In this new episode of Entrepreneur Talks, we sit down with Blaise Matuidi and Ilan Abehassera, Co-founders and General Partners of Origins, to learn more about building a VC fund that combines funding with influence. 

Origins is a Venture Capital fund investing across Paris, NYC and Miami in legendary consumer founders. In this episode of Entrepreneur Talks, we hear more about how Origins is funding early stage companies with the help of their limited partners (LPs) who have a combined social media following of 160,000,000.

Tune in to this new episode to learn about the founding story behind the fund, how Blaise, Ilan and their fund co-founders spotted an opportunity to combine early-stage funding with access to influence, and the many lessons to be shared between the sports and investing world.

This episode was recorded in French 🇫🇷

Topics

01:00 to 05:45 — Introduction to Blaise and Ilan 

05:45 to 11:00 — Presentation of Origins

11:00 to 19:30 — From Zoom call to VC fund co-founders

19:30 to 27:00 — US vs Europe, on the pitch and in the boardroom

27:00 to 29:00 — Raising the fund 

29:00 to 35:00 — Investment thesis and founder-market-fit 

35:00 to 41:00 — Making the move from Angel Investor to General Partner

41:00 to 43:30 — Dealflow realtalk 

43:30 to 54:00 — Learning resilience and dealing with failure

54:00 to 56:00 — The importance of emotional intelligence 

57:00 to the end — Outro questions: 1 word to describe entrepreneurship, a dream LP, unpopular opinion about tech or investment 

If you enjoyed this episode, please let us know by leaving a rating and a review!

This episode is hosted by Yacine Sqalli, and produced with STATION F.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this new episode of Entrepreneur Talks, we catch up with Nicolas Morin-Forest, co-founder & CEO of Gourmey, a company that creates culinary delights like foie gras, directly from cell cultivation.

Thanks to Gourmey, it’s now possible to eat foie gras that doesn’t come from an animal! In this new episode of Entrepreneur Talks, we have the pleasure of welcoming Nicolas Morin-Forest, CEO & cofounder of Gourmey.

Tune in to this new episode to learn about Nicolas’ entrepreneurial journey so far, how he built a deep tech startup with a non-technical background, and how he plans to revolutionize meat production.

Topics

01:00 to 04:00 — Introduction and presentation of Nicolas

04:00 to 10:00 — Presentation of Gourmey

10:00 to 20:00 — Why and how Nicolas became a deep tech founder

20:00 to 26:00 — The moment he decided he wanted to build a sustainable business

26:00 to 31:00 — Nicolas’ biggest failure during his entrepreneurial journey

31:00 to 36:00 — How to manage a deeptech company as a non-tech CEO

36:00 to 43:00 — Why foie gras as a first product and Gourmey’s next products?

43:00 to 47:00 — Outro questions: Best quality trait of an entrepreneur? A board member he wishes to have? The most underrated advice for an entrepreneur to succeed?

If you have enjoyed this episode, please let us know by leaving a rating and a review!

This episode is hosted by Yacine Sqalli, and produced with STATION F.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the latest episode of Entrepreneur Talks, STATION F's podcast. We had the chance to sit down with Frédéric Montagnon, Founder & Chairman of Arianee. He created 7 companies, exited 5 of them, killed one, and invested in more than 150 startups.

Arianee is on a mission to empower brands and owners to give digital life to products, experiences, or communities through NFTs. Last year, they issued more than 1M NFTs.

Tune in to this new episode to learn about his journey so far as an entrepreneur and investor, why he believes Web3 is the solution to data sovereignty, and why founders should now seek for the Environment-Market fit rather than Product-Market fit.

Topics

01:00 to 04:00 — Introduction and presentation of Fred by ChatGPt and himself

04:00 to 09:00 — His background and why Web3 with Arianee

09:00 to 12:00 — Why did he become an entrepreneur, only 2 years after graduation?

12:00 to 15:00 — His strength: at the intersection of Tech and Business

15:00 to 19:00 — His failures and learnings as an entrepreneur

19:00 to 24:30 — The "environment-market fit"

24:30 to 29:00 — How did you become an expert in Web3?

