Founded & Funded
Madrona Ventures
Listen to conversations between Madrona investors and entrepreneurs, founders, and startup personalities who talk about some of the key moments in building a company. Designed to give would-be founders and others interested in working with or for startups a view into the struggle and the lessons learned, these conversations are informal and informative.
With more than 25 years of investing in early-stage technology companies, Madrona has worked with founders from day one to help build their company for the long run. We invest in seed and Series A companies in the Pacific Northwest building across the information technology spectrum and in Acceleration (B and beyond) stage companies building with AI, regardless of geography.
With more than 25 years of investing in early-stage technology companies, Madrona has worked with founders from day one to help build their company for the long run. We invest in seed and Series A companies in the Pacific Northwest building across the information technology spectrum and in Acceleration (B and beyond) stage companies building with AI, regardless of geography.
Episodes
Mentioned books
Nov 22, 2021 • 13min
What is the IA40?
Matt McIlwain and Ishani Ummat discuss the vision, methodology and top level insights from the first IA40 list.
Nov 19, 2021 • 23min
Meet the Investor: Aseem Datar of Madrona
Aseem talks about growing up in Mumbai with "jugaad" all around him - the Hindi word for 'Hustle', how he made his way to Seattle, to Microsoft and to Madrona. Aseem joined Madrona this year as a partner after 17 years at Microsoft working in entrepreneurial roles and growing businesses like Azure from the underdog to a contender.
Sep 7, 2021 • 34min
Building a company at the intersection of life and computer sciences with Dr. Ali Ansary of Ozette
Madrona Partner, Chris Picardo, sits down with Dr. Ali Ansary, founder & CEO of Ozette Technologies. Chris and Ali talk about Ozette’s mission to uncover hidden information about the immune system to help with the efficacy of cancer treatments. Ali also speaks about the unique ability of biotech companies to attract traditional tech talent.
Aug 23, 2021 • 28min
From Startup to Exit with founder Shirish Nadkarni and Ishani Ummat
Madrona Investor, Ishani Ummat, sits down with Shirish Nadkarni, serial entrepreneur, now angel investor and author of FROM STARTUP TO EXIT, out from Harper Collins Aug 2021. Ishani and Shirish talk about starting a company, finding your co-founder, product market fit and how to choose your investors.
Jul 20, 2021 • 46min
Linda Lian of Common Room on Building a Team of Co-Founders One by One
Starting a company is a lonely business. Finding co-founders can be the solution to this – but what if you don’t know anyone who fits the bill? Linda Lian of Common Room set out to build a company and recruited her co-founders one by one. Hear her story and theirs. Viraj Mody, Francis Luu, Linda Lian in conversation with Madrona’s Shannon Anderson.
May 11, 2021 • 35min
Rajeev Singh of Accolade on Resilience, the Expectations of Leaders and Building a Healthcare Company
Investor Matt McIlwain speaks with CEO of Accolade, Rajeev Singh. Rajeev is the CEO of Accolade, a healthcare advocacy company, but this is not his first time leading. Matt and Rajeev talk about learning resilience, how it's not about directing but more about convincing employees of the road ahead, and how the role of the CEO has changed considerably. They also talk about what the entrance of big tech companies into healthcare means for consumers and the industry.
Apr 9, 2021 • 23min
Building a Healthy Open Source Community with Jeremiah Lowin, Founder and CEO of Prefect
In this episode of Founded and Funded, Anu Sharma continues her deep dive into commercial open source projects and talks to Jeremiah Lowin, the founder and CEO of Prefect, a dataflow automation platform that is trusted to build, run, and monitor millions of data workflows and pipelines. Jeremiah talks about how he and his team built this open source community from zero to 5,000, and how the community helps the team at Prefect reach their users and intentionally break out of internal echo chambers that often trap early stage products.
Mar 31, 2021 • 45min
The Entrepreneurial Journey with Hope Cochran
Going back to the archives to bring forward one of our most popular episodes which is a deep dive on Hope Cochran’s journey to investor, public board member and colleague. She tells the story of being overlooked at her first job which spurred her to take a post in a small European country in her early 20s to take on a huge challenge. That spirit of adventure and ambition set her on the road to entrepreneur, CFO, and founder advocate. Dan Li, who is now a CEO of a new stealth company, Plus, sat down with her to learn her story.
Mar 16, 2021 • 42min
Behind the Scenes of Raising a Round, or Two, or Three, a Conversation with Demetri Themelis of Knock Rentals
Knock was on the verge of raising their B round and then Covid hit. Co-founder and CEO Demetri talks with Madrona investor, Scott Jacobson, about how they successfully navigated 2020, including an inside round, and came out even stronger. Knock raised in early 2021 from a new outside investor and is a crucial element in the big business of multifamily.
Mar 4, 2021 • 36min
Building Companies on Open Source, Conversation with co-creator of Kubernetes, Joe Beda
Building a company on open-source software is not easy. As one of the creators of Kubernetes, and a founder of Heptio, Joe Beda has experience building open source, cultivating a community and founding a company. In this conversation he talks with Madrona Partner, Anu Sharma about the varying states of open source and how founders can think about building companies around or on top of these powerful technologies. This is a co-production with Traction, Anu’s blog and video conversations on GTM for technical products.
