth of EchoSign and Adobe Document Services to $100,000,000+ ARR in 2013. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: How Jason made his way into the SaaS and VC industry? What actions did Jason do to get his blog to 1m+ page views per month? What advice would Jason give to founders thinking of selling to large companies? What type of entrepreneur does Jason like to invest in? How does Jason see SaaS valuations, with recent enormous rounds from Zenefits? What areas of the SaaS industries are neglected or undervalued?   Is the 40% growth rule broadly correct and can this be applied to early stage tech companies? What is Jason's pre-investment meeting approach like? What makes a founder insane in a good way, rather than a bad way? How are SaaS companies innovating to acquire new customers? Quick Fire Round: Apple: Hit or Miss Most exciting SaaS companies and sectors Jason's favourite book and why? Items Mentioned in Today's Episode: SaaStr: Jason's Blog Jason's Favourite Book: The Lion Who Shot Back Mark Suster: Both Sides Follow: @saleshacker (amazing content from VPs of Sales @ Top Tech Startups) Emergence Capital: Joe Floyd David Saks: Yammer Slack: Stewart Butterfield, Zenefits: Parker Conrad

1 Juli 201523min