The High Flyers Podcast with Vidit Agarwal

Mike Vernal, General Partner at Conviction and former Facebook engineering and product leader, reflects on scaling Facebook alongside Mark Zuckerberg, venture lessons from Sequoia, and what makes founders exceptional. He explores speed as an advantage in the AI era, durable engagement, the risks of staying too long in one role, and what happens when software becomes nearly free. A revealing look at ambition, character, curiosity, and leadership.

Amit Singh, Managing Partner of Mandala, has advised three Australian prime ministers and led global economic policy at Uber. He shares his journey from political instability in Fiji to the heart of Australian government, the landmark equal-pay decision he helped advance, and his leap into technology. He also discusses building a global research firm, Australia–India ties, bold career risks, mentorship and people leadership.

Ryan Beiermeister, a Founders Fund Partner and former leader at OpenAI, Meta, and Palantir, shares her journey from elite debate to building technology for governments and billions of users. She explores human judgment in the AI era, technology’s developmental risks for young people, the double-edged nature of products, and her transition from operator to investor.

Ellen DaSilva, entrepreneur, investor and healthcare executive, takes us from Wall Street to Twitter’s hypergrowth years, Hims & Hers as employee #8, and founding Summer Health. She explores building consumer healthcare, spotting companies that feel inevitable, AI’s promise and risks, fundraising, mentorship, and why she lives in “maximum mode” with founder energy always switched on.

Shiv Rao, cardiologist and co-founder-CEO of healthcare AI company Abridge, traces his journey from Pittsburgh and India to medicine, music, skateboarding, and startups. He discusses nearly quitting medical school, the four-year “languishing” phase before generative AI transformed Abridge, enterprise healthcare, founder pressure, scaling past 500 people, family sacrifices, and lessons from Jensen Huang and Rick Rubin.

John Willett, co-founder and COO of Rogo, is a former investment banker building AI for the world’s biggest financial institutions. He shares his journey from an engineering family and Princeton to discovering coding, meeting co-founder Gabe Stengel, and launching Rogo before ChatGPT. Hear how years of rejection turned into Lazard’s breakthrough partnership, global bank adoption, and rapid expansion from 40 to 200 people.

Mukund Narayanamurti, an Australian diplomat and Austrade leader in South Asia, recounts his journey from cricket-loving Bengaluru teenager to representing Australia in India. He discusses surviving an $8.5 billion deal, years of failed pitches, brutal academic feedback, and lessons from Nicholas Moore. The conversation explores India’s business complexity, Australia–India ties, leadership, lifelong learning, and building a career across Asia.

Keith Rabois, Khosla Ventures managing director and veteran operator behind PayPal, LinkedIn, Square, Opendoor and OpenStore, shares his journey from credential-focused student to Silicon Valley powerhouse. He discusses the mentors who shaped him, spotting exceptional talent, lessons from Slide’s failure, handwritten notes and disciplined time management, plus evaluating AI companies, durable product-market fit and the future economics of venture capital.

