Unicorn Bakery - For the World's Most Ambitious Founders & Teams

Jon Dishotsky has raised 50 million himself from top investors like Y Combinator or Index Ventures, meanwhile, he is an investor at Giant Ventures and thus works on the other side. In the podcast, we talk about the phase between Seed and Series A, a good pitch deck, how to properly ask for intros, and much more. What you'll learn: Why you should always give context when asking someone for help as a founder: in- and the role a like-minded trusted network plays in this. What is important in a convincing pitch deck? How to present yourself and your company as a motivated and convincing competitor. How you should approach fundraising when everything doesn't go like a fairy tale (00:00:44) What things do you wish you had known as a founder that you only learned as a VC? (00:02:49) As a founder:in you need to manage your investors and continue to build relationships after a round of funding (00:04:21) Why context is incredibly important when asking for help as a Founder: in (00:09:18) What makes a good pitch deck (00:13:59) Competitive slide in the pitch deck: How do I position my company cleanly to the competition without using irrelevant slides? (00:17:13) How can I convince as a founder: in such a way that an investor picks up the spark of motivation and vision and can no longer say no?  (00:19:04) How important is a peer group/trustworthy network in terms of contact with the VC? (00:21:37) What uncomfortable tasks await me on the way from the seed round to Series A? (00:28:38) How do I explain to my Series A investors that not everything went optimally in the seed phase? (00:31:51) Is Series A still the logical consequence after pre-seed and seed? Did companies get Series A funding too quickly last year? (00:36:18) Where is the line between "I'm too confident in myself and my product" and "I'm too reflective and doubtful"? (00:40:31) What advice do you often give but find hard to follow yourself? Jon Dishotsky LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jondishotsky/ Giant Ventures: https://www.giant.vc/  WHATSAPP NEWSLETTER: 1-2x a week get a personal voice note or content from me that will make you a better founder, sign up now with one click: https://bit.ly/ub-whatsapp-newsletter ALL ABOUT UNICORN BAKERY: https://zez.am/unicornbakery

Sophia Bendz is a general partner at Cherry Ventures. Sophia joined Cherry from Atomico, where she was also a Partner and built the firm's well-known Angel program. Sophia's passion is supporting early-stage companies, an interest she has discovered in over 40 angel investments in Europe and North America.  Sophia was also Global Marketing Director at Spotify for seven years, taking the audio platform from a Swedish apartment-based startup to an international player with hundreds of millions of users and 3000+ employees. We talk about anecdotes from her early days at Spotify, building a global brand in the consumer space, her learnings as an investor, the role of Scandinavia in Europe, founder egos, the part of personal development in your success, and how you figure out what success means to you in the first place. What you'll learn: What are the critical cornerstones for a successful marketing and brand strategy? How close is the Netflix series "The Playlist" to the real deal in Spotify creation? How do you make difficult decisions without letting emotions and ego get the upper hand? What role do personal development and work-life balance play in a successful career? Chapters: (00:01:51) How do you make important decisions, and why did you choose the relatively unknown Cherry at the time? (00:04:52) Who is Cherry Ventures? (00:05:46) Why was the growth peak at Spotify the right moment for you to leave the company? (00:07:33) What were the early days at Spotify like? What all was happening at that time?? Can you walk us through those early days? (00:10:31) How does brand focus fit into a developer-focused team? How did Sophia convince the rest of the group of its relevance? (00:12:22) When did you feel like you were working on something massive at Spotify? (00:13:33) How real is the series "The Playlist" on Netflix about the rise of Spotify? (00:15:11) From your experience: What does a marketing and brand strategy need? What are the fundamental cornerstones? (00:21:02) How much are the brand strategy and the founder's vision related? (00:23:05) What tips do you give "your" founders (that you invest in) regarding ego? How do you make the right decisions? (00:27:41) How important is trusting your "founding family"? (00:28:50) Do investors focus too much on the B2B and software sectors and neglect consumer startups? Or is this just a distorted perception? (00:30:32) What characteristics do you use to define successful brands? What signals do you observe among founders? (00:32:16) What influence does AI have on future startups? (00:35:00) What is the role of Scandinavia in Europe? (00:37:48) How do you live personal development and work-life balance to grow with your challenges? (00:45:05) What advice do you often give but find hard to follow yourself? Sophia Bendz LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sophiabendz/ Cherry Vertures: https://www.cherry.vc/  WHATSAPP NEWSLETTER: 1-2x a week, you'll get a personalized voice note or content from me that will make you a better founder; sign up now with one click: https://bit.ly/unicorn-bakery-news ALL IMPORTANT LINKS TO UNICORN BAKERY: https://zez.am/unicornbakery

