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

Latest Episodes:

20VC: OpenAI's Multi $BN Deal with AMD | Polymarket, Vercel and Supabase Raise Mega Rounds | Does King Making Really Work in Venture Capital: Harvey vs Legora | Chamath is Back: The SPAC is Back Oct 09, 2025

Show notes

AGENDA:

03:29 OpenAI and AMD's Major Partnership

07:35 Microsoft Have F***** Up the OpenAI Partnership

17:08 OpenAI's Developer Day Announcements

20:45 Why VC is the Most Forgiving Asset Class on Price and Valuation

29:10 What Does it Take to IPO in 2025: Why Snyk Will Not IPO

42:30 Four Strategies Companies Need to Take to Own Their Own Destiny

49:31 Vercel Raises $300M at $9BN: Suicide Round or Strategic

55:39 Does King Making Really Work in Venture Capital: Legora vs Harvey

01:08:11 Chamath Raises Latest SPAC: SPACs are Back

01:10:56 Polymarket Raises $2BN at a $9BN Valuation

01:14:53 Quick Fire Questions and Wrap-Up

20VC: Cerebras CEO on Why Raise $1BN and Delay the IPO | NVIDIA Showing Signs They Are Worried About Growth | Concentration of Value in Mag7: Will the AI Train Come to a Halt | Can the US Supply the Energy for AI with Andrew Feldman Oct 06, 2025

Show notes

Andrew Feldman is Co-Founder & CEO of Cerebras, building the world's fastest AI inference and training. Cerebras recently closed a $1.1BN Series G round at an $8.1 billion valuation, backed by top names including Fidelity, Atreides, Tiger Global, Valor Equity and 1789 Capital. Under his leadership, they've leapfrogged GPU limits in inference, operate at trillions of tokens per month, and are filing to go public soon.

AGENDA:

02:43 Why We Did Not IPO and Raised $1BN From Fidelity

05:03 Analysis of Chip and Compute Landscape Today

07:14 NVIDIA Showing Signs They Are Running Out of Ideas

13:57 The Real Questions to Ask on Chip Depreciation

24:54 Energy Requirements for AI: Is it Feasible?

29:25 Mag7 Value Concentration: Feature or a Bug

31:57 Talent is the Bottleneck and Trump Makes it Worse

32:55 The War for Talent: Secrets No One Sees

34:22 Evaluating the Data Centre Economy: Many Will Lose Money

38:01 Three Changes the US Could Make to Beat China in AI

42:30 Why 80% of our Revenues are in the UAE

47:26 Quick Fire Questions

58:59 Why Work Life Balance is Total BS

20Growth: How to Use Influencers to Scale Growth Insanely Fast | How to Optimise User Onboaring for Growth | How the Best Growth Teams Create Organic Growth and Community | Why LTV/CAC Models are BS with Ketty Slonimsky Oct 03, 2025

Show notes

Ketty Slonimsky is Chief Growth Officer at Palta, the platform behind apps like Flo (the #1 female health app with 77M+ MAU), Simple, and Zing AI, where she leads a centralized growth function across the portfolio. She was previously first VP Product & Growth at HeliosX (£900M+ ARR, bootstrapped D2C healthtech), has advised companies like SonderMind, Runna, Guardio, Cheddar, P&G Digital Ventures, and is a board advisor at HeliosX.

AGENDA:

02:33 What is Growth and When to Hire For It

06:04 Three Profiles of Successful Growth Leaders

10:07 Challenges and Learnings from Failed Ventures

21:17 How to Optimise User Onboarding for Growth

26:14 Biggest Lessons on Retention

30:25 How to Artificially Create Organic Growth and Community Building

32:10 Why LTV Models are BS

37:35 How to Use Influencers to Grow Insanely Fast

47:07 The Metrics that Matter in Growth

49:48 Push Notifications and Engagement: What To Do vs What Not to Do?

