OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar on IPO, AI Rivalries, New Device, and Spending $100B+ on Compute
(0:00) OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar joins the show!
(0:31) How OpenAI thinks about its IPO timeline
(3:31) OpenAI, Anthropic, Google: The AI arms race
(7:43) Navigating the compute crunch and AI bottlenecks, device preview!
(15:53) OpenAI's economics
(26:08) Push into chips, the cloud
(29:32) OpenAI's ad business and strategy
Thanks to our partners for making this possible!
EY - Agentic AI is introducing a new investment discipline. As AI shifts to consumption-based models, EY connects spend to enterprise value.
https://www.ey.com/en_us/insights/ai/agentic-ai-token-costs?WT.mc_id=3501318&AA.tsrc=sponsorship
NYSE - Thank you to our partner, the New York Stock Exchange - a modern marketplace and exchange for building the future. It all happens at the NYSE.
https://www.nyse.com
Plaud - Never miss a moment. Plaud, our official wearable AI note-taking partner at All-In Liquidity Summit, captured every insight.
https://www.plaud.ai
Follow Sarah Friar: https://x.com/thefriley
Apply for Summit 2026: https://allin.com/events
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Intro Music Credit: https://rb.gy/tppkzl https://x.com/yung_spielburg
OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar: IPO, AI Rivalries, New Device, and Spending $100B+ on Compute
(0:00) OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar joins the show!
(0:31) How OpenAI thinks about its IPO timeline
(3:31) OpenAI, Anthropic, Google: The AI arms race
(7:43) Navigating the compute crunch and AI bottlenecks, device preview!
(15:53) OpenAI's economics
(26:08) Push into chips, the cloud
(29:32) OpenAI's ad business and strategy
Thanks to our partners for making this possible!
EY - Agentic AI is introducing a new investment discipline. As AI shifts to consumption-based models, EY connects spend to enterprise value.
https://www.ey.com/en_us/insights/ai/agentic-ai-token-costs?WT.mc_id=3501318&AA.tsrc=sponsorship
NYSE - Thank you to our partner, the New York Stock Exchange - a modern marketplace and exchange for building the future. It all happens at the NYSE.
https://www.nyse.com
Plaud - Never miss a moment. Plaud, our official wearable AI note-taking partner at All-In Liquidity Summit, captured every insight.
https://www.plaud.ai
Follow Sarah Friar: https://x.com/thefriley
Apply for Summit 2026: https://allin.com/events
Follow the besties: https://x.com/chamath https://x.com/Jason https://x.com/DavidSacks https://x.com/friedberg
Follow on X: https://x.com/theallinpod
Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theallinpod
Follow on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@theallinpod
Follow on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/allinpod
Intro Music Credit: https://rb.gy/tppkzl https://x.com/yung_spielburg
20VC: The 8 Moats of Enduring Software Companies: How to Analyse for Durability and Defensibility in a World of AI | Why Dropouts are "AI Maxing" the World & Remote Early-Stage Companies are Dying with Gokul Rajaram
Gokul Rajaram is one of the greatest operators turned investors of the last 2 decades. He is trusted as the go to advisor for the greatest founders in the world. Today he serves as a Board Director at three public companies: Coinbase, Pinterest and The Trade Desk. Prior to Marathon (his firm), Gokul served on the executive team at DoorDash and Block. Before Block, he served as Product Director of Ads at Facebook. Earlier in his career, Gokul served as a Product Management Director for Google AdSense. Gokul is also a prolific angel investor, having invested in 700+ companies, including Airtable, Figma, Groq, Runway, Supabase, and Vercel.
AGENDA:
03:53 — Investing Lessons from Google, Doordash and Facebook
05:32 — Why Mark Zuckerberg is the Greatest Distribution Genius Alive
07:23 — Why Every Company Today Needs to be Multi-Product
09:16 — Negative Gross Margins: Are the Best Companies Actually Built on "Shit" Economics?
10:50 — The SaaS Apocalypse: Is the Entire Sector Going to Zero?
12:15 — The 8 Moats of Enduring Software Companies: How to Analyse Companies
14:50 — Why Brand is No Longer a Strong Moat (And What Replaced It)
16:13 — Salesforce vs. Atlassian: Which Systems of Record are Dying?
18:13 — Outcome-Based Pricing: Is This the Total Death of Seat Pricing?
20:16 — The Bolt-On AI Trap: Why Rebuilding Your Entire UX is Non-Negotiable
23:44 — Are the Outcome Sizes of Vertical SaaS Large Enough for VC Today?
28:16 — The Zombie Cohort: What Happens to Private Companies with High Valuations?
32:44 — Is "King Making" Complete Bullshit?
