The VITALIZE Podcast: Venture Capital | Startups | Angel Investing

Justin Gordon (@justingordon212) talks with Jonathan Heiliger (@heiligerj), General Partner at Vertex Ventures US, a boutique fund that invests early (often the first!) in enterprising founders who make it possible for new applications and services to be born. Jonathan and his partners have created $6B+ of value as founders themselves, and ’first check’ backers. Jonathan co-founded Vertex US in 2015 to empower the next generation of pioneers who are passionate about solving hard problems with tech.

Before Vertex US, Jonathan was General Partner at North Bridge Venture Partners, where he led investments in Lytro (acquired by Google), Periscope, Quora, and Ravel Law (acquired by LexisNexis), in addition to co-founding Coolan (acquired by Salesforce). He spent the previous five years at Facebook as Vice President of Infrastructure and Operations, leading global infrastructure, site architecture, and internal systems as the company scaled from 35 million to nearly 1 billion users.

Earlier in his career, Jonathan held executive engineering roles at Walmart and Danger (acquired by Microsoft) and spent several years as Chief Operating Officer for Loudcloud/Opsware (IPO then acquired by HP for $1.6 billion). At 19, he co-founded and was Chief Technology Officer of GlobalCenter, one of the first web hosting providers and the world’s first native-optical IP network, serving CNN, Netscape, Playboy, and Yahoo! as initial customers. He also founded Global Crossing’s venture capital group.

Today, through his role at Vertex US, Jonathan holds board seats for a number of their portfolio companies. Looking ahead, he is particularly excited about innovations that will improve how and where we live, specifically in construction and real estate.

Website: Vertex Ventures US

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/jheiliger/

Twitter: @heiligerj
Email: [email protected]

Show Notes:

• Where and how Vertex Ventures US is investing
• How their focus has shifted since launching in the U.S. in 2015
• The major changes Jonathan has observed in the VC industry over the years
• What helps Jonathan and Vertex stay laser focused despite the quick-paced nature of the industry
• Navigating fund strategy as the market changes
• How both Vitalize and Vertex address ownership targets
• How Jonathan approaches mentorship and hard conversations with founders
• Jonathan’s angel investing and advising journey 

More about the show:

The Vitalize Podcast, a show by Vitalize Venture Capital (a seed-stage venture capital firm and pre-seed 300+ member angel community open to everyone), dives deep into the world of startup investing and the future of work.

Hosted by Justin Gordon, the Director of Marketing at Vitalize Venture Capital, The Vitalize Podcast includes two main series. 

The Angel Investing series features interviews with a variety of angel investors and VCs around the world. The goal? To help develop the next generation of amazing investors. 

The Future of Work series takes a look at the founders and investors shaping the new world of work, including insights from our team here at Vitalize Venture Capital. 

More about us:

Vitalize Venture Capital was formed in 2017 as a $16M seed-stage venture fund and now includes both a fund as well as an angel investing community investing in the future of work. Vitalize has offices in Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

The Vitalize Team:

Gale - https://twitter.com/galeforceVC
Caroline - https://twitter.com/carolinecasson_
Justin - https://twitter.com/justingordon212

Vitalize Angels, our angel investing community open to everyone:
https://vitalize.vc/vitalizeangels/

Justin Gordon (@justingordon212) talks with Max Zamkow (@MZamkow), Managing Partner at Third Act Ventures, an early-stage venture firm investing in AgeTech - technology for older adults and their caregivers. Third Act Ventures invests in founders revolutionizing aging, and is the only firm investing across the entire spectrum of AgeTech.

A century ago we didn't expect to make it to 60, but now we're surviving well into our 80's and beyond. Surviving, but not thriving. Technology hasn't kept pace with the medical advancements that gave us 20+ extra years of life leaving us directionless, isolated, and alone. Third Act Ventures invests in companies that recognize this massive opportunity to improve the lives of older adults and their caregivers.

