Spotlight On

If you’ve ever been to a Laracon, you’d be mistaken for thinking you’d just walked into a music festival, not a PHP framework conference. Taylor Otwell founded Laravel in his native Little Rock, Arkansas, and has spent most of the past 14 years bootstrapping a company known for building exceptional product experiences alongside a community of over 1 million people. On this episode of Spotlight On, Taylor joins Accel’s Miles Clements to discuss building outside of Silicon Valley, why software is an excellent vehicle for viral community growth, and why he ultimately decided to take on investment. Conversation Highlights: 00:00 – The beginnings of Laravel03:24 – On choosing to bootstrap and build a company outside of Silicon Valley7:59 – Navigating the tension between open source and commercialization 11:50 – How Taylor’s definition of “selling out his community” changed 14:27 – What’s changed since Taylor took on fundraising after 13 years of bootstrapping17:29 – What it takes to go from programmer to CEO 20:56 – Taylor’s secrets to scaling (and keeping a four-meeting week) 23:31 – How Laravel’s kept its DNA while doubling in a year  29:50 – How Taylor built a 1 million+ strong community around a PHP frameworkMentioned in this episode: Our Series A Investment in Laravel: The Future of ShippingHow Sentry's David Cramer Turned an Open Source Side Project into a $3B BusinessCheck out Taylor’s artifact: The Founder of Laravel on Centering Mission and Users During Growth Featured: Taylor Otwell, CEO and Founder of Laravel and Miles Clements, Partner at Accel 

Welcome back to Season 3 of Spotlight On! This season, we’re digging into the parts of founding and building companies that people don’t often see: the firsts, the crucible moments, and the key decision points that come after that initial founding phase. Great companies are built one decision at a time, so we’re asking the people doing the building: How do you make the decisions that matter? What are the tradeoffs? And would you do it the same way again? We start this season with Joel Flory, the co-founder and chairman of Visual Supply Company (VSCO). When Joel and his founders launched VSCO, no serious creators took mobile photography seriously. 14 years later, he’s steered the company through innumerable technology shifts to build VSCO into a generational business. In this episode, we talk about how the business of creativity online has changed, the make-or-break moment that happens as you start to scale (and how to navigate it), how to select investors and leadership teams, and how to treat your company as something bigger than you are. Conversation highlights: 00:00 – How VSCO emerged out of Joel’s own need as a wedding photographer 07:50 – When to adapt to customer feedback – and when to stay the course12:08 – How VSCO capitalized on the dawn of mobile photography 16:07 – The types of brands that stand the test of time16:24 – Joel’s three guiding principles for selecting an investor21:27 – Before you scale, you need to align on what your definitions of success are26:18 – How VSCO navigated the transition from startup to scale-up 32:40 – How to hire a leadership team that’s ready to scale36:24 – Creating a generational business means being able to walk away43:29 – What Gen AI changes about the business of creativity, and what it doesn’t Featured: Joel Flory, Co-Founder and Chairman of VSCO and Vas Natarajan, Partner at Accel

Welcome to Season 3 of Spotlight On: a podcast about how companies are built, from the people doing the building.When we talk about startups, we talk a lot about the big milestones: founding, funding, and going public. We talk less about what happens in between: the firsts, the mistakes, and the messy, exhilarating decisions the people building these companies have to make every day. This is a podcast that takes you behind the scenes to hear from founders and builders about what they did, what they learned… and what they’ll never do again. Subscribe to get a new episode every Tuesday.

David Cramer, co-founder and CPO of Sentry, shares how his teenage passion for gaming led to creating a game-changing error-logging tool. He reflects on the journey from a humble Open Source project to a $3 billion business used by over 100,000 organizations. David emphasizes the importance of design in tech and discusses the Open Source Pledge, a significant initiative aimed at better supporting Open Source maintainers. His insights reveal the challenges and successes in balancing ethics with entrepreneurial growth in the tech industry.

Karri Saarinen, CEO and Co-founder of Linear, leads a project management suite loved by top AI companies and Y Combinator graduates. He discusses how his team prioritizes quality over hyper-growth, taking a deliberate approach to scaling and culture. Karri emphasizes the need for innovative hiring practices and balancing speed with thoughtful product development. He also shares insights on raising capital when profitable and the importance of building a high-functioning team instead of merely increasing headcount.

Jeff Shiner, CEO of 1Password, shares insights from leading the company’s impressive growth from a small team to over 1,200 employees. He discusses the strategic pivot from a consumer app to a robust B2B platform in response to market changes. Shiner emphasizes the importance of purpose behind funding decisions and navigating the tech landscape's evolving demands. He also delves into how AI is reshaping identity security, enhancing user experiences, and the challenges of balancing B2B and B2C customer needs.

