20VC: Qualtrics Founder, Ryan Smith on The 2 Hour Decision Whether To Sell Qualtrics for $8Bn in Cash, Why Tying Your Identity To Your Company Will Never Make You Happy and His Relationship To Risk, Wealth and Responsibility as a Result
The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
Release Date: 05/11/2021
The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
Chris Dixon is a General Partner at Andreessen Horowitz, one of the leading venture firms of the last decade with investments in Oculus (acquired by Facebook), Coinbase, and many more. Chris also founded and leads a16z crypto, a division of the firm that he has grown from $300 million in 2018 to more than $7 billion of committed capital. Due to his many successes, Chris was named #1 on the Forbes Midas List in 2022. In Today’s Episode with Chris Dixon We Discuss: From Founder to Leading GP in Venture: How did Chris make his way into the world of venture and startups? When did he...
info_outline 20VC: Lessons from 32 Years of Fund Investing | Why Exits Will Be Larger & Funds Sizes Bigger | Top Reasons to Turn Down Potential Fund Investments | Fees, Carry, Deployment Pace; What Do LPs Inspect When Fund Investing with David Clark, CIO @ VencapThe Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
David Clark is the CIO of , one of the leading fund of funds in the venture landscape. David has been at Vencap for 32 years and has been an LP his entire career. In Today's Episode with David Clark We Discuss: 1. From Unemployed Student in Love to Leading LP: How did a girlfriend lead to David taking his first steps into the world of fund investing? What does David know now about fund investing that he wishes he had known when he started? 2. Is Being an LP Harder than Ever Before: Does David agree with , "venture has transitioned from a boutique high margin business to a low...
info_outline 20VC: Bryan Johnson on Why Humans Are No Longer Qualified to Manage Our Own Affairs, How Algorithms Will Run our Bodies and How to Process New Ideas and Challenge Conventional BeliefsThe Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
Bryan Johnson is the founder of Blueprint, the man is at war with death and is mastering longevity. Bryan is on a mission aimed at enhancing human intelligence and being respected by people in the 25th century. Before starting Blueprint, Bryan also founded Braintree (acquired by PayPal for $800M) and OS Fund – a $100M venture capital fund investing in genomics, synthetic biology, and complex systems. In Today’s Episode with Bryan Johnson We Discuss: The Philosophy of Don’t Die What does Bryan think is the biggest existential threat to humankind? Why does Bryan believe humans are...
info_outline 20Product: Why Process is Killing Your Product Team and How to Remove it | Three Product Decisions Every Team Needs to Make | Why the Best Companies Build Movements and Lessons from Shopify and Atlassian on How to Do It Right with Jean-Michel LemieuxThe Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
Jean-Michel Lemieux is one of the OGs of engineering and product having been the CTO at Shopify and the VP Engineering at Atlassian. Jean-Michel helped grow both Shopify and Atlassian from single-product to multi-product companies and led the building of their platforms. In Today’s Episode with Jean-Michel Lemieux We Discuss: From band class to Shopify CTO How did Jean-Michel make his way into the world of product? What were Jean-Michel’s biggest lessons from his time at Atlassian & Shopify? How are Shopify & Atlassian the same? How are they different? Why does...
info_outline 20VC: 19 Company Portfolio: 1 Decacorn, 7 Unicorns, 4 Acquisitions; One of the Best Seed Investors of All Time on How to Pick Generational Defining Founders, Why Nothing but the Founder Matters & Why the Best Investors are Never Happy w/ Gili RaananThe Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
Gili Raanan is the Founder of and one of the most successful seed investors ever. In his 19 company portfolio, Gili has invested in a decacorn (Wiz), seven unicorns and had three others acquired. Prior to Cyberstarts, Gili spent over 15 years as a General Partner @ investing in some of the world's best cyber security companies. In Today's Episode with Gili Raanan We Discuss: 1. From Founder to World's Best Seed Investor: How did Gili make the move into the world of venture with Sequoia? How did Mike Moritz and Doug Leone recruit him? What was that process like? What are 1-2 of...
info_outline 20VC: Bending Spoons: The Most Untold Success Story in Startups: Lessons Scaling to 500M Downloads, $360M in Reported 2023 Sales and a $2.55BN Valuation... Bootstrapped with Luca Ferrari, Co-Founder and CEO @ Bending SpoonsThe Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
Luca Ferrari is Co-Founder and CEO of Bending Spoons, one of the most incredible but untold success stories in startups. Luca has scaled Bending Spoons to 100M monthly active users, $380M in sales in 2023 and aiming to reach $500M in EBITDA by the end of 2026. The company’s products include Evernote, Meetup, Remini, and Splice and their products have now been downloaded more than 500M times. In Today’s Episode with Luca Ferrari We Discuss: From McKinsey Associate to $2BN Founder What was Luca like as a child? How would his parents have described him? Why did Luca share his...