Website: Third Act Ventures

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/mzamkow/
Twitter: @MZamkow
Newsletter: AgeTech News

Email: [email protected]

Show Notes:

• What AgeTech is
• Why Third Act Ventures invests in the AgeTech ecosystem and how it’s changing
• The process of developing a thesis and overcoming the lack of interest in AgeTech
• Emerging models and how social determinants of health are impacting AgeTech
• How having a wide range of stakeholders has led to lack of innovation in the industry
• How Max screens for value and the importance of timing
• The challenge of not being the end user for products he invests in 
• One of the AgeTech companies Max is excited about
• Third Act Ventures’ strategy as a follow fund and why they’re shifting their approach
• Max’s effort to expand investments in the AgeTech industry and shift it from niche to mainstream
• Justin’s thoughts on how to market yourself uniquely to stand out

More about the show:

The Vitalize Podcast, a show by Vitalize Venture Capital (a seed-stage venture capital firm and pre-seed 300+ member angel community open to everyone), dives deep into the world of startup investing and the future of work.

Hosted by Justin Gordon, the Director of Marketing at Vitalize Venture Capital, The Vitalize Podcast includes two main series. 

The Angel Investing series features interviews with a variety of angel investors and VCs around the world. The goal? To help develop the next generation of amazing investors. 

The Future of Work series takes a look at the founders and investors shaping the new world of work, including insights from our team here at Vitalize Venture Capital. 

More about us:

Vitalize Venture Capital was formed in 2017 as a $16M seed-stage venture fund and now includes both a fund as well as an angel investing community investing in the future of work. Vitalize has offices in Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

The Vitalize Team:

Gale - https://twitter.com/galeforceVC
Caroline - https://twitter.com/carolinecasson_
Justin - https://twitter.com/justingordon212

Vitalize Angels, our angel investing community open to everyone:
https://vitalize.vc/vitalizeangels/

Justin Gordon (@justingordon212) talks with Peter Liu (@NewOrleansVC), Managing Partner at Revelry Venture Partners. RVP is a full service venture capital firm with a unique model that includes both a fund investing in pre-seed and seed SaaS and tech-enabled solutions, as well as an incubation studio that supports their founders every step of the way. They are a team of builders that actually work for their founders to solve the problems that matter during the lonely, difficult, and scary initial phases of launching a startup.

Website: Revelry Venture Partners

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/petereliu/

Twitter: @NewOrleansVC 

Show Notes:

• How Peter first got into VC
• How he got the idea for what Revelry Venture Partners is today while participating in the Kauffman Fellowship
• The barbell versus incubation models Peter has observed in VC
• The different variations of RVP and their unique model
• How they manage their $15M fund between traditional pre-seed/seed investing and incubating
• Why they’re excited to be based in New Orleans
• The process of raising their fund and the experience of working with first-time LPs 
• The challenges of being unique and finding your niche as a VC firm
• How they evaluate early stage companies and founders to make sure they’re a good fit for RVP’s model
• Unique insights on customer acquisition Peter has seen
• Areas where Peter sees high potential and is excited about investing in 

More about the show:

The Vitalize Podcast, a show by Vitalize Venture Capital (a seed-stage venture capital firm and pre-seed 300+ member angel community open to everyone), dives deep into the world of startup investing and the future of work.

Hosted by Justin Gordon, the Director of Marketing at Vitalize Venture Capital, The Vitalize Podcast includes two main series. 

The Angel Investing series features interviews with a variety of angel investors and VCs around the world. The goal? To help develop the next generation of amazing investors. 

The Future of Work series takes a look at the founders and investors shaping the new world of work, including insights from our team here at Vitalize Venture Capital. 

