Village Global Podcast

Latest Episodes:

The Intersection of Financial Services and Marketplaces with Pete Flint and Alex Taussig Jul 11, 2019

Show notes

Erik is joined on this episode by Alex Taussig (@ataussig) of Lightspeed, and Pete Flint (@peteflint) of NFX.
They talk about:
- The evolution of marketplaces over time, including a comparison of the characteristics of eBay and Lyft at the time they went public.
- Why the next wave of marketplace businesses will be in financial services, and why they require a unique team with a specific set of experiences.
- Examples of existing startups that are working in this space, as well as their requests for startups.
- The pros and cons of ISAs, and their potential impact.
- Conversational commerce, and why it didn’t live up to the hype.
- How healthcare and other heavily regulated markets might be be attacked by entrepreneurs.
Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform.
Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.
Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

Value Hacking and How To Avoid The Fake Growth Epidemic with Mike Maples Jul 09, 2019

Show notes

Erik is joined on this episode by Mike Maples (@m2jr) of Floodgate.
The talk about:
- The difference between fake growth and real growth, and how to know which one your company is experiencing.
- Why fake growth has taken hold in so many companies in the Valley, and its broader systemic causes.
- The difference between value hacking and growth hacking.
- Why once you’ve entered the growth stage, it’s next to impossible to go back to the value hacking stage.
- His thoughts on the Thiel vs. Rabois schools of markets.
- His tips for growing SaaS companies.
- How to think about incumbents.
- Why a pivot is not the same thing as a mulligan.
- The reasons for the fact that, in his opinion, there is too much money in VC.
- Why companies are staying private longer.
Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform.
Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.
Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global and is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg. Grace Chen is our audio engineer and the show is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

The LP Perspective: Alex Bangash Jul 07, 2019

Show notes

Alex Bangash (@AlexBangash), founder of Trusted Insight, joins Erik as part of our LP series.
They talk about:
- The myth, according to Alex, that there are such things as “good pickers” in venture.
- The fact that in venture, the traditional investment model is turned on its head — assets are picking managers, rather than the other way around.
- Why “the structural advantage of the big funds has all but disappeared” and why he cringes when someone tells him they want to be the next Benchmark.
- How he is trying to disrupt the entire venture model by democratizing access to capital.
- Why he’s bullish on the studio model and which kinks still need to be worked out.
- Where the next big thing in VC will come from.
- What he means when he says he’s “trying to bring a tennis racket to a basketball game” when talking about whether star GPs could be thought of as analogous to big NBA free agents.
Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform.
Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.
Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global and is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg. Grace Chen is our audio engineer and the show is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

The LP Perspective: Michael Kim Jul 04, 2019

Show notes

Michael Kim (@MKRocks), founder and managing partner of Cendana Capital, joins Erik on this episode to talk about what LPs look for in venture funds and the future of the industry.
They discuss:
- The reasons for the proliferation of seed funds over the past few years.
- The rise of the "super angels."
- Why portfolio construction is so important to Cendana when they're looking at a fund.
- How he evaluates a fund to see whether their thesis can generate the right returns.
- Why he’s “not looking for the ETF of seed investing.”
- In which geographies they’re looking for emerging fund managers.
- The rise of YC and the economics of accelerators.
- What the next 5-10 years will look like for the industry, including whether there’s a “reckoning” ahead.
Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform.
Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.
Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global and is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg.

The LP Perspective: Beezer Clarkson and Chris Douvos Jul 02, 2019

Show notes

Erik is joined on this episode by Beezer (Elizabeth) Clarkson (@Beezer232), managing director at Sapphire Ventures, and Chris Douvos (@cdouvos), founder of Ahoy Capital.
They talk about:
- The state of the venture industry and the industry from the LP perspective.
- Why venture is “either all about access or audacity.”
- How LPs pick which funds to back.
- Whether there is too much capital in the venture capital asset class.
- What “dilettante capital” is and why there are more “clowns” in the industry than ever for whom lightning struck in the form of an outlier investment.
- The three main ways that venture funds are differentiated.
- Why succession is always a threat in venture and how good firms have been able to manage when a GP "calls in rich."
- Why a good venture firm operates like a basketball team and a bad one operates like a tennis team.
- The difference between building a firm and deploying capital.
- Some impromptu book recommendations of classic works on California.
Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform.
Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.
Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global and is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg. Colin Campbell was our audio engineer for this episode and the show is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

