The Shobeir Show

Avlok Kohli is the CEO of AngelList, which he’s transformed over the past four years into a company that is quickly becoming the software provider for the entire venture ecosystem, as it creates tools for startups, investors, and fund managers, to accelerate innovations.

Avlok is also a two-time founder, having previously sold Fairy, a residential cleaning service, to Postmates in 2019, and Fastbite, a meal delivery service, to Square in 2015.

Avlok’s background is in software engineering, having graduated from the University of Waterloo. He began his journey in tech working for Zvents and Doximity in San Francisco.

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Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ever wanted to leave high school and go straight into a tech startup with no engineering background? My next guest of The Shobeir Show, Rafael Vivas, did just that when he joined Applovin.

Rafael Vivas is AppLovin’s General Manager, New Initiatives. AppLovin enables developers to grow their business with a powerful set of industry-leading solutions. Rafael oversees Vessel, AppLovin’s NFT marketplace for mobile applications and games. Previously, Rafael was President of Lion Studios, a mobile games publishing studio created by AppLovin. As one of the company’s first hires, Rafael has held several roles at AppLovin bringing developers to the AppLovin platform and helping them maximize revenue. At age 14, Rafael founded his first profitable online company, which offered affordable servers for PC games. He later became director of business development at Social Hour, where he built the company’s mobile ad network.

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"If you have a bootstrapped company, you should STFU quietly and get on with it because you don't want others digging into the same space you are creating." My next guest on The Shobeir Show is Peter Nixey, Founder of Intentional.io, who adamantly believes in bootstrapping his company.

Peter Nixey, Founder of Intentional.io, is a simple way to plan your day. A day planner that focuses on managing your time rather than your tasks. Previously Peter was the Creator of Copyin.com, a Platform for Professional Communities built entirely in email, a Venture Partner at Breega, Pioneer Fund, and Entrepreneur First, the UK Founder of the Coca-Cola Founders Programme was CTO of Bojure, CEO of Pingpanel, and CEO of Clickpass that was one of the original YC companies from 2007.

Please join me in hearing Peter's story on this episode of The Shobeir Show!

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"The Lemonade Stand" is a book for parents to encourage their children to be entrepreneurs. My next guest on The Shobeir Show, Aaron McDaniel, his mother gave him the book to read, and years later, he did as it inspired him to be a serial entrepreneur in tech, real estate and become a teacher.

Aaron McDaniel is a serial entrepreneur (3 exits), teacher (BerkeleyHaas), author (3 books, Wall Street Journal/National Bestseller), former corporate manager (AT&T LDP grad, Diamond Club Honoree), real estate investor (commercial/multifamily), company advisor (incl. Copilot Labs, acquired. by Open Table/Booking.com) and professional speaker (global business growth, innovation, engaging a multi-generational workforce).

Aaron is currently a member of the faculty at UC Berkeley's Haas School of Business, where he teaches entrepreneurship, author of the bestselling book Global Class: How the World's Fastest Growing Companies Scale Globally by Focusing Locally, and is a Co-Founder of 10X Innovation Lab, focused on building innovation ecosystems worldwide. Aaron is also managing director/founding partner at Grow Scale, a real estate private equity firm investing in multi-family properties across the US.

Previously, Aaron was the co-founder & CEO of Access Invest, at the time the nation's largest mobile aggregator of private investments. Before this, Aaron co-founded Tycoon, the first real estate crowdfunding platform to be acquired (Nov. '15) and Pong360 (acquired in 2012). He was also a partner and CMO of IP Shark, an online brand protection service. Aaron is an alumni of AT&T's flagship Leadership Development Program (LDP) and was one of the youngest to serve as Regional Vice President (at age 27), leading a multi-state organization. Aaron has worked in business development, strategy, sales, customer care, operations & marketing and was part of AT&T's Diamond Club (top 1% of sales managers worldwide).

Please join me in hearing Aaron's story on this episode of The Shobeir Show!

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Ever dream of having straight teeth without the pain of spending thousands of dollars?

My next guest on The Shobeir Show, Khamzat Asabaev, Founder and CEO of SoftSmile, was founded by tech disruptors committed to making perfect smiles affordable for everyone by pioneering in-house aligner production.