More about us:

Vitalize Venture Capital was formed in 2017 as a $16M seed-stage venture fund and now includes both a fund as well as an angel investing community investing in the future of work. Vitalize has offices in Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

The Vitalize Team:

Gale - https://twitter.com/galeforceVC
Caroline - https://twitter.com/carolinecasson_
Justin - https://twitter.com/justingordon212

Vitalize Angels, our angel investing community open to everyone:
https://vitalize.vc/vitalizeangels/

Justin Gordon (@justingordon212) talks with Nik Talreja (@niktalreja), Co-Founder and CEO of Sydecar, a platform making smart software and providing superior service to support a new generation of investors and enablers. Sydecar was founded upon the radical idea that anybody should be able to fund entrepreneurs who are changing the world. The opportunity in venture capital is greater than ever. But for aspiring investors, getting started can be intimidating, expensive, and time-consuming. Sydecar makes private investing dead simple so you can focus on what matters most: building relationships and sourcing investment opportunities.

A “recovering” corporate attorney, Nik Taljreja is passionate about automating away inefficiency, and is on a mission to create new standards for how we all interact with private markets by enabling the next generation of alternative asset investing.

Website: Sydecar.io

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/niktalreja/

Twitter: @niktalreja

Show Notes:

• How Sydecar serves as an onramp to fluid capital allocation in venture
• Why Nik is passionate about Sydecar eliminating the inefficiencies of breaking into venture
• The end to end experience of putting together an SPV through Sydecar
• Building credibility and trust with their customers and demystifying the legal element of investing
• Who they’re attracting to the Sydecar platform and the impacts of diverse customer interest
• The need for standardization in deal flow, capital allocation, and reporting
• Going from lawyer to founder and how Nik has approached team building for Sydecar
• How and why they’ve leveraged recruiters in their hiring process
• How fundraising varied from their first to second round
• Nik’s thoughts on finding time to invest while building a company
• Nik’s complementary dynamic with his co-partner and co-founder David Meister
• How Nik has leveraged his learnings as a lawyer to build Sydecar 
• Professional services as a great training ground for future founders
• Building brand loyalty as a fund
• What’s next for Sydecar and why Nik thinks the future of venture will be more personal
• Your portfolio as a representation of your story

More about the show:

The Vitalize Podcast, a show by Vitalize Venture Capital (a seed-stage venture capital firm and pre-seed 300+ member angel community open to everyone), dives deep into the world of startup investing and the future of work.

Hosted by Justin Gordon, the Director of Marketing at Vitalize Venture Capital, The Vitalize Podcast includes two main series. 

The Angel Investing series features interviews with a variety of angel investors and VCs around the world. The goal? To help develop the next generation of amazing investors. 

The Future of Work series takes a look at the founders and investors shaping the new world of work, including insights from our team here at Vitalize Venture Capital. 

More about us:

Vitalize Venture Capital was formed in 2017 as a $16M seed-stage venture fund and now includes both a fund as well as an angel investing community investing in the future of work. Vitalize has offices in Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

The Vitalize Team:

Gale - https://twitter.com/galeforceVC
Caroline - https://twitter.com/carolinecasson_
Justin - https://twitter.com/justingordon212

Vitalize Angels, our angel investing community open to everyone:
https://vitalize.vc/vitalizeangels/

Justin Gordon (@justingordon212) talks with Bo Ren (@Bosefina), Director of Early Stage Startups at Silicon Valley Bank. Bo is a liberal arts thinker, PM turned investor, and incubation partner. She marries deep tech expertise (5G, edge, AI) with consumer applications (strong interest in AI apps). She loves to invest and empower product-driven founders building weird shit at the earliest stages. 

In her free time, she writes about product management, private and public markets, responsible AI, behavioral science, and career pathing. Her writing has been featured in The Atlantic, New York Times, FastCompany, and Women 2.0. Bo is also a public speaker, covering topics such as creative thinking, designing products for behavioral change, millennial career paths, and why curiosity matters. She is passionate about inspiring people through her nontraditional career path and focusing on building a more inclusive future. 

