InProd

In today's episode, we're joined by Daniel Fetner, a General Partner at Alpaca.  Before joining Alpaca, Daniel founded Soil Connect, a SaaS-enabled marketplace to manage and acquire soil. Daniel joined Alpaca in 2018 as Chief of Staff and later moved into an investor role. At Alpaca, he primarily focuses on real estate and construction tech. Daniel dives into how he recruited for VC, why specialization matters, PropTech as a standalone category, and the current state of the market.

Episode Chapters:

1. Founding Soil Connect - 1:45
2. Founder -> Funder - 4:36
3. Alpaca's 4 Founder Strategy - 10:47
4. Category Specialization as an Investor - 13:40
5. PropTech Evolution - 16:12
6. Hardware meets Software - 21:40 
7. PropCo/OpCo Structure - 23:15
8. Real Estate Tech Enablement - 26:35
9. Multiples Leveling Off - 28:00
10. Ending Questions - 29:43

As always, feel free to contact us at [email protected]. We would love to hear ideas for content, guests, and overall feedback.

We are excited to sit down with Mike Hinckley, the founder of Growth Equity Guide. Mike started his career in investment banking before working in growth equity at General Atlantic. Mike noticed firsthand the need for interview prep resources and sought to create a dedicated growth equity platform.  With recruiting in full swing, Mike dives into growth equity as an asset class over time, tips and timelines for breaking in, and the importance (or not) of networking,

Episode Chapters:

1. Investment Banking -> Growth Equity -> Tech - 1:33
2. Growth Equity Interview Prep - 5:21
3. GE Evolving Overtime - 7:00
4. Recruiting Landscape - 9:45
5. How to Stand Out in a Crowded Market - 14:53
6. Networking - 21:37
7. Interview Structure - 23:04
8. Ending Questions - 30:00

As always, feel free to contact us at [email protected]. We would love to hear ideas for content, guests, and overall feedback.

Today, we sat down with Jacqueline Blackburn, a Principal at Decisive Point. Jacqueline was an athlete at the Naval Academy before serving as a platoon commander for six years after college. Now, Jacqueline is focused on investing in defense, energy, and infrastructure. During this episode, Jacqueline discusses the importance of purpose and team, early-stage investing in deep tech, becoming a strategic partner, innovation during times of need, and the current state of globalization.

Episode Chapters: 

1. Starting at the Naval Academy - 1:28
2. Deployment and Platoon Responsibilities - 4:01
3. Introduction to Venture Capital - 6:54
4. Investment Strategy at Decisive Point - 9:55
5. Hardware, Robotics, Drone, and Quantum Investing - 12:35
6. How to Win Deals - 16:03
7. Hardware meets Software - 18:20
8. Success Stories in Defense (Anduril) - 20:20
9. Building in Advanced Manufacturing - 24:02
10. Geopolitical Collaboration - 26:18
11. Ending Questions - 28:10

As always, feel free to contact us at [email protected]. We would love to hear ideas for content, guests, and overall feedback.

We are excited to sit down with Charlotte Japp, the Head of Platform at ffVC. Charlotte began her career in creative marketing and later founded Cirkel, a platform that facilitates connections between experienced and younger professionals for mutual career support. Fundraising for Cirkel served as her introduction to the VC ecosystem. During this episode, Charlotte provides insights into platform's evolving role, the value VCs bring to the table, the assessment of platform performance, brand development, and her vision for the future of platform strategies.

Episode Chapters:

1. Media Background - 1:30
2. Founding Cirkel - 4:33
3. The Role of Platform - 6:26
4. Value Add as a VC - 9:55
5. Individual KPIs and Metrics - 12:31
6. Prioritizing Portfolio Tasks - 15:25
7. Early Stage versus Growth Equity - 17:45
8. Brand Building as a VC - 19:15
9. Winning Deals - 25:36
10. Sequoia Cuts Talent Team - 27:38
11. Ending Questions - 31:33

As always, feel free to contact us at [email protected]. We would love to hear ideas for content, guests, and overall feedback. 

We are excited to chat with Tycho Onnasch, General Manager of Trust Machines and Co-Founder of Zest Protocol. Originally from Amsterdam, Tycho attended Oxford University before founding Deedmob, a volunteer management platform. Now, Tycho is building Zest Protocol, the first on-chain Bitcoin lending protocol. Tycho discusses deciding where to build in Bitcoin, introduction to smart contracts, adoption points in Bitcoin, regulatory jurisdiction, and transitioning to a mainstay currency. 

Episode Chapters:

1. Dutch Culture - 1:30
2. Building Deepmob - 2:57
3. Exposure to Bitcoin - 5:12
4. What is Finance? - 8:55
5. The Role of Bitcoin in DeFi - 11:20
6. Building at Trust Machines - 14:57
7. How Zest Protocol Profits - 18:42
8. The Importance of Bitcoin Lending - 21:55
9. Regulatory Oversight in Crypto - 23:45
10. Investing in Crypto - 26:45
11. Traditional Banking Systems & Bitcoin's Impact - 30:22
12. Ending Questions - 31:44

As always, feel free to contact us at [email protected]. We would love to hear ideas for content, guests, and overall feedback. 

