Sand Hill Road

Sand Hill Road

By Sand Hill RoadTechnology
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Sand Hill Road episodes

  • E43 Opening a global hub for tech entrepreneurs at UC Berkeley with SkyDeck founding GP Chon Tang

    In this episode, Erasmus Elsner is talking to Chon Tang, the founding GP of the Skydeck Fund. Chon is an experienced Silicon Valley engineer, entrepreneur and investor. He was formerly founding partner and Managing Director of Junzi Capital Engineering, a leading quantitative hedge fund investing in the commodity space. He has been actively investing in Silicon Valley startups for 12 years, and has personal investments in over 25 deals with multiple IPOs and exits.   

    00:00​​ Intro 

    03:40​​ Starting a tech company in 2000 

    09:27​​ Founder-investor transition 

    17:51​​ The art of talent arbitrage 

    22:09​ Raising Fund II 

    27:00​​ Portfolio construction 

    30:40​​ Skydeck Fund entry point 

    32:50​​ Success stories 

    37:00​​ Skydeck Accelerator Program + Challenges 

    41:00​​ The accidental VC 

    45:00​ Next Skydeck batch

    47 min
  • E42 Taking Zoom meetings like a pro with Fathom (YC W21) founder Richard White

    In this episode, Erasmus Elsner is talking to Richard White, the serial entrepreneur behind Uservoice and Fathom.video. Richard is a design engineer and product visionary who has been in the first YC batch with Justin Khan and Emmett Shear for Kiko (YC S05) and most recently came back to the YC W21 to see how startup kids are doing the tricks today.   

    00:00​​ Intro 

    00:51​ Who is Richard White 

    03:40 The power of cold emails 

    05:09 Kiko (YC S05) 

    08:53 The UserVoice journey 

    12:09 Traction and funding 

    16:09 UserVoice today 

    $18:16 Starting Fathom 

    22:28 The Fathom product 

    27:35 Fathom customer profile 

    30:27 Fathom in remote orgs 

    32:03 Richard's own use of Fathom 

    33:57 Fathom integrations 

    36:14 Zoom Marketplace + platform risk $

    39:20 Going through YC (again) 

    42:57 Fathom seed round 

    46:11 The fun of fundraising 

    47:28 Vision for Fathom

    52 min
  • E41 Replacing credit bureaus one API integration at a time with Argyle founder Shmulik Fishman
    In this episode, Erasmus Elsner is talking to Shmulik Fishman, founder and CEO of Argyle, about raising the Series A through an investment memo and the firm’s mission of making user-permissioned employment data ubiquitous and reinvent credit decisioning for lenders and consumers.   
    00:00​​ Intro 
    00:56 What does Argyle do? 
    03:17 Experiencing the pain point 
    06:48 Raising the Series A with an investment memo 
    11:41 Automated form population 
    14:05 Real-time income/employment verification 
    17:52 Status quo: credit bureaus 
    22:18 Technical/data moats 
    26:59 Standing on the shoulders of giants 
    28:40 API integrations 
    30:28 Screen scraping vs. API scanning 
    32:41 Traction and metrics 
    35:26 Pricing Strategy 
    38:36 Argyle Team 
    41:36 Remote-first valuation discount/premium
    45 min
  • E40 The world is broken, let's fix it with 8VC founding partner Drew Oetting

    In this episode, Erasmus Elsner is talking to Drew Oetting, founding partner of 8VC, about building a multi-billion venture firm from the ground up with Joe Lonsdale.   

    00:00 Intro 

    01:05 Operation Mask 

    06:33 Resilience 

    12:54 Views on Venture 

    20:06 Building 8VC / Addepar 

    26:30 Raising the maiden fund 

    30:48 8VC Investment Thesis 

    40:01 Drew as a VC 

    50:53 Silicon Hills

    55 min
  • E39 Trailblazing the silver tech category with Seth Sternberg co-founder of home-care unicorn Honor

    In this episode, Erasmus Elsner is talking to Seth Sternberg the co-founder and CEO of Honor, which is a managed marketplace for in-home care that has recently announced a USD 370m Series E led by Baillie Gifford.  


