The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding

Latest Episodes:

20VC: Why Success in Gaming is Like Success in VC, The Key To Building An Enduring Game & Why Few Metrics Matter in Gaming with Kevin Chou, Founder & CEO @ Kabam Mar 17, 2017

Show notes

Kevin Chou is co-founder and CEO of Kabam, a world leader in mobile free-to-play games. At Kabam, Kevin catapulted revenue to $400 million and a valuation of more than $1 billion in 2014. Under Kevin's leadership, Kabam has raised more than $240 million from venture and strategic investors, including some of the world's largest entertainment and internet companies such as Alibaba, Google, Intel and Warner Brothers. Before Kabam, Kevin worked at Canaan Partners, Kabam's initial investor and where he invested in 14 consumer technology and online media companies. In 2014 Kevin was named one Fortune magazine's prestigious "40 Under 40" and, in 2012, was identified by Fortune as one of the "Smartest People in Tech."

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Kevin came to found the wildly successful Kabam from a life in VC with Canaan Partners?

2.) How does Kevin respond to investors that say games is so challenging as it is so hits driven? What are the requirements to build an enduring and successful games company?

3.) What are the metrics that define success in gaming? Why does Kevin believe that gaming is unlike any other in terms of metrics?

4.) To what extent does Kevin believe it is right to monetise games from the beginning vs the free to play market? What are the features and challenges required for success in the premium end of the market?

5.) How does gaming alter both in terms of design and monetisation when comparing the East to the West? What feature sets are preferrable in both? Why doe the East want to pay for as much up front as possible?

Items Mentioned In Today's Show:

Kevin's Fave Book: Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

Kevin's Fave Blog or Newsletter: Dean Takahashi: VentureBeat

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Kevin on Twitter here!

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

X.ai is AI-poweredered personal assistant for scheduling meetings bringing you Amy or Andrew. The assistant you interact with like you would to any other person and it allows you to avoid the tedious hours of email ping pong in order to schedule one meeting. Even better, there is no sign in, no password, no download, all you do is cc amy@x.ai beautiful! And you can check it out now on x.ai it really is a must!

Workable is the all-in-one recruiting software for ambitious companies. From posting a job to tracking and managing candidates, Workable provides everything you need to hire better. Transparent communication, organized candidate profiles, structured interviews and a full reporting suite gives hiring teams the information they need to make the best choice. Workable is available for desktop and mobile and you can find out more on workable.com where you can try it for free.

20VC: Sequoia Partner, Carl Eschenbach on Building and Scaling High Performace Teams and The Common Mistakes In Scaling A Go-To-Market Strategy Mar 15, 2017

Show notes

Carl Eschenbach is a Partner @ Sequoia Capital, one of the world's leading funds with investments in the likes of Google, Apple, Whatsapp, Paypal and Stripe just to name a few. As for Carl, prior to Sequoia, Carl was President and CEO @ VMWare where he grew the team from 200 to 20,000 people. If that was not enough Carl has also stepped in as CFO at a $5Bn company and transitioned 3 CEOs.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Carl made the move from President and CEO @ 20,000 person company, VMWare to Partner @ Sequoia?

2.) Question from Alfred Lin, Partner @ Sequoia: How did Carl look to build a culture of performance at VMWare?

3.) Question from Pat Grady, Partner @ Sequoia: What were Carl's biggest learnings with regards to high performance teams? What are the common mistakes in scaling a go to market strategy?

4.) How does Carl view the internal workings at Sequoia to the external perception? Was the move to Sequoia everything he expected? What was different or challenging?

5.) What does Carl believe are the core components that make a great board member? How has Carl's time in operations affected his view of boards and their working?

Items Mentioned In Today's Show:

Carl's Fave Book: Half Time

Carl's Most Recent Investment: Zoom

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Carl on Twitter here!

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

20VC: Sequoia Partner, Pat Grady on Why Data Is The New Oil, Why We Will See The Return of The Apprenticeship Model in VC & The Defining Characteristics of The Next Generation of Great Software Mar 13, 2017

Show notes

Pat Grady is a Partner @ Sequoia Capital, one of the world's leading funds with prior investments in the likes of Apple, Google, Whatsapp, Paypal, Stripe and many more. At Sequoia, Pat has made investments in many past guests of this show and the SaaStr podcast including Zoom, Namely and Qualtrics, just to name a few. Prior to Sequoia, Pat spent 3 years with the team at Summit Partners.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Pat made his way into the world of VC and one of the most famous funds in the world, Sequoia?