Today, we sat down with Sean Simons, a Senior Associate at Newark Venture Partners. Sean had an untraditional path into Venture Capital. He started his career at PhotoShelter and 212 brewing before beginning a fellowship at NVP. While at NVP, he worked as a scrap collector and airplane washer. Five years later, Sean has built a strong brand by leading impressive investments within supply chain & logistics. Join us as Sean dives into getting his foot in the door, how to win deals, theme-focused sourcing, why the supply chain is essential, and the future of maritime technology.

Episode Chapters:

1. Working in Sales and Washing Airplanes - 1:42
2. The Journey into Venture Capital - 6:45
3. Why You? - 9:07
4. NVP’s Investment Strategy - 11:10
5. Seed Stage Investment Process - 15:15
6. The Supply Chain Innovation - 17:08
7. Globalization and Nearshoring Supply Chain - 20:55
8. Blue Economy Technology - 23:19
9. EV Waste and Innovation - 29:08
10. Final Questions - 29:56

As always, feel free to contact us at [email protected]. We would love to hear ideas for content, guests, and overall feedback.  

Today we are joined by Rickard Brüel Gabrielsson, an artificial intelligence researcher and co-founder of Unbox AI. Rickard moved from Sweden to the US to attend Stanford and immediately dove into learning systems and artificial intelligence. Rickard breaks down unsupervised learning, text-based language models, revolutionizing retail, pricing your product, encoding semantics, and where companies will incorporate foundation models.

Episode Chapters:

1. Transitioning from Sweden to the US - 1:35
2. Interest in Learning Systems & AI - 2:40
3. Unsupervised Learning - 5:24
4. Foundation Models - 7:14
5. Unbox AI - 9:29
6. Building Application Models - 11:41
7. VC in the eyes of an AI founder - 14:26
8. Fine-tuning and Vector Databases - 17:08
9. Embedding Semantics - 19:50
10. Protecting Domain Expertise - 24:40
11. Are Smaller Players Ripe for AI Innovation? - 26:43
12. Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) applicability - 28:52
13. Ending Questions - 31:33

As always, feel free to contact us at [email protected]. We would love to hear ideas for content, guests, and overall feedback.  

During today’s discussion, we sat down with Kartik Chopra, CIA officer turned Founder, leading Devron - a federated machine learning platform. With a Series A backing from Tiger Global, Devron revolutionizes data access and empowers teams to analyze and build models on-site. Join us as Kartik shares his journey, AI's impact on investing, finding a VC partner, machine learning capabilities, and the state of data privacy.

Episode Chapters: 

1. Childhood and Rutgers University - 1:45 
2. Roles & Responsibilities in the CIA - 3:45
3. Roots of Devron - 5:35
4. Devron as a Solution - 7:20
5. Raising VC Capital - 10:54
6. Scaling Post Fundraise - 13:30
7. Enterprise versus Government Customers - 15:34
8. Trends in Machine Learning - 19:14
9. Investing in Machine Learning Companies - 23:26
10. Data Sharing in Regulatory Environments - 25:10 
11. Consumer Data Privacy - 27:43
12. Ending Questions - 29:00

As always, feel free to contact us at [email protected]. We would love to hear ideas for content, guests, and overall feedback.  

During today’s discussion, we sat down with Dawit Heck, a Principal at Bain Capital Ventures based in New York.  In February, BCV announced $1.9 billion in new funds to back founders from Seed to Growth stages. Over the last 20 years, BCV has backed companies such as Attentive, DocuSign, LinkedIn, Mirakl, and more. Dawit discusses transitioning into venture capital, Bain's structure and value add, thesis building, and the current state of marketing tech and venture capital. 

Episode Chapters: 

1. Takeaways from Banking & Growth Equity - 1:25
2. Bain Capital’s Structure - 5:55
3. Former Operator Impact as an Investor - 9:47
4. Learnings from Scott Friend - 11:17
5. Thesis Building - 12:53
6. Sourcing Tips & Tricks - 15:50
7. The Power of Marketing Tech - 19:40
8. Trends within the Application Layer - 24:36
9. Vertical SaaS Solutions - 27:58
10. Content Creation and Displacing Legacy Solutions - 30:10
11. The State of Venture - 33:22
12. Ending Questions - 36:44

As always, feel free to contact us at [email protected]. We would love to hear ideas for content, guests, and overall feedback.

We are excited to introduce John Melas-Kyriazi, Co-Founder and CEO of Standard Metrics. John began his journey as a physics Ph.D. student at Stanford before embarking on a career as an Investor in 2014 at Spark Capital in Boston. After five years of sourcing and leading 10+ investments, John left to start his own company. Standard Metrics is a portfolio collaboration tool for venture capital firms and startups. During our discussion, John dives into sourcing tactics, contributing as a younger board member, the inception of Standard Metrics, the evolution of the ideal customer profile, and the future of data automation and reporting.

Episode Chapters:

1. Path To Studying Physics - 1:22
2. Introduction to StartX - 4:35
3. Starting at Spark Capital in Boston - 7:20
4. Sourcing Tactics - 9:30
5. Transition To Leading Deals - 13:00
6. Adding Value as a Junior Board Member - 14:40
7. Catalyst for Starting Standard Metrics - 16:45
8. Evolution of The Ideal Customer Profile - 23:15
9. Future of LP Reporting - 25:25
10. Competition/Platform Displacement - 28:15
11. Automation of Financial Data - 30:20
12. Leveraging Artificial Intelligence - 32:44
13. Ending Questions - 34:50

As always, feel free to contact us at [email protected]. We would love to hear ideas for content, guests, and overall feedback.