29:00 to 31:00 — The beauty of open source

31:00 to 35:00 — The pain: digital sovereignty

35:00 to 37:00 — His views on Twitter acquired by Elon Musk

37:00 to 42:00 — Arianee's solutions and the future of data ownership

43:00 to 45:00 — Arianee’s KPIs and its clients

45:00 to 47:00 — Business Angel: why and how to invest in 150 startups?

47:00 to 49:00 — Is he a philanthropist?

49:00 to 52:00 — Outro questions: his unpopular opinion about Web3? Best quality trait of an entrepreneur? The company he would build tomorrow?

If you have enjoyed this episode, please let us know by leaving a rating and a review!

This episode is hosted by Yacine Sqalli, and produced with STATION F.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Having a deep impact on pollution with a breakthrough technology! That's one bet Neoplants is about to win in the next few months. After 4 years of R&D, the Neo P1, an indoor plant to purify the air, is coming to home.

This is what we discuss with Lionel Mora, CEO & co-founder of Neoplants, amongst other topics, in this new episode of Entrepreneur Talks, STATION F podcast. Tune in to learn about Lionel's entrepreneurial journey, why he decided to build a deeptech company, the learnings so far, and what's coming next at Neoplants.

Topics

01:00 — Introduction and presentation of Neoplants

04:00 — The genesis of the company

08:00 — Breakthrough technology vulgarization

12:00 — 4 years of R&D before launching the market

17:00 — Product iteration: trying to kill the idea fast

24:00 — When tech meets bioengineering

27:00 — The risks they face

33:30 — Raising funds as a deeptech startup in the US vs Europe 

35:00 — The vision: from indoor to outdoor plants

37:30 — The market launch

40:00 — Where to order?

42:00 — Outro: Best quality of an entrepreneur? Unpopular opinion about tech or entrepreneurship? A dream board member?

If you have enjoyed this episode, please let us know by leaving a rating and a review!

This episode is hosted by Yacine Sqalli, and produced with STATION F.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Creating a platform and a community to help launch 250,000+ products. That's what Ryan Hoover has accomplished with Product Hunt. Now he is investing in early-stage startups from all around the world with Weekend Fund, a VC fund he cofounded with Vedika Jain.

Tune in to this new episode to learn more about Ryan's entrepreneurial journey, his learnings and tips to succeed, his willingness to help and support other founders, and his expectations about investments.

Product Hunt is the place to curate new products every day. Product enthusiasts can share and geek out about the latest mobile apps, websites, hardware projects, and tech creations. Among 250,000+ products launched on the platform since 2013, we find great successes like Notion, Houseparty, Robinhood, or Front. Product Hunt was acquired by AngelList in 2016 (Ryan talks about it here).

Weekend Fund is the VC fund he created in 2017, to back early-stage founders from all around the world. Together with Vedika and a team of 2 analysts, they write checks from $100k to $300k, and offer an LP collective of 350+ exceptional founders and operators. They already invested in Intercom, Deel, and just raised their 3rd fund of $21M.

Topics

01:00 — Introduction and Proust survey

06:00 — The work-life balance

08:00 — The beginning of his entrepreneurial journey

10:00 — His vision of entrepreneurship: a creator or a manager?

17:00 —  Scaling pace of PH before selling to Angelist

20:00 — Products that launched on his platform (Meerkat, Notion)

23:00 — Did u think of monetizing your database?

25:00 — The selling to AngelList

28:30 — The impostor syndrome

31:30 — Creation of Weekend Fund

38:00 — Convincing Limited Partners: a sales job

40:00 — Sourcing opportunities from Product Hunt?

42:00 — His thoughts on Angel investing in the next few years

46:00 — Outro (Definition of entrepreneurship? His biggest failure? One sector to be more digitized? Unpopular opinion about tech or entrepreneurship? Most underrated advice?)

If you enjoyed this episode, please let us know by leaving a rating and a review!

This episode is hosted by Yacine Sqalli.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Did you know that Jeff Lawson, the co-founder and CEO of Twilio, sold his wedding gifts to kick the company off? Back in the summer of 2008, this strategy may seem risky but looking at what Twilio achieved since, it clearly was a winning choice. Twilio is now the leading cloud communications platform and became an international company.

Despite its international growth, Twilio managed to keep its very strong company culture, focused on the well-being of its employees, and that’s something that Jeff is very proud of. He explains the concept of “Twilio Magic”, the company’s core values, and defines what is “blameless post-mortem”, an important mindset in the big Twilio family.