51:57 Quick Fire Round

20VC: Are Burn Multiples BS in an AI World | Sam Altman Needs $1TRN of Energy | Klarna, Figma, Stubhub, all Down: Are Public Markets Turning? | FiveTran and DBT: Is the Wave of Consolidation About to Begin? Oct 02, 2025

Show notes

AGENDA:

03:58 Understanding Burn Multiples and Capital Efficiency in an AI World

11:54 What Metrics Founders Need to Focus on in a World of AI

19:31 The Role of Kingmakers in Venture Capital: Harvey, Abridge, Profound

33:42 Klarna, Figma, Stubhub, all Down: Are Public Markets Turning?

36:35 OpenAI Needs the Same Energy as Japan… WTF!

41:09 How Can We Fund the $1TRN Sam Altman Needs for Energy

52:39 FiveTran and DBT: Is the Wave of Consolidation About to Begin?

59:44 Does Private Equity Need to Change in a World of AI

01:06:23 Political Expression and Corporate Responsibility

20VC: OpenAI and Anthropic Will Build Their Own Chips | NVIDIA Will Be Worth $10TRN | How to Solve the Energy Required for AI... Nuclear | Why China is Behind the US in the Race for AGI with Jonathan Ross, Groq Founder Sep 29, 2025

Show notes

Jonathan Ross is the Founder & CEO of Groq, the AI chip company redefining inference at scale. Under his leadership, Groq has raised over $3B from top investors. The company has reached a valuation of nearly $7B, positioning itself as one of NVIDIA's most formidable challengers. Previously at Google, Jonathan led the team that built the first Tensor Processing Unit (TPU), making him one of the leading architects of modern AI hardware.

AGENDA:

00:00 The Future of AI and Compute

05:07 Why the Hyperscalers Have to Keep Spending Recklessly on AI

12:49 Why OpenAI and Anthropic Will Have to Build Their Own Chips

19:47 OpenAI and Anthropic Will be $5BN Companies: The Bull Case

29:50 Why China is Behind the US in AI and Deepseek is More Expensive to Run

33:55 How Europe Could Compete in AI and Why the US is More Risk Averse Than Europe

42:51 Why AI Will Lead to Too Many Not Too Few Jobs

43:19 Deflationary Pressures and New Job Markets

45:51 The Future of Vibe Coding

47:14 Why AI Companies Should Strive to Have Low Margins

49:31 Why We Have to Have Nuclear Energy and How to Bring it Back

56:55 How Permits are Ruining the Potential of AI

01:03:58 Why OpenAI and Anthropic are so Undervalued

01:16:53 Quickfire: Biggest Fear, Nvidia: $10TRN, Zuck Buying AI: Work or Not

20Product: Revolut Business $1BN Revenue: Five of the Biggest Product Lessons | How Revolut Structures Product and Design Teams | How Revolut Experiments and Invests in New Product Bets | How Revolut Ships Product So Fast with James Gibson Sep 26, 2025

Show notes

James Gibson is Head of Revolut Business. Under his leadership, Revolut Business now processes over $33 billion in monthly transaction volume and generates more than $1BN in annualised revenue.

AGENDA:

04:10 Is Consulting the Worst Background for Aspiring PMs

07:09 How Revolut Hires for it's Product Team

17:21 How Revolut Sets Goals: What Works, What Does Not

19:37 How Revolut Structures Their Product Teams

22:13 How Revolut Structures Product Review Sessions

27:23 New Bets Process at Revolut

29:11 How Revolut Balances Super Users and General Customers

36:55 How Revolut Drives Product Velocity and Efficiency

39:26 Future of Product with AI

44:56 Quick Fire Questions and Reflections

20VC: NVIDIA Invests $100BN Into OpenAI | Is Triple, Triple, Double, Double Dead | Navan Files to go Public & Notion Hits $500M ARR | The Impact of H1B Visas on Startups in the US Sep 25, 2025

Show notes

AGENDA:

00:00 Why I am 100% Equities and 0% Cash

04:35 Nvidia's Massive $100BN Investment in OpenAI

08:39 Is Anthropic Negatively Positioned by OpenAI Gaining NVIDIA Investment

27:30 Is Triple, Triple, Double, Double Dead

44:00 Navan Files to Go Public at $8BN

49:31 Lockup Periods and Liquidity

50:35 Impact of H-1B Visa Changes on Startups

01:02:42: Notion Hits $500M ARR Re-Accelerating

01:09:42 Why Founder Friendly is Total BS Today

20VC: General Catalyst CEO Hemant Taneja on The Future of Venture Capital: Chanel vs Walmart | Lessons Scaling GC to $40BN in AUM | Investing $5BN+ Into Stripe Over 14 Rounds | Investing Hundreds of Millions into Anthropic at $60BN Valuation Sep 22, 2025

