Garrett Smallwood was recently promoted to CEO of Wag Labs, the popular on-demand dog-walking service backed by venture firms from Freestyle Capital to Softbank. New York Times said of the company ""Most dog owners should consider installing Wag on their phones just to have as a backup option. It is the best-designed and most efficient app for summoning a dog walker with some or no advance notice." Garrett previously founded Finrise, a startup that Wag acquired. In this episode, find out what ha...
Aug 18, 2020•37 min
Fast.co has raised over $20 million from firms like Kleiner, Index and Stripe. It bills itself as the world's fastest checkout – one click, no passwords. A fascinating but typical story, such as it is, in Silicon Valley. But then there's this: Domm didn't go to Stanford. He isn't even from the US. He's from Australia, where his first business was…a towing company. A more than $50 million business. His co-founder is a woman. He met her on Twitter. So in this episode – find out how Domm made his w...
Aug 11, 2020•30 min
What makes communities of startups thrive, and how have they been impacted by the recession, COVID-19, and the remote work trend? Brad Feld addresses these questions in this episode and in his new book "THE STARTUP COMMUNITY WAY: Evolving an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem" and the second edition of his book "STARTUP COMMUNITIES: Building an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem in Your City ." You may know Brad as the legendary investor who co-founded the Foundry Group, and who has been an early stage investor a...
Aug 06, 2020•35 min
Parker Conrad lists himself as "customer support" at Rippling, but he is its co-founder and CEO. He previously founded Zenefits. In this episode he traces his journey from a journalist at Harvard, to founder and CEO of a company that has raised over $50 million. Episode Highlights: The specific thing he likes about sales "I really liked sales. I enjoyed it. But I liked it in a very specific way: I enjoyed selling something that I had built. I didn't want anyone else explaining why it was great o...
Jul 28, 2020•53 min
Scott Simpson worked on digital books at Amazon, then podcasting at Apple. Thus, a key guy on two technologies that revolutionized the "long tail" of content. And then…he left to start a standup comedy show. "Cheaper Than Therapy", housed in San Francisco's Shelton Theater, presents about 6 standup comedy shows a week, almost always sold out. Then Covid hit Cheaper Than Therapy and standup comedy everywhere. In this episode we discuss Scott's path from tech to comedy, and the affects of Covid on...
Jul 08, 2020•52 min
"As an entrepreneur, tech CEO and venture capitalist who is also a woman of color, I am well aware of the challenges most entrepreneurs face when it comes to raising capital." So Promise Phelon summarizes with typical grace what she has learned in an amazing career. Her book, "The Way of the Growth Warrior" – well you can't get it yet. You can pre-order it in the link below. In the meantime, you can hear her story in this episode. Promise Phelon started that career at BEA Systems, where she beca...
Jun 24, 2020•50 min
"Most Black computer science students think Silicon Valley companies are racist." If you didn't know this already – you should really sit down and listen to this episode. No one educates more Black students in computer science than Codepath. Codepath is the non-profit co-founded by Michael Ellison to eliminate educational inequity in technical careers. Every year Codepath teaches hundreds of college students the skills they need to get jobs at companies like Facebook, Google and Amazon. In this ...
Jun 18, 2020•26 min
Monique Woodard is a venture capitalist in Silicon Valley. She is one of the very rare Black, female General partners in venture capital. Previously on Something Ventured we explored Monique's unique path to becoming a venture capitalist, and what she invests in. As events drove the Black Lives Matter ("BLM") movement to accelerate worldwide, Monique was gracious enough to come back and share her thoughts. She discusses what she believes is the state of the BLM movement in general, and Silicon V...
Jun 11, 2020•37 min
Hold fast to dreams For if dreams die Life is a broken-winged bird That cannot fly. Not every podcast includes a Langston Hughes quote. Not every venture capitalist is Somesh Dash. Somesh is a partner at the venture capital firm IVP. IVP is one of the largest, most established venture firms in Silicon Valley. From his post there, Somesh has seen several cycles of Silicon Valley's ups and downs. In this episode, we contemplate recent events: Racial issues converging with US 2020 presidential poli...
Jun 01, 2020•58 min
Raj Kapoor contracted Covid in mid-March. He and his family are recovered and well. But Raj is taking aim at shortening the path to a post-Covid world. He partnered with Clara Health to create www.worldwithoutcovid.org . The site let's people register to help researchers worldwide accelerate their race to find better testing, treatments, and vaccines. Raj has been a venture capitalist (Mayfield) and a entrepreneur (SnapFish). He is currently the Chief Strategy Officer at Lyft. In this episode we...
