20VC: General Catalyst's Hemant Taneja on Why We Are In A Golden Age For VC, Why Pro-Rata Is A Lazy Posture and Why He Does Not Focus On Price

Max Levchin is the Founder & CEO @ Affirm, the company that aims to remake consumer finance from the ground up. They have backing from some of the best in the business with over $400m in VC funding from the likes of Founders Fund, Lightspeed, Andreesen Horowitz, Khosla Ventures and Spark Capital just to name a few. Prior to Affirm, Max held numerous exec positions including Chairman of Yelp for 11 years and sitting on the board of directors @ Yahoo. Before that, Max founded Slide, subsequently bought by Google and was the Co-Founder & CTO @ Paypal. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How did Max come to co-found Paypal and how did that serve as the foundations for his founding of Affirm today? 2.) Why does Max believe there is a crucial misalignment between service providers and consumers in financial services? Does Max agree with Bill Clerico that 'we are still in the very early days for Fintech?' 3.) Having co-founded Paypal, Slide and now Affirm, how has Max changed as a leader and CEO? What does Max believe makes the truly great CEOs? Are there commonalities in how they operate and their skills? 4.) What does Max look for in all new hires or when evaluating founders for potential investment? Why is self-awareness so important for entrepreneurs to have? Why does Max want to be slightly terrified by how smart an individual is? 5.) How has having Children changed Max's perception of what is important and what he chooses to spend his time on? How does that reflect in his actions and self-discipline? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Max's Fave Book: The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Max on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. eShares is the No 1 Cap Table Management platform, allowing for equity management, 409A valuations, and liquidity, all in one place. eShares is made for companies of all sizes with over 5,000 trusted customers including the likes of Squarespace, Kickstarter, and DoorDash just to name a few. To try out the must have service of the industry, simply head over to esharesinc.com it is a must. Fond is the employee engagement suite with 3 core products, rewards: a recognition platform for rewarding achievements and milestones, perks: a premium corporate discounts program to show employees you care about them and then finally engagement IQ, a free employee engagement survey that allows you to measure the health of your organization. To check it out head over to fond.co

14 Juli 201722min

Roseanne Wincek is an investor with IVP, one of the leaders in growth financing with a portfolio including the likes of Snap, AppDynamics, SuperCell and Slack. At IVP, Roseanne focuses on investing in later-stage, high-growth consumer and enterprise companies, currently serving as a Board Observer for MasterClass and actively working with IVP's investments in Compass, Glossier, and Qubole. Prior to IVP, Roseanne was a Principal with Canaan Partners where she completed transactions for Beckon, Metacloud, and Stayful, just to name a few. Prior to VC, Roseanne was a co-founder @ imthemusic working to built music apps on the early Facebook platform. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Roseanne made her way from science labs to startups and one of the valleys leading growth stage funds? 2.) Question from Maha Ibrahim @ Canaan Partners: How has the transition been from early to late stage? How do the industries differ in terms of startup visibility? Assessing the "what could be"? Allocation to reserve funding? Expected hold period? 3.)Why does Roseanne believe we are seeing a blurring of the lines between early and late stage? What is the effect for late stage of earlier stage funds having opportunity funds? What is the effect for early stage funds to see growth funds investing earlier?? 4.) Why does Roseanne believe go to market strategy is now more important than ever? How serious does Roseanne believe the incumbency with regards to distribution channels is? Does this mean startups have to develop proprietary organic distribution channels? 5.) How does Roseanne view competition within the financing market? Question from Jenny Lefcourt @ Freestyle: How has Roseanne consistently gotten into some of the hottest most competitive deals? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Roseanne's Fave Book: Einstein's Refrigerator: Tales of Hot & Cold Roseanne's Most Recent Investment: Masterclass As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Roseanne on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. eShares is the No 1 Cap Table Management platform, allowing for equity management, 409A valuations, and liquidity, all in one place. eShares is made for companies of all sizes with over 5,000 trusted customers including the likes of Squarespace, Kickstarter, and DoorDash just to name a few. To try out the must have service of the industry, simply head over to esharesinc.com it is a must. Fond is the employee engagement suite with 3 core products, rewards: a recognition platform for rewarding achievements and milestones, perks: a premium corporate discounts program to show employees you care about them and then finally engagement IQ, a free employee engagement survey that allows you to measure the health of your organization. To check it out head over to fond.co