Website: Silicon Valley Bank

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/bo-ren-0ba2218/

Twitter: @Bosefina
Medium: https://medium.com/@Bosefina
Substack: https://bosefina.substack.com/

Show Notes:

• How Bo got her start in angel investing through advising
• What pushed Bo to make her first investment
• Bo’s perspective on when to start investing
• Shifting from an opportunistic approach to sourcing deals through a women’s angel group
• What key elements Bo looks for in the teams she invests in
• Bo’s value-adds as an investor and how she works with founders 
• The importance of matching a founder’s needs with an investor’s expertise and approach
• How being a “nerd herder” benefits her portfolio companies
• How being the child of immigrant parents affects how Bo invests
• The double-edged sword of immigrant survivalist mentality 
• The value of resilience and the intersection of grit and ambition
• Bo’s thoughts on work-life balance and identity
• Moving from the achievement mindset to the manifestation mindset
• Bo’s journey to joining Silicon Valley Bank and being at the epicenter of the innovation economy 

More about the show:

The Vitalize Podcast, a show by Vitalize Venture Capital (a seed-stage venture capital firm and pre-seed 300+ member angel community open to everyone), dives deep into the world of startup investing and the future of work.

Hosted by Justin Gordon, the Director of Marketing at Vitalize Venture Capital, The Vitalize Podcast includes two main series. 

The Angel Investing series features interviews with a variety of angel investors and VCs around the world. The goal? To help develop the next generation of amazing investors. 

The Future of Work series takes a look at the founders and investors shaping the new world of work, including insights from our team here at Vitalize Venture Capital. 

More about us:

Vitalize Venture Capital was formed in 2017 as a $16M seed-stage venture fund and now includes both a fund as well as an angel investing community investing in the future of work. Vitalize has offices in Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

The Vitalize Team:

Gale - https://twitter.com/galeforceVC
Caroline - https://twitter.com/carolinecasson_
Justin - https://twitter.com/justingordon212

Vitalize Angels, our angel investing community open to everyone:
https://vitalize.vc/vitalizeangels/

Justin Gordon (@justingordon212) talks with Juan Jaysingh (@JuanJaysingh), President and CEO at Zingtree, leading the company’s mission to transform complex processes into clear actions for businesses around the globe. Since becoming CEO in January 2020, Juan has focused on scaling and expanding Zingtree as a profitable, B2B SaaS organization working with over 700 customers worldwide. 

Juan’s years of experience in tech entrepreneurship include his time at Universal Tennis, the sports tech startup behind UTR Powered by Oracle. Juan led the GTM strategy and rollout of UTR’s community platform to elite clubs and tennis academies worldwide. Juan also founded ZeeMee, a social media community platform for high school students transitioning to college. Under his leadership, ZeeMee was named to the inaugural CNBC Upstart 25 in 2017. Before ZeeMee, Juan held various technology consulting roles.

An accomplished tennis player, Juan immigrated to the United States alone at the age of 14. A chance encounter landed him full tennis scholarships to study and compete at Georgetown Prep and then at American University. Juan says passion and integrity drive his work ethic. As he likes to say, “if it’s too easy, it’s probably not worth it.” Juan and his family reside in Palo Alto, California.

Website: Zingtree

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/juanjaysingh/

Twitter: @JuanJaysingh

Email: [email protected]

Show Notes:

• What Zingtree is and how the company was founded on accident
• Going from consultant to CEO
• Zingtree’s initial completely organic growth (its first 600 customers, 150 of which are enterprise household name logos)
• How early customers began leveraging Zingtree’s tool beyond its original use case
• Going from focusing on SMBs to being enterprise solution
• The challenge of joining a startup as a non-founder at the executive level
• How Zingtree is improving the customer service experience on both ends
• Defining their ideal customer profile
• Applying their own product to their internal decision-making processes as they grow
• Leaning in to the remote work style and how this has amplified the need for Zingtree’s software
• The importance of investing in building culture early amongst a remote team 

More about the show:

The Vitalize Podcast, a show by Vitalize Venture Capital (a seed-stage venture capital firm and pre-seed 300+ member angel community open to everyone), dives deep into the world of startup investing and the future of work.

Hosted by Justin Gordon, the Director of Marketing at Vitalize Venture Capital, The Vitalize Podcast includes two main series. 