Apr 16, 2020•30 min
In the midst of the Covid crisis, how should Silicon Valley think about China? Kaiser Kuo is founder and host of the Sinica podcast, and has been a longtime journalist and tech executive in China. Few people know more about the intricacies of China's politics and their interaction with technology companies. In this episode we discuss China's responsibility for Covid, and compare its response times to those of the US. We discuss how the US should think about China going forward as a new world ord...
Apr 14, 2020•40 min
Joe Garofoli is the Senior Political Writer for the San Francisco Chronicle, and host of the "It's All Political" podcasts. He recently broke the story of the USS Theodore Roosevelt, which ultimately led to the resignation of the Acting Secretary of the Navy. In this episode we discuss the political implications of the COVID outbreak, and how Donald Trump is (not) doing in managing the crisis. We discuss the next moves for candidate Joe Biden and now-former candidate Bernie Sanders. Also discuss...
Apr 09, 2020•31 min
Mike Stutz is a Hollywood producer, director and writer. He's worked across genres, and recently has focused on reality TV (Animal Planet, Discovery Network, etc.) In this episode, Mike discusses the impact of COVID-19 on Hollywood: How it affects writers, producers and even standup comics. We also discuss: What happened when Mike decided to leave Los Angeles for Arkansas and political protest when you can't gather. Finally – we end on a positive note (really!) about how to address depression an...
Mar 28, 2020•1 hr 6 min
(Note this episode was recorded before the current Coronavirus crisis) Matt Hulett is President of Rosetta Stone – one of the largest language learning companies in the world. Long known for its striking yellow boxes of CDs (those CDs are now a thing of the past, BTW), Rosetta helps people learn almost any language from any mobile device or computer, at their own pace. Matt came to Rosetta Stone after stints at Expedia, Atom Entertainment and RealNetworks. Where he worked for famous internet exe...
Mar 24, 2020•46 min
Paul-Henri Ferrand is the Chief Operating Officer of Brex. Brex, the corporate card that accelerates entrepreneurs and scaling businesses, is founded by Henrique Dubugras and Pedro Franceschi, two engineers who previously founded Pagar.me, a Brazil payment processing company. Brex has raised $315M in equity and $510M in debt, and is backed by the co-founders of PayPal (Max Levchin and Peter Thiel), Y Combinator, Ribbit Capital, Greenoaks Capital, DST Global, IVP, and Carl Pascarella (former CEO ...
Mar 09, 2020•37 min
Brianne Kimmel is a newly minted venture capitalist. She didn't join a venture fund: She started her own. Her fund — Work Life Ventures — invests in new technologies and services for your work life. Work today has a whole new meaning: it's social w/ Slack, flexible w/ Zoom and approachable through low-code and no-code tools for anyone with an idea to build something. Brianne's recent investments range from enterprise software (i.e. developer productivity tools) to creator tools that help anyon...
Mar 04, 2020•55 min
Do you know why we download podcasts, but stream video? This is the podcast that tells the story. Jeff Macpherson is founder of AR/VR training company Motive.io . But before that – he created and acted in "Tiki Bar TV". If you don't know what that is, you can -- and should -- find it at TikiBarTV.com . Tiki Bar TV was at the red-hot center of the early video wars – which were at one point a knife-fight between Apple and YouTube. "Tiki Bar TV" caught the eye of Steve Jobs, and ended up being feat...
Feb 24, 2020•1 hr 8 min
In honor of Keller's recent warmly received recent talk at Jackson Square ventures -- here she is again! ----- Keller Fitzsimmons is the author of Lost in Startuplandia: Wayfinding for the Weary Entrepreneur. She gives lie to the idea that entrepreneurship is a thrilling, lucrative adventure. All is great, of course, until things go horribly wrong. "As crisis after crisis hits, even the most seasoned founder can get disoriented. Whether you're in the throes of business woes or just getting into ...
Feb 12, 2020•42 min
Marco Zappacosta is a co-Founder & CEO of Thumbtack, a startup that lets people find local professionals for "pretty much anything". Thumbtack has raised over $400 million and is valued at well over $1 billion. Investors include Sequoia Capital, Cyan Banister, Jason Calcanis and brothers Ali and Hadi Partovi. Marco has been recognized by Forbes as top "30 under 30" entrepreneur, and Thumbtack is recognized as one of Fortune's "Great Place to Work". In this episode, Marco discusses how he bui...
Feb 05, 2020•44 min
Chris Douvos has a rare job. There are very few venture capitalists in the world. There's an even more scarce job, however: Several 'fund-of-funds" exist that provide capital to venture capital firms, and a path into venture capital for large institutions that want to invest in Silicon Valley. Chris Douvos' Ahoy Capital is one of those funds. In this wide-ranging discussion, Chris tells us how he made his way up and through a history major to his current profession. We talk about what Chris has ...