12 Juli 201729min

Mitch Lasky is a General Partner @ Benchmark, one of the world's leading VC funds with a portfolio including the likes of Twitter, Uber, Snapchat, eBay, WeWork, Yelp and many more revolutionary companies of the last decade. As for Mitch himself, Mitch has made investments or is on the boards of Snapchat, Riot Games, Discord, Outpost Games and Cyanogen, just to name a few. Prior to Benchmark, Mitch was CEO @ JAMDAT Mobile where he led the mobile gaming company from a 10 employee startup to a 700 employee global business leading their IPO on the NASDAQ in 2004 and later negotiating their sales to Electronic Arts for $680m. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Mitch made his way from leading a 700 person gaming company to IPO to being General Partner with Benchmark? 2.) What does the investment decision-making process look like at Benchmark? Why does Mitch believe small is beautiful when it comes to VC teams? What is it that makes the Benchmark partnership the very special partnership it is? 3.) What makes Mitch say that "venture is very much like Hollywood? What does he mean by this? How does he apply this to talent evaluation? The hits-driven nature of the business? 4.) Why does Mitch struggle when analysing the future for VR? What is it about the current crop of innovation around VR that makes Mitch nervous? Where does Mitch see potential within the realms of VR & AR? 5.) How does Mitch view the continued rise of eSports? Does he believe that the industry will ever be as large as the traditional sports industry? What aspects of the industry does Mitch think is highly investable or not investable? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Mitch's Fave Book: The Genius of System Mitch's Fave Blog: Above The Crowd Mitch's Most Recent Investment: Outpost Games As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Mitch on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. eShares is the No 1 Cap Table Management platform, allowing for equity management, 409A valuations, and liquidity, all in one place. eShares is made for companies of all sizes with over 5,000 trusted customers including the likes of Squarespace, Kickstarter, and DoorDash just to name a few. To try out the must have service of the industry, simply head over to esharesinc.com it is a must. Fond is the employee engagement suite with 3 core products, rewards: a recognition platform for rewarding achievements and milestones, perks: a premium corporate discounts program to show employees you care about them and then finally engagement IQ, a free employee engagement survey that allows you to measure the health of your organization. To check it out head over to fond.co

10 Juli 201724min

Kim Scott is the Co-Founder @ Candor, the startup that allows you to become a better leader. Prior to founding Candor, Kim was a CEO coach at Dropbox, Qualtrics, Twitter and several other Silicon Valley companies. She was a member of the faculty at Apple University, developing the course "Managing at Apple," and before that spent 5 years at Google on AdSense, YouTube, and Doubleclick Online Sales and Operations at Google. Previously, Kim was the co-founder and CEO of Juice Software, a collaboration start-up. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Kim came to founder Candor and be an advisor to Twitter, Qualtrics and Dropbox? 2.) How did Kim's interactions with Sheryl Sandberg while at Google shape how Kim views employee feedback? What is the most effective way for a superior to convey their feedback to their employee? 3.) What really is radical candor? How does it differ to more traditional "feedback"? What are the challenges of ruinous empathy? How does this play out in the work environment? How does this contrast to "obnoxious aggression"? 4.) Is this a gender issue? What makes it so difficult for people to be radically candid? Why is it a problem that people are told to 'be professional'? How does that act to de-humanize people? 5.) How do males go most wrong when conveying feedback to their female counterparts? Why is this a problem for both the males and the females involved? What can the female do to ensure that she is not disadvantaged by this? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Kim's Fave Book: Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy Kim's Fave Blog: Rands In Repose: Management As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Kim on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. eShares is the No 1 Cap Table Management platform, allowing for equity management, 409A valuations, and liquidity, all in one place. eShares is made for companies of all sizes with over 5,000 trusted customers including the likes of Squarespace, Kickstarter, and DoorDash just to name a few. To try out the must have service of the industry, simply head over to esharesinc.com it is a must. Fond is the employee engagement suite with 3 core products, rewards: a recognition platform for rewarding achievements and milestones, perks: a premium corporate discounts program to show employees you care about them and then finally engagement IQ, a free employee engagement survey that allows you to measure the health of your organization. To check it out head over to fond.co