The Angel Investing series features interviews with a variety of angel investors and VCs around the world. The goal? To help develop the next generation of amazing investors. 

The Future of Work series takes a look at the founders and investors shaping the new world of work, including insights from our team here at Vitalize Venture Capital. 

More about us:

Vitalize Venture Capital was formed in 2017 as a $16M seed-stage venture fund and now includes both a fund as well as an angel investing community investing in the future of work. Vitalize has offices in Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

The Vitalize Team:
Gale - https://twitter.com/galeforceVC
Caroline - https://twitter.com/carolinecasson_
Justin - https://twitter.com/justingordon212

Vitalize Angels, our angel investing community open to everyone:
https://vitalize.vc/vitalizeangels/

Justin Gordon (justingordon212) talks with Heather Hartnett (@HeatherHartnett), General Partner and CEO of Human Ventures, where she and her team have created one of New York’s premiere startup studios, incubators and early stage venture funds. Prior to founding Human, Heather’s venture capital career spanned across various roles at firms including Lightspeed Venture Partners, CityLight Capital, and Claremont Creek Ventures. Previously, Heather led the development and operations at the David Lynch Foundation, where she worked with some of the country's largest family offices and investment institutions. She's a graduate of the Kauffman Fellowship Program and serves on the board of Transact Global, Trilantic Capital Partners Founder’s Council, AARP’s Innovation Council, and Summit Impact.

Heather is active in the community, serving on the leadership board of tech: nyc and Transact Global. She has been listed as one of The 50 Most Influential Women in America by Hearst Digital Media Publications, is a frequent speaker at TechCrunch Disrupt, and is a regular contributor to Forbes, where she covers a range of venture capital topics.

Website: Human Ventures

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/heatherhartnett/

Twitter: @HeatherHartnett

Heather’s Forbes Contributions

Heather with Transact Global

Show Notes:

• Human Ventures as a business creation platform
• How Heather and her partner Joe Marchese started as a startup studio in NYC and how it was received
• Where Human Ventures focuses their investments
• How they operationalize their network to build companies
• How Heather personally manages her network as an investor
• Being relationship driven and focusing on creating value
• How she evaluates founders’ EQ
• Their Guide to Being Human
• Some highlights of Human Venture’s portfolio companies
• Evaluating product vs. distribution
• Their Humans in the Wild entrepreneur in residence incubation program, born during the pandemic
• Heather’s thoughts on building startup and VC ecosystems
• Transitioning from an operator to an investor
• Increasing diversity in VC

More about the show:

The Vitalize Podcast, a show by Vitalize Venture Capital (a seed-stage venture capital firm and pre-seed 300+ member angel community open to everyone), dives deep into the world of startup investing and the future of work.

Hosted by Justin Gordon, the Director of Marketing at Vitalize Venture Capital, The Vitalize Podcast includes two main series. 

The Angel Investing series features interviews with a variety of angel investors and VCs around the world. The goal? To help develop the next generation of amazing investors. 

The Future of Work series takes a look at the founders and investors shaping the new world of work, including insights from our team here at Vitalize Venture Capital. 

More about us:

Vitalize Venture Capital was formed in 2017 as a $16M seed-stage venture fund and now includes both a fund as well as an angel investing community investing in the future of work. Vitalize has offices in Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

The Vitalize Team:

Gale - https://twitter.com/galeforceVC
Caroline - https://twitter.com/carolinecasson_
Justin - https://twitter.com/justingordon212

Vitalize Angels, our angel investing community open to everyone:
https://vitalize.vc/vitalizeangels/

Justin Gordon (@justingordon212) talks with Ruben Harris (@rubenharris), Co-Founder and CEO of Career Karma, which is helping over 1 million workers navigate their careers every month through advice and coaching. By offering free coaching and peer mentorship, Career Karma has grown to over 150,000 members from every background and profession. Through their directory of 9,000 bootcamps and trade schools, career switchers discover training programs by comparing courses and reading student reviews.

