20VC: Raising $126M Across 3 Rounds in Just 6 Months, Being the Youngest Founder of a Unicorn Company | But Everything Was Not as it Seemed: The Real Story of Vise: The Regrets, Mistakes and Mis-Hires with Vise's Samir Vasavada

Matt Clifford is the Co-Founder of Entrepreneur First (EF), the leading global talent investor and incubator. EF has incubated startups worth over $10bn, including Cleo, Tractable and Aztec Protocol. Matt is also Chair of ARIA, the UK’s Advanced Research and Invention Agency, and advises the UK government on AI and in 2023 served as the Prime Minister’s Representative for the AI Safety Summit at Bletchley Park. In Today's Episode with Matt Clifford We Discuss: 1. The Most Important Questions in AI: Are we seeing diminishing returns where more compute does not lead to a significant increase in performance? What is required to reach a new S curve? What do we need to see in GPT 5? Why does Matt believe that search is one of the biggest opportunities in AI today? 2. The Biggest Opportunities in AI Today: How does Matt see the future for society with a world of autonomous agents? What is the single biggest opportunity around agents that no one has solved? Is society ready for agentic behaviours to replace the core of human labour? How does warfare change in a world of AI? Does AI favour states and good actors or criminals and bad actors more favourably when it comes to offence and defence? 3. China and the Race to Win the AI War: Does Matt believe that China are two years behind the US in terms of AI capability? What are Matt's biggest lessons from spending time with the CPP in China working on AI policy? In what way is the CCP more sophisticated in their thinking on AI than people think? What is the bull and the bear case for China in the race for AI? What is the core impact of US export controls on chips for China's ability to build in AI? Does a Trump vs a Biden election change the playing field with China? 4. What Makes Truly Great Founders: Does Matt agree that the best founders always start an entrepreneurial activity when they are young? What is more important the biggest strength of one of the founders or the combined skills of the founding team? What did EF believe about founders and founder chemistry that they no longer believe? Does Matt believe that everyone can be a founder? What are the two core traits required?  

Samir Vasavada is the Co-Founder & CEO of Vise, a technology-powered asset manager. Samir and his co-founder, Runik founded Vise from the Midwest at 16 years old. They bootstrapped the company before dropping out of high school and raising $128M in just 6 months from some of the best including Sequoia Capital and Founders Fund. The company achieved unicorn status when the pair turned 20 years old, making them the youngest founders of a $BN company at the time. In Today's Episode with Samir Vasavada We Discuss: 1. The Biggest Hiring Mistakes That Broke Us: Why is hiring people who come with a playbook one of the most damaging things you can do? Why is it impossible to build a remote company that performs the same as in person? Why is it the worst thing to hire people who have a reputation they are obsessed with maintaining? Why do you never want to hire people who join because of who your investors are? Why does Samir regret not firing people faster? How much time is enough time to know? Why is hiring in a hot market one of the most dangerous things you can do? 2. Fundraising: 3 Rounds and $126M in 6 Months: Does Samir regret raising so much money so soon in the company life? What did Samir do that he regrets doing, having had so much money so early? How did the need for free food at an event lead to a term sheet and $50M from Sequoia? Did Samir feel that he could talk to investors when things were going really badly? Why does Samir believe that liquidation preference matters more than valuation? 3. The Depression, The Pressure and Wisdom From Jensen Huang: What did Jensen Huang teach Samir when it comes to wealth and leadership? How did Samir deal with the pressure of raising $126M in 6 months and being the youngest unicorn founder, ever at the time? Was Samir hurt when people he thought were his friends, no longer stuck with him when the company was no longer "hot"? What was Samir's darkest time? How did he overcome and get out of it? Does Samir blame his parents for the pressure they put on him from such a young age?  