Today, Marc Lore is synonymous with eCommerce. He is known for translating his bold visions into trailblazing companies like Diapers.com and Jet.com. As a serial entrepreneur, there are consistencies in Marc’s companies: they were born out of his own needs and focused on how we consume goods. But perhaps most notably – they are ideas so daring that some would call him crazy.   His latest endeavor, Wonder, is no different.  In this episode of Spotlight On, Marc joins Accel’s Sameer Gandhi to reflect on their long-standing partnership and Marc’s bold yet methodical approach to company growth. They unpack Marc’s vision for Wonder to become an AI-powered personal chef and, along the way, share lessons for new and seasoned founders on stage-by-stage growth, scaling a team, and building investor trust. The conversation offers an open look into Marc’s ambition and unshakable belief in the importance of founder naïveté when challenging new markets that nobody believed could be disrupted before. Conversation highlights: 00:00 – Recounting Marc’s and Sameer’s partnership over the years 04:00 – Marc’s early interest in entrepreneurship and atypical first investor 09:16 – Strategies for doubling the valuation of companies at each round  12:11 – Advice for new entrepreneurs on the power of naïveté 14:43 – How Diapers.com transformed e-commerce by redefining customer expectations 24:12 – Overview of Wonder and how it is redesigning the food supply chain 30:59 - Marc’s rubric for growth and the necessity of capital burn 35:10 – How Marc’s approach to interviewing and building a team has evolved 45:50 – Marc’s reflection on how to gain an advantage in the early days of your career Featured: Marc Lore, CEO of Wonder, and Sameer Gandhi, Partner at Accel

With any new technology, malicious actors exploit vulnerabilities and create uncertainty. But there are tools investigators, regulators, and cybersecurity professionals can use to fight back. In this episode, Chainalysis’ Jackie Burns Koven, Head of Cyber Threat Intelligence, shares how to mitigate risks and build trust in emerging spaces, drawing from her work across the cryptocurrency and blockchain landscape. Since Chainalysis launched in 2014, the platform has been used to solve some of the world’s most high-profile criminal cases and safely expand consumer access to cryptocurrency. Jackie joined Chainalysis in 2019 after serving as an Intelligence Officer in the U.S. Department of Defense. In this conversation, she reflects on the crucial role Chainalysis plays in enhancing blockchain safety and ensuring its viability. She also offers valuable advice on how early-stage startups and leaders can stay informed in the rapidly evolving tech ecosystem, and how they can think about implementing their own systems. The episode also explores the challenges new technologies like AI face from malicious actors, the importance of effective collaboration between technology and government agencies, and the steps needed to stabilize the crypto industry long-term. Conversation highlights: 00:00 – Introduction to Chainalysis  05:30 – Why Chainalysis is working with government agencies to fight bad actors  14:00 – How the blockchain threat landscape is evolving with AI 16:30 – The role of education in rising crypto threats, like pig butchering 29:10 – Advice for staying up to date on the rapidly evolving technology ecosystem 31:34 – Building a Cyber Threat Intelligence team; Jackie’s role Featured: Jackie Burns Koven, Head of Cyber Threat Intelligence at Chainalysis and Amit Kumar, Partner at Accel

In 2012, Netskope CEO and Founder Sanjay Beri was convinced that the security industry was on the brink of a massive transformation. Through countless conversations with CEOs, CIOs, and CISOs, he identified a significant shift towards the cloud, presenting a unique opportunity to redefine data network security for this new era. Thus, Netskope was born, starting small but with grand ambitions. Netskope’s early days exemplify the power of a clear vision and controlled growth. They began with specific SaaS products and steadily expanded into a comprehensive platform. Today, Netskope serves over 3,400 customers, tens of millions of users, including over 30 of the Fortune 100. In this episode, Sanjay shares insights into their steady strategy, intentional fundraising, and evolution into an industry-leading security platform. He also reflects on over a decade of leadership and people management, offering valuable lessons about team evolution as the company scales. Conversation highlights: 00:00 – Sanjay’s background at Juniper Networks and interest in entrepreneurship 03:23 – The reasons behind Netskope’s early focus on SaaS products 04:14 – How Netskope approached fundraising with a focus on relationships and differentiation 11:00 – Netskope’s shift from products to platform 15:30 – Learnings from over a decade of leadership and people management 25:00 – A new approach to startup innovation; from product to GTM to marketing 27:10 – Why Netskope incorporated AI into their platform from the early days 35:00 – Reflections on how the ecosystem has evolved since 2012

Alex Bovee sees three critical ingredients to building a high-growth startup: a founding team with innate grit for entrepreneurship, a good idea, and great timing. ConductorOne has all three. In this episode of Spotlight On, Alex shares his founding journey and encourages entrepreneurs to focus on building unique solutions that address unmet market needs. ConductorOne is an access control solution that helps companies secure identity across their cloud and on-premises apps and infrastructure. In 2020, Alex joined Accel as an Entrepreneur in Residence (and was our first virtual EIR, for obvious reasons) before we partnered for their Seed later that year. The episode covers the founding story, identity market, ConductorOne’s unique approach to building a company out of Portland, Oregon, and the advantages of getting a startup team together in the same room. Alex also discusses the challenges faced during the early iteration phases, the importance of timing, and the inspiration that can be found in competing against large incumbents. Conversation highlights: 00:00 – Alex’s background and early interest in entrepreneurship 04:51 – Identifying current gaps in the access control experience 07:44 – Complementary skillsets that make startup founders successful 08:50 – Transitioning from COVID to an in-person culture in Portland, Oregon 17:00 – Early iteration phase challenges 19:00 – Finding inspiration as an underdog competing against large incumbents 25:18 – Takeaways from RSA 2024 and the biggest trends in security, AI, and identity