Ruben Harris is a Bay Area transplant from Atlanta, Georgia where he served as an Advisor for Forge and organized Atlanta's first Healthcare Hackathon. Over the past couple of years, Ruben has worked with academics, organizers, politicians, and union leaders at Hustle, Honor and AltSchool focused on improving their personalized outreach, healthcare and education.

Ruben began his technology career working in Partnerships and Sales and later Co-Founded the Breaking Into Startups Podcast to demystify the process, resulting in a social media reach of ~3 million people and invitations to be a Contributor for TechCrunch and Black Enterprise.

Prior to working in tech, Ruben worked as an Investment Banker. During college, Ruben organized 50+ events for non-profits, athletes, and celebrities including Tyrese, Kim Kardashian, and Jay-Z. Ruben has been playing the cello for ~25 years, taught music, performed in venues all over the world - including Carnegie Hall, and landed placements from Def Jam. He is also an active member of the NAACP.

Website: Career Karma

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/rubenharris

Twitter: @rubenharris

Instagram: instagram.com/rubenharris
Email: [email protected]

Show Notes:

• What Career Karma is and how they’ve expanded and evolved in recent years
• How the student loan bubble and “the great resignation” have led Career Karma to work more closely with employers
• Career Karma’s secret sauce of community building
• How social audio rooms have played a part in the growth of Career Karma
• The Breaking into Startups podcast
• Ruben’s view on audio, communication, and community in the Future of Work and Learning
• How Ruben has approached personal branding and taking control of your narrative
• Relationship building on the internet
• Ruben’s advice for what employers and recruiters need to do differently to identify and develop talent
• The 110 initiative
• Education as an employee benefit
• Ruben’s perspective on juggling part time roles and the freelance economy
• Career navigating as a social experience
• Social capital and virtual currency

More about the show:

The Vitalize Podcast, a show by Vitalize Venture Capital (a seed-stage venture capital firm and pre-seed 300+ member angel community open to everyone), dives deep into the world of startup investing and the future of work.

Hosted by Justin Gordon, the Director of Marketing at Vitalize Venture Capital, The Vitalize Podcast includes two main series. 

The Angel Investing series features interviews with a variety of angel investors and VCs around the world. The goal? To help develop the next generation of amazing investors. 

The Future of Work series takes a look at the founders and investors shaping the new world of work, including insights from our team here at Vitalize Venture Capital. 

More about us:

Vitalize Venture Capital was formed in 2017 as a $16M seed-stage venture fund and now includes both a fund as well as an angel investing community investing in the future of work. Vitalize has offices in Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

The Vitalize Team:
Gale - https://twitter.com/galeforceVC
Caroline - https://twitter.com/carolinecasson_
Justin - https://twitter.com/justingordon212

Vitalize Angels, our angel investing community open to everyone:
https://vitalize.vc/vitalizeangels/

Justin Gordon (@justingordon212) talks with Mac Conwell (@MacConwell), Managing Partner at RareBreed Ventures. Mac is a former software engineer and two-time founder. One of Mac's companies failed, the other went on to a successful exit. RareBreed Ventures is a pre-seed fund that invests in exceptional founders outside of large tech ecosystems, earlier than everyone else. They invest in 2 types of companies: those building a software product with a unique or clearly repeatable customer acquisition strategy or building a physical product in a vertical that has lacked innovation in 10+ years. This is because these two founders are out-of-the-box thinkers and problem solvers. Unlike other pre-seed funds, RareBreed takes a concentrated portfolio approach by writing checks of up to $250K as the first or one of the first investors.

