Unicorn Builders

In today’s episode of Unicorn Builders, we speak with Martin Mao, CEO and co-founder of Chronosphere, a Cloud-Native Observability Platform that raised more than $250 million in funding and has been ranked as one of the top ten fastest growing SaaS companies ever, reaching unicorn status in just 2 years and four months. Topics Discussed: What Chronosphere does, the problem it solves, and the types of companies using the platform today. The origin story behind the company — born from personally experiencing the problem while Martin and his co-founder working on the Observability team at Uber. Why Chronosphere takes a top-down GTM motion. How Martin thinks about category creation. How Chronosphere engages firms like Gartner to educate them about how they see the market evolving and their PoV. Three actionable takeaways that Martin attributes to the incredible growth of the company. The top challenges Chronosphere faced in the early days and how they overcame those challenges Why investors are so excited about the opportunity to back the company with more than $250 million. What personally excites Martin about the work he gets to do every day. What’s in store for the future of the company and where Martin plans to take the company over the next 5 years.

In today’s episode of Unicorn Builders, we speak with Marc-Alexander Christ, Co-Founder of SumUp, a mobile point of sale solution that’s raised $1.5 Billion in funding, about the trials and challenges of disrupting the established payments industry, as well as the benefits it brings to small businesses everywhere. By simplifying orders, unifying payment processes and providing critical insights on everything from tax payments to business performance, SumUp is empowering small businesses with software tools that, until now, have been the reserve of major enterprises. We also talk about Marc-Alexander’s background in banking and real estate finance, the inspiration for revolutionizing existing payments systems which inspired founding SumUp, causing a major market disruption and the inevitable skepticism that brings from incumbents, and why small businesses became the focus of this global-facing payments platform. Topics Discussed: Marc-Alexander’s background in banking and real estate finance, and how he eventually found himself in the startup sector The inspiration for SumUp’s disruptive payments system and what it means for small businesses Why doing something new will always bring skepticism from incumbents, but why real disruption is always worth it Why focusing on payments addresses a critical pain point for SumUp’s clients in the small business world How resilience and investor appeal have both contributed to SumUp’s success in the startup economy

According to AngelList, seed-funded founders have a 2.5% chance of building a company worth more than $1 billion. Unicorn Builders interviews founders who've defied the odds and made it happen. This show is brought to you by FrontLines.io