34:21 — Durability Over Margins: What Really Matters in a 100x Growth World
35:36 — The Non-Consumption Miracle: Why Granola and Gamma are Crushing It
38:50 — The PayPal Rule: Can You Raise Prices 5 Times in 3 Years?
42:47 — My Biggest Miss: How I Misread the Shopify Billion-Dollar Mark
45:18 — The Courage to Bet: Why Instacart is the Best VC Deal Ever
46:33 — Seed vs. Growth Pricing: When Does Price Actually Destroy Returns?
50:53 — Does "Proprietary Founder Access" Even Exist?
54:33 — Double Down or Diversify? The Truth About Fund Reserves
59:44 — The Vanta Anti-Portfolio: A Mistake I'll Never Forget
01:01:21 — When to Sell: The "Sell a Third, Hold a Third, Trade a Third" Rule
01:04:12 — Why Remote Early-Stage Companies are Dying
01:07:33 — Why Mid-Level Partners are Fleeing Mega Funds
01:09:47 — The Best CEO Superpowers: Larry, Mark, Jack, and Tony
01:12:33 — The Next 10 Years: Why Dropouts are "AI Maxing" the World
Square: Jim McKelvey. He Lost a $2,000 Sale, Then Built a $10 Billion Company
Most entrepreneurs think the hardest part of building a company is the product.
For Jim McKelvey — co-founder of Square — the hardest part was the system around the product.
Because Square wasn’t just competing with other startups …
It was competing with regulations, middlemen, entrenched networks, and monopolies designed to keep outsiders out.
In this episode, Jim shares the mindset and tactics that helped Square go from a tiny card reader that processed credit card payments … to a company—now known as Block— that generates over $10 billion in gross profit.
What You’ll Learn:
Why the market is often “locked” on purpose
How a simple hack can solve a seemingly complex problem
How candor can sway investors more than confidence
How Square survived by building something Amazon couldn’t copy
Timestamps:
00:12:26 – Engineering and art: Balancing an IBM job with glassblowing
00:15:46 – The family trauma that rewired Jim
00:36:26 – Losing a $2,000 sale — the moment Square was born
00:43:06 – Breaking into the credit card club: “We were violating 17 rules”
00:48:31 – The headphone jack hack that sidestepped Apple’s control
00:58:03 – The “140 reasons we might fail” pitch that won over investors
01:06:26 – The taxi ride that convinced Jim he had product-market fit
01:09:28 – Amazon attacks, and why copying doesn’t always work
01:13:18 – The founder’s job after success: choosing hard problems
***
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This episode was produced by Alex Cheng with music composed by Ramtin Arablouei. It was edited by Neva Grant with research help from Katherine Sypher. Our engineers were Patrick Murray and Robert Rodriguez.
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Gokul Rajaram - Lessons from Investing in 700 Companies - [Invest Like the Best, EP.456]
My guest today is Gokul Rajaram, Founding Partner at Marathon Management. Gokul is one of the most prolific product builders and investors of the last twenty years. He has built the core ad and product businesses at Google, Facebook, Square, and DoorDash, working at each company during its most formative scaling periods.
Alongside his operating career, Gokul has invested in more than 700 companies, giving him an unusually broad view into how products are built and scaled.
This conversation is about how product building is changing with AI. We discuss the one thing Gokul believes is truly future-proof in AI, why companies like Zendesk and Slack are more exposed than Salesforce or NetSuite, and the only sources of defensibility.
We also talk about everything Gokul has learned from helping build the most important ads businesses, including the only three ways an ad business can make money, how those constraints shape product decisions, and what consumer behavior change threatens every major platform.
Gokul shares lessons from working closely with Larry and Sergey, Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Dorsey, and Tony Xu.
For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page here.
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Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant (https://thepodcastconsultant.com).
Timestamps
(00:00:00) Welcome to Invest Like The Best
(00:00:53) Meet Gokul Rajaram
(00:02:05) How Product Development is Changing with AI
(00:07:32) Philosophy of Product Management
(00:10:19) What is Future-Proof in AI Era
(00:11:25) Building AI Applications Today
(00:15:03) Systems of Record vs Agent Companies
(00:16:58) Which Legacy Software Companies Are Most Exposed
(00:22:15) Stickiness in the AI Era
(00:24:10) Learning from Larry Page and Sergey Brin
(00:28:15) Learning from Mark Zuckerberg
(00:31:31) Learning from Jack Dorsey
(00:35:40) The Art of Great Product Design
(00:36:49) Weekly CEO Communication
(00:40:27) Three Ways to Succeed in Advertising
(00:44:27) What Should Scare Major Ad Platforms
(00:48:24) North Star Metrics
(00:50:09) Self-Serve Products
(00:54:50) Careers in the AI Era
(00:59:03) Stay Long Enough to Have Impact
(01:00:10) Founder Authenticity and Superpowers
(01:02:21) Navigating the Idea Maze
(01:03:42) Role of Boards
(01:06:31) Excellence in Customer Acquisition
(01:09:11) The Kindest Thing
Square's product chief on the death of the penny and the future of money
Today, I’m talking with Willem Avé, who’s the head of product at Square. You know Square — it was started by billionaire Jack Dorsey of Twitter fame more than 15 years ago, and it got big on the back of that little magnetic reader that once plugged into the headphone jack of the iPhone and let small businesses accept credit cards.