This episode is hosted by Roxanne Varza, STATION F’s Director, and Laurence Benamran, co-founder and CEO of Pinpo, a STATION F company selected to be part of Future 40 in 2019. Pinpo is a leading tech platform specializing in lead qualification and a happy user of Twilio.

Topics

00:10 — Introduction with Roxanne Varza (STATION F) and Laurence Benamran (Pinpo)

02:58 — The story behind Twilio’s funding. Spoiler: it involves Jeff Lawson’s wedding gifts!

12:35 — Jeff about Twilio going international and its launch in France

17:51 — How to implement a strong company culture, like Twilio does, on a large scale?

22:30 — Jeff describes Twilio’s core values as “Twilio Magic”

24:18 — The difference between a company culture and its values

26:16 — Jeff explains the concept of “blameless post-mortem”

32:30 — Jeff’s biggest advice for entrepreneurs

This episode is supported by TikTok, hosted by Roxanne Varza, produced by Cindy Yang, and edited by Grégoire Duhourcau. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In 2018, only a few people knew what an NFT was and the term Web3 was far from being a buzzword. However, Nicolas Julia was convinced that it would be the next revolution in the tech space so he co-founded Sorare, global fantasy football game (or soccer game, for our American audience) that you play with NFTs. 

Sorare became a unicorn in less than four years, reaching a $4.3 billion valuation. It is the French startup that has reached the unicorn status the fastest. How did Nicolas know that NFTs would become the new hype? How did he convince famous business angels such as Antoine Griezmann or Gerard Piqué to join the project early on? How did he get Serena Williams on board? And, what are the next steps for Sorare? Tune in to this week’s podcast to hear Nicolas’ answers to all of these questions and more.

This episode is hosted by Roxanne Varza, STATION F’s Director, and Clarisse Hagège, co-founder and CEO of Dfns (Founders Program, Future 40 in 2021). Dfns provides crypto custody as a service, enabling developers to deploy bank-grade custody infrastructure and turn their apps into safe zones for crypto. The company recently announced a 13,5M$ raise.

Topics

00:10 — Introduction with Roxanne Varza (STATION F) and Clarisse Hagège (Dfns)

03:30 — How Nicolas Julia got into NFTs ahead of the hype in 2018

06:44 — How Sorare avoided the scalability problems that NFT platforms encounter on Ethereum

09:07 — What Sorare is and how does it work

12:22 — How Nicolas convinced their very first partner, the Belgian League, to join Sorare (the story includes an intern)

15:28 — Sorare’s fundraising strategy (730M$ in total amount raised)

17:05 — What’s next after soccer for Sorare? Sorare recently announced Serena Williams as a board member

20:06 — How Nicolas convinced so many investors and notable business angels like Antoine Griezmann to join the project

23:19 — The possible evolutions of Sorare within the metaverse

26:58 — Nicolas’ career path

28:06 — Nicolas’ biggest learnings from his entrepreneurial experiences

37:04 — Nicolas on regulations in the crypto space

This episode is supported by TikTok, hosted by Roxanne Varza, produced by Cindy Yang, and edited by Grégoire Duhourcau. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

FemTech designates all technologies addressing women’s health — including reproductive health, hormonal health, menopause, and a lot more. Last year, STATION F launched a new startup program to support innovation in this space because FemTech entrepreneurs have to overcome additional challenges on top of the usual founder hurdles: they have to deal with censorship, taboo, and difficulty convincing investors.

In this first episode of Entrepreneur Talks, we interview Alexandra Fine, Founder & CEO of Dame Products, a leading SexTech company that has not only faced these barriers but also built a thriving business. Dame has led and won a three-year legal battle to have the possibility of doing ads in the New York City subway. Dame is also part of the first companies to be featured at Sephora in their new Sexual Wellness selection. It has broken new ground for FemTech startups at large and we are super excited to have Alexandra on the show to tell us about her stories and learnings from building Dame — starting with how to fundraise to market a product surrounded by taboo.

This episode is co-hosted by Elin Øyre and Andrea Olsson, the co-founders of Bumpy, a startup in STATION F’s FemTech Program. Elin and Andrea are building a platform to support people going through infertility by connecting them together and helping them to find the right fertility provider. 