Website: RareBreed Ventures

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/mckeever/

Twitter: @MacConwell

Show Notes:

• Mac’s thoughts on being a great storyteller
• How Mac uses his story as his pitch to raise a fund 
• The journey that led him into VC
• How Mac has the confidence to constantly bet on himself
• Mac’s experience at rock bottom and building resilience
• From dropping out of high school to having a 6-figure job at the age of 21
• How Mac manages his time and priorities
• Mac’s secret to using Twitter
• What Mac looks for in the founders he invests in
• How Mac evaluates customer acquisition at the pre-seed level
• The value of creativity and how Mac leveraged it for customer acquisition as a founder
• Some of Mac’s portfolio companies and their stories of grit
• What’s next for RareBreed Ventures

More about the show:

The Vitalize Podcast, a show by Vitalize Venture Capital (a seed-stage venture capital firm and pre-seed 300+ member angel community open to everyone), dives deep into the world of startup investing and the future of work.

Hosted by Justin Gordon, the Director of Marketing at Vitalize Venture Capital, The Vitalize Podcast includes two main series. 

The Angel Investing series features interviews with a variety of angel investors and VCs around the world. The goal? To help develop the next generation of amazing investors. 

The Future of Work series takes a look at the founders and investors shaping the new world of work, including insights from our team here at Vitalize Venture Capital. 

More about us:

Vitalize Venture Capital was formed in 2017 as a $16M seed-stage venture fund and now includes both a fund as well as an angel investing community investing in the future of work. Vitalize has offices in Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

The Vitalize Team:
Gale - https://twitter.com/galeforceVC
Caroline - https://twitter.com/carolinecasson_
Justin - https://twitter.com/justingordon212

Vitalize Angels, our angel investing community open to everyone:
https://vitalize.vc/vitalizeangels/

Justin Gordon (@justingordon212) talks with Anoop Gupta (@anoopxgupta), CEO and Co-Founder of SeekOut, the AI-powered Talent 360 platform. SeekOut provides companies with a comprehensive view of internal employees and external talent with analytics, predictive insights, and action recommendations to provide a competitive advantage in recruiting, retaining and developing their talent base.

Anoop started SeekOut after a 20-year career at Microsoft, which began with the acquisition of his first startup, VXtreme, in 1997. During his tenure, Anoop was the Corporate Vice-President of the multibillion-dollar Unified Communications group. He was TA to Bill Gates, advising on technology and product strategy as a Distinguished Scientist at Microsoft Research, leading work on Telepresence and Natural User Interfaces. Prior to Microsoft, Anoop was a tenured professor at Stanford University and he holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Carnegie Mellon University.

Website: SeekOut

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/guptaanoop

Twitter: @anoopxgupta

Show Notes:

• What SeekOut is and their incredible growth, including 3X-ing their revenue over the last year
• Anoop’s journey from professor at Stanford, to a 20 year career at Microsoft, to startup founder
• How founding a series of other companies and the resulting pivots led Anoop and his team to start SeekOut
• How their company has evolved to focus on retention and the digital transformation during COVID
• How SeekOut’s recruitment platform is helping companies put DEI into action 
• How they’ve approached the in-person versus virtual work question as a high growth company
• How SeekOut is investing in their own team and their focus on positive mindset and gratitude
• How Anoop views the future of work
• What he has loved about the transition from big tech to startup founder
• Building great company culture
• What’s next for SeekOut

More about the show:

The Vitalize Podcast, a show by Vitalize Venture Capital (a seed-stage venture capital firm and pre-seed 300+ member angel community open to everyone), dives deep into the world of startup investing and the future of work.

Hosted by Justin Gordon, the Director of Marketing at Vitalize Venture Capital, The Vitalize Podcast includes two main series. 

The Angel Investing series features interviews with a variety of angel investors and VCs around the world. The goal? To help develop the next generation of amazing investors. 

The Future of Work series takes a look at the founders and investors shaping the new world of work, including insights from our team here at Vitalize Venture Capital. 

More about us:

Vitalize Venture Capital was formed in 2017 as a $16M seed-stage venture fund and now includes both a fund as well as an angel investing community investing in the future of work. Vitalize has offices in Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

The Vitalize Team:
Gale - https://twitter.com/galeforceVC
Caroline - https://twitter.com/carolinecasson_
Justin - https://twitter.com/justingordon212

Vitalize Angels, our angel investing community open to everyone:
https://vitalize.vc/vitalizeangels/