Built to Sell Radio Ep 517 The Surprising Truth of a 9-Figure Exit — and How Not to Lose $23 Million (After the Deal)
Oct 24, 2025
Zain Jaffer, tech entrepreneur and co-founder of Vungle, dives into his journey from growing up in a refugee family to executing a $780M exit to Blackstone. He reveals the magic behind rewarded video ads and discusses the peculiar challenges of sudden wealth, including altering friendships and managing privacy post-exit. Zain shares candid mishaps in real estate, lessons from risky trades during COVID, and his philosophical views on wealth distribution. Now, he’s channeling his experiences into new ventures focused on AI in marketing.
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Bet The Infrastructure, Not The Product
- Zain Jaffer spotted mobile video ads as the inevitable infrastructure play before bandwidth and smartphones made them viable.
- He positioned Vungle as the payment-facilitator taking 40–50% of ad revenue across thousands of apps.
Optimize Levers At Scale
- Vungle scaled from near-zero to hundreds of millions in revenue by optimizing conversion levers across many apps.
- Small percentage improvements in ad performance translated into large absolute revenue gains.
Pillows That Opened Doors
- Zain described sending branded pillows to target app developers as a cheap, creative outbound tactic that drove integrations.
- A $100 pillow sometimes directly correlated with spikes in new customers and revenue.