Mantle Mondays

AI makes it easier to ship. Ashok Sivanand, founder and former CEO of Integral, explains why that can be dangerous if founders confuse output with progress.In this Mantle Mondays conversation, Ashok breaks down how lean product teams actually win: identify the constraint, sequence the bottlenecks, and tie every prototype to a real business outcome. 00:00 Intro01:17 Ashok’s origin story05:18 Efficiency vs. effectiveness07:56 Silent killers before Series A17:18 AI experimentation and false progress21:56 Build vs. buy in the AI era27:43 The hidden cost of building in-house32:38 What Ashok is optimistic about34:23 Rapid fire

Phil Jacobson, former Head of Operations at Tensor Labs, breaks down what startup ops actually looks like when the stakes are high: legal, finance, hiring, cap table cleanup, and acquisition readiness. The biggest takeaway: the systems founders delay early are often the same systems that matter most when it’s time to raise, scale, or sell.

In this Mantle Mondays episode, Phil shares how he went from founder to operator, why he joined Tensor Labs, what he learned running ops in crypto, and why getting the cap table out of a spreadsheet was one of the first things he tackled before Tensor’s acquisition by Coinbase.

Most people treat networking like a volume game: more DMs, more intros, more meetings.

Andrew D’Souza (Boardy, ex‑Clearco) argues it’s actually a trust + memory game—and AI finally makes a true “trust bridge” possible.

In this episode, Amar Varma (Mantle) and Andrew D’Souza (Boardy) break down:

• Why paid referrals can kill trust (even when the intro is great)
• What product-market fit feels like in real life (“stumbling in the desert” → inflection)
• The CEO moment nobody talks about: knowing when you’re not the right operator
• Why Boardy exists: perfect memory + growing imagination + a principled network
• 2026 go-to-market: what AI makes possible that humans never could (or never would)If you’re building something ambitious and want better opportunities to find you, listen to Andrew’s framework and then get on Boardy’s radar by telling your “why you, why now.”

Subscribe for more founder/operator conversations on Mantle Mondays.

Take a call with Boardy: www.boardy.ai

Create your cap table with Mantle: www.withmantle.com

In this episode of Mantle Mondays, Amar Varma sits down with Mark Gilbert, co-founder and CEO of Zocks, to talk about what it really takes to build a product people can’t live without.

Mark's journey is anything but linear: from programming at Canada Post as a teenager, to interning at Elon Musk's first company Zip2, to building global infrastructure at Microsoft and scaling Twilio through COVID, Mark brings a rare combination of deep technical credibility and hard-won founder instincts.

Learn more about Zocks: zocks.io

Learn more about Mantle: withmantle.com

For decades, if you wanted to build a world-class tech company, you had to move to Silicon Valley. AI just changed that. When SF deploys new AI infrastructure today, the entire world gets access within 24 hours. For the first time in tech history, a founder in Belgrade has the same tools on day one as a founder in San Francisco.Tiho Bajic lived this shift firsthand. He went from war refugee at age 9 to first engineer at Rypple (acquired by Salesforce) to founding CTO at Nitro to building the Long-Term Stock Exchange with Eric Ries. Now, as GP at Fifth Quarter Ventures, he's investing in overlooked geographies, particularly the Balkans. In this conversation, we cover his "first follower" philosophy, the distribution hacks that actually scaled Nitro, what pre-seed/seed means in 2026, and why geography still matters—just differently. Silicon Valley still has speed and capital density, but it lost its monopoly on technology. The opportunity now is understanding what each geography uniquely offers.

Joshua Berkowitz, Managing Principal at Berkocorp, shares how he runs his family's investment office as a one-person investment team—and why that's actually an advantage.In this episode of Mantle Mondays, Josh reveals:- Why most investors are "investing not to lose their job, not to make money"- How family offices win by being contrarian when institutions can't- The data stack and AI tools he uses daily (Mantle, Attio, ChatGPT)- Why top quartile VC returns have never exceeded 3X net—and how to beat that- His approach to "weird" investments that institutions won't touchLearn more about Mantle Portal: withmantle.com/portal

In this episode of Mantle Mondays, Amar Varma sits down with Narayan Chowdhury, Co-founder and Managing Director at Franklin Park, for an in-depth conversation about how AI is fundamentally transforming institutional investing and what it means for LPs navigating this transition.Narayan brings a unique perspective as both a technical builder and an institutional investor. From writing code to selecting venture managers, he shares candid insights on the challenges and opportunities facing LPs in 2026, including why firms built in the pre-LLM era face a critical dual pivot, how the cost of operations is trending toward zero, and why experience still matters in an increasingly automated world.Learn more about Franklin Park: www.franklinparkllc.comLearn more about Mantle: www.withmantle.com0:00 - Narayan's background7:00 - What is Franklin Park?14:03 - Franklin Park's philosophy17:21 - How AI is transforming LP operations26:26 - The dual pivot problem29:35 - The Goldilocks paradox34:03 - Advice for aspiring LPs39:14 - Rapid fire42:18 - Life lessons from hockey and closing thoughts

In this episode of Mantle Mondays, Amar Varma sits down with Candice Faktor, co-founder and CEO of Disco, to discuss her incredible journey from scaling Wattpad from 4 million to 90 million users to revolutionizing online learning in the age of AI.Check out Disco: www.disco.coSign up for a free Mantle account: www.withmantle.com

Chapters:00:00 - Introduction00:56 - Candice's Background & Immigration Story03:37 - The Wattpad Journey: 4M to 90M Users07:15 - The "After" Story: Building a $100M Franchise12:29 - Meeting Chris Sukornyk & Starting Disco18:57 - The Problem with Online Learning22:15 - Finding Product-Market Fit29:50 - Remote-First Co-Founder Dynamics34:07 - The Power of Mentorship38:19 - Leadership Lessons43:22 - Fundraising & Cap Table Strategy46:36 - AI's Impact on Disco

"Elon Musk was my first board member. I still have his signed offer letter with his phone number on it."

That's just one story from Nihal Mehta's journey from college entrepreneur to Managing Partner at Eniac Ventures ($500M+ AUM). But the real story is what happened after he lost it all.

Nihal raised over $1M for phillytonight.com in college. Billboards on I-95. MTV commercials. Then it went bankrupt in 2001.

Most people would've quit. Nihal bought his code back for $1,000. That code became ipsh!—the SMS technology that powered American Idol voting and Madonna's mobile campaigns. Eventually acquired by Omnicom. That resilience became the foundation for Eniac Ventures.

Join Mantle's Amar Varma for an incredible conversation with Farhan Thawar, a tech veteran who's been at the forefront of every major wave of innovation over the past three decades. From early days at Waterloo to leading engineering at Shopify, Farhan shares hard-won insights on building world-class products and teams.

Learn more about Mantle: withmantle.com