Cal Henderson and his team wanted to improve ways to connect online. The result was a lot of bad decisions - and finally, Flickr and later Slack. Where did the courage come from to build something from the failed pile to such successful companies? What you learn: When was the right moment for Cal to walk away from Flickr, and how that led to the idea for Slack What strategies have been established for a small company to make software popular in the B2B space? What role do blockchain, crypto, AI, and other technologies Play in the future - and can artificial intelligence improve software like Slack? Chapters: (00:03:11) When and how did you start as an entrepreneur? (00:06:41) Why didn't you go to Microsoft after all, and what was your work like at Flickr? (00:08:46) How did the purchase by Yahoo! change your work, and how did it feel to be bought by such a corporation? (00:09:50) When and why did you decide to leave Flickr, and how did you end up on Slack? (00:14:46) Why a communication tool, and how did you approach companies to promote Slack? (00:17:20) From today's perspective, would you promote software the way you did with Slack back then? (00:20:53) When did you realize that Slack could do more than just enterprise communications and what impact does that bring to the future? (00:23:43) What is coming technologically in the next few years? Will things like blockchain and AI become more critical? (00:27:10) How would you evaluate the role of blockchain and crypto from an expert perspective, and are you concerned about it yourself? (00:31:17) What book would you recommend? (00:35:58) How did your company culture evolve when you proliferated? (00:38:08) Closing Words Cal Handerson LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/iamcal Slack: https://slack.com/

Ryan Breslow looks back on many successful founding years: Bolt (11 billion dollar valuation), Eco (Unicorn), and now love.com. He gained plenty of experience on the road to success, which he now shares with you. He talks to Fabian about the influence of Silicon Valley, the importance of setbacks, his biggest mistake, and the perfect company culture. What you'll learn: What mindset & skillset do you need to start a stable business outside the flourishing ecosystem? Can a successful business be built entirely remotely? How do you achieve the optimal product-market fit & what tips does Ryan have for early-stage founders in particular? What matters most in an impact-driven business? Chapter: (00:00:41) Is Silicon Valley a mafia? (00:02:24) How has Silicon Valley rejection affected Ryan's journey as a founder & do you see it more as an opportunity or a challenge? (00:04:26) What mindset & skillset is helpful when building a business from a place that's not part of a flourishing ecosystem? (00:05:28) Is it necessary to meet like-minded people in person, or can you build a solid network purely online? (00:07:22) Can you build a good company culture remotely at all? (00:08:36) On what important cornerstones do you build a good company culture that works well during the growth phase? (00:10:30) How do you define and measure the impact of a company? (00:12:42) How to find the right balance between achieving results and investing until growth is visible? (00:18:50) What are the pros and cons of simultaneously building a new business and, on the other hand, producing content as a founder? (00:22:32) What is your north star or vision that drives you? (00:25:44) What are the specifics of your new company love.com? (00:31:01) How do you want to achieve product-market fit with love.com & what tips do you have for other early-stage founders? Ryan's recipe for product market fit  (00:35:25) What accomplishments are you most proud of? (00:36:02) What was the most challenging compromise you had to make to succeed? (00:36:44) What was your biggest mistake (so far)? (00:38:08) What is one thing about you that people often misunderstand? (00:41:02) What is your greatest strength in the company & what is the area with the most potential for improvement?(00:42:18) You've met many people in your career so far - who has impressed you the most? (00:45:31) Ryan's advice for founders. Ryan Breslow LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryantakesoff/  Love Health: https://www.love.com/  Ryan and Fabian talked about this some more: Ryan's Twitter profile: https://twitter.com/ryantakesoff  Ryan's book on fundraising: https://amzn.to/3F3odjA Ryan's book on recruiting: https://amzn.to/3ij8ZOs WHATSAPP NEWSLETTER: 1-2x a week, get a personalized voice note or content from me that will make you a better founder. Sign up now with one click: https://bit.ly/unicorn-bakery-newsletter

Blinkist is now globally known, has been profitable since last year, and seems at first glance to have been a stroke of genius. Behind it, however, is a process of many years that the founders have thought out and followed. They also built their company based on holacracy. What are the pros and cons of scaling with flat hierarchies? What you learn: Why is it good if "the one idea" needs a little more time to mature? What challenges do pretty much all founders face along the way & how can you prepare for them? Why can brainstorming with like-minded people be elementarily important for your founding success? How can you approach the topic of recruiting in a structured way & what should you definitely keep in mind?