Nowadays, of course, Square is more than a credit card reader, and sadly, the headphone jack is ancient history. The company itself is now part of parent organization called Block, which is made up of a very interesting mix of financial services like Afterpay, Cash App, and, yes, the streaming music service Tidal. So Willem and I really got into where Square is headed next with AI and automation, why he’s excited about crypto and Bitcoin specifically, and even what it means that the US is discontinuing the penny.
Links:
Square’s public roadmap | Square
Jack Dorsey is reorganizing the entirety of Block | Fortune
How Block turned Square into a financial services giant | Fast Company
Block to roll out bitcoin payments on Square | Square
Square buys $170 million worth of bitcoin | CNBC
Square, Jack Dorsey’s payments company, changes its name to Block | NYT
The penny dies at 232 | NYT
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Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.
Decoder is produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and edited by Ursa Wright. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane.
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Proud pod parents (Friends)
Richard Moot joins us to discuss Changelog helping Square launch a developer pod and the excitement around MCP (Model Context Protocol) servers. What might it foretell about the future of human/robot relations?
Join the discussion
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Featuring:
Richard Moot – Website, GitHub, LinkedIn, X
Jerod Santo – Website, GitHub, LinkedIn, Mastodon, X
Adam Stacoviak – Website, GitHub, LinkedIn, Mastodon, X
Show Notes:
The Square Developer Podcast
Rhea Lana on Scaling a Pop-Up Business to 120 Franchises
The Bottom Line
Square Developer on YouTube
Fireside Chat with Jack Dorsey & Adam Stacoviak
Something missing or broken? PRs welcome!
Gokul Rajaram | Lessons from Zuck, Jack Dorsey, Sergey Brin + Defining your ICP, Evolution of Seed Investing
Gokul Rajaram is an early stage technology investor. As a product leader, operator and board member, he’s helped build seven generational technology companies, including Alphabet, Block, Coinbase, DoorDash, Meta, Pinterest, and The Trade Desk.
We talk about lessons learned from Zuck, Sergey Brin, and Jack Dorsey, when big acquisitions can go well, how to define your ICP, why you should always size markets bottoms-up, having a fast response time, how seed investing has changed since 2007, and Gokul’s hot takes on titles at a startup.
Building an enterprise-ready SaaS app? WorkOS has got you covered with easy-to-integrate APIs for SAML, SCIM, and more. Start now at https://bit.ly/WorkOS-Turpentine-Network.
Timestamps:
(00:00) Intro
(02:14) Common thread of success between the founders of Google, DoorDash, Facebook, and Square
(05:50) Gokul’s first job in Silicon Valley
(07:46) How Serendipity led to PMing Adsense, one of Google’s biggest products
(12:20) Lesson from Sergey Brin on reducing friction before a products magic moment
(18:50) How Zuck used founder mode to beat Google Plus in 2011
(22:51) When big acquisitions can go well
(24:47) How Gokul switches from startup helper to public company board member
(28:09) The evolution of Seed investing since 2007
(33:27) How to have a fast response time
(37:40) Lessons from Jack Dorsey always selling
(39:54) How to define your ICP
(42:40) Using bottoms-up to size a market
(44:05) Why Director and VP titles are bad for startups
Referenced:
Who’s Got the Monkey? https://hbr.org/1999/11/management-time-whos-got-the-monkey
Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity https://www.amazon.com/Getting-Things-Done-Stress-Free-Productivity/dp/0142000280
How to Size a Market in 30 Minutes https://blog.blingcap.com/2023/02/13/How-to-Size-a-Market/
Follow Gokul:
Twitter: https://x.com/gokulr
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gokulrajaram1
Follow Turner:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/turnernovak
Subscribe to my newsletter to get every episode + the transcript in your inbox every week: https://www.thespl.it/
#193 Former CEO Nextdoor, Sarah Friar: Four Circles
Guest: Sarah Friar, former CEO of Nextdoor
Sarah Friar has worked with some of the top leaders in Silicon Valley, including Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff, Walmart CEO Doug McMillon, Block CEO Jack Dorsey, and most recently Nextdoor founder Nirav Tolia, who just replaced her as CEO in May. And one of the things that sets top performers apart from the rest, she argues, is their compassion and their responsiveness. When her former EA’s husband was diagnosed with cancer, Sarah texted Benioff — who she had just left behind to work at Square — for help. Within seconds, she recalls, he arranged an appointment at UCSF. “That is an amazing moment of compassion,” she says, “where he did not need to take that time.”