2.) How does Pat view the apprenticeship model in VC? How can VCs attempt to develop and convey the founder empathy when they have not been a founder? Do 'career VCs' get the same respect from founders?

3.) What does Pat believe to be the defining characteristics of the next generation of great software? What are the commonalities?

4.) Pat has said before that 'data is the new oil', what makes Pat think this? How does this affect his investment thesis going forward? Are there elements of being 'data long' that make Pat nervous?

5.) How does Pat think the data incumbency advantage can be mitigated? What can startups do to build a moat?

Items Mentioned In Today's Show:

Pat's Fave Book: The Boys In The Boat

Pat's Fave Blog: CB Insights

Pat's Most Recent Investment: Namely

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Pat on Twitter here!

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

20VC: Wealthfront and Benchmark's Andy Rachleff on Why Delight Is The Greatest Form Of Virality, Why Competition Does Not Matter & What The Future Holds For Automated Personal Finance Mar 10, 2017

Show notes

From 1995 until 2004 Andy Rachleff was a co-founder and General Partner of Benchmark Capital, who have backed the likes of Twitter, Snapchat, Dropbox, Uber and Instagram. Upon his retirement from Benchmark, Andy joined the faculty of the Stanford Graduate School of Business to teach a variety of courses on entrepreneurship. In 2008 he co-founded Wealthfront Inc, the online financial advisor and investment management solution, where he now serves as Executive Chairman. In just 3 years, Wealthfront now have over $2bn AUM. In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Andy made his way into the world of VC, became the Co-Founder @ Benchmark and what was the origin story behind the founding of Wealthfront?

2.) On rejoining Wealthfront as CEO Andy stated, 'I am an investor, not a CEO but what I did not realize was that I am a founder'. At what point did Andy realize this? Would Andy say that this is a strategic inflection point for Wealthfront with his return?

3.) What are the few elements that will make or break Wealthfront in the coming years? It it the best CEOs that are able to both balance the challenges with the opportunities?

4.) What does the future hold for Wealthfront? What is the exciting news? What does this mean for the road ahead and the world of automated personal finance?

As always you can follow The Twenty Minute VC, Harry and Andy on Twitter here!

20VC: Why Valuation Is Of Critical Importance At Seed, How To Understand Innovation Cycles & Having 3 CEOs and Burning $10m a Month with Lee Hower, Co-Founder @ NextView Ventures Mar 08, 2017

Show notes

Lee Hower is a co-founder and Partner at NextView Ventures, one of the East coast's leading early stage funds with investments in the likes of Dia & Co, Sunrise, TaskRabbit and GrabCad just to name a few. As for Lee, prior to being a VC with NextView, Lee started his career as an early employee of PayPal in product and business development roles, through the company's 2002 IPO and sale to eBay. After PayPal, Lee was a co-founder of LinkedIn (NYSE: LNKD) and served as head of corporate development.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Lee made his way from the early days of PayPal with Elon Musk to the founding team of LinkedIn with Reid Hoffman to founding NextView and being a VC?

2.) What were Lee's biggest takeaways from his time working with Elon Musk, Peter Thiel, Reid Hoffman in the early days of PayPal? How has that experience affected how he invests today?

3.) Unlike other Paypal mafia members, Lee decided not to pursue the multi-stage investing strategy. Why was this? How does Lee evaluate the current seed environment?

4.) Why does Lee believe it is fundamental to study the history of VC and innovation? How does this affect his mindset when investing?

5.) What would Lee advice to a junior VC or someone looking to move into the industry in terms of differentiation and personal branding? What is key? How should this be approached?

Items Mentioned In Today's Show:

Lee's Fave Book: The Globalisation Paradox

Lee's Most Recent Investment: Optimus Ride

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Lee on Twitter here!