Bill Gates on Advice For Founders, Mistakes, and Philanthropy Jun 30, 2019

Show notes

On this special live episode of Venture Stories, Bill Gates was interviewed at San Francisco’s Exploratorium by Julia Hartz, co-founder and CEO of Eventbrite.
We are honored to have Bill Gates, one of the most successful entrepreneurs of all time, among our small group of luminary LPs whose financial capital and engagement power the next wave of Village Global founders.
They covered:
* Gates’s entrepreneurial journey starting Microsoft, including the most important turning points in the early years of the company.
* His thinking on work-life balance for founders and what he would do differently if he was starting again.
* His “greatest mistake of all time.”
* What he’s learned from the next generation of founders.
* His perspective on the current tech landscape.
* His views on philanthropy, global development, education, and much more.
Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform.
Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.
Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

The Past and Future of the World Economy with George Gilder and Patrick Stanley Jun 27, 2019

Show notes

This episode is a conversation between George Gilder (@ScandalOfMoney), author, investor, writer and economist, Patrick Stanley (@PatrickWStanley), head of growth at Blockstack, and Erik Torenberg, partner and co-founder of Village. It was originally released on The Stacks Podcast presented by Blockstack.
They talk about:
- Gilder’s Information Theory, and why it is central to everything, including the world economy and biology.
- Why Gilder says that “wealth is really knowledge,” why money is not wealth, and why using money as anything other than a measuring stick is one of the biggest economic problems of the past and future.
- The problem with the “morbid financialization of the world” and the fact that share buybacks financed by near-zero interest loans from the government have driven economic growth for the last several years.
- Why prices are just measures of time.
- The importance of community and how to measure it in a society and economy, as well as Gilder’s thoughts on the scourge of materialism.
- Why Gilder is skeptical of the potential world-dominating effects of AI and isn’t as concerned about privacy as others are.
- Gilder’s critique of the Bitcoin framework.
- What Gilder looks for in companies when he “puts his VC hat on.”
- The role of the fed, China’s unique economy, trade wars, debt, and the charter cities movement, and much more.
Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform.
Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.
Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

Sarah Guo on SaaS Investing and Building an Enterprise Company Jun 25, 2019

Show notes

Erik is joined on this episode by Sarah Guo (@saranormous), partner at Greylock. It was recorded live as part of a talk Sarah gave at Village Global’s Network Catalyst program in summer 2019.
They discuss:
- Which spaces Sarah is most interested in and where she has been investing
- Her advice for entrepreneurs looking to build a company in SaaS and enterprise, as well as her interest in companies working in security and privacy
- Her investment thesis at Greylock
- Why a company without an initial product is really just a story
- Her thoughts on the consumerization of the enterprise
- The product spec as an imagined future press release
- Her advice on pricing and mistakes that she sees entrepreneurs make when thinking about sales
Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform.
Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.
Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

Requests For Startups: Consumer FinTech with Howard Lindzon and Sheel Mohnot Jun 24, 2019

Show notes

Erik is joined by Howard Lindzon (@howardlindzon), GP at Social Leverage and co-founder and chairman of StockTwits, and Sheel Mohnot (@pitdesi), FinTech investor at 500 Startups.
They discuss:
- Which spaces they’re most excited about within FinTech.
- How the space has evolved over the last decade or so.
- Why it’s a very difficult and crowded space to try to build a company in (hint: “CACs are ridonculous”).
- Their takes on crypto and its future.
- Why incumbents like Google and Amazon have done a poor job in FinTech.
- Why Howard likes companies that have “weird angles of attack” into a market.
- Their thoughts on ISAs.
Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform.
Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.
Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

The Case For Anarcho-Capitalism with David Friedman Jun 20, 2019

Show notes

David Friedman (daviddfriedman.com), economist and author, joins Erik on this episode. He is the son of Milton Friedman and the father of former guest, Patri Friedman.
They cover a lot of ground in this episode, including:
- The rationale for privatizing government and the failures of the existing system.
- What it would look like to have a fully privatized government, including how a private substitute for police and defense would work.
- Why he is not a utilitarian and the framework he uses to figure out what is right and wrong.
- How he would approach collective-action problems like global warming and nuclear proliferation.
- His perspective on inequality and his explanation for why people look to relative measures of affluence rather than absolute measures.
- How you would deal with punishment and criminals in a market-based society.
- And much more, including Glen Weyl’s Radical Markets, Tyler Cowen’s Stubborn Attachments, fake news, ISAs and restorative justice.
Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform.
Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.
Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.

Our TOPPODCAST Picks

Follow Us

Stay Connected

Related Podcasts

Links

Stay Connected

Our TOPPODCAST Picks

Follow Us

Stay Connected

Village Global Podcast

Related Podcasts

1

2

3

4

5

6