Find out what it takes to succeed in the FemTech industry. And, if you are building a FemTech startup, applications for STATION F’s FemTech Program are open until April 24! Learn more here.

Topics

00:10 — Introduction

03:24 — How Alexandra Fine came up with the idea of Dame Products

04:42 — The challenge of fundraising for FemTech companies

08:41 — The problem with the term “FemTech” perceived as a niche rather than an essential

11:09 — Alexandra’s tips for FemTech companies on how to address taboo

14:13 — Elin & Andrea’s personal stories, which led to the creation of Bumpy

20:20 — Alexandra’s three-year legal battle to run ads in the NYC subway

26:33 — How Dame Products arrived in Sephora’s shelves and why it is a turning point

28:17 — Tips on how to approach new partnerships and leverage the power of storytelling

30:10 — Alexandra on making mistakes as a boss

33:10 — The moment when Dame Products really took off: their crowdfunding campaign

This episode is supported by TikTok, hosted by Cindy Yang, and edited by Grégoire Duhourcau. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

“Talent wars”, “the Great Resignation”, “the hiring race” — you’ve likely seen these words all over the headlines of your favourite tech media. It’s no secret that recruiting for tech talent is becoming increasingly competitive and companies are looking for the secret sauce to win over top candidates.

A few months ago, STATION F conducted a study on the European talent landscape in collaboration with more than 200 VC funds with the hope to serve startups worldwide in navigating this core element of their business.

In this episode of the podcast, we discuss the findings with entrepreneurs and investors in our community:

• Pascal Gaulthier, CEO of Ledger,
• Salma Bakouk, co-founder & CEO of Sifflet,
• Bérénice Magistretti, VC-in-residence at Visionaries Club,
• Dhruv Jain, Investor at Bessemer Ventures.

We dive into the current talent landscape, identify areas of improvement, and share best practices on all topics related to talent — from diversity to salaries, recruitment, and remote work.

Topics

00:23 — Intro with Roxanne Varza & Cindy Yang

01:35 — Part I with startups: Salma Bakouk (Sifflet) & Pascal Gauthier (Ledger)

05:10 — Gender diversity in the European startup ecosystem

13:09 — Implementing diversity-driven policies in tech companies

19:30 — The challenges of the recruitment landscape in Europe

23:55 — The most difficult roles for startups to fill

26:53 — How to build a brand that attracts talent

30:20 — Key takeaways on the European talent landscape today

34:30 — Part II with investors: Bérénice Magistretti, (Visionaries Club) & Dhruv Jain, (Bessemer Ventures)

36:57 — Is being a solo founder a “no-go” territory?

41:02 — The typical profile of European founders

43:25 — Is there a best moment in a career to become an entrepreneur?

46:43 — The impact of diversity in company performances

49:40 — How funds approach the diversity question

55:28 — The difficulty of recruiting sales and marketing talent

58:47 — The importance of recruiting a Head of People very early

01:01:40 — The tools and incentives (beyond financial) that startups can leverage to attract talent

01:05:40 — Is remote work just a trend or a long-term change?

This episode is supported by TikTok, hosted by Roxanne Varza & Cindy Yang, and edited by Grégoire Duhourcau. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Climate change is a global threat and, without a doubt, one of the greatest challenges of our generation.

According to PitchBook, VC investment in climate tech companies this year has already exceeded the previous two years by 37 percent. At the beginning of this year, Elon Musk offered a 100M$ prize to find the “best carbon capture technology” able to achieve low cost at gigatonne scale.

But what is carbon capture and how does it work? 

In this episode, we dive into the topic with Henrietta Moon, co-founder & CEO of Carbo Culture, and Talal Hasan, co-founder & CEO of 44.01. Carbo Culture is converting CO2 from plants into stable carbon while 44.01 is turning CO2 into rock.

Topics

00:22 — Introduction with Roxanne Varza

Part I with Henrietta Moon, co-founder & CEO of Carbo Culture

01:33 — Henrietta Moon on what Carbo Culture does

06:03 — The story behind Carbo Culture

09:03 — How the company has evolved

10:30 — Carbo Culture's business model

12:10 — The different types of customers they have

13:35 — How Carbo Culture's technological approach differentiates itself

16:53 — The importance of reducing emissions

18:21 — Examples of companies that should be recognized for their approach to carbon reduction

20:40 — Carbo Culture's fundraising with True Ventures and Cherry Ventures

21:40 — The advantages of being based in Helsinki, Finland

23:59 — Clean innovations that Henrietta is excited about beyond carbon capture

26:20 — Henrietta's vision for Earth in 50 years

Part II with Talal Hasan, co-founder & CEO of 44.01

28:03 — What does 44.01 mean?