7 Juli 201728min

Barry Schuler is a Partner @ DFJ Growth, the team that seeks out companies that have gone through the early stages of funding and are category leaders or are poised to be. Their portfolio includes the likes of Tesla, Twitter, Box, Unity 3D and more fantastic companies. As for Barry, he is credited with being one of the pioneers of the modern Internet as chairman and CEO of America Online and an entrepreneur for over 30 years. Today he serves on the board of some truly game-changing companies in the likes of Coinbase, Unity and Foursquare just to name a few. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How did Barry make his way from Chairman of Americal Online to Partner @ DFJ Growth, one of the leading growth funds? 2.) Why does Barry believe we have seen a drought of tech IPOs in the last few years? What needs to be done to change this and generate the "200 IPOs a year that we need"? 3.) Why does Barry believe we are in a "bulge and not a bubble" in today's current startup ecosystem? What does Barry suggest will happen to the many highly priced tech startups with lacking exit options? 4.) Why does Barry believe that companies are 'bought and not sold'? How has Barry seen the growth and momentum patterns change for those in hypergrowth? How does that affect the IPO market and their price sensitivity? 5.) Why is Barry concerned that there is too much money chasing too few deals? What does that do to his funnel in producing 10m+ revenue scaling startups? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Barry's Fave Book: Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind Barry's Most Recent Investment: Unity 3D, Giphy As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Barry on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. eShares is the No 1 Cap Table Management platform, allowing for equity management, 409A valuations, and liquidity, all in one place. eShares is made for companies of all sizes with over 5,000 trusted customers including the likes of Squarespace, Kickstarter, and DoorDash just to name a few. To try out the must have service of the industry, simply head over to esharesinc.com it is a must. Fond is the employee engagement suite with 3 core products, rewards: a recognition platform for rewarding achievements and milestones, perks: a premium corporate discounts program to show employees you care about them and then finally engagement IQ, a free employee engagement survey that allows you to measure the health of your organization. To check it out head over to fond.co

5 Juli 201724min

Eric Feng is a Partner @ Kleiner Perkins, one of the world's leading venture capital firms with prior investments in the likes of Google, Amazon, Snapchat, Uber, Twitter and more. At Kleiner Eric focuses on consumer and incubation with his current being his co-founding role with Packagd, the startup building a family of apps offering a new mobile shopping experience. Packagd recently raised a $6m Series A led by Forerunner and GV. Prior to KPCB, Eric held the role of CTO at both Flipboard and Hulu. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Eric made his way into venture, all thanks to the help of Al Gore and Kleiner Perkins? 2.) What does Eric believe are the 2 opposing views of VCs? What side does it sit on? Has he always sat on that side? What was it that changed his mind? 3.) Why does Eric think consumer today is harder than ever before? How does the incumbency issue with regards to distribution affect Eric's thinking? Why does Eric believe we have never seen incumbents as strong as those of today? 4.) Why does Eric believe consumer companies are binary? How does this affect his attitude to price sensitivity? How does this influence his ownership requirements? 5.) How are VC funds building and using their own data platforms to find the best startups? Are we seeing the start of VC funds being disrupted by technology? What advantages does using this technology have? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Eric's Fave Book: Adventures in The Screen Trade: A Personal View of Hollywood Eric's Fave Blog: TechMeme Eric's Most Recent Investment: Hollar As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Eric on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. eShares is the No 1 Cap Table Management platform, allowing for equity management, 409A valuations, and liquidity, all in one place. eShares is made for companies of all sizes with over 5,000 trusted customers including the likes of Squarespace, Kickstarter, and DoorDash just to name a few. To try out the must have service of the industry, simply head over to esharesinc.com it is a must. Fond is the employee engagement suite with 3 core products, rewards: a recognition platform for rewarding achievements and milestones, perks: a premium corporate discounts program to show employees you care about them and then finally engagement IQ, a free employee engagement survey that allows you to measure the health of your organization. To check it out head over to fond.co