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

20VC: Betaworks' John Borthwick on Why The VC Model Is So Inefficient, Why Venture Fund Cycles Are Too Short & Why Frontier Tech Could Only Have Been Disappointing Over The Last Year Mar 06, 2017

Show notes

John Borthwick is the Founder & CEO @ Betaworks, the New York-based startup platform combining 3 areas of expertise. They have a studio where they have built products including Giphy, Dots, Bitly and more. They have a fund with prior investments including Tumblr, Medium and Kickstarter. Finally they have a camp, a thematic accelerator program for companies in frontier technology sectors. As for John, Prior to Betaworks, John was an SVP at Time Warner Inc following John's previous company, WP-Studio, being acquired by AOLTW.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How John made his way from AOL and Time Warner to founder of Betaworks?

2.) Why is John skeptical of the traditional VC model? Why does John believe that the market has adapted but the VC model has not?

3.) Why does John believe fund cycles are simply too short, in the same school of thought as Matt Ocko @ Data Collective? What are the problems with this?

4.) How does John evaluate Fred Wilson's post on the consumer downturn? Why does John think we are addicted to short term rapid fire hits?

5.) Why is John not surprised that AI, Bots, VR and AR are being 'labeled a disappointment for the last year? What does he think will be the catalyst for their rise?

Items Mentioned In Today's Show:

John's Fave Book: King Lear

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and John on Twitter here!

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

20VC: Why Product Market Fit Is Like Porn, How The Entrance of Facebook and Google Into Enterprise Software Effects Traditional Enterprise Companies & The Future Pricing Model For The Enterprise with Dennis Mortensen, Founder @ X.ai Mar 03, 2017

Show notes

Dennis Mortensen is the CEO and Founder of X.ai, the artificial intelligence driven personal assistant that lets people schedule meetings using plain English and nothing more than a CC to amy@x.ai. Their female persona Amy is so lifelike that users have asked her on a date at a rate of one request per month! X.ai is now one of the best funded AI startups having raised over $30m from our friends at FirstMark and DCM and a big thanks to Matt Turck for making the intro and from DCM, who also helped us with some of the questions for Dennis!

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Dennis came to found one of the leading AI startups today with X.ai?

2.) Why is product market fit like porn? How does this analogy affect Dennis' evaluation of product market fit?

3.) What are the fundamental features required to turn a single user consumer product into an enterprise product? How should that transition be managed?

4.) Is Dennis concerned by large incumbents making their entrance into the world of more traditional enterprise companies with the likes of GSuite and Facebook for Work?

5.) How did Dennis evaluate the right pricing method for X.ai? What pricing mechanisms did he consider? What does Dennis believe is the future of enterprise pricing?

Items Mentioned In Today's Show:

Dennis' Fave Book: Shoe Dog

Dennis' Fave Blog or Newsletter: Azeem Azhar: The Exponential View

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Dennis on Twitter here!

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

20VC: The Power Of A Concentrated Seed Portfolio, Why Operational Value Add Models At Seed Do Not Make Sense & Why We Will See A Shakeout Of Growth Stage Investors with Roger Ehrenberg, Founder & Managing Partner @ IA Ventures Mar 01, 2017

Show notes

Roger Ehrenberg is the Founder and Managing Partner @ IA Ventures, one of New York's leading early stage funds with investments in the likes of TransferWise and The Trade Desk. Prior to IA, Roger was a prolific angel investor making investments in over 40 companies including BuddyMedia and previous guest, Howard Lindzon's StockTwits. Before that, Roger served as President and CEO @ DB Advisors, Deutsche Bank's internal hedge fund trading platform which managed $6Bn in capital across multiple geographies.

In Today's Episode with Roger You Will Learn:

How Roger made his way into VC from the world of Wall St?
How does Roger view the diversification model of 50+ in a portfolio in micro VC? What levels of ownership does that require?
With regards to small and honed portfolios Roger has previously said that 'small is beautiful'. How does Roger approach this with IA and what capital pools does this allow his partners?
Roger has also said that 'VC platforms are not a panacea'. What does he mean by this? What do founders really want from an investment partner today?
What is the effect of Roger and IA being outside the traditional echo chambers of Silicon Valley? How does this affect Roger's dealflow? Hiring ability? Partnership opportunities?

Items Mentioned In Today's Show:

Roger's Fave Blog and Newsletter: Maria Popova: BrainPickings

Roger's Fave Book: Out Of The Crisis

Roger's Most Recent Investment: Octane Lending

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Roger on Twitter here!