29:57 — The type of infrastructure that 44.01 uses

32:44 — Talal's view on the best-case scenario for our planet

33:48 — Why 44.01 is based in Oma

36:12 — The customers of 44.01

37:27 — Carbon credits provided by 44.01

39:03 — How ClimateTech can seduce investors in this space

42:18 — The KPIs that Talal tracks

43:05 — Carbon capture companies and technologies that Talal is excited about

46:03 — Talal's background: what brought Talal into the CleanTech space?

This episode is supported by TikTok, hosted and produced by Cindy Yang. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Wade Foster is the co-founder and CEO of Zapier, the leading automation tool in the ever-growing no-code space.

Earlier this year, Zapier reached $5 billion in valuation and $140 million in recurring revenue — one might think of it as a standard Silicon Valley startup that has raised lots of money with VCs but, apart from having done YC, the company has in reality taken a very different path. Wade and his co-founder started Zapier in Columbia, Missouri. They have been running the company entirely remote before the pandemic made it commonplace. And, they have only raised a total of 1,4 million dollars in funding, which gives them a 100x ratio of ARR/funding.

In this episode, Wade tells us the story behind Zapier’s growth, shares some invaluable tips for startups looking to scale, speaks about the company's long-term vision for automation, and a lot more.

Topics

00:22 — Introduction with Cindy Yang

01:49 — Wade Foster's background and founder story

04:48 — Surprising use cases of Zapier

07:14 — Zapier's new product, Transfer

08:17 — Wade's approach to VC fundraising

09:31 — How Zapier reached 140M ARR in 10 years

12:31 — The importance of defining your go-to-market strategy early on

13:55 — Why Zapier does not have a Sales team

16:17 — Full remote work and "de-location" packages

23:28 — Technologies that Wade is excited about: Web3 and AI / Machine Learning

25:47 — Zapier's vision on the long term

27:48 — Wade's advice for early-stage founders

This episode is supported by TikTok, hosted and produced by Cindy Yang. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Emmanuel Straschnov is the founder of Bubble, a leading company in the no-code movement.

Founded in 2012, Bubble was launched before the term "no-code" had even been coined, with the ambition to help anyone build web applications without any knowledge of code. It has since helped many entrepreneurs launch their companies without a technical co-founder.

The company recently announced a $100 million Series A round and, in this episode, we discover that it's only the beginning for them. We dive into the early days of Bubble with Emmanuel, how he bootstrapped for 7 years, his vision for Bubble, and a lot more.

Topics:

00:23 — Introduction with Roxanne Varza

01:40 — Emmanuel Straschnov on the rise of No-Code

04:00 — Emmanuel's skepticism towards general code education

05:41 — What Bubble does

07:10 — How Bubble helps non-technical founders build businesses

09:31 — Bubble's fundraising strategy: from bootstrapping during 7 years to raising $100M

14:30 — Bubble's ambition as a company

15:40 — Going public vs. getting acquired?

17:18 — What's next on Bubble's roadmap for the next two years

20:12 — What Emmanuel finds exciting in the No-Code space

This episode is supported by TikTok, hosted by Roxanne Varza, produced by Cindy Yang, and edited by Grégoire Duhourcau. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

After the success of his first book AI Superpowers, a New York Times best-seller examining the role of the US and China in the future of artificial intelligence, Dr. Kai-Fu Lee is back with a new book! Co-authored with award-winning science-fiction writer Chen Quifan, his latest book is called AI 2041: Ten Visions for Our Future. AI2041 presents a roadmap to educate and explore the opportunities and challenges presented by AI over the coming decades. 

Kai-Fu has spent more than three decades at the cutting edge of artificial intelligence research, development, and investment in both the US and China. 

He is the chairman and CEO of Sinovation Ventures, a leading venture capital firm focused on developing the next generation of Chinese high-tech companies.