Khamzat started his career at Linklaters 2009, a leading global firm headquartered in London. He made a stellar career advising international companies like BP, PepsiCo, Hershey, Goldman Sachs, and others on landmark transactions. He moved to New York in 2014 to pursue a Master's in Law at Columbia Law School. After graduation, Khamzat continued his career at Linklaters, working between London, Moscow, New York, and the Middle East. In parallel, he founded and co-founded several startups, notably a braces producer in Switzerland (3D Med) and a car-sharing company in Dubai (Motor). In 2019 Khamzat was offered a prominent role as Head of Practice in Saudi Arabia. He had to relocate to Riyadh and lead the local Linklaters M&A team.

Please join me in hearing Khamzat's story on this episode of The Shobeir Show!

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Left Brain (art, creativity, and feelings) versus Right Brain - (logic, language, and science).

Why not enjoy using to use both? 

My next guest on The Shobeir Show, Andrea Walne, General Partner at Manhattan Venture Partners, describes how she went to two high schools one in the morning focused on the left brain and the one in the afternoon was the right brain. Many of her peers in tech leverage both left and right brains.

Andrea Walne is General Partner at Manhattan Venture Partners, “MVP” a traditional venture fund focused on the emerging secondary market for late-stage private technology companies. 

Andrea is an advisor to Aumni, KingsCrowd, and Parallel Markets. Andrea previously worked as Head of Liquidity solutions for Carta, was Director of West Coast region opening up the new office for Nasdaq Private Market in San Francisco, Director of Growth Technology Partners, Co-Founder of Equity LLP, Co-Founder of Forge, and was US Account Exec at Experien working directly with Facebook.

Andrea is also a thought leader, as she’s made several appearances on Bloomberg TV. Please join me in hearing Andrea’s story on this episode of The Shobeir Show!

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Are NFTS a fad? NO!  

NFTS has deep humanistically derived drivers. What does that mean? Our next guest, Mike Vorhaus, CEO of Vorhaus Advisors, explains this, Metaverse and the gaming industry trends.

I call Mike Vorhaus the Gaming Superconnector. Mike has invested early in companies like DraftKings (NASDAQ: DKNG), Skillz (NYSE: SKLZ), Tenor (sold to Google), sits on the board of Rewardify, PopReach, and Perion Network (NASDAQ: PERI), and has advised companies like Forte, Unity, and Zynga.

Please join me in hearing Mike’s story on this episode of The Shobeir Show!

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Ever want to be an “Angel Employee” at a startup?

My next guest of The Shobeir Show, Chris Surdi, defines and gives insights on how to join an early-stage tech startup as a ‘hustler’ and salesperson. 

Chris Surdi is a serial Angel Employee who currently runs strategic accounts at SourseGraph. Sourcegraph provides this enterprise developer platform to everyone else, helping startups and large enterprises ship better software faster and with less risk. 

Previously, Chris was the first salesperson at Segment, a YC company acquired by Twilio. Before that, he was Enterprise Sales Executive at Braintree, which was sold to Paypal.  Chris also started several companies in Phastcash, Global Executive Program, and Founding Team at PowerBeam.

Please join me in hearing Nikhil’s story on this episode of The Shobeir Show!

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Have you ever heard of Global Maximum? My next guest is Nikhil Basu Trivedi, Co-Founder and General Partner at Footwork was introduced to this terminology by his friend Chris Paik of Pace Capital. Nikhil mentioned that Global Maximum is pursuing the highest peak possible, so in his professional life, it was for him to pursue his dream of starting his venture fund.

Nikhil Basu Trivedi is Co-Founder and General Partner at Footwork, an early-stage focused venture capital firm investing in its first fund ($175M). Footwork lead and co-lead Series A and Seed rounds in companies with early signs of product-market fit. Previously Nikhil was Managing Director of Shasta Ventures, a boutique, early-stage venture capital firm in Silicon Valley investing its fifth fund in consumer and enterprise technology startups. Nikhil focused on consumer companies. Many have subscription business models or subscription-like characteristics. Nikhil had started his career Co-Founding Artsy. Artsy's mission is to make all the world's art accessible to anyone with an Internet connection.

Please join me in hearing Nikhil's story on this episode of The Shobeir Show!

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