In this episode, Sarah and Joubin discuss public markets vs. VC, George Floyd, working with the board, singular focus, Goldman Sachs, being in “flow,” the freedom of not getting the thing you want, Walmart, Steph Curry, Graham Smith, Charlie Rose and Donald Trump, ugly babies, Elon Musk, Ladies Who Lunch, CNBC, commuting from home, white noise, “frequent Friars,” @TechEmails on Twitter, and the “zone of gratefulness.”
Chapters:
(02:04) - Why Sarah left Nextdoor
(08:18) - The stock market and success
(10:21) - Going through hell
(14:48) - Life is not an A/B test
(16:09) - Multiple tours of duty
(19:21) - Ikigai
(22:02) - Perfectionism and drive
(25:54) - Sarah’s next operating role
(28:35) - Big transitions
(30:35) - Personal burn rate
(35:34) - “Are people gonna take my call?”
(38:40) - Leaving Salesforce for Square
(41:27) - Loyalty
(45:33) - Leaving the right way
(47:44) - Square and Swiss cheese companies
(50:03) - Growth companies
(52:38) - Apolitical workplaces
(53:42) - Leaving Square
(55:38) - Loneliness
(57:18) - Daily routines
(01:05:03) - Working on weekends
(01:08:30) - Hyper-responsiveness
(01:11:47) - Resumé virtues and eulogy virtues
(01:15:33) - What “grit” means to Sarah
Links:
Connect with SarahTwitter
LinkedIn
Connect with JoubinTwitter
LinkedIn
Email: grit@kleinerperkins.com
Learn more about Kleiner Perkins
This episode was edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm
AI Innovations Reshaping Commerce: Perspectives from Deeksha Chugh at Square
In this episode, we explore the disruptive potential of AI in revolutionizing commerce, discussing with Deeksha Chugh of Square how artificial intelligence is transforming sales, marketing, and customer experiences.
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How AI can help small businesses
AI tools are helping small business owners manage their businesses, so they can stay focused on the aspects of their business they love to do. This week on No Priors, Sarah and Elad are joined by Alyssa Henry, an executive at some of the most impactful companies from Microsoft to Amazon. Most recently she was the CEO of Square. She led Square’s team as they were very early adopters of a consumer-facing product that used GPT-2 and have continued to incorporate AI into their offerings. On today’s episode, they talk about the whitespace within e-commerce for AI and lessons from the prior generation of infrastructure.
Alyssa recently retired from being longtime CEO of Square, within Block. Before that she was a vice president of AWS running, amongst other things, the storage products, or the digital storage bucket for the world. And before AWS, she ran order management software at Amazon Retail and started her tech career at Microsoft. She remains on the boards of Intel, Confluent and was previously on the board of Unity.
Sign up for new podcasts every week. Email feedback to show@no-priors.com
Follow us on Twitter: @NoPriorsPod | @Saranormous | @EladGil | @alyssahhenry
Show Notes:
(0:00) Alyssa’s experience and career trajectory
(2:30) Transition from engineer to manager
(4:09) AI implementation at Square
(7:46) Small business AI applications
(12:14) Latent demand for content generation
(15:04) The origin story of Square’s GPT-2 products
(16:54) Consolidating ecommerce workflows
(18:46) How will AI change cloud services
(23:07) Hyperscaler foundation models and the AI land grab
(25:16) Enterprise demand for open source models
(28:08) Startups in the AI semiconductor space
(31:02) Scale up architectures vs scaling out
(34:32) What’s next for Alyssa
(36:08) What Elad and Sarah are excited about in 2024
The Economy is Fine?, VC Funding Declines, Non-Negotiable Expectations
Square co-founder and Invisibly founder Jim McKelvey joins Ranjan Roy and Alex Kantrowitz for our weekly news recap show. We cover: 1) The state of the economy and markets 2) Fears of a credit crunch, or is it a credit tightening? 3) The state of the commercial real estate market 4) How commercial real estate's struggles impact small and regional banks 5) The decline in VC funding in Q1 6) What is 'dry powder' anyway? 7) Reflecting on Uber again 8) What is AutoGPT? 9) Regulating AI 10) Sell your data for money? 11) The Square reader's founding story 12) "Non-negotiable" expectations.