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

X.ai is AI-powered personal assistant for scheduling meetings bringing you Amy or Andrew. The assistant you interact with like you would to any other person and it allows you to avoid the tedious hours of email ping pong in order to schedule one meeting. Even better, there is no sign in, no password, no download, all you do is cc amy@x.ai beautiful! And you can check it out now on x.ai it really is a must!

20VC: Benchmark's Scott Belsky on What Makes Truly The Best VCs? Why Entrepreneurs Must Focus on 'The First Mile' & The Key Ingredients To The Perfect Onboarding Process Feb 27, 2017

Show notes

Scott Belsky is a Venture Partner @ Benchmark, one of the world's leading VC funds. As an early-stage investor himself he has made investments in the likes of Uber, Warby Parker, Pinterest and Flexport just to name a few. Prior to Benchmark, Scott co-founded Behance in 2006, and served as CEO until Adobe acquired Behance in 2012. After Behance's acquisition, Scott served as Adobe's Vice President of Products, rebooting Adobe's mobile product strategy and leading Behance until 2016. If that was not enough Scott is also, the co-founder and Chairman of a new marketplace product under development.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Scott made his move into VC with Benchmark having founded Behance and been a VP @ Adobe?

2.) How did Scott see his investment decision making process change when comparing being an angel to a VC? What was it about VC that made Scott realise that he would not be a traditional VC?

3.) Why does Scott believe that when momentum is growing too fast it is generally likely to fade out? At what point is the transition point between large momentum that is and is not sustainable?

4.) Why is Scott fascinated by 'the journey in between'? What gives Scott hope when reviewing a company in this stage? What does he always look for?

5.) Why does Scott think that autonomous vehicles in cities will be a public utility? Will the data sets produced be publicly or privately owned? Who will operate mass transit systems?

Items Mentioned In Today's Show:

Scott's Fave Book: Tribe: On Homecoming & Belonging

Scott's Fave Blog or Newsletter: The Information

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Scott on Twitter here!

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

20VC: Raising $24m From The Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative, Why EdTech Is So Misunderstood & Why The Future Of Work Is Decentralised with Andela's Jeremy Johnson Feb 24, 2017

Show notes

Jeremy Johnson is the Founder & CEO @ Andela, the startup that aims to bring a scientific approach to building engineering teams. They have backing from some of the best investors in the world with the likes of the Zuckerberg-Chan Initiative, Spark Capital, Google Ventures and our friends at Susa Ventures just to name a few. As for Jeremy, prior to founding Andela, Jeremy co-founded 2U, one of the fastest-growing education technology startups in history. 2U went public in 2014 (NASDAQ:TWOU) and continues to transform higher education. Jeremy has spoken on education and entrepreneurship at meetings hosted by the White house and Congress and was named "30 Under 30" by Inc. Magazine in 2012 and Forbes in 2013 and 2014.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Jeremy made his entry into startups and came to found Andela?

2.) Question from Paige Craig: How did the Zuckerberg-Chan Initiative deal come about? What has been the effect of taking that round for the company and for you as the founder?

3.) How does Jeremy view the contrast between being CEO and being founder? What does he believe makes a truly great CEO?

4.) Andela is an intensely operational and logistics based business, how did Jeremy learn to handle this? What were the fundamental challenges?

5.) How does Jeremy view the future wof work? Why does Jeremy believe the future can only be in decentralised work forces?

Items Mentioned In Today's Show:

Jeremy's Fave Book: The Power of One

Jeremy's Fave Blog or Newsletter: Social Snippets, Charles Hudson @ Precursor

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Jeremy on Twitter here!

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

Intercom is the first to bring messaging products for marketing and customer support together on one integrated platform. With Intercom, businesses can chat directly with prospective customers on their website, engage current users with targeted messages based on their behavior, and provide personal support at scale with an integrated help desk and knowledge base. This is perfect for Businesses that want to help people visiting their website become customers. Marketing and growth teams that want to onboard and retain users by sending the right messages at the right time and Support teams that want to move beyond email to provide personalized, scalable support so simply head over to Intercom.com/20MVC

Cooley are the global law firm built around startups and venture capital. Since forming the first venture fund in Silicon Valley, Cooley has formed more venture capital funds than any other law firm in the world, with 50+ years working with VCs. They help VCs form and manage funds, make investments and handle the myriad issues that arise through a fund's lifetime. So to learn more about the #1 most active law firm representing VC-backed companies going public. Head over to cooley.com and also at cooleygo.com.

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