info_outline 20Growth: Top Five Lessons from Leading Analytics at Facebook and Data Science at Sequoia Capital, The Two Skills Required to do Analytics Well, The Three Types of Execs within Companies and When and How to Hire for Growth with Chandra NarayananThe Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
Chandra Narayanan is one of the growth and analytics OGs having spent 7 years at Facebook leading analytics for the Facebook App and for Instagram. After Facebook, Chandra became Chief Data Scientist @ Sequoia Capital, helping Sequoia, find, select and help the best entrepreneurs in the world. Today, Chandra is the Founder & CEO @ Sundial, building products to help builders make meaningful use of data to fulfill *their* mission. In Today's Episode with Chandra Narayanan 1. From Working on the Weather to Leading Analytics at Facebook: How did Chandra make his way from analyzing...
info_outline 20VC: The Future of TikTok; Is it a Danger to US National Security| Why the "Woke Mind Virus" is a "Post-Modern Religion" and Is it Too Late to Reverse | Why the Education System is Broken | Investing Lessons from Wish, Palantir and Lady Gaga | Joe LonsdaThe Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
Joe Lonsdale is the Founder and Managing Partner at , an early-stage venture capital firm managing over $6 billion in capital. In 2003, he founded . Since then, he has founded over a dozen companies, including Addepar, a wealth management platform helping investors manage over $5 trillion, and OpenGov, recently sold for $1.8BN. In Today’s Episode with Joe Lonsdale We Discuss: The Making of a Multi-Unicorn Founder: What was Joe like as a child? How would his parents and teachers have described him? What does Joe know now that he wishes he had known when he started his career? How...
info_outline 20Sales: Outbound Sales is Dead Today, Why Demand Generation Will Move Back Under Marketing, "Wisdom" that Everyone Needs to Unlearn About Sales & Why You Should Never Hire Someone You Do Not Know in Your First Five Hires with Brendon CassidyThe Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
Brendon Cassidy is one of the OG of enterprise sales of the last decade, having advised the likes of Gong.io, Pipedrive, Showpad. Previously Brendon was first Head of Sales at LinkedIn and VP of Sales at Talkdesk. In Today's Episode with Brendon Cassidy We Discuss: 1. From Recruiter to Sales OG and Linkedin's First Head of Sales: How did recruiting prepare Brendon for a career in sales? What impact did the dot-com bubble burst have on his early career? What does Brendon know now that he wishes he had known when he started his career in sales? 2. The Sales Playbook and Hiring The...
info_outline 20VC: 27 Years of Investing Lessons on Picking Founders, Price Discipline, Reserves and Selling Positions | Can Seed Investors Compete with Multi-Stage Venture Firms | Why Returns Will Not Worsen Moving Forward with Peter Wagner, Founder @ WingThe Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
Peter Wagner is a Founding Partner of . Peter has led investments in dozens of early-stage companies including Snowflake, Gong, Pinecone, and many others which have gone on to complete IPO's or successful acquisitions. Prior to founding Wing, Peter spent an incredible 14 years at , starting as an associate in 1996 and scaling to Managing Partner, before leaving to start Wing. In Today's Episode with Peter Wagner We Discuss: 1. From Associate to Managing Partner to Founding Partner: How did Peter first make his way into the world of venture as an associate at Accel? How important does...
info_outlineRyan Smith is the Founder and Executive Chairman @ Qualtrics, the leader in customer experience and creator of the experience management (XM) category. Ryan has grown the company from a basement startup to one of the fastest-growing technology companies in the world, with 25 offices globally and more than 13,000 customers. Qualtrics raised $400M in funding from Accel, Sequoia, and Insight Venture Partners. Three days before the company was initially scheduled to go public, SAP announced its intent to acquire Qualtrics for $8B, which was the largest private enterprise software acquisition ever. In 2020, Qualtrics and SAP announced plans to take Qualtrics public as an independently operated company.
In Today’s Episode with Ryan Smith You Will Learn:
1.) How Ryan made his way into the world of startups having travelled the world and came to found Qualtrics in his basement over 21 years ago?
2.) How does Ryan think about his relationship to happiness and what it means to "be happy"? How does Ryan think about identity and founders aligning their identities to their company? How does Ryan think, if not careful, tech can eat you up? What does Ryan mean when he says he would rather be "opportunistic than an entrepreneur"?
3.) How does Ryan approach decision-making today? In what situations does Ryan think with his head vs his heart? How does Ryan approach risk today? How has his relationship to risk changed over time? What did the sale process to SAP look like? What was that decision-making process to sell to SAP for $8BN in cash vs IPO? What advice did his wife give him?
4.) How does Ryan evaluate his relationship to money today? How did it feel when Ryan sold Qualtrics to SAP for $8BN in cash? How does Ryan think about giving his children the right mentality and upbringing while being brought up in extreme wealth? What are the challenges of doing so?
5.) How does Ryan think about the weight of responsibility? Ryan and his brother Jared, did a lot very young, did Ryan feel the pressure of having to grow up faster than one usually would? How did that impact his mentality? How did Ryan's travels to Mexico and Japan change the person he is today?
Item’s Mentioned In Today’s Episode with Ryan Smith
Ryan’s Favourite Book: Alchemist: A Fable about Following Your Dream
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