In this episode, we discover how Kai-Fu became a leading voice in AI around the world, discover his new book AI 2041, and learn about how he invests in AI and DeepTech companies.

Topics

00:22 — Introduction with Roxanne Varza

01:44 — How Kai-Fu Lee got into AI

02:54 — Milestones in Kai-Fu's career: from his studies at Columbia University; to his work at Microsoft, SGI, Apple, and Google; to launching Sinovation Ventures.

06:47 — His new book AI 2041: why this title, why 2041?

07:27 — The format of AI 2041

08:31 — How AI 2041 paints the future of AI-based technologies

09:40 — The possible dangers of AI

12:53 — Kai-Fu's favorite part of AI 2041 (includes quantum computers, bitcoin, and robot romance!)

15:00 — Possible solutions against AI's dangers

17:55 — The link between Kai-Fu's two books: AI Superpowers and AI 2041

19:10 — How Kai-Fu invests in AI and DeepTech at Sinovation Ventures

24:23 — Most exciting companies in Kai-Fu's portfolio

25:45 — The trends that Kai-Fu's most excited about on the global landscape

28:27 — Kai-Fu's vision for the future of AI

This episode is supported by TikTok, hosted by Roxanne Varza, and produced by Cindy Yang. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Co-founder of Masterclass. Founder and CEO of Outlier.org. Aaron Rasmussen is most known for founding these two phenomenal EdTech companies but he is a very prolific builder who has successfully started and sold companies in the gaming, robotics, and consumer packaged goods industries. With Outlier.org, a company that creates beautifully shot online college courses, Aaron has for mission to create the world's best online college courses. The GV-backed company has been named as one of TIME's Best Inventions of 2020 for its work in making education accessible. Students enrolled in Outlier.org courses earn real, transferable college credit for $400, which is approximately one-sixth the cost of a traditional college course in the USA.

Aaron is a fascinating entrepreneur, inventor, — and artist with a huge TikTok following. In this episode, we talk about how he started Masterclass and Outlier, discuss the future of education, and could not help but ask about what he is doing on the popular social media platform with over 130k followers!

Topics

00:22 — Introduction with Cindy Yang 

01:17 — Aaron Rasmussen’s background and beginnings into the entrepreneurial journey

03:34 — How Aaron ventured into the EdTech space

06:17 — The beginnings of Masterclass: How Masterclass managed to get access to high-level speakers as an early-stage company

10:23 — Fascinating things that Aaron has learned while building Masterclass 

14:19 — Why Aaron left Masterclass 

17:28 — How the idea of Outlier came about

19:30 — Outlier’s model for online education based on educational psychology

21:44 — Working with the University of Pittsburgh and their shared vision of making education more accessible

23:41 — How online classes work on Outlier

25:20 — Aaron on online vs. in-person education

29:58 — How Outlier finds the best teacher for each class

32:40 — Outlier’s long-term vision

36:67 — High-level thoughts on education: the university vs. the anti-university model, the purpose of education, and more.

42:29 — Aaron’s TikTok with 130k+ followers 👀

45:34 — Aaron’s advice for early-stage entrepreneurs

This episode is supported by TikTok, hosted and produced by Cindy Yang. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Mathilde Collin is the co-founder and CEO of Front. Since starting Front in 2013, Mathilde has raised over $138 million with an impressive roster of investors including Sequoia, Initialized, and the founders of Slack, Zoom, Atlassian, and more. She is known for her values-driven leadership style and for championing top-down radical transparency. From lessons in leadership to tips on fundraising, this episode is filled with invaluable tips for CEOs!

Topics:

00:22 — Introduction with Cindy Yang 

01:18 — Introduction of Mathilde Collin 

02:23 — Mathilde’s background and mission to make “work happier” 

04:48 — The importance of measuring what you want to improve in your company and how Front measures employee happiness 

06:36 — Use cases of Front: Shopify, Lydia, Sennder 

08:45 — Surprising use cases: political campaigns and #CovidListe, COVID vaccine lists! 