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Fireside chat with Jack Dorsey ♻️ (Interview)
This week we’re re-broadcasting a very special episode of Founders Talk. Adam was invited by our friends at Square to host a fireside chat with Jack Dorsey as the featured finale of their annual developer conference called Square Unboxed. Jack is one of the most prolific CEOs out there. He’s a hacker turned CEO, often working at the very edge of what’s to come. He’s focused on what the future has to offer and an innovator at scale. He’s also a Bitcoin maximalist and has positioned himself and Block long on Bitcoin.
Join the discussion
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Featuring:
Jack Dorsey – Website, GitHub, X
Adam Stacoviak – Website, GitHub, LinkedIn, Mastodon, X
Show Notes:
Block.xyz
Square Unboxed 2022
Square Unboxed 2022’s replay on YouTube
Square Unboxed 2022’s recap blog post
Jack Dorsey on Lex Fridman (#91)
Something missing or broken? PRs welcome!
Gokul Rajaram on designing your product development process, when and how to hire your first PM, a playbook for hiring leaders, getting ahead in you career, how to get started angel investing, more
Gokul Rajaram serves on the executive team at DoorDash, where he leads the Caviar product line. Previously he worked at Square, where he was also on the executive team and led a number of key product lines, and as a product director at Facebook, where he helped the company transition its advertising business to become mobile-first. Earlier in his career, Gokul was a product director for Google AdSense, where he helped launch the product and grow it into a substantial portion of Google’s business.
Gokul also serves on the boards of Coinbase, Pinterest, and The Trade Desk and is a prolific angel investor, having invested in companies like Airtable, Khatabook, and 100+ more.
In this episode, you will learn:
1. How to navigate your next career
- What should you focus on in order to improve your optionality?
- What should you consider as you look for your next career adventure?
- Why join winners in a space?
- Why should people entering the workforce join mid-stage companies?
- Why there are many paths to success.
2. How to build a product development process at early-stage companies
- What does the best product development process typically look like at different company stages?
- What are some common pitfalls when building these processes?
3. Hiring PMs
- When should you hire your first PM? What should you look for?
- When should you wait longer to hire a PM?
- What’s the number one secret for hiring a product leader, regardless of industry?
- How much time should you allocate for hiring as a founder?
- How might job titles impact your company’s work culture?
4. How to start angel investing
- How did Gokul start investing in startups? What would he have done differently?
- What does he look for in a startup pitch?
- How much time should you spend as a part-time investor?
- How do you find deals as a new investor?
Where to find Gokul:
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/gokulr
References:
- Gokul’s current favorite app, Coinbase Wallet: https://www.coinbase.com/wallet
- Favorite book, Playing to Win: How Strategy Really Works: https://rogerlmartin.com/lets-read/playing-to-win
- TED talk: TEDxConcordia - Lenny Rachitsky - Losing Serendipity
—
Thank you to our sponsors for making this episode possible:
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CMO Square, Lauren Weinberg: Self-made boss
As the CMO for Square, Lauren Weinberg spends a lot of her time talking to new and inexperienced small business owners — and she knows that each of them has wisdom that the others could benefit from. So, Lauren and her former colleague Jackie Reses wrote a book pooling all that wisdom into one place, Self-Made Boss: Advice, Hacks, and Lessons From Small Business Owners
In this episode, Lauren and Joubin discuss why Lauren never leaves home without sneakers post-9/11; how she maintains discipline in her schedule, and how her priorities have changed over the years; how Lauren overcame three back-to-back challenges in her personal life; why she took a job at Square — after initially turning them down; and the importance of competition for any business.
In this episode, we cover:
Weekend date nights and the best restaurants in New York City (10:04)
How Lauren creates her own time and recharges (15:15)
Moving to California to work at Yahoo, and finding a new community (19:32)
“The worst year of my life” and going into “survival mode” (22:52)
The difference between Square and its newly re-christened parent company, Block (30:22)
Why our culture is galvanized by small business stories (36:05)
What inspired Lauren and Jackie to write “Self-Made Boss,” and the surprising parts of publishing a book (39:52)
Why Lauren includes sad or funny personal stories in every marketing email (42:26)
Square’s secret superpower in the company’s early days (49:27)
The planning “manifesto” Lauren sent to Square’s executive team shortly after joining (53:31)
How Square “earns the right” to show up for social causes (56:50)
Links:
Connect with LaurenTwitter
LinkedIn
Connect with JoubinTwitter
LinkedIn
Email: grit@kleinerperkins.com
Learn more about Kleiner Perkins
This episode was edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm
What's Next For Our Crazy Economy — With Square Co-Founder Jim McKelvey
Jim McKelvey is the co-founder of Square, chair of the St. Louis Fed, and founder of Invisibly. He joins Big Technology Podcast to discuss whether the Fed should still hike interest rates given the markets' slowdown and the conflict in Ukraine. Stay tuned for a discussion of how Jim tolerates risk, why he's not building his new startup on the blockchain (aka: Web3), and a preview of our SXSW featured session: The Future of The Data Economy: Putting People First, taking place March 11 in Austin.