Andrew Bialecki is the Co-Founder and CEO of Klaviyo, the platform that powers smarter digital relationships for businesses and their data. To date, Klaviyo has raised over $778M from the likes of Accel, Summit Partners, Sands Capital, and Shopify, and raised an additional $700M after its IPO in September 2023.  In Today’s Episode with Andrew Bialecki We Discuss: Founding a $6.23BN Machine in Klaviyo: The Aha Moment What was the aha moment for Klaviyo? How important does Andrew think it is for founders to stick with their initial vision vs when is the right time to pivot? Does a great product sell itself? If you build it, will they come? Bootstrapping Klaviyo: Would it Have Worked with More VC Cash Earlier? Why did Andrew decide to bootstrap & not take VC money with Klaviyo? Does Andrew think Klaviyo would have been successful if they raised a seed round? What would they have done differently? Why does Andrew believe companies should take their time to find product-market fit? What are the most common mistakes founders make? What is Andrew’s advice to founders on fundraising? When did Andrew decide to raise a seed round when he did?  How to IPO in an IPO Winter: Advice & Lessons Why did Andrew decide to take Klaviyo public in a bad public market? How was the IPO roadshow process? What were Andrew’s lessons from it? How has Andrew’s role as CEO changed after taking Klaviyo public? Does Andrew think Klaviyo is undervalued today? What is Andrew’s advice to founders on secondaries? Behind the Shopify Partnership How did Klaviyo’s partnership with Shopify happen? What were Andrew’s lessons working with Tobi Lütke & Harley Finklestein? How does Andrew define a win-win partnership?  What does Andrew mean by “Partnerships are like a tug of war?” What does Andrew think are the most common reasons partnerships go sideways?      

David Luan is the CEO and Co-Founder at Adept, a company building AI agents for knowledge workers. To date, David has raised over $400M for the company from Greylock, Andrej Karpathy, Scott Belsky, Nvidia, ServiceNow and WorkDay. Previously, he was VP of Engineering at OpenAI, overseeing research on language, supercomputing, RL, safety, and policy and where his teams shipped GPT, CLIP, and DALL-E. He led Google's giant model efforts as a co-lead of Google Brain. In Today's Episode with David Luan We Discuss: 1. The Biggest Lessons from OpenAI and Google Brain: What did OpenAI realise that no one else did that allowed them to steal the show with ChatGPT? Why did it take 6 years post the introduction of transformers for ChatGPT to be released? What are 1-2 of David's biggest lessons from his time leading teams at OpenAI and Google Brain? 2. Foundation Models: The Hard Truths: Why does David strongly disagree that the performance of foundation models is at a stage of diminishing returns? Why does David believe there will only be 5-7 foundation model providers? What will separate those who win vs those who do not? Does David believe we are seeing the commoditization of foundation models? How and when will we solve core problems of both reasoning and memory for foundation models? 3. Bunding vs Unbundling: Why Chips Are Coming for Models: Why does David believe that Jensen and Nvidia have to move into the model layer to sustain their competitive advantage? Why does David believe that the largest model providers have to make their own chips to make their business model sustainable? What does David believe is the future of the chip and infrastructure layer? 4. The Application Layer: Why Everyone Will Have an Agent: What is the difference between traditional RPA vs agents? Why is agents a 1,000x larger business than RPA? In a world where everyone has an agent, what does the future of work look like? Why does David disagree with the notion of "selling the work" and not the tool? What is the business model for the next generation of application layer AI companies?  

Val Scholz is the former Head of Growth @ Revolut, where he led the company to their first 10M users. Post Revolut, Val played a crucial role in scaling several high-growth companies including VEED, Simple & Busuu (exited for $400M). Today, Val is the Head of Growth at Kittl, an intuitive design platform empowering graphic designers. In Today’s Episode with Val Scholz We Discuss: Lessons from Scaling Revolut to 10M Users What were Val’s biggest takeaways during his time at Revolut? What does Val consider the secret sauce behind Revolut’s success? What did Val think Revolut understood about customers that no other bank did? The Secrets to Revolut’s Growth Playbook What was Val’s best growth decision? What was his worst? Why does Val think most companies don’t do referrals well? What made Revolut’s signup strategy so successful? What are Val’s two ways to master content marketing? Does Val think it’s good to diversify growth channels? When should founders diversify? What are Val’s strategies to make Youtube influencers successful? Product Marketing 101: Why does Val think traditional marketing methods are outdated? If traditional marketing methods are outdated, what should startups do instead? What does Val think is the most dangerous myth around product-led growth? What does Val believe are the most common mistakes founders make on optimizing products? Growth Hires: Who, What, When & How When does Val think is the best time to hire a head of growth? What is the profile Val looks for in a growth hire? What traits does he look for? What are the most common reasons founders fail at hiring? What does Val think are the biggest red flags to look out for in a CV? How does Val define good culture? Did Revolut have a good culture?  