10:22 — Fundraising tips for CEOs: the importance of mindset, storytelling, and focus ⚠️ 

16:06 — Building between Paris and San Francisco at Y Combinator 

16:32 — The tech ecosystems in France vs. the US 

18:14 — On sharing her learnings on her blog and on writing to clarify thoughts 

20:28 — Mathilde’s most important lessons in leadership 

23:56 — Good transparency vs. bad transparency 

25:47 — On vulnerability

28:15 — Startup spaces that Mathilde is excited about: mental health and asynchronous communication

31:33 — Gender diversity in entrepreneurship

This episode is supported by TikTok, hosted and produced by Cindy Yang. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Back in 2018, Alex Bouaziz and his co-founder Shuo Wang picked up on the trend of remote work and founded Deel, a startup that helps companies of all sizes compliantly hire and pay talent remotely all around the world. Over a year into COVID, it's clear that remote work is here to stay and has become a new norm, particularly for tech companies. With this shift in work behaviour, Deel has seen their business explode with 20X growth in the past year, reaching a $1.25 billion valuation after a $156 million Series C funding led by the YC Continuity Fund and existing backers Andreessen Horowitz and Spark Capital.

In this episode, we dive into the story of the newly-minted unicorn with its co-founder Alex and one of its first investors, Anish Acharya of Andreessen Horowitz. We discuss the future of work, learn about their VC-founder encounter, and —with Alex and Anish both having founded successful companies— pick up lots of founder wisdom along the way.

Topics:

00:23 — Introduction with Cindy Yang

01:24 — Alex Bouaziz on the origin story of Deel

03:16 — Anish Acharya's macro-analysis of work and employment

04:14 — How Alex and Anish met through Ryan Hoover (Product Hunt, Weekend Fund)

06:34 — Growth and unicorn status

07:10 — Trends in remote work: contractor vs. full-time

09:13 — Best practice for cross-timezone collaboration

11:16 — How to find the best talent geographically

12:10 — Working in a physical office vs. in remote

14:01 — Anish and Alex on the future of work

20:04 — The relevance of starting a company in Silicon Valley today

23:15 — Anish's investment scope at a16z

23:58 — Alex on how VCs perceive remote teams

23:27 — Anish on FinTech and FinTech-adjacent companies

25:32 — Alex on how Deel falls into the FinTech spectrum

26:04 — How Deel helps companies compliantly employ and pay talent in so many countries

28:15 — What Anish looks for in founders at a16z and what struck him about Alex and Shuo

29:44 — Companies that Anish and Alex are excited about

32:09 — Advice for early-stage founders

This episode is supported by TikTok, hosted and produced by Cindy Yang. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jamie Macfarlane is the founder & CEO of Creator Fund, an early-stage VC fund that invests in student-led companies with student investment partners.

Having studied both in the UK and in the USA, he started Creator Fund based on the observation that some of the world's most successful technology companies —like Facebook and Google— have been started in the dorm rooms and laboratories of American universities. Europe has universities of equal caliber but these have not yet managed to spin out as many tech champions. With the Creator Fund, Jamie hopes to support more student-led innovation and the creation of tech-driven companies across the continent. To do so, he has also designed a very unique student-focused model.

In this episode, we talk to Jamie to learn more about how their model works, what are some of the most exciting companies currently being built in universities across Europe, and what Europe can do to encourage more DeepTech companies.

Topics:

00:23 — Introduction with Cindy Yang

01:07 — How Jamie first started investing in students

02:29 — Creator Fund's investment model (and its secret sauce 🌶)

03:50 — How they recruit their student investment partners

05:02 — Why they're not called "ambassadors" or "scouts"

07:16 — The difference between investing in students in the US vs. in Europe

08:20 — What Creator Fund looks for in companies

12:16 — The advantage of getting investment from Creator Fund: talent network and follow-on investment

15:34 — The ideal founding team and the example of Touchlab

19:56 — Trends and companies that Jamie is excited about: Baseimmune and RecyclEye

23:44 — The technology behind vaccine company Baseimmune

28:10 — The limits to Creator Fund's investment model

31:44 — How IP works in universities

33:16 — What Europe can do to encourage more DeepTech companies

37:00 — Jamie's piece of advice for student entrepreneurs

This episode is hosted and produced by Cindy Yang. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The tech entrepreneur who raised the largest seed round in Europe this year. The restaurateur behind Paris' favourite group of Italian restaurants.