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Sarah Friar - Building the Local Graph - [Invest Like the Best, EP. 249]
My guest today is Sarah Friar, the CEO of Nextdoor, which connects people in local neighborhoods together. Sarah’s CV sparkles with impressive achievements at interesting businesses, and we spend a lot of time in this conversation thinking through what excellence looks like as a CEO, CFO, equity analyst, and board member. The rest of our discussion is focused on Nextdoor and how the soon-to-be public business is fostering connections between people and businesses in their local areas.
I do this podcast so I get to meet and learn from people like Sarah. I could have talked to her for hours. I hope you enjoy this great conversation with Sarah Friar as much as I did.
For the full show notes, transcript, and links to the best content to learn more, check out the episode page here.
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Invest Like the Best is a property of Colossus, LLC. For more episodes of Invest Like the Best, visit joincolossus.com/episodes.
Past guests include Tobi Lutke, Kevin Systrom, Mike Krieger, John Collison, Kat Cole, Marc Andreessen, Matthew Ball, Bill Gurley, Anu Hariharan, Ben Thompson, and many more.
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Follow us on Twitter: @patrick_oshag | @JoinColossus
Show Notes
[00:03:03] - [First question] - What makes an excellent equity analyst
[00:05:51] - Things Sarah does differently as an operator because she was an investor
[00:08:29] - Key factors that make a great CFO
[00:09:31] - The role of the CFO in regards to capital allocation as a company grows
[00:11:50] - What convinced her to join Salesforce and Square
[00:14:45] - The initial spark and appeal that led her to join Nextdoor
[00:17:35] - Existing problems with ‘community’ and how they approach fixing them
[00:21:36] - Interesting and compelling data points about in-person interactions
[00:23:54] - Network density as a driving factor of product quality
[00:26:43] - What gives Nextdoor a unique angle against some of its existing competitors
[00:28:51] - Thoughts on platform leakage and user retention
[00:30:57] - Successful strategies for deploying Nextdoor in a new country
[00:35:32] - Having a feed and trying to avoid creating echo chambers
[00:37:04] - Some of the biggest mistakes they’ve made while trying to grow
[00:38:49] - Options for a business model and thoughts on advertising
[00:43:25] - The importance of scale, advertising, and their relationship dynamic
[00:45:55] - Ways she’s learned to effectively steer the businesses strategy
[00:49:48] - Why she doesn’t like titles
[00:51:07] - Key levers that will allow Nextdoor to succeed in the future
[00:53:35] - How advertisers evaluate platforms like Nextdoor compared to Google or Facebook
[00:57:19] - What a successful board member looks like and how she’s learned to be one
[00:59:34] - Leading with transparency and empathy
[01:02:00] - An overview of what Ladies Who Launch is and what they do
[01:03:57] - Way to educate our children about finance and encourage financial literacy
[01:07:51] - Making your platforms welcoming and guiding users away from conflict
[01:10:30] - The kindest thing anyone has ever done for her
SaaStr 478: How to Move Upmarket and Serve Multiple Customer Segments at the Same Time with Square's Global Head of Sales, Ashley Grech
Over the last decade, Square has introduced a variety of new hardware, software, and financial services offerings targeted at businesses of all sizes -- and yet, many still think of Square as only serving farmer markets and local coffee shops. In this session, you'll hear from Square's Global Head of Sales, Ashley Grech, on the challenges and learnings of Square's work to move upmarket and serve multiple customer segments at once.
Video + show notes: https://www.saastr.com/moving-upmarket-and-serving-multiple-segments-with-square-global-head-of-sales-saastr-podcast-478-and-video/
The Empathy Flywheel, w/Nextdoor CEO Sarah Friar
A social network that limits your network? Yes. Meet Nextdoor, a hyperlocal social network that’s all about who you really are and where you really live. Although it goes against everything that we've come to expect from social networks, Nextdoor’s secret to scale lies in real personal connections based on empathy and kindness. And this is what Nextdoor CEO Sarah Friar knows: No, these connections don’t scale as fast – but they tend to be stronger. And they can be the flywheel that drives you to scale.
Read a transcript of this episode at https://mastersofscale.com
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Pivot Schooled #2: The New Generation of Innovators, with Nextdoor CEO Sarah Friar and investor Rana Yared
In this audio version of the second episode of our live video series Pivot Schooled, Kara Swisher and Scott Galloway talk about the future of innovation in the US and worldwide. They interview Nextdoor CEO Sarah Friar and Balderton Capital general partner Rana Yared, answer questions from the audience, and make predictions. Plus: A prediction from Silicon Valley actor Suzanne Cryer, and why TikTok isn't selling to anybody.
