Startup Field Guide by Unusual Ventures: The Product Market Fit Podcast

How Oyster HR found product-market fit: Tony Jamous on leveling the global employment playing field


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Since the rise of COVID-19, every company has adopted remote work, and our guest's mission is to create a more equal world by making it possible for talented professionals to work from any country they choose to.


Tony Jamous is a serial entrepreneur and the founder of Oyster, a global employment unicorn that helps companies hire employees and contractors anywhere in the world. Before Oyster, Tony was the founder of Nexmo (2010), a Twilio competitor that was acquired by Vonage in 2016 for $230M. In this episode, Tony takes us through the product-market fit journey of Oyster.


Join us as we discuss:

  • The origins of Oyster in April 2020 as world implemented lockdowns
  • Tony's approach to product-market fit and the milestones and key metrics that gave them confidence that they found it
  • The learnings that Tony took from his first company Nexmo, to help him build Oyster
  • The challenges of creating connection across a remote team and how Oyster uses Kona
  • Tony's best advice for seed stage founders just starting out on their journey 

  • About Unusual Ventures — Unusual Ventures is a seed-stage venture capital firm designed from the ground up to give a distinct advantage to founders building infrastructure software and application-level companies. Unusual was founded in 2018 with the mission to reinvent the venture capital engagement model by serving entrepreneurs with an unprecedented level of hands-on services.  Described as a partner versus a top-down stakeholder by its portfolio companies, Unusual is laser-focused on serving exceptional founders and teams building innovative products. With offices in Menlo Park, San Francisco, and Boston, Unusual has invested in category-defining companies like Arctic Wolf Networks, Carta, Robinhood, Harness, 
and Vivun.


    About Sandhya Hegde — Sandhya is a General Partner at Unusual Ventures, leading investments in enterprise SaaS companies. Previously an early employee and executive at Amplitude, Sandhya is a product-led growth (PLG) coach and mentor. She can be reached at [email protected] and on Twitter (https://twitter.com/sandhya) and LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/sandhyahegde/).


    Further reading:

    • Managing remote teams: https://www.field-guide.unusual.vc/field-guide-enterprise/leadership-managing-remote-teams
    • Key metrics for product-led SaaS (from SaaStr 2022): https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1CT34wM2QSVhNErZ_5tB-VMv_OCREwM4vdJ20PfbLIIo/edit#slide=id.g13acbf38164_0_86 
    • Leading through uncertainty: https://www.field-guide.unusual.vc/field-guide-enterprise/leadership-through-crisis
    • ...more
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      Startup Field Guide by Unusual Ventures: The Product Market Fit PodcastBy Unusual Ventures

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