Michael Eisenberg is a Co-Founder and General Partner @ Aleph, one of Israel's leading venture firms with a portfolio including the likes of Wix, Lemonade, Empathy, Honeybook and more. Before leading Aleph, Michael was a General Partner @ Benchmark. In Today's Show with Michael Eisenberg We Discuss: 1. The State of AI Investing: Why does Michael believe that "foundation models are the fastest depreciating asset in history"? Are we in an AI bubble today? As an investor, what is the right way to approach this market? Who will be the biggest losers in this AI investing phase? Where will the biggest value accrual be? What lessons does Michael have from the dot com for this? 2. Where Is the Liquidity Coming From? Why does Michael believe that it is BS that private equity will come in and buy a load of software companies and be the primary exit destination? Why does Michael believe that IPO windows are always open? Should founders go out now? What is good enough revenue numbers to go out into the public markets? Why does Michael believe that Lina Kahn is a threat to capitalism? How does Michael predict the next 12-24 months for the M&A market? 3. AI as a Weapon: Who Wins: China or the US: Does Michael agree with the notion that China is 2 years behind the US in AI development? Does Michael agree that AI could be a more dangerous weapon in wars than nuclear weapons? Why does Michael suggest that for all founders in Europe, they should leave? US, China, Israel, Europe, how do they rank for innovating around data regulation for AI? 4. Venture 101: Reserves, Selling Positions and Fund Dying: Why does Michael only want to do reserves into his middle-performing companies? What framework does Michael use to determine whether he should sell a position? Which funds will be the first to die in this next wave of venture? Why does Michael not do sourcing anymore? Where is he weakest in venture? Why does Michael believe that no board meeting needs to be over 45 mins?    

Danny Rimer is a Partner @ Index Ventures and one of the most prominent VCs of the last two decades. Danny has led Index to be one of the top global firms on both sides of the Atlantic. Among Danny's incredible portfolio, he has led or been involved with Figma, Discord, Dream Games, Etsy, Glossier and Patreon. In Today's Discussion with Danny Rimer We Cover: 1. The Biggest Lessons from Missing Snap, Airbnb, Spotify and Facebook: How did Danny miss investing in Brian Chesky and Airbnb when Brian says "Index is the best investor that Airbnb never had"? What was Danny's biggest takeaway from turning down Daniel Ek and Spotify multiple times? Why did Danny turn down the chance to invest in Facebook at $10BN? What did he learn from this? Why did Index not lead Snapchat's Series B? How did that decision change Danny's mindset towards the concentration of positions in a fund? 2. The Biggest BS Rules in Venture: Market Sizing, Valuations and Signalling Why does Danny believe that "valuation is a mental trap"? Why does Danny believe that TAM is "noise" and should not be used to assess an investment? Why does Danny believe that stage, sector and geo-specific funds are BS? Why does Danny believe there are no IPO windows? Are IPO markets always open to the best? Why does Danny believe that signalling is BS and does not exist today? 3. Lessons from the Biggest Wins and Losses: What are Danny's biggest lessons from Index's $BN win in King (Candy Crush)? How did the Discord deal come to be? What are Danny's biggest takeaways from it? What are Danny's biggest reflections from losing 10s of millions on Nasty Gal? What is Danny's biggest advice to a new investor today? 4. Lessons from Two Decades Building Index into a Premier Firm: What specifically has Index done to enable them to do what no one else has done and win on both sides of the Atlantic? How did the Benchmark partnership shape much of how Danny has constructed Index today? Who does Danny view as Index's biggest competition? How has it changed with time? Why is Danny more bullish than ever on the UK despite Brexit?  

Janie Lee is the Head of Product and the owner of the Self-Serve business at Loom. Janie previously worked at Rippling, leading the Identity Management and Hardware teams. Prior to that, she worked at Opendoor launching markets and developing pricing algorithms. During this time, Opendoor scaled from 2 to 20+ markets, $5B+ revenue, and 1500+ employees. In Today's Episode with Janie Lee We Discuss: 1. Inside the Product Building Machine of Rippling and Opendoor: What are Janie's single biggest product lessons from Rippling? How do they build so much product so fast? Can you have breadth and high quality? What are Janie's biggest lessons from Opendoor on talent and pricing? What does Janie know now that she wishes she had known when she started her product career? 2. What Makes a Truly Great PM: What core skills do the best PMs have? What is the difference between good vs great? Writing: What are Janie's biggest pieces of advice to PMs who want to write better? Communicate: How do the best PMs and product leaders communicate with their teams? Question Asking: How do the best PMs ask questions of their team and other orgs? 3. How to Find and Pick the Best PMs: How does Janie structure the interview process when hiring new PMs? What questions should one ask in every interview with a PM? Does Janie do a case study? What is she looking to achieve from it? How do the best do? What are Janie's biggest mistakes in hiring PMs? How did she change from it? 4. Onboarding PMs and Crushing Product Reviews: What do the first 30 days look like for new PMs? What are the biggest signs that a new PM is not going to work out? How does the product review process work at Loom? How does Janie prioritise when there is so much volume and data? How has AI changed the way Loom builds products today?  