Dec 19, 2019•58 min
Mike Maples, Jr. is Founder and General Partner of Floodgate, a seed investing firm that has made early investments in companies like Twitter, Demandforce and Lyft. He was #12 on the 2018 "Midas List" of top venture capitalists. The seed investing trend he identified has become, literally, an entire category of investors. He is also the host of his own podcast – Starting Greatness. In this episode of Something Ventured we talk about Mike's path to Silicon Valley, the investing opportunity he saw...
Dec 10, 2019•49 min
David Hornik is a partner at August Capital. He is also the much-loved creator and executive producer of "The Lobby". In preparing for this podcast, a number of people expressed sincere affection for David, The Lobby, and the relationships it has fostered. In this episode David explains what the Lobby is, and where the idea came from. In addition to The Lobby, David started (with his colleagues) the first venture capital blog, VentureBlog, and the first venture capital podcast, VentureCast. He h...
Dec 03, 2019•51 min
Joe Garofoli is the Senior Political Writer for the San Francisco Chronicle. He is also host of the San Francisco Chronicle podcast "It's All Political". Guests on "It's All Political" recently have included California Governor Gavin Newsom, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and a "Who's Who" of Democratic presidential hopefuls. Very few people have Joe Garofoli's unique perch – here in San Francisco in the heart of Silicon Valley – to view California and National politics through the lens of Silicon ...
Nov 26, 2019•47 min
Ryan Petersen founded Flexport to make the world a more connected and better place. He wanted to "fix the user experience in global trade". It's been quite a success so far. To date – the company has raised $1.3 billion, and Paul Graham, the founder of Y Combinator, told Bloomberg News, "There will be more international trade because of Flexport and international trade is a very big thing for there to be more of". Before starting Flexport, Ryan was co-founder and CEO of ImportGenius.com , a data...
Nov 19, 2019•41 min
Josh Felser co-founded and sold two companies -- Spinner and Grouper – for a combined value of nearly $400 million. Then, he and his partner, Dave Samuel, started one of Silicon Valley's most successful seed venture funds – Freestyle. Freestyle has backed companies like Airtable, Intercom, BetterUp, Patreon and Wag. In this wide-ranging discussion, Josh talks about building Spinner and the nail-biting moment an acquirer asked him "what's your number". We also cover Josh's rebuttal to Kent's prev...
Nov 12, 2019•1 hr 3 min
Dan Scheinman is one of the best investors – and nicest people – you may not have heard of…yet. But you should know him, because he has become a force in Silicon Valley. After running Corporate Development at Cisco, Dan became an investor. Investing his own capital, he has backed from the earliest stages firms like Zoom, Arista, SentinalOne and CyCognito. These companies are now collectively worth tens of billions of dollars. We briefly discuss the passing of Sequoia Capital Founder and Cisco Bo...
Nov 05, 2019•49 min
You know her right? The woman who started two venture funds and a wealth management firm? You don't? Meet Ba Minuzzi. Ba was born in Brazil, where she started a fashion business in her teens. That soon gave way to a real estate business, and then the venue changed to Miami. In Miami, she realized she wanted to start a venture fund – and that Silicon Valley was the place to do it. Today she is founder of Babel (an early stage healthtech venture fund), Ausum (a blockchain fund) and UMANA (a wealth...
Oct 28, 2019•50 min
Jerry Colonna is the author of Reboot: Leadership and the Art of Growing Up, and cofounder of Reboot – a coaching company, which he started along with Ali Schultz, Khalid Halim, and Dan Put. Before building a successful coaching firm – Jerry was a "Prince of New York" – he co-founded the VC firm Flatiron partners and then ran JP Morgan Partners'. But walked away from it all at the age of 38, wracked with depression. Today he's a bestselling author, Buddhist, and a sought after coach for the most...
Oct 07, 2019•46 min
Maha is a partner at Canaan Partners, one of Silicon Valley's largest and most successful venture firms. She spots technology trends early and partners closely with her companies to drive growth and exits. Maha focuses on e-commerce and enterprise / cloud, and was one of the first investors to recognize the potential of social gaming. She represented Canaan as the first institutional investor in The RealReal – which recently went public. Maha is a founding member of All Raise , an organization w...
Sep 24, 2019•52 min
Esther Wojcicki is a journalist and educator. She founded and runs the Palo Alto High School Media Arts Center, which engages over 600 students directly in media such as magazines, newspapers, radio, television and photography. She wrote the book "How to Raise Successful People: Simple Lessons for Radical Results ". Her qualifications? Her three daughters, Susan, Anne and Janet are the CEO of Youtube, Founder and CEO of 23 and Me, and a professor of medicine at UCSF. In this podcast, we discuss ...
Sep 17, 2019•43 min
