The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

20VC: Zoom From Series A to IPO, How VCs Can Provide CEOs with Additional Leverage and Why The Negative Effects of Signalling Are Very Real with Santi Subotovsky, General Partner @ Emergence Capital

Jul 15, 2019

Santi Subotovsky, General Partner at Emergence Capital, shares his fascinating journey from founding a SaaS e-learning company to leading investments in giants like Zoom. He discusses how he identified Eric Yuan's potential and the importance of building strong relationships in the VC landscape. Santi emphasizes the need for specialized funding strategies and the evolving nature of venture capital, particularly in the SaaS sector. He also advocates for the significance of mentorship and resilience in the entrepreneurial journey.

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ANECDOTE

Unintentional VC

Santi Subotovsky's path to venture capital was unconventional, starting with founding a SaaS company in Argentina.
He initially joined Emergence Capital to learn about VC decision-making, intending to return to startups.

INSIGHT

Immigrant Advantage

Santi Subotovsky's "immigrant advantage" allows him to see opportunities others miss.
This unique perspective helps him connect with founders who address unmet needs.

ANECDOTE

Zoom's Demo

Santi Subotovsky was drawn to Zoom's founder, Eric Yuan, because of his customer obsession.
Yuan insisted on a product demo, showcasing his focus on product quality over fundraising.

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Santi Subotovsky is a General Partner @ Emergence Capital, one of the valley's leading venture firms of the last decade focusing on enterprise & SaaS applications. Within their incredible portfolio is the likes of Salesforce, Zoom, Box, Veeva Systems, SuccessFactors and many more. As for Santi, he has led deals in the likes of Zoom, Crunchbase, Clearbanc, Top Hat and Chorus.ai to name a few. Before Emergence, Santi founded AXG Tecnonexo, a SaaS e-learning company in Argentina which he expanded to 150+ employees across Latin America and the U.S. Santi is also a founding board member of Puente Labs, an organization that helps founders of Latin American high-potential growth companies scale their businesses globally.

In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Santi made his way from founding a Latin American EdTech business to being one of the valley's most successful investors of 2019 with Zoom's IPO? What was the biggest barrier he faced when getting into VC? How did he overcome it?

2.) What does Santi believe his superpower as an investor is? What did Santi see in Eric Yuan and the 30 person team at the time that made him believe they would be successful? What made how Eric thinks about presents product so special? What did the relationship building process look like between Eric and Santi in the early days?

3.) How does Santi like to work with his portfolio companies? How does Santi think about time allocation across the portfolio? Why does Santi believe it is crucial to not just spend time with the CEO but the exec team also? Where does Santi most like to provide value and leverage to the CEO? Why does Santi believe all VCs are just sales reps?

4.) Why does Santi believe that a vertically focused fund is the optimal strategy to pursue today? What are the benefits? What are the drawbacks? How does Santi think about the obvious overlap between consumer and enterprise today? With the thematic focus, how does Santi think about loss ratio and batting average? How does Emergence approach the element of both ownership and price? Where do they optimise?

5.) With larger and larger funds, how does Santi see the future of venture? Why does he believe that we will see vertically focused capital-as-a-service? What does this look like in reality? Is Santi concerned by the extended window of privatisation that is now present in today's capital markets? How concerned is Santi by the compression of fundraising timelines and what does that to investor founder relationships?

Items Mentioned In Today’s Show:

Santi’s Fave Book: Candide by Voltaire

Santi’s Most Recent Investment: Openpath

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