Alex Wang is the Founder and CEO @ Scale.ai, the company that allows you to make the best models with the best data. To date, Alex has raised $1.6BN for the company with a last reported valuation of $14BN earlier this year. Scale tripled their ARR in 2023 and is expected to hit $1.4BN in ARR by the end of 2024. Their investors include Accel, Index, Thrive, Founders Fund, Meta and Nvidia to name a few. In Today's Show with Alex Wang We Discuss: 1. Foundation Models: Diminishing Returns: What are the three core pillars that can meaningfully improve foundation models performance? Why is data the single largest bottleneck to the performance of models today? What data do we need to capture that we do not currently, that will have the biggest impact on model performance moving forward? Will we see the largest companies in the world revert back to on-prem with the increasing security challenges of migrating all customer data to foundation models? 2. AI: A Military Asset in Global Conflict: China + Russia Why does Alex believe that AI has the potential to be an even more powerful military asset than nuclear weapons? If this is the case, should we have open systems? Do we not have to have closed systems? Why does Alex believe that the CCP's approach to industrial policy is better than anyone else's? How does Alex evaluate the rise of Chinese EV car manufacturers in the last few years? Does Alex really believe that China is two years behind the US in the AI race? 3. "I Get Fairer Treatment in Congress than in the Press": Why does Alex believe that the best PR is no PR? Why does Alex believe that he got fairer treatment in congress than he does in the media? Why does Alex believe that all founders should look to own their own distribution channels today? 4. Alex Wang: AMA: What are some of Alex's biggest lessons from Patrick Collison on the impact that a hot company brand has on the ability for that company to hire the best? Does Alex think Trump is going to win? What would be the impact if he were to? Why does Alex believe that enterprise software will be changed forever in the next few years? What question is Alex never asked that he thinks he should be asked?  

Reid Hoffman has been one of the most impactful people in technology over the last two decades. He is the Co-Founder of Linkedin (acq by Microsoft for $26BN) and Co-Founder of Inflection.ai. As an investor, Reid has backed the likes of Facebook, Airbnb, Zynga and more. Reid is also a Board Member @ Microsoft and was on the board of OpenAI. In Today's Show with Reid Hoffman We Discuss: 1. Foundation Models: Commoditisation, Business Models, Incumbents: Does Reid believe we are seeing the commoditization of foundation models? Is it too late for new foundation models to be born today? Are they VC backable? How will foundation models eventually make money? What will be the sustainable business model? Does Reid believe that foundation models will be acquired by large cloud providers? Who goes first? 2. Inflection & Microsoft: What Went Down: How did the Microsoft and Inflection deal go down? Did Satya call up one day and make it happen? With the decay rate of models, Microsoft did not do it for the models, so why did they do it? Was Inflection a sustainable business in it's own right? Does this not prove that to win at this game, you have to be an incumbent with incumbent cash? 3. OpenAI: Board, Lessons and Management: What are 1-2 of Reid's biggest lessons from being on the OpenAI board with Sam? Why did Sam ask Reid in front of the whole company if Reid would fire him if he did not perform? Scarlett Johannsen, super alignment team quitting, NDAs tied to equity, this is a lot in a short amount of time, how does Reid analyse this? 4. Trump is the Biggest Threat to Democracy: What Lies Ahead? Why does Reid believe that Trump is a threat to democracy and evil? What were Reid's biggest takeaways from a two hour lunch with Joe Biden? How does a Trump administration change the world of AI, technology and startups? 5. The Future of TikTok: Is TikTok a threat to US democracy? Should it be banned? What will be the outcome of the current judicial process? Will they sell to a US entity? How could Trump impact the future of TikTok in the US? 6. Reid Hoffman: AMA: What are Peter Thiel's biggest strengths and weaknesses? I believe Mark Zuckerberg is one of the most unappreciated public market CEOs, what are the core components that Reid believes makes Mark so special? How did Reid miss out on investing in SpaceX's first round? What did he not see that he should have seen? What do we think is crazy today but will be a no brainer and very normal in 10 years?