Victor Lugger is the co-founder and CEO of Big Mamma Group and Sunday App. Being at the head of 26 very popular Italian restaurants across Europe, including La Felicità on our campus, Victor is embarking on a new FinTech adventure with his Big Mamma co-founder, Tigrane Seydoux, and their new partner, Christine de Wendel, to reinvent the way that people pay in restaurants. The trio recently announced a $24 million seed round for their new company Sunday App.

In this episode, we catch up with Victor to learn more about what it means to have raised the largest seed round in Europe this year and how Big Mamma Group keeps launching restaurants that people cannot stop raving about. We'll talk about company culture, logistics, trends in the restaurant space, and a lot more!

Topics:

00:22 — Introduction with Roxanne Varza and Cindy Yang

01:53 — Victor Lugger on raising the biggest seed round in Europe

02:17 — The origin story of Big Mamma Group

05:47 — The importance of company culture for Big Mamma's success

16:12 — On choosing a co-founder

19:44 — The beginnings of Sunday app

23:00 — How Sunday works

24:53 — Sunday's technology 🌍

26:17 — Innovations in the restaurant space

27:26 — On being a BCorp company

28:48 — Scaling logistics at Big Mamma Group 💡

31:03 — The importance of pursuing ideas that are not easy

32:35 — Victor's favourite Big Mamma restaurant 😉

This episode is hosted and produced by Cindy Yang. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A few years ago, Sarah Guo became the first female and youngest General Partner at one of the leading Silicon Valley venture capital firms, Greylock. Sarah has led investments in companies like Figma, Clubhouse (not the social media 😉), and Sqreen. She is bullish on SaaS and openly shares on her website the types of companies for which she's keeping an eye out. In this episode, we discover the vast landscape of SaaS with Sarah, dive into the future of work, and learn more about being an investor in this space.

Topics:

00:23 — Introduction with Roxanne Varza

01:12 — Sarah’s background prior to joining Greylock and becoming their first female and youngest partner

02:58 — Greylock’s investment strategy

08:15 — The story behind Sarah’s investment in Sqreen (acquired by Datadog)

15:51 — Identifying areas of investment before finding the companies

16:18 — Post-mortems and learnings on missed deals: Twilio & Benchling

23:02 — Investing in a company called Clubhouse

26:35 — Companies that Sarah is excited about: deep dive into the SaaS landscape

30:21 — Service companies that are becoming SaaS companies: Rippling & Scale.ai

31:50 — The impact of COVID on the future of work: the rise of remote & hybrid

37:42 — Mistakes that companies are making about the future of work

40:57 — Sarah’s advice for early-stage entrepreneurs 

This episode is hosted by Roxanne Varza and produced by Cindy Yang. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Zach Sims is the co-founder and CEO of Codecademy, the leading online learning platform for technical skills.

Since its founding in 2011, Codecademy has helped over 50 million people from 190+ countries learn how to code. The company has raised over $82M from investors like Union Square Ventures, Naspers, Owl Ventures, Y Combinator, and Kleiner Perkins, supporting its vision to close the technical skills gap and transform people’s lives through engaging, flexible, and accessible online education.

Zach and Codecademy have been recognized by reputable thought leaders as technology pioneers, appeared on numerous 30 under 30 lists, and won many awards. Yet, behind all the hype, things were not always smooth sailing.

In this episode, we talk about the story of Codecademy with Zach and dive into some of his key learnings throughout the journey: the difference between building a movement vs. building a business, the industry's attitude towards VC fundraising, the future of education, and more.

Topics

00:22 — Introduction with Roxanne Varza

01:05 — The background and growth stories of Codecademy

05:08 — Key learnings around VC funding from the early days of Codecademy

06:50 — Codecademy in a few numbers

08:06 — The type of people that Codecademy addresses

08:51 — How Zach learned to code

09:46 — The evolution of coding since 2011

11:00 — The importance of coding education and no-code

12:08 — How Codecademy keeps up with the no-code trend

13:14 — Life-changing stories from Codecademy learners

15:16 — Code education for kids

16:11 — Countries that are leading the way in code education

17:17 — The future of education

19:18 — The user experience on Codecademy

21:00 — The importance of community on Codecademy

22:20 — Zach on what he finds exciting in the education space

24:46 — What to expect from Codecademy in the coming months: international markets and Codecademy for Business 

This episode is hosted by Roxanne Varza and produced by Cindy Yang. Art is by Gaëtan Lefebvre.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.