EP 65: Aaron Levie's (CEO/Cofounder, Box) AI Takes and Advice for First Time Founders
The Logan Bartlett Show
The Importance of Simplifying Advice
The founder of Box says he rejects broad based advice in general. "I've just seen too many different ways of succeeding and failing" He recommends Fit for Growth, a book about how to spend less and grow.
Aaron Levie is the CEO and Co-founder of Box - a now profitable public company he founded in 2005 after dropping out of USC. In his second appearance on The Logan Bartlett Show, Aaron shares what he's most excited about in the AI world including real applications that Box is building today. He also shares his takes on who will win the AI battle between incumbents and startups, AI doom and where there are opportunities for new founders to build. As always, Aaron gives great operating advice for first-time founders and recounts some of the things that Box did well to get to where they are today.
(0:00) Intro
(0:54) Welcome back, Aaron Levie
(4:28) Lightning bolt moment with AI
(10:00) OG Customers
(12:50) Describe Box's AI usage
(24:13) Why have the big tech companies been able to execute as well as they have?
(28:00) How would you start a company as a young enterprising founder today?
(33:04) The social contracts of AI
(37:21) Aaron's doom perspective
(45:06) Operating profit
(48:29) One lesson of operational excellence
(52:59) Wrong startup advice
(56:38) Reading recommendations
Mixed and edited: Justin Hrabovsky
Produced: Rashad Assir
Executive Producer: Josh Machiz
Music: Griff Lawson
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About the Show
Logan Bartlett is a Software Investor at Redpoint Ventures - a Silicon Valley-based VC with $6B AUM and investments in Snowflake, DraftKings, Twilio, and Netflix. In each episode, Logan goes behind the scenes with world-class entrepreneurs and investors. If you're interested in the real inside baseball of tech, entrepreneurship, and start-up investing, tune in every Friday for new episodes.
Executive Producer: Rashad Assir
Producer: Leah Clapper
Mixing and editing: Justin Hrabovsky
Check out Unsupervised Learning, Redpoint's AI Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@UCUl-s_Vp-Kkk_XVyDylNwLA
🎥 Subscribe on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCugS0jD5IAdoqzjaNYzns7w?sub_confirmation=1
Follow on Socials
📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/theloganbartlettshow
📱 X - https://twitter.com/loganbartshow
🎬 Clips on TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@theloganbartlettshow
About the Show
Logan Bartlett is a Software Investor at Redpoint Ventures - a Silicon Valley-based VC with $6B AUM and investments in Snowflake, DraftKings, Twilio, and Netflix. In each episode of The Logan Bartlett Show, we sit down with the people behind today’s most important startups and extract the tactics, lessons, and frameworks they’ve learned the hard way. Conversations span hiring to GTM, product, growth, fundraising and everything in between - collectively forming the ultimate playbook to make you a better CEO, investor or board member.
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