Show notes

Hemant Taneja is the CEO and leader of General Catalyst, the firm he has scaled over the last decade into one of the largest with over $40BN in AUM. He has been one of the most influential investors of the past two decades, leading early bets in Stripe, Snap, Gusto, Samsara, Grammarly, and Canva. He also played a pivotal role in Livongo's $18.5B merger with Teladoc, one of the largest digital health deals in history.

AGENDA:

00:00 Introduction

03:37 Is Hemant a CEO or an Investor?

05:42 With $40BN AUM Is General Catalyst Still a VC Firm?

12:11 Has Trump Done More to Hurt or Help the US?

13:25 No One is Talking About the True Impact of AI on Jobs

21:30 Is Hemant Concerned by the Concentration of Value in MAG 7?

27:30 Has Trump Done More to Hurt or Help the US?

30:27 GC's Anthropic Investment: Upside from a $60BN Price

37:06 Do Margins Matter in a World of AI

45:23 Does Revenue Growth Matter in a World of AI

49:39 Why it is BS to Turn Down a Company Based on Price

56:06 We Have Invested $5BN Into Stripe Over 14 Rounds

01:00:02 VC is About To Be Flooded with Retail Investment: What Does It Mean for VC

01:08:51 "What I Learned Losing the Series A of Snap, Stripe, Samsara"

01:11:25 Future of Venture Capital: Walmart vs Chanel

20VC: Why 90% of Founders Build Startups Wrong | Why AI Growth Rates are Sustainable & Remote Work is BS and the AI Talent War | Competing with Brett Taylor and Sierra: Who Wins the Customer Service War with Jesse Zhang, Decagon Sep 19, 2025

Show notes

Jesse Zhang is the Co-Founder and CEO @ Decagon, the conversational AI platform for customer experience. As one of the fastest growing companies in the valley, they have raised over $230M at a last round price of $1.5BN. Prior to Decagon, Jesse founded Lowkey (acquired by Niantic), studied CS at Harvard, and worked at places like Google, HRT, Citadel, and Intel.

AGENDA:

00:00 Introduction and Sponsor Messages

03:43 Olympiad Mathematician to Startup Founder

05:34 Selling to Niantic and What I Did Differently the Second Time

07:16 Why 90% of Founders Build Companies the Wrong Way

12:19 Scaling to $50M ARR in 15 Months

31:31 Is the AI Talent War Out of Hand: How To Compete with Meta Pay Packets

32:38 Why Remote Work is Total BS

34:06 Competitors in AI Customer Experience: Sierra, Intercom and more

37:34 AI Market Predictions

44:56 Embracing Stress and Winning Culture

50:13 Quick Fire Questions: Most Underrated AI Founder, Biggest Changed Opinion

20VC: Opendoor's CEO on The Greatest Turnaround in Tech | OpenAI and Oracle: How Can Either Afford to Do This | How Anthropic Could Lose 50% of Their Revenue Overnight | Replit Raises at $3BN | Figure, Gemini & VIA IPOs Broken Down Sep 18, 2025

Show notes

AGENDA:

00:00 Opendoor's Potential and Market Valuation

03:32 Why Did Kaz Leave $300M on the Table to Join Opendoor

04:44 Why Does Kaz Believe OPEN Can Be a Good Business When the Market Doesn't

06:34 How does Kaz Feel About OPEN Becoming a Meme Stock?

17:25 Kaz's $0 Salary but $1BN Stock Based Compensation

23:41 Oracle and OpenAI Partnership: WTF is Going On?

42:21 Microsoft's Investment in OpenAI: A Financial Perspective & Who Has the Power

44:46 Why Sam Altman is the Greatest Politician of our Time

48:33 How Anthropic's Revenue Could Go to Zero Overnight?

50:12 Replit Raises $250M at $3BN Valuation and Higgsfield Raises $50M at $50M ARR