Get your tickets for the next Pivot Schooled, "The Big Four," at PivotSchooled.com.
Get your Pivot Schooled hats, mugs, shirts and more at PivotSchooled.com/Shop.
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Exploitation Economy
Scott discusses how the Tech Giants will see a snapback in their US advertising revenue, as well as how the disruption to higher education has already begun and why universities need to rethink their plans. Scott also brings on Jim McKelvey, the co-founder of Square, to hear his ideas around innovation, the payments sphere, and advice to entrepreneurs. McKelvey is also the author of “The Innovation Stack: Building an Unbeatable Business One Crazy Idea at a Time.”
This week’s Office Hours: Palantir’s potential IPO, what to expect when impact investing, and how to build your personal brand.
Algebra of Happiness has Scott wondering when the US moved from an innovation economy to an exploitation economy.
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Machine Learning Commerce at Square with Marsal Gavalda - #384
Today we’re joined by Marsal Gavalda, head of machine learning for the Commerce platform at Square, where he manages the development of machine learning for various tools and platforms, including marketing, appointments, and above all, risk management.
We explore how they manage their vast portfolio of projects, and how having an ML and technology focus at the outset of the company has contributed to their success, tips and best practices for internal democratization of ML, and much more.
#91 – Jack Dorsey: Square, Cryptocurrency, and Artificial Intelligence
Jack Dorsey is the co-founder and CEO of Twitter and the founder and CEO of Square.
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EPISODE LINKS:
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This conversation is part of the Artificial Intelligence podcast. If you would like to get more information about this podcast go to https://lexfridman.com/ai or connect with @lexfridman on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Medium, or YouTube where you can watch the video versions of these conversations. If you enjoy the podcast, please rate it 5 stars on Apple Podcasts, follow on Spotify, or support it on Patreon.
Here’s the outline of the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time.
OUTLINE:
00:00 – Introduction
02:48 – Engineering at scale
08:36 – Increasing access to the economy
13:09 – Machine learning at Square
15:18 – Future of the digital economy
17:17 – Cryptocurrency
25:31 – Artificial intelligence
27:49 – Her
29:12 – Exchange with Elon Musk about bots
32:05 – Concerns about artificial intelligence
35:40 – Andrew Yang
40:57 – Eating one meal a day
45:49 – Mortality
47:50 – Meaning of life
48:59 – Simulation
Rapid Response: "Neighbors are the frontline of support," w/Nextdoor's Sarah Friar
A neighborhood is more than just the people who share a common address, says Nextdoor CEO Sarah Friar. It’s every space that makes up your daily life. So Nextdoor is jumping in, rolling out new features like Help Maps and Groups so residents can connect and coordinate. Sarah says these products, some new, some in development pre-Covid, all help fulfill Nextdoor’s mission and help neighbors act as the frontline of support for one another.
Read a transcript of this episode: https://mastersofscale.com
Subscribe to the Masters of Scale weekly newsletter: https://mastersofscale.com/subscribe
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Interview w/ Carl Yates Perry (Part 2)
What is your mindset?
In this second part of our discussion with Carl Yates Perry, we're talking about healthy developer mindsets and how to identify a healthy team mindset and how your team mindset can affect your own growth.
Carl Yates Perry On The Web
Twitter
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🍵 Subscribe to the Tea Break Challenge
This is a daily challenge designed help you become more self-aware and be a better developer so you can have a positive impact on the people around you. Check it out and give it a try at https://www.teabreakchallenge.com/.
🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by: X-Team
X-Team is the most energizing community for remote developers. Work from anywhere for the world's leading brands and get supported to do more of what you love. If you're looking for your next career move, X-Team just might be what you're looking for.
Check them out at https://x-team.com/developertea and let them know you heard about it from the show.
Interview w/ Carl Yates Perry - Part 1
Carl Yates Perry leads Square's developer business but made a few tough career decisions to get there. In today's part 1 of this 2-part conversation with Carl Yates Perry, we're digging into his career trajectory and how he knew when it was time to make the next career change.
Carl Yates Perry On The Web
Twitter
🧡 Leave a Review
If you're enjoying the show and want to support the content head over to iTunes and leave a review! It helps other developers discover the show and keep us focused on what matters to you.
🍵 Subscribe to the Tea Break Challenge
This is a daily challenge designed help you become more self-aware and be a better developer so you can have a positive impact on the people around you. Check it out and give it a try at https://www.teabreakchallenge.com/.
🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by: Linode
Whether you’re working on a personal project or managing your enterprise’s infrastructure, Linode has the pricing, support, and scale you need to take your project to the next level. Get started on Linode today with a special $20 credit for listeners of Developer Tea.
Visit: linode.com/developertea and use promo code developertea2020
P.s. They're also hiring! Visit https://www.linode.com/careers to see what careers are available to you.
How Twitter needs to change | Jack Dorsey
Can Twitter be saved? In a wide-ranging conversation with TED's Chris Anderson and Whitney Pennington Rodgers, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey discusses the future of the platform -- acknowledging problems with harassment and moderation and proposing some fundamental changes that he hopes will encourage healthy, respectful conversations. "Are we actually delivering something that people value every single day?" Dorsey asks.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
#148 — Jack Dorsey
Sam Harris speaks with Jack Dorsey about how he manages his dual CEO roles at Square and Twitter, the role that Twitter plays in journalism, how it's different from other social media, what makes a conversation healthy, the logic by which Twitter suspends people, the argument for kicking Trump off the platform, Jack's practice of meditation, and other topics.
If the Making Sense podcast logo in your player is BLACK, you can SUBSCRIBE to gain access to all full-length episodes at samharris.org/subscribe.
Recode Decode: Square CFO Sarah Friar and Instacart CEO Apoorva Mehta
In these highlights from our September 2018 Code Commerce event, Recode's Jason Del Rey talks with two great guests: (00:57) First, he speaks to Square CFO Sarah Friar; (35:02) then, Jason interviews Instacart CEO Apoorva Mehta. You can catch up on Code Commerce and watch all the interviews from the event for free on Recode's YouTube page.
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20VC: How Great VCs Handle Themselves In An M&A Process, Why M&A Has Become The Primary Method of Exit & How The Best M&A Teams Operationalise Their Process with James Loftus, Corporate Development Lead @ Square
James Loftus is Corporate Development Lead @ Square where he has made multiple acquisitions and investments including the likes of acquiring OrderAhead and investing in Eventbrite. Prior to Square, James was responsible for strategy, business development and operations at STX Digital. Before that James was a Partner @ Andreessen Horowitz where he led strategic coverage for the firm's 45+ consumer-facing portfolio, advising them on everything from capital raising to partnerships to M&A. Prior to VC with a16z, James was VP & Head of Corporate Development @ Yahoo and also spent time in the M&A team at Google.
In Today's Episode You Will Learn:
1.) How James made his way into the world of corporate development and M&A with Andreessen and how that translated to leading Square's M&A efforts today?
2.) Why does James fundamentally disagree with the notion that "companies are bought and not sold"? What are the nuances behind the scenes that make this wrong?
3.) 514 VC backed exits in 2017, 499 were M&A, so how does James assess the M&A landscape at present? Is it now the undeniable leader in primary exit method? How does James believe we will see the M&A market evolve over the next year? Who are the new entrants? How will their entering effect both volume and pricing of M&A?
4.) How does James respond to Paul Graham's article titled "Don't Talk To Corp Dev"? How does James and Square think about operationalizing the tracking of companies in the landscape? When is the right time for startups to relationship build with corp dev? How does James most like to interact with VCs in the processes? What makes the best so good?
5.) Paul Graham has also called the process "grueling", would James agree with this? What does James do to minimise pain and friction both for startup and acquirer? How does product play a pivotal role in this "grueling" process? How should cor dev also be thinking about the emotional and sentimental elements of selling companies?
Items Mentioned In Today's Show:
James's Fave Book: A History Of The World In 10 1/2 Chapters
James's Most Recent Investment: Eventbrite
As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and James on Twitter here!
Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.
Leesa is the Warby Parker or TOMS shoes of the mattress industry. Leesa have done away with the terrible mattress showroom buying experience by creating a luxury premium foam mattress that is ordered completely online and ships for free to your doorstep. The 10-inch mattress comes in all sizes and is engineered with 3 unique foam layers for a universal, adaptive feel, including 2 inches of memory foam and 2 inches of a really cool latex foam called Avena, design to keep you cool. All Leesa mattresses are 100% US or UK made and for every 10 mattresses they sell, they donate one to a shelter. Go to Leesa.com to start the New Year with better nights sleep!
Zoom, fastest growing video and web conferencing service, providing one consistent enterprise experience that allows you to engage in an array of activities including video meetings and webinars, collaboration-enabled conference rooms, and persistent chat all in one easy platform. Plus, it is the easiest solution to manage, scale, and use, and has the most straightforward, affordable pricing. Don't take our word for it. Zoom is the top rated conferencing app across various user review sites including G2Crowd and Trust Radius. And you can sign up for a free account (not a trial!). Just visit Zoom.us.