Entrepreneurs and startups make decisions all the time - but what if you realize your decision was wrong? Daniel Weinand (formerly Co-Founder of Shopify) joined me at START Summit to answer questions about making important decisions: - What makes good decisions? - How do I assess risk when making important decisions? - How do I react to changing circumstances after I've already made a decision? - How do I evaluate the quality of my decisions? This much up front: you won't make a good decision without information and advance work. Chapters: 00:54 Introduction of the Fireside Chat 02:06 Short introduction Daniel 04:07 Daniel's framework on decision making - how do you make great decisions? 06:56 Example Fabian: When is it necessary to reconsider the decision? 08:07 How do you make sure you don't change the decision too early? 10:40 Example Daniel: How do you proceed when you need/want to change a decision? 14:03 Tips for good decisions - and how to avoid bad decisions. 17:32 Bold decisions require scaling 18:36 How do you scale the culture to make a collaboration work? 21:48 Do you think remote work is a risk or an advantage? 23:14 What happened next for you after Shopify? 24:50 What is your mission? Daniel's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danielweinand/

Ijad Madisch has turned the world of science upside down: Through his platform ResearchGate, he offers scientists the opportunity to exchange information about things that have not worked. With his concept, he convinced Bill Gates, Peter Thiel and Benchmark Capital, among others, as investors. He tells Fabian live at Stage Two how he doesn't lose focus despite his success and why work-life balance is of considerable importance to him. What you learn: How does Ijad manage to grow along with his tasks and develop personally fast enough?  Why was a social platform for scientists absolutely necessary? How does Ijad achieve his work-life balance - and what can you learn from this for your entrepreneurial life? How does entrepreneurship in Germany differ from the US - and why is it worth looking across the pond? Which people have helped Ijad on his way, inspired him and acted as mentor:in? Ijad Madisch LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ijad-madisch-4428229/ ResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/ WHATSAPP NEWSLETTER: 1-2x a week get a personalized voice note or content from me that will make you a better founder, sign up now with one click: https://bit.ly/ub-whatsapp-newsletter

How do I create a diverse recruiting process and avoid toxic investors? Monika Liikamaa is the founder of the Finnish fintech startup Enfuce. There are currently more than 100 people working for Enfuce and more than 60 million euros have been invested in the startup. We talk about: - How you promote diversity in your team - why diversity has a positive impact on your startup - what to look for in the application process when your CV is not the deciding factor - what toxic characteristics you need to recognize in your investors early on MONIKA LIIKAMAA LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/monikaliikamaa/ Enfuce: https://enfuce.com/

Eugene Danilkis is the founder of the fintech unicorn Mambu. About 10 years ago, there was no interface for cloud and banking. In the last 10 years, Eugene has completely changed that with Mambu. We talked in Fireside Chat at START Summit 21 about how the whole journey started. Where did Eugene actually meet his co-founders and how did Mambu evolve from that? How did Mambu get its first customers in such an industry? Of course, we addressed many more questions. Important links: - Eugene's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edanilkis/ - Mambu: https://mambu.com - START: https://startglobal.org

How the market leader for luxury watches was founded in Karlsruhe This podcast episode is a recording from the START Summit, where Fabian Tausch interviews Tim Stracke, CEO of Chrono24. Tim Stracke and his co-founders took over the Chrono24 brand at an early stage and built it up to become the global market leader. Today, billions of dollars worth of luxury watches are traded through Chrono24, hundreds of thousands sell their watches through the marketplace, and you'll learn how it all came to be in this podcast episode. Important links: – Tim’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/timstracke/ – Chrono24: https://www.chrono24.com/ – START: https://www.startglobal.org/