This episode is supported by Xero, helping businesses use AI with more control through JAX, its in-platform AI finance partner. Get 90% off your plan for your first 6 months at xero.com/highflyers.  ________ Kevin Hartz is the Co-Founder of Eventbrite and Xoom, and Co-Founder and General Partner at A*, the early-stage venture firm whose latest fund is $450M. Xoom was acquired by PayPal for more than $1B, Eventbrite went public, and Kevin has backed some of technology’s most important companies from the earliest stages, including PayPal, Airbnb, Palantir, SpaceX, Anduril, Ramp and Decagon. In this conversation with Vidit, Kevin goes back to the beginning: growing up in the Bay Area before Silicon Valley became Silicon Valley, studying history at Stanford and Oxford, returning home “fairly lost,” and nearly choosing medicine before the internet pulled him into technology. He shares how friendships with Peter Thiel and the early PayPal team shaped his trajectory, why he chose to build Xoom instead of joining PayPal, and what it felt like to later be “brushed aside” as CEO. Kevin also reflects on building Eventbrite with his wife Julia while raising a family, the relentless reality of being a scaling CEO, and how identity changes when a company that defined two decades of your life is no longer yours. He explains what the PayPal Mafia taught him about talent, why the best founders create leverage by surrounding themselves with exceptional people, and why some founders are simply an “automatic check.” They also explore A*, how Kevin finds the next generation of breakout founders, the extraordinary valuations and competition in today’s AI market, why relationships still matter at seed, and what decades of building and investing have taught him about ambition, judgment and the people you choose to spend your life around. Please enjoy exploring your curiosity. ________ Get in touch with us via email at [email protected] Join our stable of commercial partners including the Australian Government, Google, KPMG,, Allens, Macquarie Capital, Xero, JP Morgan and more.  Show notes and more episodes here Follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram Get in touch with our Founder and Host, Vidit Agarwal directly here Contact us via our website This episode is supported by Xero, helping businesses use AI with more control through JAX, its in-platform AI finance partner. Get 90% off your plan for your first 6 months at xero.com/highflyers.  ________ TIMESTAMPS 00:00 – Meet Kevin Hartz 02:56 – Xero  03:56 – Childhood and family 16:00 – Stanford vs Oxford 21:00 – “I was fairly lost” 24:00 – PayPal, Peter Thiel and Xoom 30:00 – Getting pushed out as Xoom CEO 33:00 – Tech then vs now 35:00 – Why Eventbrite had to exist 43:00 – The reality of being CEO 45:00 – Building with Julia and becoming a dad 48:00 – What the PayPal Mafia taught him 53:00 – Investing in a wild market 56:00 – Who is Kevin Hartz after Eventbrite? 59:00 – Building A* after the SPAC era 1:02:00 – Finding the next great founder 1:04:00 – Why Ashwin was an “automatic check” 1:08:00 – Kevin’s dream dinner table 1:11:00 – The question Kevin asks every founder 1:13:00 – Why “I’d be happy to” is banned at A* ________ The High Flyers Podcast features in-depth interviews with the world’s most influential figures in business, tech, finance, government and sport. Launched in 2020, it has ranked in the global top ten for past three years, with listeners in 27 countries and over 200+ episodes released, and featured in Forbes, Daily Telegraph, and at SXSW. Our guests include -- Malcolm Turnbull (Prime Minister of Australia), Jason Collins (Head of BlackRock, Asia Pacific), Brad Banducci (CEO, Woolworths), Michael Schneider (CEO, Bunnings), David Eckstein (CFO, Legora), Kevin Hartz (Partner, A*; Founder, Eventbrite), Jesse Zhang (CEO, Decagon), Vandita Pant (CFO, BHP), Elena Verna (Head of Growth, Lovable), David Haber (a16z Partner), Jodie Auster (Uber's Global Head of Travel), Rob Giglio (CCO, Canva), Jean-Michel Limieux (CTO, Shopify and Atlassian), Stevie Case (CRO, Vanta), Cristina Cordova (COO, Linear), Gautam Chari (Head of Capital Commitments, Bank of America), John Haddock (CBO, Harvey), Mark Suster (Partner, Upfront Ventures), Niki Scevak (Partner, Blackbird), Craig Tiley (CEO, USA Tennis), Jeanne DeWitt Grosser (COO, Vercel), Paul Bassat (Partner, Square Peg), Bowen Pan (Creator, Facebook Marketplace), Peter Varghese (Secretary of Foreign Affairs, Australian Government), Sam Sicilia (CIO, Hostplus), Jack Zhang (CEO, Airwallex), Tim Doyle (CEO, Eucalyptus), Sukhinder Singh Cassidy (CEO, Xero), Sanjeev Gandhi (CEO, Orica) and Philip Green (Australia's Ambassador/High Commissioner to India). 

Dylan Babbs, Co-founder and CTO of Profound and former Uber design engineer and maps specialist, shares his maps-driven product lens and how design+engineering sped growth. He recounts leaving big tech, founding Profound, and scaling from $1M to $33M ARR. They discuss why founders should “swim downstream,” the rise of marketing engineers, AI reshaping marketing, and Profound’s focus on speed and vertical moats.