    00:00​​ Intro 

    01:19 Elevator pitch 

    02:19 Original inspiration 

    05:28 The Meebo experience 

    08:06 Serial founder problems 

    09:06 Getting the founder team together 

    10:52 The Honor MVP and marketplace model 

    14:52 Marketplace supply side 

    19:44 Marketplace demand side 

    21:57 Fundraising journey 

    25:07 Growth capital rounds 

    27:07 Expansion strategy 

    28:56 Homestead acquisition 

    31:45 Competitive landscape 

    31:45 Competitive landscape 

    34:08 GTM and growth strategies

    38 min
  • E38 Helping brands build sustainable products with Novi Connect found Kimberly Shenk
    In this episode, Erasmus Elsner is talking to Kimberly Shenk of Novi Connect, B2B marketplace to help brands build and manufacture transparent products, which recently announced a $10.3M Series A led by Greylock
    00:00​​ Intro 
    02:04 Getting started with Naked Poppy 
    04:09 From Naked Poppy to Novi Connect 
    05:17 Sustainable Chemicals Market 
    07:30 Kimberly’s data science background 
    09:19 The Novi Connect Business Model 
    11:11 The Novi Connect MVP 
    12:49 Getting the first Customers 
    13:42 Growth Metrics and Milestone 
    14:33 Fundraising journey 
    15:50 Series A led by Greylock 
    17:37 Mulit-sided B2B marketplace 
    21:26 Growth metrics and milestones 
    23:26 Acting as certification agent 
    24:24 Competition 
    26:49 AI-driven platform 
    28:26 Scaling Novi Connect 
    29:37 Newjoiner Bootcamp 
    30:53 Priorities and focus 
    31:53 Category expansion 
    33:14 Longterm vision
    36 min
  • E37 Finding regulatory moats at the Series A with Jordan Nof of Tusk Venture Partners

    In this episode, Erasmus Elsner is talking to Jordan Nof of Tusk Venture Partners, a venture firm that invests in early-stage consumer technology startups operating in heavily regulated markets.  

    00:00​​ Intro 

    01:39 Investment thesis 2022 

    02:36 Lithic 

    05:02 Tusk Venture Partners 

    08:46 Meeting Bradley Tusk 

    12:52 Regulatory investment thesis 

    14:58 The role of regulations in startups 

    16:37 Fanduel / repeal of PAPSA 

    17:33 Tusk entry stage 

    19:01 Consumer vs. Enterprise 

    19:43 Roman - men’s health 

    21:34 Alma - mental health care

    23:31 Out of scope areas 

    25:14 Bird - scooter wars 

    29:36 First mover vs. fast follower 

    32:50 Sunday - DTC lawn care 

    37:11 Focus areas 2022 

    41:02 How to get in touch

    42 min
  • E36 Running the world's largest trust experiment with Couchsurfing founder Casey Fenton

    In this episode, Erasmus Elsner is talking to Casey Fenton, founder of Couchsurfing and Upstock, about the early days for Couchsurfing when Casey was pioneering what has since become known as the “sharing economy” and how is is now bringing the sharing economy to the cap table with Upstock.    

    00:00​​ Intro 

    01:13 The Couchsurfing proof-of-concept 

    02:46 The first Couchsurfing stay 

    03:49 501(c)3 non-profit status 

    06:34 The mechanics of the benchmark Series A 

    06:34 The mechanics of the benchmark Series A 

    08:27 The Couchsurfing MVP 

    10:38 The donation-based model 

    11:58 The demand side monetization model 

    15:34 The chicken-and-egg question 

    17:11 Casey’s philosophy on ego hacking 

    21:11 Building for the internet without ego 

    23:57 Upstock 

    28:34 Ideal customer moment 

    30:20 Switching costs 

    31:09 Competitors and integrations 

    33:40 Milestone-based equity kickers 

    35:03 Following Casey’s work

    37 min
  • E35 Launching a startup acquisition marketplace with MicroAcquire founder Andrew Gazdecki

    In this episode, Erasmus Elsner is talking to Andrew Gazdecki, founder of MicroAcquire. The episode was recorded when MicroAcquire was still a fully bootstrapped one person company. A few weeks later MicroAcquire announced that it had raised a $6.3m Seed round led by Bessemer Ventures.  

    00:00 Intro 

    01:09 What is MicroAcquire? 

    02:55 Buying a micro-SaaS as a learning experience 

    05:15 Andrew’s own founder path 

    10:40 Key bootstrapper metrics 

    14:53 Solving the chicken-and-egg problem 

    19:17 Supply side: company profiles 

    20:24 Marketplace discovery vs. transaction facilitation 

    22:45 Microacquire marketplace monetisation 

    26:51 Microacquire as a curated marketplace 

    30:12 Dealing with inflated seller asks 

    33:25 Disrupting the business broker industry 

    35:45 Competitor marketplaces 

    36:50 Scaling Microacquire 

    38:10 Raising venture capital vs. bootstrapping

    41 min
  • E34 Tackling the formalwear industry with Queenly co-founders with Trisha Bantigue and Kathy Zhou

    In this episode, Erasmus Elsner is talking to Queenly co-founders Trisha Bantigue and Kathy Zhou about building a consumer marketplace and tackling the formalwear industry.  

    00:00 Intro 

    00:56 The Queenly Elevator Pitch 

    01:52 Launching Queenly during lockdown 

    04:04 The pageant dress market  

    08:06 Formal wear resale market microstructure 

    10:16 The Queenly minimum viable product 

    12:37 Go to market strategy 

    14:56 Queenly marketplace metrics 

    16:36 The Queenly fundraising journey 

    20:40 Raising $6.3m From Andressen Horowitz  

    22:58 Solving the marketplace chicken and egg problem 

    24:58 Unlocking supply 

    27:02 Offering power seller tools to boost supply 

    28:15 Cracking the demand side 

    29:12 Facilitating Marketplace Transactions 

    31:36 Marketplace take rate 

    32:43 Competition And Playbook 

    35:16 Formal wear Price dynamics 

    38:22 The Queenly Vision

    42 min

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