3 Juli 201726min

Ari Mir is the Founder @ Clutter, the startup that provides simple, painless solutions to your storage problems. They have raised over $90m in VC funding with their recent Series C round being a $64m round led by Atomico with participation from Sequoia, GV and the fantastic Brendan Wallace @ Fifth Wall. Prior to Clutter, Ari founded Gumgum, the world's largest image ad network in the visual AI space and PocketChange, a startup backed by Google. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Ari made his way into the world of early stage startups and came to found Clutter? 2.) Why does Ari believe that you should build a sports team and not a family, with regards to your team? What does that really mean? How does that affect both hiring, training and objective attribution? 3.) Why does Ari say 'culture is not a happy hour'? How can one look to build a culture that is driven by humane performance management? Does this not instantly instill a culture of fear? 4.) Why does Ari believe that diversity of thought is so dangerous for early stage startups? How does this view change with the scaling of the team? What key inflection points has Ari noticed with the scaling of the Clutter team? 5.) Why did Ari only hire individuals with finance backgrounds in the early days of the company? What are the benefits of this, particularly for on-demand startups with a heavy focus on unit economics? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Ari's Fave Book: Sam Walton: Made In America Ari's Fave Blog: AVC As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Ari on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. eShares is the No 1 Cap Table Management platform, allowing for equity management, 409A valuations, and liquidity, all in one place. eShares is made for companies of all sizes with over 5,000 trusted customers including the likes of Squarespace, Kickstarter, and DoorDash just to name a few. To try out the must have service of the industry, simply head over to esharesinc.com it is a must. Fond is the employee engagement suite with 3 core products, rewards: a recognition platform for rewarding achievements and milestones, perks: a premium corporate discounts program to show employees you care about them and then finally engagement IQ, a free employee engagement survey that allows you to measure the health of your organization. To check it out head over to fond.co

30 Juni 201722min

Ethan Kurzweil is a Partner @ Bessemer Venture Partners, one of the world leading venture funds with prior investments including the likes of Skype, LinkedIn, Yelp and Pinterest just to name a few. As for Ethan, he focuses on consumer facing technology and developer platforms having made investments in the likes of Twitch, Periscope and Dropcam on the consumer side and Twilio, Intercom and SendGrid on the developer platform side, just to name a few from his outstanding portfolio. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Ethan made his entrance into the world of venture and came to be a partner @ Bessemer? 2.) What was the developer roadmap that Ethan established a couple of years ago? Why was it controversial at the time? How have we seen this play out and come into fruition? What is the next frontier in developer focussed businesses? 3.) Ethan has previously said, 'history does not repeat itself but it does rhyme'. How does Ethan view pattern recognition? How does Ethan look to avoid biases and escape the echo chamber of Silicon Valley? 4.) How does Ethan see the world of eSports evolving? From an investment perspective, where does the equity value creation lie; the brands being built or the core underlying technology? 5.) Bessemer publishes their anti-portfolio, why is this? What does one need to take away when assessing the opportunities they have missed? How can one build a process of self-reflection around the anti-portfolio? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Ethan's Fave Book: The Namesake Ethan's Fave Blog: Nuzzel Ethan's Most Recent Investment: Periscope Data As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Ethan on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. eShares is the No 1 Cap Table Management platform, allowing for equity management, 409A valuations, and liquidity, all in one place. eShares is made for companies of all sizes with over 5,000 trusted customers including the likes of Squarespace, Kickstarter, and DoorDash just to name a few. To try out the must have service of the industry, simply head over to esharesinc.com it is a must. Fond is the employee engagement suite with 3 core products, rewards: a recognition platform for rewarding achievements and milestones, perks: a premium corporate discounts program to show employees you care about them and then finally engagement IQ, a free employee engagement survey that allows you to measure the health of your organization. To check it out head over to fond.co

28 Juni 201727min